THE
PEOPLE.

In January 2023, Paul suggested to his cousin Henry that they try making something heavier and more atmospheric together. He was thinking of music in the direction of Sunn O))), perhaps with a little more structure.

Two months later, they released Billy the Delivery Man.

Paul has been a self-taught drummer since he was fourteen. He also plays synthesizers, although he is not particularly concerned with mastering an instrument before trying to make something with it.

After the sessions, he listens through the recordings, selects passages, mixes the audio and creates the images and videos.

He has never been formally trained in mixing, which, according to Paul, you can probably hear.

Tight Whale XII took twelve mixes before he found what he wanted. Much of the work involves listening, turning knobs, adjusting things and trying again.

Henry and Paul are cousins and have known each other since childhood. They have played music together in different constellations for many years and have always shared an interest in music.

When they were children, they would often sit in front of the stereo listening to Black Sabbath.

Long before Happü, they also played together in Jazz Fiction.

In the early Happü sessions, Henry played through a tube amplifier in a cramped outbuilding in Delsbo. They sometimes played loudly enough for things to fall off the benches.

Henry has his own approach to guitar sounds. Sometimes he plays a riff that changes the direction of the drums. Sometimes Paul introduces a rhythm that Henry has to find his way into.

And sometimes they deliberately try to trick each other, in a musical game of cat and mouse.

During This is NOT a Prompt, they created a guitar drone together, recording it into a loop machine so it could continue independently while Henry played something else.

Petter and Paul have known each other since childhood. More than thirty years ago, they played folk music together.

Later, Petter played saxophone alongside Paul, Henry and Hannes in Jazz Fiction.

He has a deep understanding of music theory and an interest in instruments beyond the saxophone. He is also remarkably willing to try things he has never done before.

For Radio Warsaw, Petter and Paul tried recording without a guitar. To reduce the sound of the drums entering Petter's microphone, they put him in another room and covered the doorway with a mattress.

During the session, Petter began experimenting with singing into a Boss RC-505. His vocal loop became part of the recording.

In another session, which produced Tight Whale XII, Petter worked with a Korg Modwave and experimented with spoken words from Paul's work notebook.

One of the phrases he found was “life and safety”. Other passages came from notes about a meeting concerning emissions from working machines.

Not all those experiments made it into the released recording, but they helped the two musicians find their way into the music.

Hannes played piano in Jazz Fiction alongside Paul, Henry and Petter.

He is a talented jazz pianist and the only one of the four with a formal musical education.

Hannes has participated in one Happü recording: Meeep.

Unfortunately, Paul made a mistake while recording the session and failed to capture Hannes's piano on its own channel.

All that remains of his playing in the recording is the sound that leaked into Petter's microphone.