Ones-to-watch brother duo EVERYONE YOU KNOW (EYK) announce new single in the shape of uplifting new cut ‘LET A LITTLE LIGHT IN’, their second new release of 2020 which continues to tease another anticipated project from the band. Written at the heart of lockdown, the track continues to amplify EYK as an outfit who can unpick important and sensitive themes within their music; their frenetic fusion of punk, 90s rave and hip-hop fast becoming their signature sound. 

Describe Everyone You Know in a paragraph for Numero NL readers – go!

We are just a couple of normal lads really. We are brothers who grew up on the outskirts of London and we love to make tunes. 

Your lyrics and storytelling feels very real and raw. Do you feel your music is an amplification of your everyday surroundings, is that what inspires you creatively?

Yeah the lyrics are inspired by a load of different things to be honest. It could be an experience we have had ourselves or something that someone close to us have been through. It could even just be something that was said in a conversation with our friends or family. It doesn’t take much to trigger and idea for a tune.

 The EYK sound across previous EP’s – and now current single ‘Let A Little Light In’ – experiments with all types of genres. How did you feel making the new track, even though it’s an uplifting listen did you find it challenging being creative during lockdown and given the current situation? 

You know what we were actually really productive during lockdown and we made some of our best music to date in that period. We really threw ourselves into our music and (as we always do) experimented with a load of different sounds. But we felt it was important to be making more positive uplifting music during this time, to still try and find and write about the positive things that were going on around us.

Give us a bit of an insight into your creative process when making music – what happens first? Are there certain aspects that you each take on and have ownership over? 

It happens differently every time to be honest. Recently we have been getting chords down on a piano or guitar and writing the whole track over that whilst building up production at the same time. But we could make the beat first or write the whole track on just guitar or piano before adding any production. We have never had a formula or method that we follow, we just go with whatever seems right on the day. And in yeah we definitely both have our roles in the studio. Harv handles the production side and I’m more on the lyrics and songwriting side of things. So it balances out perfectly.

Creative and visuals are an incredibly important part of any artists’ identity. Your music videos and live performances feel powerful and all hold a strong message. How involved are you in this process?

Yeah we like to be quite hands on in the early stages of our videos. We always have an initial idea of what we would like the video to look like and what sort of world we would want it to live in. And from there we let the professionals take over lol! It’s great when you can come up with a concept or an idea and watch directors really bring it to live in their own unique way. Our visuals on stage however are all down to some lads that are now good pals of us that are part of a company called ‘Pilot’. They came up with all our stage visuals and lighting etc themselves. 

What were the seminal albums or artists growing up that you vividly remember, and do you believe that these have influenced and shaped you into the musicians you are today?

Music has been massive part of our lives since we were born. So there are albums that aren’t only integral to our music but to our childhoods and adolescents in general. Kano – Home Sweet Home was the first album that ever made me pick up a pen and make me write lyrics (albeit kano’s lyrics). Arctic Monkeys – Whatver People Say I Am That’s What I Am not was literally the soundtrack to mine and my pals secondary school years as well as Biggie Smalls – Ready To Die. Raekwom – Only

Built For Cuban Links, Amy Winehouse – Back To Black, The Streets – Original Pirate Material,  Nas – Illmatic. The list goes on and on and on. But all of them play an equally important part in our lives and in our music for sure.

Who do you look up to at the moment – not necessarily huge or established artists – more your peers who are around you – who do you think is pushing boundaries?

For a while (especially during the first couple months of lockdown) I was just listening to a lot of old school Hip-Hop and wasn’t really paying to much attention to what was happening around us musically. But in the last couple of months there has been some wicked projects and tunes that have come out. Che Lingo is an artist I’m really enjoying, Kojey Radical, Arlo Parks. They are artists that have a really unique and genuine sound. So been listening to them 3 in particular.

What have you missed most this year so far?

I have really missed live shows. Both playing at them and going to them. There is a feeling that you get from live shows that you can’t really get anywhere else. I’ve also missed festivals and Football too. My football league started for 3 games but has had to stop again due to the second lockdown which is gutting. But yeah they are 3 things that I have particularly missed this year.

What do you want to achieve next year? 

I hope next year we can achieve everything that we set out for this year. A couple of sold out UK tours, a few European dates and a U.S tour too. 

What can we expect from the EYK sound for 2021, do you see yourselves channeling and moving more in one direction?

I think because we draw so much influence and inspiration from so many different things it’s hard to just head in one direction. For us it’s  just important to get music out that people enjoy and make them feel a certain way. We have a back catalogue of about 50 odd tunes and we make new music all the time, so for the next few months it’s just about making sure people have good music to listen to.