Julie Talk Early Influences And Their Debut Album
Julie have talked about their early steps as a band, their early influences and their relationship with the shoegaze tag they’ve been given in their first NME cover feature.
pre-order Julie’s ‘My Anti-Aircraft Friend’ here
The band talked about their early aims after forming during the Covid pandemic. “You know how Spotify has that ‘less than’ sign for songs that have less than 1,000 listens?” guitarist Keyan Pourzand asked. “We all just said: ‘Please let us have more than that.’”
Pourzan went on to talk about early influences – his parents emigrated to the States in the ’80s, his father fleeing the revolution in Iran. “[My parents] played some music like The Cure and Joy Division, but for the most part, I couldn’t tell you what was being played because it was in Arabic.”
Singer Alexandria Elizabeth also discussed their first steps as a live band. “We were extremely nervous,” Elizabeth recalled, adding that those fears faded once they got onstage: “We’d never had that kind of reaction. The crowd just started going crazy and didn’t stop. It was the first time I remember feeling really confident in my live performance.”
Julie have just released their debut album, My Anti-Aircraft Friend, to great acclaim, but Elizabeth remembered their early attempts at recording, “We sent our manager the four demos we were going to properly record for our first EP, and he was like ‘OK, cool.’ And then he later told us that he never sent them to our producer because they were so indecipherable.”
Pourzand also discussed the band’s relationship with the shoegaze tag they’ve been labelled with, “It’s cool because it’s helped us grow, but I think we’re getting a little sick and tired of it.”