Clean Bandit has traveled a thousand miles from comfort and over land and sea, but cellist Grace Chatto said there’s no place she’d rather be than on the stage, playing with her bandmates for the fans.
The British dance music group, formed by University of Cambridge students with shared interests of classical and electronic music, won a Grammy Award for its 2014 single “Rather Be” before the group released its debut full-length album, “New Eyes.” Now, the quartet has an album under its belt and an even bigger fan base to support them, a feeling Chatto said is awe-inspiring.
Clean Bandit will perform at the Hollywood Bowl Thursday to promote its album. The Daily Bruin’s Shreya Aiyar talked with Chatto about “Rather Be,” exercising while on tour and combining electronic and classical music.
Daily Bruin: How did it feel to win a Grammy Award for a song that you released even before your debut album?
Grace Chatto: It was amazing. It was never even something on our radar, as a goal or anything. When we made that song, we were just making music in our bedroom and trying to kind of make music videos as well. We made that music video ourselves. It didn’t really cost any money, and we made it ourselves, Jack (Patterson) and I. Crazy to think that it has so many views now. The Grammy was such an amazing surprise, and even just being there was so incredible.
DB: One thing that sets you apart from other dance music groups is that you fuse electronic and classical music. What are some challenges in doing that style?
GC: I guess on paper, it sounds like a bad idea, trying to fuse different kinds of music. It wasn’t really like a plan to do that – it was more that we were friends and some of us were playing classical music and some of us were into electronic music. We just wanted to do something together. This mix came about, and it really worked. But if anyone had pitched it as an idea before, I would have thought, “Oh, no. That should be avoided.”
The one problem we’ve had is making the strings sound good in a live situation, especially when we’re playing in a club or other venues where the instruments themselves act as microphones. We (would) then get spotty feedback from the cello. We now play electric cellos and violins, and that’s amazing to me. It’s fun as well.
DB: Do you tailor your music to a certain group of people or audience?
GC: No, not at all. When we first started playing, we would just put on parties and invite all our friends and they were all in a similar age group. But then, since we started releasing music, we noticed such a wide variety of ages, people, different countries. We really liked that. I guess we don’t really think about the audience that much when we’re writing, but it’s a nice idea that it’s really wide.
DB: Touring can get pretty hectic and stressful. How do you as a group of four relax or let off steam together?
GC: We try to stay active. Jack and I go running together sometimes. That’s really nice because it’s a good way to explore the city, because sometimes we’re only there for a few hours and then we have to leave. It’s quite nice to jog around a city – we get to see quite a lot of it. We go bowling quite a lot as well.
Compiled by Shreya Aiyar, A&E senior staff.