INTERVIEW | FLOYA: "We're just trying to make ourselves happy first"

After three years, FLOYA have finally dropped their debut album 'Yume.' I caught up with the German duo to chat about the creative journey that shaped the release.

Marv, Guitar (Left) Phil, Vocals (Right) — Credit Lennart Kortmann

Just over six months ago, amid the electrifying atmosphere of UK’s RADAR festival, I had the pleasure of catching up with Phil Bayer and Marv Wilder, the dynamic German duo behind FLOYA.

Back then, the duo were riding high with just a handful of tunes to their name. Fast forward to today and their debut album, Yume, finally sees the light of day, courtesy of Arising Empire.

Three years in the making, their long-awaited release is a vibrant and colourful collection of tracks seamlessly blending their rock and electronic influences across ten electrifying singles.

Despite still finding their footing in the new electronic world, it’s not about to slow them down. With Yume in their back pocket and guided by the simple mantra that there are no limits, FLOYA is only just getting started.

Before the release, I sat down with the two of them as they reminisced about their favourite moments and reflected on how every step of the album's creation has been a learning experience.

Lauren: Hey guys! Nice to see you again, how are you?

Phil: Excited! We’ve been working for three years on this.

L: I saw the albums arrived yesterday, how does it feel to have the physical copy?

Marv: Surreal!

Phil: I’ve already secured my copies!

L: I love the cover art! What was the inspiration behind it?

Marv: To be honest, nothing too specific. Phil knew that most of the lyrics had something to do with water and we always use water elements in the videos so that's why the idea with the wave came.

Phil: At some point when we were thinking about names for the album, I was like let's just call it fucking ‘Water’.

Honestly, I wasn't really part of the creation of [the cover] but when I look at it now I start to see a relationship with the artwork. Before we met and after I left my last band I was in a pretty shit situation personally and pretty lonely, you know, not coming out of my room. Now, when I look at that artwork it’s like the wave sweeping the room is like I'm back to doing music — I'm a happy person again!

L: Is there a sense of relief now it’s out there?

Phil: God, yes, absolutely. [Also] it's really hard to be taken seriously if you've got a back catalogue of five songs because people don't even know if you’ll exist in a year. Now, with an actual body of work behind us it's way easier to be noticed.

L: You both already have fans from your previous bands, is the intention to get noticed by a different kind of audience?

Marv: Absolutely but it's incredibly difficult.

Phil: It is about finding a new one but also about keeping the old ones because it's all about that fusion: the rock world with the electronic world. When I think about the first releases we had, a lot of people in charge of rock playlists told us back then that it [was] just too electronic, it's not rock enough, so they wouldn't feature us. And the same thing happened with the electronic playlists where the curators were like, yeah, that's too rock, it’s too heavy. So we just fell in between. 

L: That’s interesting because when we last spoke we touched on how music seemed to be moving away from strict genres. Do you worry that when people listen to Yume they might say something similar, like ‘it’s not rock enough’?

Marv: No, not worrying, but I get it. And I feel that’s most of the feedback we’ve had. There’s been no real negative feedback but in between the lines, you can tell some people are like, oh, the guitars aren’t as they used to be because they’re a bit more in the back and the song is more vocal-focused. But that's pop music. 

Phil: Early in my career I would worry. Now I'm just like we're trying to make ourselves happy first, and if we're happy with the product, we're happy with everybody who likes it. As soon as we start creating for the audience it’s not going to be authentic anymore.   

L: How was exploring that new territory and writing Yume compared to your previous projects?

Marv: Pretty different, especially because we run the project as a duo. The freedom is huge! There’s no other bassist, and there’s no second guitarist that needs to do something on stage, so when I’m writing now I think in a very different way to when I wrote songs for ALAZKA.

Phil: There's less of a mould that we have to fit in.

Marv: The other important thing is we wrote this album over three years with each song written individually. It wasn’t on purpose but at different phases, we were like ok we love this band we should try something like this, and take elements from that, and combine it with that. We had different inspirations for all these songs. I think in the end that's the cool thing about it!

L: Were there any particularly difficult ones to write?

Phil: Hell yes, which one do you want to talk about first? 

L: Take your pick! 

Marv: ‘Epiphany’…

Phil: Oh yes, damn it! So, I had about twenty choruses for ‘Epiphany’ until we figured something out. The one dude that saved me was Tom Byrne. I like “Dude, I can't write any choruses. Go express yourself in whatever way you wish”. He sent me something back within a day and what came back was the structure of the chorus, and how it was phrased. When I shared it with Marv, he said, that’s it! And I was like you’ve got to be kidding me. I've got twenty different choruses….so yeah, thanks to Tom Byrne for saving my arse on this one!

But I think ‘Lights Out’ was pretty difficult at first.

L: How come?

Phil: When we started this [project] it was about writing in a more positive manner and I wasn't used to that. The last album I did before Yume was Time, The Valuator’s How Fleeting, How Fragile and that album is dark as shit lyrically and that's how I used to work. So, when I tried to change my approach to lyric writing starting with ‘Lights Out’ it didn't work.

That more positive mindset, call it whatever you want, actually took fruition when we wrote ‘Wonders’ because that was the first time I succeeded in using my new way of lyric writing.

L: What was that new way? 

Phil: I have a habit of focusing on things I don't have, can't afford, all these things. But, with Marv’s uplifting playing and the ideas I had for the project dark lyrics didn’t anymore. Instead, I focused on the things that did work, focused on the things that I'm grateful for. So, practising gratitude was something that really helped me and I think that shows in almost every song.

Obviously, we’re not going to write all happy songs all the time because that's just one part of the spectrum. But for Yume I had so many positive emotions that I wanted to share.

L: It sounds almost therapeutic!

Phil: In a way it was self-therapy. It was hard as shit when I tried to think of happy lyrics because all that came out at first was cheesy, cringe-worthy lyrics and at some point I just made it work!

L: How about you Marv?

Marv: Tough to say. We just had so many drafts and each draft gave us something. It gets to the point where the song is getting close to being finished and it’s like now everything needs to be good. Most of the time Phil is adding the lyrics or vocals last…

Phil: Which is a mistake by the way! Not something I would advise anyone to do.

Marv: It’s just easier to do some guitar melodies and be like, ok yeah, here's something you can sing to [but] then it’s a struggle to work on the vocals and finish them which has nothing to do with Phil.

L: A bit of karaoke…

Phil: But that’s just it, for this album we were so used to writing instrumentals that you could listen to without vocals. But in the end, you have to write them. Not leaving any room for them to breathe or to fit into the mix was a challenge and we had to delete a lot of shit and rewrite the instrumentals to make the vocals work.

L: Do you think that's because you were focused on creating more electronic pieces?

Phil: That's a factor for sure. But I think in the end […] I just really enjoy playing my synth or my midi keyboard and occasionally picking up a guitar when there’s no expectation to it. In a live scenario, I’m a singer, that’s my instrument so when we write I get to just pick up whatever’s fun to me! As soon as I think about writing vocals and using my voice it gets a little bit more serious and if I'm not careful that can take the fun away pretty quick. 

Right now, whenever we have something new to add to the library it's like ok there are eight bars, this is the vibe, you go jam on it with your guitar; I’ll go jam on it with any kind of gibberish that comes out of my mouth to see where it leads.

Marv: It's more of the pop writing that pop artists do, which is pretty tough. Where we come from it’s just pure emotion and the structures aren’t fixed. That's the balance we're trying to find every time we write a song.

L: The title track, ‘Yume’ is your final release before the album comes out in full!

Phil: We were in Croatia when we wrote that!

Marv: It was like 3 am and I’d been awake with Chris [our producer] but you know when you’re tired and you go to bed like that's nothing cool. Then Phil listened to it the next morning and was like dude we need to start working on that one. 

Phil: I think I went out to the balcony for like five minutes and came back in and did the verse. So that was incredible. It was just right there — I had an emotion and a story that I wanted to follow and that's not a given on many tracks. 

L: What was the inspiration behind it?

Phil: It’s a cliche topic but Marvin and I have both lost people very close to us, some not that long ago. To this day I have very specific memories of saying goodbye to my grandma […] When I said goodbye I knew that I wasn't gonna see her again. ‘Yume’ is my way of paying tribute to her and what she did for me — I think a lot of people can relate to that. 

I’m not proud of it but when we recorded the second part of the song our producer was like look up your lyrics, read your lyrics, and feel it. If you're not feeling it and I know you’re just performing that shit I'm going to delete it […] I actually couldn't perform it all the way through because I started crying every time. So it's very authentic and it involves a lot of pain.

L: It really is a beautiful track, and I think it’s such a wonderful way to round off the album, especially after such an energetic song like ‘Lights Out’.

Phil: Marv was just in the zone for that one and I mean in the zone. He was sweating bullets, casually undressing every ten minutes because he was so warm, clothes were just in the way.

Marv: It was the first one we ever recorded officially as FLOYA!

Phil: I probably wouldn’t write another one like it. I don't want to take it off the table. But as of right now, how I feel about it, I wouldn't do it again. We shelved it because the version that existed back then was more about where we had come from rather than our future. […] We also didn’t know how to produce electronic music at that point, so it sounded like kids trying to figure out what sounds good and it showed.

Marv: I still don’t think we can say that's the FLOYA sound because it will always change. 

Phil: What I appreciate about the here and now is if people recognise that it's a FLOYA track through Marv’s guitar playing and my voice, that's all I need.

L: The emotions in your songs seem to cover similar themes — taking risks, going after what you want — were there any plans to make it into a concept album?  

Marv: No, and that's due to the fact we went down the route of releasing in singles. In our opinion, that’s the only thing that works as a new act nowadays. Not hiding for two years and then coming back with a single and telling people there’s an album on the way. People aren’t invested in the band then and then they’re not interested in purchasing or hearing the album.

L: Even though all the singles have been released, do you think the way people hear the songs will change when they hear it as a full album?

Phil: Yes, because the track listing wasn't just random. We sat down and we were like ok what's the perfect opening track? And where does it lead? Comparing endings and emotions and how they flow into each other. I think some of our audience still won't know that it's not an entirely brand new album and I think some people might be a little bit angry […] but also it's a body of work that we wanted to introduce to a completely new audience like you said.

L: It was nice to see ‘Stay’ as the opener since it’s my favourite!

Phil: Funny you say that because that’s our favourite song. 

L: Oh really? 

Phil: To this day, it's the song that showcases our sound the most and what we're trying to do in the best possible way. Songs like ‘Drift’ are electronic-focused and ‘Lights Out’ is rock-focused. ‘Stay’ has a huge rock chorus but the verses are kind of electronic so it's everything that makes us, us.

L: Over the last three years of creating Yume do you have any moments you’re particularly fond of?

Marv: Our working times are a bit healthier nowadays! The Phoenix album I did for Alazka was done in three months… which was just 12-14 hours every day. Hell. Honestly, I never wanted to do that again.

Phil: Dude, that album is the reason I wanted to work with you! But there are several I think, right?

Marv: Especially the writing trips! We did Athens, Norway, Croatia. Did we do anything else?

Phil: No, I think those were it: 3 years, 3 trips. 

L: Why did you decide to do the trips?

Marv: Inspiration, they brought the most creative output. 

Phil: Absolutely, I mean I have a more drastic view…

Marv: To escape…

Phil: Nothing against Germany, it’s just that I firmly believe there are more inspiring landscapes out there than just endless fields and grey shit weather. We have this office space that we work in, nothing too fancy, but if you spend every day in here it can get clouded very quickly. To get out of our usual comfort zone and have new impulses reach our brain is important and we're very privileged to be able to do that.

L: I can understand that

Phil: We also spend 99% of our time working together, and we rarely get to do personal shit; grabbing a drink, going out to skate or swim, whatever it is. We almost never get the chance to do that. But on the writing trips or tour, we do get that chance. If you work alongside each other and you’re codependent you should be friends as well, it also nurtures the love between us.

L: Do you feel it can also add more pressure too? You go somewhere else you think ‘I’ve got to make something of it!’

Phil: Oh, yes! If two days go by and all I did was produce shit I get depressed very easily. Marv’s like dude you're so annoying. […] He’s like if you’re going to continue complaining, how are you going to create something productive from that? And that’s completely the right mindset.

Marv: You can only be creative if you enjoy it, right? 

Phil: True, and that was a pivotal point for us last year. I was so hell-bent on improving things that didn’t work like I mentioned before and I completely forgot to have fun alongside it. Marv was like we're constantly busting our asses to make this work and I want to have fun. That’s 100% true and I just briefly forgot about it and that's sad. You shouldn't forget about having fun when you get to do the thing that you love.

L: On the topic of fun, you’ve got your album release party on Saturday night! That’s very exciting, what’s the plan?

Phil: All of our friends and family are going to be there, so I can't wait for that. The venue is going to be all decorated with Yume stuff and we're going to play for close to an hour, sign shit and all sorts of fun stuff! So it's going to be quite the experience!

It's also a way to cherish the crew that we have. We market ourselves as two people but our crew enables us to do what we're doing. We’re very fortunate to have a team that sacrifices their free time to come join us in chasing this career!

L: Aww, that sounds awesome!

Marv: Yeah, looking forward it!

L: Is the plan to then make your way over to the UK for a Yume tour…

Marv: Unfortunately no plans yet but we're trying everything to come over as soon as possible! We’re still working on a small headline run at least through Germany, that’s for sure!

Buy or Stream Yume now

Follow FLOYA Online
https://www.instagram.com/floyamusic
https://www.facebook.com/floyamusic
https://www.tiktok.com/@floyamusic
https://twitter.com/floyamusic

---

In case you missed it: