Chennai grunge act Null Friction emerge out of hiatus that lasted nearly two years with Be Calm & Bring Ice, the band’s planned second album which will be released this March. Null Friction’s debut album, Madras, was released in 2009 and following a music video, a tour and sporadic gig performances, the band went on a break as individual members of the trio pursued personal careers. Then, earlier this year, the band reformed for a performance at the recently concluded Chennai Global Music Festival.
Now, the band is prepping their sophomore release. Be Calm & Bring Ice will be produced by Ayan De who’s also worked with The Lightyears Explode on their debut EP (download here), Goddess Gagged and others. The band has also released a teaser for the album that you can check out at the end of this post.
We caught up with frontman Shreyans Jha and asked him about what the band’s been up to, and what people can expect from the new album.
NH7: What caused the band to go on hiatus? Was it easy to come back after that period and start making new music?
Shreyans: After high-school the three of us went to three different places to study. Luckily for us, we were just a (sometimes long) bus ride away from each other. Ansh was in Ottawa, Abhishek in Boston and I was in New York. Even during the hiatus we would often trek to each other’s cities to jam for a little bit. We even played a few gigs in New York and Ottawa. So we were never really musically out of touch with each other. Yes, I was slightly nervous because a lot of our influences had changed because of the various bands we played with while we were away from each other. But coming back together wasn’t as hard as I thought it would be. Ansh is still a solid drummer, Abhishek still writes some amazing baselines in spite of getting fat, and they can still tolerate me and my tantrums. So it still works.
NH7: What can people expect from the new album – in terms of sound, themes, et al?
S: While the last album was soaked in nostalgia, the new album is lyrically themed around very specific interactions, conversations, and moments in the last one year when we all were going through a lot of change: moving cities, girlfriends becoming ex-girlfriends and everything that comes with it. We’re not talking soppy love songs, and self-pity, we’re talking about really consequential moments when you know that whatever comes next is not going to be anything like whatever was before. Yea, something like that.
NH7: Is there a tour plan to support the album release? Details?
S: No there’s no tour planned, we’re all back in our respective cities. The idea was to focus all energies on writing a few really good songs and i think we’re happy with how it is sounding right now.
More from Null Friction as we hear it. Check out a teaser for Be Calm & Bring Ice below.
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