Interview 60 Seconds With: Treetop Flyers

Taking their name from a Stephen Stills song and sporting the kind of vintage denim last seen in archive footage of the Woodstock festival, it’s fair to say London’s Treetop Flyers are unlikely to be an electro dubstep collective. We met up with the implausibly brilliantly named Sam Beer and Reid Morrison to discuss four part harmonies and adult diapers.

So, tell us a little bit about your music.
We play Country style music - not hardcore American country, but more of a West Coast seventies influence with a modern edge. We’re not copycat band, but we like that sort of vibe and bringing it to the 21st century. We write about things that we know and care about, stuff that happens to all of us but, lyrical content aside, we love melodies and harmonies, and somehow, by absolute chance, the right guys have got together in a room together. If you have four people singing, and you get it right, it’s a timeless sound.

And you’ve recently won the Glastonbury Emerging Band talent competition?
Yeah, since that happened everything has snowballed, which is really good. When you are in a band you want to be really busy. Give us a couple of days off we will be in black mood, saying things like ‘We’ve lost all the momentum’. We are playing the Other Stage, but we’ve actually got five gigs at Glastonbury so it’s going to be quite a busy weekend. A couple of months ago we were like ‘I wish we could play Glastonbury - can we get on the crap stage?’. I’ve never been, so for my first time to be with a band, it’s amazing, we could not be happier. I’m already constructing the nappy that I’m going to wear on stage.
We’ve also doing the Hop Form Festival with the Eagles, and we’ve got a show coming up with Bob Dylan. All these things that a few months ago we didn’t dream would ever happen. Every morning we get up and check our e-mail and crap ourselves. It’s like ‘We’ve got another gig!’

You also played the South by Southwest Festival in 2010. A lot of bands seemed to have Visa problems this year. Did you experience anything like that?
We had a nightmare. We had to go down to the US Embassy at six in the morning and queue for hours. The Embassy is quite an imposing place with a massive Eagle on the roof and loads of guys with guns, so you’ve got all these business types queuing up and dotted around you spot a guy with a beard and a massive hat and a guitar. You could tell every twentieth person was in a band, looking pale and nervously clutching an out of date passport.

Tell us about your new single.
It’s called ‘Things will Change’ and it’s released on Communion Records on the 23rd May. We’ve also got an old school launch party that night at the Borderline in London so it should be a good night. XFM and Lauren Laverne on 6Music have both been playing it on Radio, which is a really weird experience. I was washing my pants the other day when I heard it and I was like ‘this is strangely familiar!’.

Treetop Flyers new single ‘Things will Change’ is out now via Communion Records.