Grouplove Talks Growing Up and the Desire to Make Dark Music

Brianne Nemiroff

Grouplove‘s origin story and individual backgrounds are as varietal as their music. The five original members met at a remote artist colony on the Greek island of Crete. Two of the members (Christian Zucconi and Hannah Cooper) ran away from the struggles of city life in New York, another (Ryan Rabin) came by way of the Czech Republic after he finished an exchange program, a third (Andrew Wessen) was related to the founder of the colony, and the last (Sean Gadd) was escaping life at home in England. What could have ended up as a collection of artists escaping to a beach abroad, only to cross paths, has now become what fans know as the band Grouplove.

After they all returned from Crete, Christian and Hannah decided to have a reunion in Los Angeles, where they all quickly realized that they were destined to turn their temporary connection into a long-term commitment and form a group. From there, it wasn’t hard to decide on a name.

“When everyone came back to LA, a year later, when we’d be cruising around, we’d scream out the window ‘the group is back!’ The band was just called Group, but we had a lot of love for each other so it just evolved into Grouplove,” said Andrew Wessen.

As the band is from all over the world, they grew up with vastly different upbringings. Their musical influences range from Michael Jackson to Nirvana to the Pixies and they also love reggae and hip-hop, making their sound consistently unpredictable. But that’s what Wessen loves about the band:

“The differences [between us all] are important. That’s what makes our band special. If we were five kids who grew up on the same street, had the same haircut, wore the same clothes, it would be a more narrow-minded vision. But as we are such an eclectic group from all over the world, [of] different ages, you get a real mix of influences that we all have individually, which I think you can hear that on the records. [Our music] embodies a range of genres in the last six years. We’re a product of our upbringing. We all grew up loving different styles of music, sounds, genres. We all loved reggae, hip-hop, punk. You get that as a crossover and I think that’s the future of music. The best bands right now are the ones that are incorporating those differences the best way and in a cohesive way.”

Grouplove also prefers not to have a  traditional writing process. Everything they write and record seems to spawn from a new experience and from working in a new environment.

“As chaotic as that is, [our writing process varies] song by song. [For us] having no process is the best process. It’s like trying to create the same piece of art in the same way. You’re going to get the same result. It’s good to mix it up and change your surroundings. We never do a record in the same place,” said Wessen.

While it’s been almost a year since the release of their latest album, Spreading Rumours, Grouplove recently released a short form tour documentary featuring performances from their New York Seesaw Tour shows and released an EP of live recordings from the shows simultaneously, both titled I’m With You. They also released an original song, “Let Me In,” included on the soundtrack to the summer hit film, A Fault in Our Stars, which has generated over $200 million worldwide. The album is currently number four on the Billboard Soundtracks Chart and is the second-highest selling album of the year. As the film is known for being a tear-jerker, the members of Grouplove were excited to be a part of the soundtrack as they were hoping to release darker music. Instead, they were asked to write a song to score one of the two upbeat scenes in the film. According to Wessen:

“We saw the film and the [story] was so heavy. We wanted to write something depressing because we have that side of us and we never get to flex [that muscle]. [“Let Me In”] still has a nostalgic feel. It’s not all sunshine and rainbows. [But writing darker music] is definitely something we’re going to explore. We just didn’t really want to have a dramatic shift [in our music]. We have this great momentum and we didn’t want to 180 it. It [also] came down to what do we want to go out and play every night? That’s the stage we’re in now. Given the time, with our careers, I think we’re definitely going to explore those avenues. They’ve been explored by us as a band, but getting them down [on a record] is something we look forward to doing.”

Starting on August 10, Grouplove will be co-headlining the Honda Civic Tour with Portugal, The Man, featuring Tokyo Police Club. Wessen is particularly excited to play the Greek Theatre as Los Angeles has always been his home.

“Playing the Greek [Theatre] is a huge deal for me. Growing up in LA, it’s an iconic venue. It’s my college venue. The idea of playing there is really surreal and I’m super grateful. A lot of my family and friends are going to be there. Hopefully I don’t fuck up (he jokes). No, I’ll be fine. The tour is awesome.”

The show is bound to be one to remember as their performance style is quite boisterous.

“On stage, we’re like 15-year-olds in a garage. We’re fucking mental, [with our] mom banging on the door. That’s our lives. I love the shows where it feels like a runaway train. You’re barely on the break and you feel like you’re going to implode at any moment because there’s so much energy and thrashing. That’s going to happen at the Greek. We’re going to be a bunch of wild children who end up in daycare with the wrong nanny. We’re always stuck in these small spaces, tour buses, overcrowded rooms. When we’re on stage, it’s like a ticking time bomb. We blast pieces of us all over the place.”