To speak with When Rivers Meet is to bask within the heat, pleasant power of Grace and Aaron Bond. Primarily based on the Essex shoreline (however very a lot ‘have van, will journey’ kinds), the couple’s staunchly impartial blues-rock band has been making some severe waves of late.
In lower than a decade their combination of soul-soaked blues and gritty, swaggering rock has taken them from probably the most humble beginnings as a operate duo taking part in pubs to the higher echelons of the charts. Not that it’s modified them one iota.
The title observe from their new album, Addicted To You, is about them, Aaron says. “We’ve been collectively for over twenty years and we’re nonetheless like that.”
“Perhaps that’s what makes it work,” Grace provides.
They usually end one another’s sentences.
“We’re intense and we needed to get that within the songs!”
They are saying they’ve sat on this album for longer than any of their earlier ones, in order that they’re now greater than able to share the outcomes – “heavier harmonies, extra layers, extra musicians” – with the world.
They’ve developed a singular bond as a married couple in a band
“I believe we’ve gone by means of increased highs and decrease lows,” Grace says. Taking part in unique music as WRM was a completely totally different proposition to the operate work of previous. “On our first tour, we felt lots of stress and we had been each on the sting of having the ability to take care of that.”
However as with every profitable relationship, romantic or in any other case, communication is pivotal. “As a result of we’re experiencing it collectively, we are able to discuss it,” Aaron says. “Whereas should you’re in a relationship with somebody doing one thing else, it have to be tough for that particular person to grasp.”
Their earlier album, Aces Are Excessive, made chart historical past in 2023
Positioned between Pink Floyd and pop famous person The Weeknd, Aces Are Excessive peaked at No.9 within the UK (Addicted To You did even higher, reaching #4), making When Rivers Meet the primary ever impartial rock and blues artists to attain a UK Prime 10 album. Was that past their wildest goals?
“Yeah, but it surely hasn’t modified our perspective,” Grace says. “We’ve had the dialog about what a profitable band is and the way you measure it so many instances. If we may look ahead 5 years in the past and see what we’ve achieved, we’d have thought we’re large. However we nonetheless assume we’re just a little band.”
Aaron enjoys appearing and is eager so as to add to his CV
Grace says she has at all times been fully “obsessive about music”, amassing devices alongside the way in which (“a piccolo, a clarinet, a saxophone…”), whereas Aaron’s passions lengthen to the silver display.
“I wish to act,” he says. “I used to be performing some bits at Pinewood Studios for some time, little ins and outs, and that’s one thing I’d wish to get again into sooner or later”.
The band’s identify was impressed by an estuary in Sardinia
Inspiration struck whereas the pair had been away recording on the idyllic Mediterranean island. Earlier than When Rivers Meet, they glided by the identify of Holmes & Bond, as a duo, and Aaron says that post-wedding, Bond & Bond wasn’t the snappiest of selections.
“It gave the impression of a constructing agency or one thing, so we couldn’t have that,” Aaron remembers. “We had been within the phrase ‘rivers’, and in Sardinia we had been overlooking an estuary the place two rivers met, and it was: ‘Ooh!’ That was it – we’re the rivers, and after we meet the music occurs”.
Their covid lockdown livestreams had been essential in constructing a fan base
With at present’s expertise, it was inevitable that musicians would placed on digital gigs to remain linked with their followers throughout lockdown. For When Rivers Meet, it had a profoundly transformative impact. Finally, Grace and Aaron had been on first-name phrases with their viewers.
“We had been all in search of connection, and we determined to stream on Saturdays, have a drink and fake we had been taking part in a gig”, Grace says. “You are feeling a bit responsible as a result of it was a shit time for therefore many individuals, but it surely constructed an incredible neighborhood of individuals. It was a giant turning level”.
The ultimate straw to give up their jobs was Grace having a dangerous day on the workplace
Grace used to work as a PA. “It was an hour’s drive on a very busy highway,” she says. “I bear in mind in the future coming residence sitting on this large visitors jam, and realising I’d left my telephone below the desk and that I’d should go all the way in which again to get it, and sat there and cried. I used to be like: “What am I doing?’ Life is simply too brief to be depressing! We’d somewhat be doing gigs for 50 quid and sleeping at the back of the van”.
“She was very convincing!” Aaron says with fun.
Addicted To You is out now by way of One Highway Data. When Rivers Meet play exhibits all through the summer season – for dates and tickets, go to the WRM web site.
