KuleeAngee on experimentation, the joy of the dancefloor, and new EP 'Love & Affection' • Neu • DIY Magazine

Life for KuleeAngee all began when, after the pandemic, members Keshav - or Kesh - Kanabar and Duncan Grant found themselves queuing outside the infamous London LGBTQ+ club, Dalston Superstore. “We were with other people but they packed it in, so we went ‘out out’,” Duncan reflects. “I said to Kesh: ‘I want to start a band’. He said ‘who with?, and I said ‘with you!’, then we danced the night away.”

Hailing from Glasgow and Edinburgh, the pair already knew each other through session work, something they continue to balance alongside the band. As we speak, Duncan is on tour in Switzerland, performing for another artist, one far removed from KuleeAngee’s sonic world. “It’s more grungy and rocky than what we do, so I play up to it and shake my hair a little bit more,” he quips. “And no one knows I didn’t grow up listening to Slipknot.”

Despite the day job, the initial dancefloor connection they forged during that integral nightclub visit remains central to the pair’s DNA, with club culture deeply embedded in both how they write and how they think about music. “Being in a rave is one of the top five feelings in life,” explains Kesh. “It’s euphoric. That energy has always carried our music - that, mixed in with all our influences of more guitar-based, indie stuff.” “That sense of euphoria… it can be accessed in other ways, but on the dancefloor, you lose yourself in it and give yourself over to the moment. We’re trying to reach for that,” Duncan adds.

The duo point to some unexpected reference points too, from the communal spirit of Britpop, to more subtle nods to decades past. “Oasis,” Kesh confirms, when asked about guitar bands that have shaped his taste over the years, citing “the way it fits into the rave space, the togetherness of the music.” “There are also ‘60s and ‘70s influences that people may not notice. In the context of everything, you might hear the organ sound sampled from a Beatles track,” Duncan adds. “We’re looking to chase a feeling within our music, rather than a specific sound or genre.”

“We’re looking to chase a feeling within our music, rather than a specific sound or genre.”

— Duncan Grant

After much experimentation, their debut EP ‘Is It Awryt’ emerged gradually, the product of an expansive creative period rather than any fixed plan. “We’d written so many tunes and at some point we realised we should start releasing them. This EP and the next one” - Kesh nods to ‘Love & Affection’, out now - “are all within the same era, of us finding our sound and the things we like.”

“And figuring out how we work best,” Duncan adds. “I think the formula will keep changing. We’ve been writing in a different way recently than we did for the tunes that are now being released, which is cool and really interesting. It keeps the sparks flying in your brain.”

That spirit of exploration is matched by their fiercely hands-on approach to recording and production. “We love the process so we want to do it ourselves,” explains Kesh. “We love making tunes, so why wouldn’t we do it?”

“That’s how we’ve worked out how to do it,” Duncan adds, on this get-stuck-in attitude. “The music video for our latest single ‘Daisies’ captures a bit of that process, filming us in the studio. We put it together ourselves.” Kesh picks up: “Duncan penned the first line of the hook” - the haunting lyric “If I was pushing up daisies outside on the street / Would you cry for me?” - “over a really fast house beat originally. We slowed it down a bit and it became a more Gorillaz sounding thing. It suited it. Maybe one day you’ll hear the house version!” he laughs.

“It still has a groove at the heart of it,” Duncan adds, referring to both the EP’s lead single and, in extension, their wider ethos. “There are no lines in the sand for us in terms of genre, but at the moment, everything has a groove to it. That might not necessarily be the way forever. What unifies it is our tastes smashing together, and ending up sounding like they belong.”

‘Love & Affection’ is out now via underplay recordings.

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