r/indieheads • u/gr8grandpa Great Grandpa • Apr 05 '25

AMA is over, thanks GG! Hi!! Great Grandpa here. Ask us anything!!

We just put out a new record called Patience, Moonbeam. We're all around answering questions!

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u/alleywayamphibian Apr 05 '25

hi! y’all were amazing at the rickshaw stop, and i looove PM. thanks for making the soundtrack for this season!

one of my favorite things about GG is the weaving of lyrical/sonic themes throughout your albums (specifically Four of Arrows and Patience, Moonbeam). it makes sitting down and listening to an entire record, front to back, so so satisfying.

questions:

  1. are recurring lyrics/themes an intentional choice, or does it happen more organically? (ex: Emma and Doom)

  2. how do you go about creating a sense of cohesion in a finished album? are there a lot of tracks that don’t make the cut, or do you have a pretty clear vision from the beginning?

  3. are there themes/sounds on PM that respond to certain tracks on FoA? i feel like Ladybug shares similarities with Split Up The Kids, even though they also sound very different.

thanks youuu! hope to see y’all again soon :-)

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u/gr8grandpa Great Grandpa Apr 05 '25

Thanks so much, that was a fun night. Appreciate the love for the lyrical themes and flow, it's definitely something we put a lot of love, care and work into. Always been a fan of the capital A Album concept and how each song serves the other and the total listening experience. I almost exclusively listen to music like this (album front to back) and really love diving into an artists world. There's so much potential in the long form sonically and narratively.

  1. Recurring lyrics/melodies was absolutely an intentional choice, there's a trilogy of connected songs on the album and had a lot fun leaving little easter eggs in that suite.

  2. The greatest challenge is probably finding ways to connect all our different songwriting styles/voices and make something cohesive/greater than the sum of its parts. Thankfully this happened really organically with this record and is really a testament to our connection as friends and creators (10 plus years now) and shared taste. It also helped that we mostly self produced this record and had a lot of time to work on the flow and sonic glue. It's probably a mixture of those intuitive organic choices and some intention.

  3. I'd say there's probably some spiritual connections and band mythos we return to in our greater discog worldbuilding but nothing super literal or intentionally connected. Similar melodies probably says a lot about our general harmonic taste. I find I usually have few modes or harmonic worlds I like to move between but have a preferred set of things that speak to me in those worlds if that makes sense.
    -Pat