When Shandong natives Lonely Leary arrived on the Beijing scene back in 2014, they hit the ground running with a string of highly impressive live sets. In the intervening years, anticipation for their first full-length release has grown considerably. Finally, in April 2018, they put the finishing touches on their powerful, razor-sharp post-punk debut, Through the Park, Almost There.
“We worked on these songs for nearly five years, and recorded them for half a month,” says vocal-ist Qiu Chi. “In fact, we weren’t very confident in the beginning, so we spent a lot of time amending the old songs to make them ‘brilliant.’ Like ‘Summer Begins’ – it was our first song, but we felt it was too simple in 2014, so we kept amending it for years. In the end, we just kept the original arrangement and recorded it.”
Lonely Leary began for the same reason that many great things tend to begin – because of boredom. As the dullness of life in his sleepy university town became too much for Qiu, the Jinan native sought out potential musical partners and came across guitarist and punk enthusiast Song Ang. They steadily worked away at learning their instruments. Before long, drummer Li Baoning joined, making them a fully fledged band.
Since leaving Jinan, they have had their ups and downs, with Li briefly leaving the group after a conflict over the direction of the band.
“It happened at the end of 2015 when I had just graduated and decided to treat the band as my primary focus,” Qiu says. “We had some disagreements, so we separated for a time and accepted a new drummer. She was a talented drummer and we had great cooperation on making new songs. However, she was a rookie and couldn’t play very well at the time.”
After reforming their original line-up, Lonely Leary signed with Maybe Mars, and brought more focus and creativity to their songwriting. Through the Park, Almost There, bears the influence of such diverse personalities as Lao Tzu and Timothy Leary, while the music crunches like broken glass underfoot.
Music video for 'Stay Ugly'
Their unique sound is characterized by Song’s sharp, reverberating guitar lines, high-octane drumming from Li and Qiu’s menacing vocals. The band credit the influence of playing live as the major factor in their songwriting development.
“The sound of Beijing underground venues is always dirty and wild, so you can never hear everything clear like in the studio or rehearsal room,” says Qiu. “So, we thought, why not make more noise and feedback, becoming more fierce so as to burn down the venue?”
“The sound of Beijing underground venues is always dirty and wild”
Integral in the making of this album was none other than P.K. 14 helmsman and ubiquitous producer of Chinese indie music, Yang Haisong, who has become a guiding figure for many young and emerging bands in China.
“Most of the time, he just broadly described the sound that he suggested to add in some particular place, without making too concrete a point,” says Qiu of Yang’s input. “It might have been a guitar solo and riff, percussions or just noise and feedback. Those subtle additions really gave the songs a different temperament!”
The pursuit of raw power, alongside gritty, dark and terrifying atmospherics, informed a lot of Lonely Leary’s approach to songwriting. Within the setting of a like-minded Beijing underground music scene, Lonely Leary found a home for their sound and their voice.
“Beijing is definitely unique,” says Qiu. “I can’t imagine how Lonely Leary’s music could sound in another city, but I’m sure the lyrics would be different. I can only write about the environment where I live.”
And while this is their first full-length album, they have come full circle, gaining experience and wisdom along the way. Certainly a lot has happened, but as the name of their album suggests, Lonely Leary are a band who haven’t yet reached the place where they want to be. Expect a lot more from this talented trio as the future unfolds.
Shanghai: Jul 6, 9pm, RMB70 presale, RMB90 door. Yuyintang, see event listing.
Beijing: Jul 14, 9pm. DDC, see event listing.
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