What is it Like To Be Baywaves?

That's the same as asking what does it feel like to be a funky guitar twang dream space pop theme? The best way is to ask Madrid's mighty talented Baywaves themselves. They've just released a new record on Foehn Records called Only For Uz and so we were lucky enough to meet up with Spanish foursome...

Baywaves it's great to see you. Tell us a bit about the band...
We are four young lads with world domination plans. Marco and David met in school and played music for a long time. After releasing our first demos as Baywaves we met Carlos and Fran, based in Madrid, where we all live now.

The sound in one sentence?
Pop songs that melt shiny melodies and marine reverb vibes with spacey synths and naughty bass lines.

What makes Madrid a good place for Indie music these days?
I guess that bands like Hinds or Parrots have opened the way for the rest of young bands. The rest of the world is suddenly looking to Spain now for new music. It's really cool because the quality of the new bands is really better now than it used to be and there's a new wave of good young musicians doing their thing. You realize there's a something great going on here when King Cayman and John Grvy released their new songs the same day and both were really great being so different one from the other. It's exciting to think this is happening near us.

"We think nowadays is quite easy to have instant updates on anyone you are interested"

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Could we say you're the Spanish Tame Impala?
We don't think any band is the whereverish version of another band. Coming from Spain, historically the bands were always treated by media as the Spanish version of any UK hype, so we fight against being the local incarnation of a success because we feel it's not the way to treat new music.

How you follow music and the people and bands which have inspired you?
We think nowadays is quite easy to have instant updates on anyone you are interested in. You open up Facebook and see the new album by King Gizzard, you open up Instagram and you see a drawing by Bjenny Montero, you open up Soundcloud and you have the latest EP by Alien Tango...it's quite easy to keep up to date when we're home, so it's quite frustrating when we are abroad and have no Internet. 

Finally a story which defines who you are?
I guess that a good example of the Baywaves Rock and Roll way of life is the first time we played in London. We flew early from Madrid and during that day, from around 8am to 10pm we sat down to have something to eat like 10 times: in the airport before leaving; once we got to Stansted; then in a KFC in London; in the venue; after the gig in a Falafel place near the place where we slept; then in the place where we slept and if I remember correctly, we also went out searching for an open grocery store to buy some chocolate. We spent more money in food than in flight tickets. 

For the feature on Baywaves follow here
​Steffen Armstrong