The young Derby indie-rock-and-rollers stopped by to give us the lowdown on the impacts of lockdown, who their fantasy festival headliners would be and their freshest single, ‘This Feeling’.

RECORD WEEKLY’S INTERVIEW WITH RIVIERA

Hey guys, how are you?

Very good thank you. Just getting by, you know what I mean?

Very much so! It’s been a strange start to the year and now we’re in March again — how have you found it?

It’s been annoying really. Before the lockdown happened, we’d started to get the ball rolling with live gigs and an audience which was growing, but then it all completely stopped. Luckily, we had to songs to release so we could try and grow through that, but it’s just not the same without gigs.

Yeah, I hear you! Tell us how you formed Riviera and where the name inspiration came from.

It started with Archie and Billy at school playing rubbish covers and, one day, they decided to write a song which sounded ‘acceptable’ to call our own (it wasn’t good).

But we couldn’t think of a band name and just thought the word ‘riviera’ was cool, so we’re not gonna claim that it has a deep meaning when it doesn’t haha, but there you go. And then we carried on playing covers and writing until Archie met Joe at college and asked him to join as a drummer. He actually said no but he brought his mate Danny to play drums and Joe took on bass. Then, after a few line-up changes, Omari joined on bass and Joe took on guitar (it’s all very confusing, I know), but now we’ve established a solid sound from each and everyone’s different influences.

Haha it’s okay, I’ve kept up! You’ve got a good thing going now then.

Describe your sound in three words.

Very, very good…

The pandemic has caused no end of issues within the music industry. Did you have gigs and festivals that had to be postponed or cancelled? And are they back on the agenda?

We still don’t know at the minute, unfortunately. I think they’re cancelled to be honest, but we’re hoping to get a load of gigs scheduled when everything opens up again, and even play some festivals. We just want to get out and see the people, because we’ve gained a fair few more fans in the lockdowns, which is helpful!

If you were to host a fantasy festival of your own, which three artists would headline?

We’ve got a proper range of music tastes, so gotta think of us all…

Probably The Stone Roses, ABBA and someone like Skepta or something like that haha.

Give us the lowdown on your latest single, ‘This Feeling’.

To be honest, it didn’t mean anything when I wrote it. It’s completely open to interpretation to the fans, which is the beautiful thing about music. The words flow together and sound nice but didn’t mean anything to me. I suppose they sort of reflect the feeling of losing something you thought you couldn’t live without and wanting it back, though. But it can be anything to anyone; ome people might think it’s about a pet hamster dying or might just think it’s rubbish, haha!

It’s a proper pop-rock song and we’re really proud of it. The intro sounds like it’s straight out of a Sex Pistols track!

And while you’re here, can you share any future plans?

Yeah, as we said, we’re hoping to get some gigs and festivals planned for when we can go back out. We’ve also been in the studio and recorded a few songs, so we’ve got loads more in our locker. Probably gonna go back soon and record some more!

If you can’t wait to hear more of these tunes the lads have teased, make sure you’re following their socials. They’re on Instagram and Twitter, and all their songs are on Spotify.