Interview: Easy Life on Dublin, Jools Holland, and genre categorization

Easy Life is one of the most promising groups of the year. They have nearly a million monthly listeners on Spotify and a sound all their own. They’ve shown further artistic depth with a series of eye-catching music videos racking up millions of hits over the past two years. Arriving in Dublin only a few hours prior, I was lucky enough to sit down with the guys and catch up before the first show of their sold-out European tour.

Firstly, I was curious to know what headspace they were in. Vocalist Murray Matravers explains, “We literally just flew back from L.A., so we’re feeling jet-lagged as fuck. But of course, we’re feeling excited to start the tour.” Also chiming in, drummer Oliver Cassidy added, “Yeah this first show might give us a little kick in the ass. We’re gassed to be here.”

Remarking on the gorgeous weather, bassist Sam Hewitt noted, “We love Dublin. It’s special to us.”

Explaining why, Oliver added, “Well, I’m a proud Irishman. Maybe an Englishman now, but an Irishman at heart. It’s absolutely mad to sell out shows outside of the U.K.”

In the little free time the guys had to explore, they wandered on over to Temple Bar for a stroll and burrito. They were totally enjoying themselves, and it was quickly evident that Easy Life has great group chemistry.

Switching gears a bit, I wanted to know what it was like to perform on Jools Holland so early in the group’s career. Guitarist Lewis Berry, or Louie, shook his head saying, “It was like going to the toilet in front of millions of people. I was genuinely horrified and kind of excited,” He continued saying that, “Jools Holland himself was lovely and made us feel really good.” Murray commented saying that, “It was the most nervous we’ve all been still to this day. Terrifying. I don’t suppose we will ever be that nervous again.” It was clearly a proper step-up for the group, who, up to that point, had been playing relatively small shows.

The group hasn’t been at it very long, but they’re already performing at the highest caliber. What could be next? “The goal is to produce a killer first album. We are committed to the idea that our first album will be insane,” enthuses Sam. He admits, “That’s why is it’s taken a while.” In the meantime, the group tells me more new music is coming.

The group’s sound can be tough to describe, Louie even admits he has trouble describing Easy Life’s music. They fuse indie, hip-hop, soul, and countless other styles into a seamless blend, which Oliver calls ‘Hip-Pop.’ It begs the question, what do they think of genre categorization? Stepping up to answer, Sam claims, ‘It’s disappearing from modern music. So many different artists are finding their influences from all over. Everyones doing something interesting, and nobody’s disliking that. It also unites the whole music scene as one instead of categorizing everyone into separate boxes.’ Certainly, if there is one group that can unite the whole music scene it is Easy Life. They have the ambition and musical chops to back that mission.

Easy Life’s Spaceships mixtape is out now.