Meet... Friedberg

Leading UK female-four-piece Friedberg are heading in the right direction for success as they infuse a plethora of genres that intricate an experimental sound that's fun yet classy.

Photo Credit: Henry Gorse

From their debut single 'Boom' to their latest single 'Midi 8', Friedberg have taken the past years in their stride that has led to world-renowned festivals and catching the imagination of critics.

Whilst their debut EP 'Yeah Yeah Yeah Yeah Yeah Yeah Yeah Yeah' is just around the corner, Vibez caught up with frontman Anna about all things lockdown, the process of their latest project and what the future holds.

Emerging onto the scene in 2019. What has the life of music thrown at you and, has it been harder to continue your dream through COVID?

So many great things! I couldn't have wished for a better start with releasing our first two songs back in 2019. It's so nice to get such amazing feedback when you've worked so hard on something and for such a long time. Releasing those babies to the world was so scary but also wonderful to finally share them. Also, playing those tunes live for the first time was an amazing feeling. It has been such intense energy on stage with my bandmates from the start that it felt like we can take those songs to another level. Playing Reeperbahn and Eurosonic shortly after our first few gigs was like a dream. That was then obviously paused again, with lockdown number one and the cancellation of what would have been our first festival summer. So somehow, yes, it has been harder since it felt like the rug had been pulled out from under our feet, but I quickly tried to put my eyes and ears back on other things and suddenly found myself with lots of new time that I have been filling with more writing and recording on my own at home. We are ready now to fire out all the things we've been working on for the past year.

Recently, you released your latest single, ‘Lizzy' - what's the story behind this track and did it come out as you planned?

I wrote 'Lizzy' on the way home from a crazy party in South London. At that party, I found myself within the TS Eliot Poem “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock”, which we had discussed quite a lot back at University in Vienna. A friend of Cheryl (our bass player) was playing this dark and interesting live set at the party, and suddenly the lights started dancing, and some random lines of the poem started to fly around my head. And Michelangelo was there too - just leaning against the wall, deep in conversation with Cheryl and casually sipping on a Gin & Tonic. I think the feeling of that night translates quite well in the lyrics and, the sound of the song. We also made a quite trippy video for Lizzy. In preparation for that video, we first did some sliding warm-up exercises in my backyard and then hit the road to film all the bits in the streets of London. The hoverboarding skills we had learned at the party already, so that was the easy bit, haha.

When forming, where did the inspiration of 'Friedberg' come from and, how would you describe your sound to someone?

I remember that back at that time, I was listening to a lot of my all-time favourites': LCD Soundsystem, ESG and Courtney Barnett- what a great and wild combo! I've never thought about it, but maybe our sound is a bit of a mixture of those 3? Or as someone once put it: "A blend of post-punk, alt-rock doused in alluring pop sensibilities." I couldn't have said it any better!

Over the past two years, you've released a series of fuzzy, joyful singles but if you could name one, which one has been your favourite so far and why?

I can't really tell. I love each and one of them for a different reason. 'Pass Me On'

will always have a super special status though, since it was the very first

song we had ever written with Friedberg - that was back in LA a few years ago. We kept all the elements from the original demo that we had, recorded in a tiny Airbnb with shitty equipment in West Hollywood. I can still smell the Californian sun mixed with kale-smoothies when listening to the song.

On a personal note, being a four-piece female group, what has been the most challenging aspect of the music industry and, what advice would you give to your younger self?

I think the most challenging part for me has always been to believe in what I'm doing. I always felt that if my insecurities had become too big, it was easy for me to let myself be pushed around by other people and let them make decisions for me and in the end, I was never really happy. So I would tell my younger self to make up my mind first, know what you want, get stuff to a point where you are really happy with before playing songs too many people and get too many opinions.

The main talking point is your debut EP '‘Yeah Yeah Yeah Yeah Yeah Yeah Yeah Yeah'. How excited are you for this release and, what is the key story from the project?

Super excited to finally share a bigger piece of work with the world. The past few years have been such a journey. I've never been that happy with what has come out of my creative processes in my life before. In so many ways, this EP is an act of liberation to me - some songs in itself but the whole process, the bigger picture - by doing what I want to do for the first time in my life and release it into this world. That feels insane!

As you continue to reach high expectations and raise the bar of being one of the most exciting UK prospects, what has been the most influential thing you've learnt over the years?

Probably what I said before- getting more confident with what you're doing and trusting your gut feeling. That sounds so easy but can be hard at times.

With European festivals and tours across the world under your belt. What has life been like without live music and, how excited are you to get back out there?

It has been a bummer, of course, but on the other hand, I found time to finish stuff that had been lying around for ages. So, it had some nice aspects too, but now we are more than ready for the return of the new roaring 20s. Can't wait to go to gigs and play gigs and, everyone is going crazy!

Finally, with your debut EP in sight, what else do you have up your sleeve for this year and is there any secrets you could share?

We've got tons of new music in our sleeves - even beyond the EP! At this very moment, I'm working on a remix for our next single "Midi8", as I'm typing these lines, which is super exciting!