South of The River is the synthesis of all of the material the band has been dabbling with in the last year or so. Taking advantage of the group’s live chemistry, the songs were all tracked live in the studio with everyone playing together in the same room. All the base tracks were recorded in just three studio half days, most of the songs are either the 2nd or 3rd takes of the material, capturing the sound and orchestration the band has when playing live.

The album itself and the songs therein are a dedication to the south London experiences songwriter Martino Gasparrini has had since living there. Songs like ‘New Cross Gate’ and ‘Hold Me Up’ recount the all too familiar situations of taking the tube, travelling on a bus or meeting someone at the local pud. The lyrics shine a spotlight and give attention to the mundane of the everyday, like bikes being stored in a front room, searching for a table at a pub or waiting in the cold for a night bus. The songs detail the imminency and the present day of people living in the here and now. With ‘Light’ exploring the political and economic hardships immigrants face in the everyday situations that the city creates or ‘Into The Dark’ detailing the unpleasantness of commuting to a job you hate. Even the album cover exemplifies the idea of the everyday being a picture Martino took in Southwark Park on his way to work.

As with any large city, London is a unique melting pot that effortlessly creates unique experiences and chance happenings. This is something that the group intentionally wanted to recreate by recording the songs quickly and all together in a single moment in time. The album and the band as a whole is a product that only a city can create, with different people from different places coming together to make the music. Both sides of the album are bookend by a solo acoustic number, one detailing the experience of listening to estate agents trying to aggrandise horrible room-shares and the last song on the album recounting the inevitable partings and many goodbyes a large city always creates through many people’s comings and goings. 



The album is the band’s best effort to date and a sign of the future direction the group is taking. Instead of focusing on meticulous click-track recordings and computer tinkering that we have in the past, the band is taking a more live-in-the-studio approach to album making by concentrating on song-craft and in the honest performance of those songs. The recordings naturally shine through by embracing the tiny imperfections and nuances of having people playing music together and not fixing anything after the fact. In 2024 the band is excited and looking forward to sharing these songs and experiences both live and through people listening to the album itself.

A project like this wouldn't be possible without the people involved with it so I would like to thank George, Lea, Ralph and Rosa for playing on these songs with me and coming to practice them week after week at our rehearsals. Also I would like to thank the engineers Matt Green and Paolo Ruiu who managed to capture and record the band in the short amount of time we had. Alex Edge helps us record some amps for a couple of songs which proved to be vital and also on Night Bus we had two other great musicians come in and help us make this long song a reality so thank you Zach and Hannah. Finally I would also like to thank Max for his patience and his great mixing and mastering skills which has allowed the entire album to shine.