Smokey Brights Interview + new tracks!

We were lucky enough to chat with Smokey Brights, one of the hottest bands coming out of Seattle right now. The band is fronted by husband and wife duo Ryan Devlin (guitar and vocals) and Kim West (keys and vocals), Nick Krivchenia (drums) and Luke Logan (bass). We talked about many topics including tour, the return of live music, writing, their start, and their new songs. You can catch them live during Freakout Records, Freakout Festival coming up in Ballard November 11-14th.

playXear: How does it feel being back in the scene after a long time off shows?

Ryan: I think it’s something that I will never take for granted, I’ve been playing live music since I was really young, like all these amazing musicians here, and I never thought that would be off the table, in terms of experiences. Losing that was like losing a little bit of your identity, or your drive, or your purpose. Getting back to that has been very good, this is the thing that makes me most excited.

Kim: We were very lucky in that we all got together throughout the pandemic and practiced and wrote, we actually wrote the whole record we just recorded during this time. When it got to the point where we were cautiously booking shows, there was no lag of, “We got to figure out how to play our songs again,” we were ready for this and it’s been amazing.

playXear: That is so great to hear, but wait you recorded a new record? I only knew of a couple of new songs being released soon.

Smokeys: We did record it about a couple of months ago but I wouldn’t get too excited because we really don’t know when it will come out. We were highly compressed springs of creativity and once we got into the studio we were ready to go. Andy, our producer, who also worked on “I Love You but Damn,” we would do a take or two and he would be like okay it’s good to go move on.

playXear: Tell me about the new tracks, what’s the story behind them?

Ryan: “Honey Eye,” and “Unity” are coming out on October 29th and we recorded those during the “I Love You but Damn” recording sessions. We were writing furiously up to the day we got into the studio with that one and those were probably some of the freshest songs of the whole batch. Thematically they are a little doomier and full of anxiety but also full of call to action, so they lived on their own not quite fitting in with the rest of the body of that record. So we’ve been eager to put them out and with Halloween coming up that felt like the right time.

Kim: It was two songs that didn’t fit on the record but very well together.

Ryan: They are about finding light in dark times songs which felt applicable when we wrote them, and have a new context right now.

Luke: What we can accomplish if we come and work together, some themes that are very applicable right now.

playXear: What is different with performing now that you’re back?

Kim: I’m going to go back to what Ryan was saying there is a level of appreciation. We’ve always been a live band, that is where we shine, where we find fans and keep them. I try to appreciate the honor of being able to play live music, people come out to your show and it’s a choice, they don’t have to be there. Now with where we are still in this pandemic, with all the extra steps people have to take to go to a show and the whole situation. People are working hard to come to a show so you better work extra hard to put on one Hell of a Show for them.

playXear: Does that add more pressure to performing?

Luke: There is pressure but in a good way of they trusted you so that means you’re on to something. They believe in you and so should you.

playXear: Let’s go back to the beginning, what brought you together as a band?

Kim: Ryan had a bunch of songs that were a little folkier and more melodic than the punk band Luke was playing at the time. Started as a recording project to get the songs down and the boys went down to Olympia and recorded a demo of songs and then it got noticed and an A&R guy came from Los Angeles to see us and wanted to make us famous. Shockingly it didn’t work that way.

It did help with our motivation though and it made us want to pursue more.

Ryan: It’s been a very organic growth, it started with friends who mostly worked at the same restaurant to actually getting our act together and putting out a record. We then put out our first full length in 2014 and Freakout Records picked us up and thought we should take this a little more seriously. From there we decided to start touring more and make some adjustments in our lives to pursue this as much as we can. I feel like we’ve never been better and we can keep growing in this direction, I just know I’m happy.

playXear: How do you go about writing the songs?

Kim: It usually starts with the seed of something, it might be a melody or a chord structure. For example “Unity” which has those thirds was started on our piano in our living room. This is the same piano I learned how to play as a kid, Ryan was just playing around on it and created those. We were on this place of writing, and we have a lot of late night conversations about the world and how we’re feeling and how messed up things are. This feeling of hopelessness that we all experience, and that morphed into that song. It really started to shine when we worked on it as a band and the arrangement came together. I’m going to go ahead and say it that Nick and Luke are the best rhythm section of any band.

Luke: That song is a fun example of the full process which starts with Kim bringing it to the practice space, we jam, and we try ideas. That is one where we had tried it a few ways and Nick messaged back “Hey, what if we combined what Luke was doing in these this time, and I was doing that time and see if they fit together?” and actually that is what we play now, Nick recognizing that something we’ve been doing in totally different approaches could work together.

Ryan: If there is any formula it’s the belief that a song is chords, melody, and lyrics. We need to play it on acoustic and have it be representative. From there it becomes a Smokey Brights song once each person puts their flavor on it.

playXear: How did you come up with the name Smokey Brights?

Ryan: We were meeting up and starting to jam, and one night when I was driving home listening to the radio and I thought I heard someone say “Praise colossal brights” and I thought that was so cool and interesting. I came back to the band next day and said, ‘We got our name! We are the Colossal Brights!’ and our original bassist looked at me and said “Spell Colossal,” and I failed immediately. So back to the drawing board since we needed people to be able to search for it easily. We held on to the Brights because we liked it, then Smokey came as something dark to balance the bright. It felt like we were creating dark music with a splash of light and it felt right at the moment.

playXear: Let’s go back in time and hear who are you listening to at a younger age? Who is inspiring you with their music?

Kim: The two artists that have inspired me were Fiona Apple and Alanis Morissette.

Ryan: I was into punk rock and was in punk bands since middle school. In high school my favorite band were The Briefs, northwest band, fantastic, I even dressed like them. Probably at the end of high school I discovered Built to Spill.

Kim: Also, 90s hip-hop and R&B.

Nick: Definitely a bunch of punk rock and grunge, and old bands like Led Zeppelin, Beatles, because that’s what my dad listened to. Later in high school I got into hip-hop after hearing “Things Fall Apart” by The Roots, and then I had to go back and listed to all the great hip-hop music I missed out on.

Luke: For me the two groups closest to my high school soundtrack would be the Pixies and Portishead. My friends and I couldn’t get enough of their music.