Staying in my hometown
YOUNG Wonder’s Ian Ring and Rachel Koeman are still getting to know one another. “We were strangers when this all started,” says vocalist Koeman. “We had never met before we began making music together.”
Introduced through mutual acquaintances, the Cork duo have created a big splash in a short time. They wrote their first track, ‘Orange’, last October.
It has since clocked up some 100,000 ‘plays’ on sites such as Spotify and YouTube. Released without fanfare in Japan, their debut EP promptly soared to number four in the iTunes charts. They are taking it all in.
“It was surreal,” says producer and beat-master Ring. “You had Daft Punk, Disclosure and then us. You never expect something like that. It goes to show how the music industry has changed.”
With a blissful pop sound, the pair are often mistaken for Scandinavian (Sweden and Norway being spiritual home of happy/sad electro music). In fact, they are as quintessentially ‘Cork’ as an amble down the Mardyke. Ring, from Ballintemple, is an esteemed studio tinkerer and DJ; Koeman, from Watergrasshill, a well regarded singer.
“I’d sung when I was in college and was trying to get a project together,” she says. “Nothing was happening and I was becoming frustrated. To be honest, I simply wanted to get into the swing of things again. It was suggested that I work with Ian. He had the bones of a track and I sang over it. That was Orange, our first release.
Since then, things have happened extremely quickly. It has been a real thrill. We are still taking it all in.”
“Meeting Rachel was an experiment,” adds Ring. “I thought she had a unique voice — there was lots of character. We decided to try something different. You don’t find anyone else in Ireland doing this sound at the moment, that’s for sure. We collaborated and there was a creative chemistry from the start. We’ve done two EPs and now we are thinking towards an album. It is a very exciting time for us.”
The group’s first EP came out in a very short time period. “The sound was extremely experimental. We were finding our way. By the second one we had started to figure out what we were doing. After that it all took off.”
Young Wonder are a thoroughly modern success story. Fans have discovered their music through YouTube; to date their biggest cheerleaders have been music bloggers and websites such as Pitchfork.
Lately the buzz about the duo has crossed over into the real world. In January, they supported Mercury Music Prize winners Alt-J at London’s Shepherd’s Bush Empire, one of the biggest venues they have performed in to date.
“We weren’t nervous,” says Koeman. “It was enjoyable. Alt-J are one of our favourite bands. To be on the same bill was amazing. How we got the gig is that we share a booking agent. He worked out the whole thing for us to support them. It was fantastic.”
As you’d expect, they have strong opinions on the avenues by which people discover music nowadays. In particular they take issue with the assertion by Radiohead’s Thom Yorke that streaming sites such as Spotify offer a poor deal to emerging artists. Granted, they are never going to get rich from streaming. At this stage in their development, it is more important that they win new fans. “Spotify is an amazing platform for artists,” says Koeman. “It is free — so it means people can listen to our music. That is brilliant. If you can find a method of introducing the public to what you are doing, it means they will come to your shows. That is the most important thing.”
He continues: “The internet has been hugely important to us . It offers an easy way to distribute your music, independently, without major labels or paying huge PR companies. It is nice that we are able to do it ourselves.
The group can’t imagine ever leaving Cork. “You could say that places like LA or London have bigger scenes,” says Ring. “The way the industry is nowadays, however, it doesn’t matter where you are. You can still get your music to people. I’ve lived in Cork all my life. I can’t see that changing. It’s going well so far. Why would we want to move?”
In addition to the backing of Irish bloggers, they have started to receive attention overseas. They’ve headlined in Milan and been bigged up by the UK’s Clash magazine. As well as to playing the new Longitude festival in Dublin this weekend, they also play Latitude in Suffolk.
“It is amazing when you see some of the acts we are performing alongside,” says Ring, sounding a little wide eyed. “People such as [cult electro composer] Gold Panda. It really does hit home for you.”
They’ve had lots of interest from music labels, including several high profile independent houses. For now, however, Koeman and Ring are happy charting their own course.
“There have been tonnes of inquiries,” says Ring. “The thing is, we can do a lot of it ourselves. We appreciate the creative freedom to try what we want. And some of the people who approach us … what they want may not suit our vision. There’s a great deal to be said for trying it on your own.”
Their Longitude gig this Saturday will be their highest profile Irish performance to date. To mark the event they have planned a ‘special surprise’, though won’t be drawn on details.
“We hope people are going to like it,” says Koeman. “We’ve put a lot of thought into our set. I think it’s going to go down well.”
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