Punctual are Will Lansley and John Morgan, a songwriter, producer and DJ duo whose debut single ‘Eva’ propelled them into the spotlight, clocking up over 3 million plays on Spotify to date and radio support from the likes of Zane Lowe, BBC Radio 1’s Pete Tong, Phil Taggart and Huw Stephens. Described as “your new favourite duo” by tastemaker magazine Mixmag, and with additional support from the likes of Clash, Wonderland, Earmilk and Indie Shuffle, Punctual draw inspiration from a wide range of musical sources. Citing Flume, Kaytranada, Calvin Harris and Basement Jaxx as influences, the pair have been immersed in the Bristol and London scenes making music together and playing DJ sets to road-test their creations. The latest in a running on singles for 2019, Anything (For Your Love) is a wonderfully evocative, blissed-out gem, with vintage house chords, skittering hats and a huge vocal guaranteed to put a smile on your face. We caught up with them to get the lowdown…
When is your next single Anything (For Your Love) being released and what sort of sounds can listeners expect from i
Anything (For Your Love) is coming out on Friday 19th July! We wanted to do a flip of an old R&B tune, turning it into a summer dance track, so listeners can expect an upbeat house tune with a hint of classic R&B.
Do you have any other releases coming out this year that you are excited about?
We’ve got so much music to come out this year. This track is the 2nd track from our upcoming EP, but after that there’s still much more to come from us.
You had a brief hiatus recently, where you took time to redefine your sound. Can you describe how you redefined it and what changes you made? How does your sound compare between now and then?
It’s quite natural to go through phases of different styles of music as an artist, especially when you’re inspired by a wide range of genres and sounds. We like to switch things up, and this current EP is a reflection of us being in the mood to release some house music for the summer and festivals. It’s us sort of going back to our roots a bit compared to our last release and EP, which is always refreshing. The time felt right!
Has music always been on your trajectories or were you ever on different paths?
We both always dreamed of being able to do music as a career. We feel lucky to be able to produce and perform music full-time straight after leaving education, but in any case I think we were both keen to get jobs somewhere in the music industry either way!
Do you either of you ever experience writer’s block? Does it help being a duo to keep the creativity flowing?
Everyone experiences writer’s block at some point! It definitely helps being able to bounce ideas off each other though. Writer’s block is a bit of a frame of mind, sometimes it’s just that whatever you’re making YOU think is rubbish at the time, but when you can send it to someone else with a clearer mind sometimes they’re able to recognise when things are actually decent, you just can’t see it in your mind frame.
So tell us, you’ve been working together a few years now. How did you two meet?
We grew up together in the same town. Back then there weren’t too many young people in our area producing electronic music, so you naturally became friends with the people that were!
Do you like to hang out socially when you are not in the studio?
Yeah, we’ve got loads of mutual friends as you’d naturally expect, especially as we lived together with other mates for a while. Think it’d be sad if we didn’t hang out!
What is the best thing about working and collaborating with someone and what can be difficult?
We collaborate with people the whole time, it just makes making music so much more fun and exciting, you get such an influx of influences and ideas when you work with other people. Difficulties only arise when you have completely different ideas of where the track should go, sometimes it’s hard to find a compromise. It’s important to have time on your own to see through your idea for a track and then come back and compare.
What gigs have you got coming up that people can come and hear you play at?
We’ve got a couple of dates this summer, but hopefully more in the Autumn.
We’re playing Ministry of Sound next month which we’re super excited for, never played there before so that’s a bit of a dream come true. We’re also out in Amsterdam to play the mainstage of Mysteryland Festival on 25th August, it’s just about the biggest stage we’ve ever played so should be amazing!
What has been your proudest moment to date?
It’s funny, it’s probably not what you’d expect. We were playing a festival
in Hungary last summer, and after our set a couple who came to see us play came up to us and told us that he’d used our song Eva when proposing to her. It was pretty mindblowing to see how our music had been used for such an important moment in their lives. It really touched us both.
Punctual Anything (For Your Love) is out now
