“Endless is about self-reflection. Lyrically, its’ somewhat lecturous tone is directed at myself. The track is basically a chat between my present and past self. The different sections of the track are meant to reflect that.”
LUCIANBLOMKAMP returns with the second part of this “three-part-abum” *Sick Of What I Don’t Understand *album, which will be released on Good Manners Records on July 6. Accompanied by a a stunning video, directed by Freya Esders and with the two really charismatic actors Kristin Apollos and Louis Cooper, the new single “Endless” keeps preying on my mind. We talked to the talented musician about developing the composition to this track and self-reflection.
So the track Endless, which is such an awesome piece, is about self-reflection. It´s a chat between your present and past self. Can you tell us more about this? What specific topics is this chat about and what is your conclusion about the reflection?
In the past I found it really hard to live in the moment and placed way too much of my self-worth in my music. A musician and nothing else. The present tense version of me obviously has the foresight to know what’s important and what’s been taken for granted. It’s cliche and obvious but whatever. Although while it is a conversation between my present and past self, I think the present is more based around an idealised version of me. Where I’m literally at today is probably more of a mixture of the two. In that sense I guess there’s no solid conclusion because I often still feel like the previous self, caught up in my music. I guess now I’m just more self aware of those aspects of myself and try to stay on top of it.
“In the past I found it really hard to live in the moment and placed way too much of my self-worth in my music. A musician and nothing else. “
I love how the rhythm changes in it a lot and the whole track feels so unexpected on many parts. How did you develop the composition of the track?
The whole flow of the track birthed from this dork idea of having an arpeggio that runs through the entire track where the bpm and time signature move around it but the arp sonically sounds the same. While it doesn’t move around as much as it originally did, I think it gives off this sense of simultaneous confusion and familiarity. Hopefully at least.
We absolutely love the video as well – how did this collaboration with director Freya Esders come about and how did the concept of the visuals emerge – did you already have in mind what you wanted or Freya visualized your music?
I guess there were just a few mutual connections. Like I found out about her work through the amazing stuff she’d done with kllo, who have the same managers as me. It just made sense you know. It’s strange because I’m really not a visual person, so trying to express what I want to convey in a clip to someone can be really difficult. So despite giving her little to work with, she really managed to capture the core feeling and emotion I wanted to convey through the song itself. This kind of emotive crossover is so hard to find and I’m so thankful she was keen to get on board.
“Making music while in totally different headspaces played a huge part of making this album.”
*Sick Of What I Don’t Understand * is your new album, which will be released on Good Manners Records. What is your most personal or favourite track on it and why?
Such a cop out but I’m not sure I have a favourite track. Making music while in totally different headspaces played a huge part of making this album (hence the parts themselves). So picking a favourite really heavily depends on what headspace I’m in. I think that’s something that keeps music making so interesting though. Coming at writing from the same emotional perspective every time is a bit dull. I’d say some of my most personal tracks though are probably Crawling (pt.1), Endless (Pt. 2) and an unreleased track from Pt. 3 called ‘We’.
Music that inspires you?
Funnily enough I’ve been basing way more of what I do on pop music recently. I mean I’ve probably listened to ‘I Like Me Better’ by Lauv more than most things for the past few months. Plus I feel like I often listen and get inspired by artists who don’t really fall in line with the music I make. Like Drake for example. Don’t know why that’s the case, it’s just the case.
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images screenshot video
last image by Joshua Maxwell De Hoog
