What are your names?

Aley Waterman, Romesh Thavanathan, Adam Hogan, Ashley Chalmers, Josh Ward

What is the bands name?

Galaa

How did you come up with the bands name?

Well the word “Gala” was our original name which is Aley’s favourite apple, and also connotes a fancy celebratory feeling, but then we changed it to set ourselves apart because many things are already called gala (including Salvidor Dali’s famous daughter).

What is your genre of music?

Electro dreampop with a bit of a dark/haunting edge.

Give us a little bio about you.

We are all from Newfoundland and met in St. John’s. The rest of the guys besides Aley and Ashley are from the band Hey Rosetta, and have spent years touring, recording, and performing with them. Aley currently lives in Toronto and is doing an MA in Creative Writing.

What made you go in to music?

Aley, the leader of the project, played piano from a young age and got into writing songs pretty young as well. A lot of the guys in the band went to music school and have always been obsessed. So many people in Newfoundland play music – it’s such a fun mode of collaboration and creative catharsis. A lot of bands occur that way in NL – through jams and everyone in a scene being into music.

Are you a signed?

No.

Your latest release is out ‘Ender’, tell us more about it.

Ender originated as this ¾ waltz-like piano-driven track that we quicky adjusted to give it the electronic feel we were going for. Lyrically it’s about how things endure. There’s a lyric that says “death is the feeling you get when you win” which speaks to how desire propels us forward and

What was the writing process like?

The songs usually occurred pretty easily or they didn’t at all – I write lyrics quickly and then go back and refine them. The only one that was written much later was BLOOM (which is on the forthcoming record). I write fiction and poetry too so sometimes I would swap one idea over to a different medium and see if it worked better there.

What was the recording process like?

Haha it was long but a great learning process. Most of it took place over the course of about a year – we did a big chunk in the spring (prepro) and then the summer, fall, and winter. Sometimes we would have a couple of weeks or a month off and then go back at it full throttle again. By the final spring we were working on it all the time, before I moved to Toronto. A lot of trial and error, a lot of tinkering with very small variations on keyboards and guitar pedals.

What is the message you want listeners to take from the single?

To embrace that you don’t always have control over what is temporary and what is permanent in your life and to try and enjoy things for what they are regardless.

Describe the single track in two words

Cloud party

Will we see a new EP or Album?

Yes! An album – early December. It’s called “The Speech.”

If so what can we expect from it?

About half slow trundling heavy experimental ballads, half upbeat etherial dark dreampop

Will it be released this year or next year?

This year

Do you have any shows or a tour in planning?

no

What else can we expect from you this year?

Music videos!

Do you have any collaborations coming up with any up coming artists?

no

Would you be up for collaborations if other musicians wanted one with you? and who would they have to contact?

Yes, depending on who it was! galaaband@gmail.com

Do you play any instruments?

Yes – keyboards of many varieties and piano, learning guitar slowly but surely. passable on bass and drums but only in a jam-like way.

Who are your influences?

Julia holter, st Vincent, hundred waters, wye oak, weyes blood, tiny hazard, Bjork, my friends, radiohead haha, caribou, Yo La Tengo, Portishead.

How do you get inspiration to write songs?

Usually stemming from ideas. I read a lot and the underpinnings of ideas that really reach me in books often transfer to writing because writing is a way of understanding.

Where do you see yourself now in 5 Years?

It’s hard to say! I would love to keep making this sort of music though – the process of recording this album opened us all up to the possibilities within the experimental electronic world.

When you’re not doing music, what do you do?

I (Aley) write a lot – mostly flash fiction and longform fiction. In the writing world in Toronto there are a lot of things like readings and launches that it’s good to go to so that takes up a lot of time and energy and is fun! I also work at Burdock, which is a great music venue brewery restaurant in Toronto. I also like making my friends dinner and reading.

What was the song you listened to most that influenced you to go more in to the music scene?

Hmm that’s tricky – I’d say a hugely influential song lyrically is Sawdust and Diamonds by Joanna Newsom

What’s the best advice you have ever been given?

Nothing is perfect – figure out when to let go of a project and release it into the world. Otherwise you’ll just be sitting on a million half finished things that no one will ever get to enjoy and that’s not fun!

What advice would you give to aspiring musicians not about the industry and just as an artist?

Trust your instincts – write something weird even if you don’t fully understand it yet. Creative intuition is a gift that can be squandered by rationality. Also read a lot and listen to a lot of other music, all the time.

What quote or saying do you always stick by?

Don’t kill the wonder.

Where in your hometown is a must go to visit?

Corner Brook, NL. Go to Marble Mountain and hike up the falls, it’s beautiful.

When you are at a gig, what are 5 things you cannot forget?

Water, whiskey, lip balm, set list, pen (in case I want to change the song order last minute).

Do you have social media accounts so your fans can follow you?Ya! InstagramTwitterFacebook