Back in April, about two weeks after the release of their sophomore EP, Carousel, the then-vocalist Kira Beckett and drummer Ben Gasan of the Bristol experimental hard rock band ANIIMALIA talked to Post-Burnout about their career and the success they had enjoyed since winning Kerrang!’s “The Deal” competition in 2023, which got them signed to Marshall Records and a slot at Download Festival.

As the EP was two weeks old when we conducted the interview, there was no time pressure to have the interview out by a certain date, and, as such, it got pushed back as I tried to hit more urgent deadlines. This caught up to me however, and, at the end of August, Kira announced that she was leaving ANIIMALIA, with the faith of the band currently up in the air.

I debated whether to publish this interview, as much of what was discussed no longer seemed relevant. However, today I’ve decided to release the transcript, if for no other reason than to document ANIIMALIA as it existed in April 2024. Regardless of what happens next, we wish Kira and all members of ANIIMALIA in whatever they do next.

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The first thing I was going to ask, quite simply, is just a bit about the background of the band. My understanding is the instrumental members had already formed during the pandemic, and it was actually post-pandemic that you joined, Kira, through [the website] Join My Band, I think. I was wondering what was it about this project that drew you to it and what was your background as a musician prior to that?

Kira: Yeah, so I started music when I was, like, ten; around ten. Funnily enough, it was Adele that got me into music, which is completely different to what I’m doing now! But then, fast forward several years of just doing things on my own, then I just went on Join My Band on a whim. I had thought about joining a band for several years but never properly committed to it. I found Kieran [Boobyer], who’s our guitarist, and we got chatting, and it seemed like we had a good vibe between us, and he literally just sent me a demo and said, “Can you write to this?”, and the second I opened it, I immediately had something come to mind. I tried one or two auditions before that and, immediately with this one, I knew that I could write something to this song. I can’t remember…I think it was “Haywire,” which was off our previous EP, and I literally just wrote it and sent it back a day or so later. I kind of knew that I wanted to be in the project, I just hoped that everybody else [Laughs] wanted me to come along! Luckily, they did! They invited me, and we all met in person and we did a rehearsal and things just went immediately well; we just immediately jumped into continuous rehearsals from there.

Ben: You were keen. You were, like, two hours early, weren’t you? You were, like, two hours on the train…

Kira: Yeah! Because it’s a completely different city to where I am! So, I was living in Bristol at the time and everyone else was kind of gathering in Bridgwater, so I just wanted to play it safe and arrive really early, and, luckily, it played in my favour, because the person before didn’t turn up or something along those lines, so, again, just brownie points for me! [Laughs] We also forget to mention that Join My Band is how Ben met the guys, as well.

Ben: Yeah!

Kira: It’s just Join My Band is such a pivotal thing for our band!

Ben: It’s good! There’s not many other platforms like it, but, got to give it credit where credit’s due, it’s very handy. It’s a little bit basic; you have to, like, log in. It’s not like a trendy app these days, where you get notifications and stuff but, if you want it, you can see the messages, and that’s how we did it with Kira and Max [Reynolds, their drummer]. And then two years of just jamming the same riff [Laughs] for hours, which is every time, and then we were like, “Oh, thank God a singer’s coming,” and here we are!

That’s cool. So, for the other members, for Max and Kieran, were they familiar with each other beforehand or did they meet online? Because it’s sort of an interesting, new dynamic of meeting online and it’s like, just a digital form of putting flyers up [Laughs], you know what I mean?

Ben: Oh, 100%. It was funny; so, Max and Kieran, and then myself, separately, both got asked by another group of people [to play in a band]. We all joined together, we all played some tunes, and we didn’t really vibe. I think that’s really pivotal, those initial one or two practices. Everything comes down to it. It’s a test – whether it’s how people get on with themselves and, obviously, musically, what you’re writing – and then it kind of got to a point where we all dispersed, and then me, Max and Kieran met up. We knew what we had, we liked the chemistry between each other. We always say this, but in lockdown, there was a week of overlap between me going, “I don’t think we can do this. We’ve just been playing the same riff…” [Laughs] “We’ve just been jamming for so long! Nothing’s come about it,” and then Kieran goes, “Oh, by the way, we have a new singer coming. It should be good.” [Kira laughs]  So, it was [Holds up index finger and thumb with a tiny gap between the two] this close! [Laughs] So, I’m very glad I did it. I’m very glad I [stuck with it].

Kira: If I remember correctly, from Max and Kieran speaking, I think they met through Kieran’s job…

Ben: Yeah.

Kira: …because Kieran’s a barber, and Max just went to get his hair cut, but it took them a good while for Max to go, “Oh, by the way, I play bass,” and Kieran was like, “Hold on a minute!”

Ben: Yeah! Too long! Too long!

Kira: “I’m looking for a bassist!” So, that was just a complete coincidence. So, they were friends for quite a long time before Ben and I were even remotely in the picture. Which I think is just the way it goes, sometimes; when you’re young, sometimes you latch onto people that you’ve played with or that you know really well, and it really helps with the connections, later on.

Ben: [Tapping his temple] You just stick it all up here, innit? You just remember, don’t you?

Kira: Yeah. Build this foundation of – cringey to say, but – a friendship. It really helps when you’re in a band! [Laughs]

Actually, I think that’s such a serendipitous [scenario]. Almost like something in a romcom or something! “Oh, we met getting haircuts!” [Laughs]

Ben: Yeah! Yeah, totally!

I was talking to someone – actually, just today – that during the pandemic people were adapting to doing things remotely and building songs and networks. I think it’s really cool that, even though that was an option, you still felt it a necessity to meet up in a common place. Was remote working something the band ever did or has it always been in close quarters?

Kira: Yeah. I actually remember some of the first dates. We never remember the exact dates of when we got together, but I’m pretty sure it was around, maybe, the second lockdown to the third lockdown, or maybe coming out of the third; something along then. Because I remember living in Bristol, and they said at the time…there was a period of time where you couldn’t leave Bristol and meet up with more than one household, and I was like, “This really throws a spanner in the works! Like, I’ve just met these guys, we bond really well, we love jamming together, and now we can’t meet up!” So, we definitely had a period of time where we would send ideas back and forth, we record things into, literally, as simple as a phone microphone, and just see what we could add together, and that’s pretty much how we wrote and came up with ideas for our first few tracks, and it really helped us to get to know each other’s sound, I think. So, we definitely did that and we still do that because none of us live particularly close to each other. It’s not convenient. We can’t just pop down the road and see each other, which is a bit annoying, but it really builds this onl…Like you said, online is everything these days, and we’ve just been able to work through demos over group chats and over recording softwares really easily, so that is still one of the main ways that we will write if we can’t meet up for any reason.

Kira, just so I’m correct, this is your first band, right? I do have to say, not all bands have the success you do! [Laughs]

Kira: Yeah, I know! We, honestly, are so grateful for everything we have. I think we put it down to…I joined these guys, wanting to be in a band, but Kieran, especially, and Max had been waiting years for this band to come together. You can go back on Facebook and find Kieran’s initial posts about wanting a singer, like ten years ago! Something silly like that. I think that really drove us to jump into things quite quickly. So, we wrote our first songs quite quickly because we were just excited. We recorded them, released them. We really put our all into the first year of the band and recorded music videos and all that stuff. Obviously, we got some really amazing opportunities. So, we got signed with Marshall Records, and played Download, and we also got to support Kris Barras in the early days, which was a really monumental gig for us, and that really just pushed us forward into still putting our all into this band, and we were just so lucky and grateful, early on, that we got that platform and that advice before we were years and years in. But, yeah, honestly, we are so thankful for everything that’s happened because it really is wild to look back on the first two years of the band! It’s so incredible!

Yeah! Actually, Ben, could I ask you, from your perspective, how does this project differ from other ones you’ve played in? Because I noticed that hunger that you’re talking about, Kira, to get stuff out and really do something, I find there’s difficulties in other projects where, maybe, people’s ambitions aren’t in line or aren’t synced up, and some people are OK just to meander. Some people don’t even want to play live, they just want to hang out and stuff. How do you find that dynamic in this project compares to other projects you’ve been in?

Ben: I think you find out pretty quickly, and it’s a weird one. I do think it can be managed, I think, if the band moulds into something that becomes more of a spearhead, where one person is taking the charge and then kind of delegates, and it’s been communicated that everyone knows where they stand. I think that’s the main thing. I think if it starts getting into, “I’m physically there, but I’m starting to grow out of it,” for whatever reason, like life just takes you elsewhere from music or anything like that. If you’re communicating it, it’s absolutely fine. It can be so manageable. But I’ve been in a few projects where you can tell quite quickly, and it’s a shame because it’s, obviously, a group effort. You all want to go at this incredible speed, and, in some ways, you’re as fast as your slowest member, so if someone’s kind of just not giving it all that, you will pick up on it. But so long as it’s communicated effectively, as long as you can say to them, “If you’re still happy to play the gigs, if you’re able to write, whatever your level of input is, then if it’s workable, it’s workable.” It’s not to say that you have to be all or nothing, because going too mad, obviously, there’s burnout. You get people who put music way too in front and then they neglect other parts of their life, and it is a balance. It’s a massive act of spinning plates. So, yeah, you can see it but I don’t think it’s the end-all, be-all, really.  

Yeah, and when it came to the music that you guys are making, it’s obvious that there’s a huge plethora of influence, and it seems like there was no conscious effort of, “We’re going to be like this,” you know? It does seem like very organic songwriting in that it seems like teasing stuff out…  – this is my interpretation, as a listener – …of teasing stuff out and seeing what sticks, and I think the music can be very heavy but it can also be very, I don’t know, almost angelic. I think there’s a lot of emphasis on melody and stuff, and the lyrics and the general melody getting really enlodged in your head. [Laughs]

Ben: Yeah, yeah!

I was wondering, was there any conscious discussion at the beginning to go, “OK, here’s reference points. Here’s what we want to sound like,” or is it just the result of collaboration? You know, everyone adding their parts and this is the result?

Kira: I think it’s exactly what you just said. Typically, for us, it is that we just add our own inputs. Whether we’re subconsciously influenced by something, it’s not really a huge discussion; we just put in our ideas and treat it as our music. Occasionally, we might bring up a song that we want to reference or we want to use a part of but, usually, it is just us, back and forth, with our own ideas. Obviously, when you start doing interviews and things, it’s really good to have yourself put in that mindset of, “Who actually has inspired us?”, and look back and try and think of all your influences over the years. And the four of us do have quite different influences; we take inspiration from lots of different places. So, it’s always good to look into, but, for us, it just really comes naturally. We don’t really have a huge discussion point on it, I would, personally, say.

Ben: Um. It’s a funny one. It’s definitely all collaborative: it will start from one idea, it will start from a riff, and then it will get layered upon. But, yeah, like you said with interviews, Kira, when we’re asked about influences, oh, Lord! [All laugh] They’re everywhere! In some ways, it’s not always incredibly helpful for ourselves [Laughs] but, at the same time, we have this sound at the moment which is because of all the different colours and all the different flavours of what we’re all listening to. It wouldn’t go amiss if we all [Laughs] aligned a little bit, but I feel like we love it the way it is! And, also, we’re at this point, now, where we’re still just trying stuff out. We’re still just doing bits here and there. We’re just seeing what sticks, basically.

I was talking to someone before that had a similar thing, where it’s like, “Oh, I find it very hard to define my sound and have reference points.” My advice – and do with this what you will – but I always think the funniest thing to do in those scenarios would be – because you know when you do press releases, you have to do the “For Fans Of…”? – just try and name the three or four most absurd! [All laugh]

Ben: Yeah, just go in every corner!

Yeah! And then people will be like, “What the hell?!”, and it forces them to listen, potentially.

Ben: 100%. They just need to see what comes up.

Kira: One thing we started doing is looking really closely at reviews of our music, and they seem to mention, “Oh, this riff sounds like this” or “Together this sounds like this,” and we’re like, “Noted! We will take that!”

Ben: Yeah, yeah, yeah!

Kira: “And we will try to do whatever we can with that information!” But when we’re coming up with it ourselves, every time we get a question like that, I jump on the group chat and I’m like, “Guys! Help!” [All laugh]

“They asked it again!”

Ben: “It’s the question!” Yeah, yeah!

Do you guys find, as music fans, reaching out and trying to discover not only new things but even going back to rediscover old music, or do you have any kind of predictive listening patterns? Do you sometimes get lost in a single album? As listeners, how’s your pattern?

Kira: I do a little bit of both. I have songs and EPs that I do kind of stick with, but recently, especially with the developments with Spotify where they have the hashtags section and things like that, I am finding a lot of new music, and I found that over the last couple of years, my genres keep fluctuating, majorly! [Laughs] Like, I’ve always listened to a variety of music, but it’s gone from totally rock to then more pop to then something more electronic pop. It’s just a very mixed bag of things. But I do think I can credit Spotify and the bands we play with. We play with some amazing bands that I’m immediately like, “Right, I’m adding you to my playlist!” I really credit that for my music taste, personally.

Ben: I think when we’re on a car journey, there’s a collective groan if I put my shuffle on because it is everything! I don’t do playlists. It’s a mad one. I use Apple Music, and I don’t really collate all my stuff into playlists and have moods. I don’t mind if I’m in one mood and it’s Sleep Token absolutely ripping it, and then it will suddenly turn into Miley Cyrus. I’m just like, “Yeah!” It’s all just there. But then I forget that people like to listen in a “mood” [Laughs] and then I’m like, “Yeah, sorry about that. Sorry you had to go through that.” But, yeah, definitely the bands we’ve played with have really shaped [us], I think. They’re starting to have a good effect on the writing, as well. Like, just seeing, what you were saying, with the vibes and stuff, because, as I said, we have all these different genres, we’ve got all these different flavours in our music, and it’s very like, “Yeah, you’re hearing these guys. They’ve got it down,” and it’s like, “What is our thing? What is our sound that we’re locking in?” Yeah, my music is a little bit all over the place.

I’m picturing you at Download Festival, and your earphones come out and it’s just playing Miley Cyrus amongst all these metal and hard rock bands.

Ben: Honestly, I know! You go and chat to some heavy metal guys, but then, if The Saturdays asked for a drummer to fill in, that email is getting sent to them, you know what I mean? [All laugh] It’s guilty pleasures, but then I think it must have gotten to a point where the guilty pleasures stopped and I just go, “You know what? They’re just good tunes. They’re just good music.”

Kira: You have no shame!

Ben: No, I don’t!

Kira: The amount of [Inaudible] in your car!

Ben: [Takes phone out] Oh, do I dare take a look at the “Recently Added” on my iTunes? The new Ariana Grande is on there; Sleep Token’s on there, and it’s just everything! New Bad Omens.

That’s a package tour, right there! [Laughs] Sleep Token and Ariana Grande.

Ben: Yeah! What festival is that? I have no idea what festival that is!

They’re arguing about who gets to headline each night.

Ben: Yeah, yeah, yeah!

As you alluded to, just through Kerrang!’s The Deal, you got the Marshall Records contract and also got to play Download. I talked to Rituals, who won that too, and they were saying that that one deal just automatically changes your life, you know? It’s an insanely good deal. What was it like to have that opportunity, I guess?

Ben: Amazing.

Kira: Yeah. First of all, insanely grateful and we just couldn’t believe it when we actually found out. But, also, it was very funny, the day we found out because had a commitment, we had a gig booked [Laughs], so we had a split second to comprehend everything and then we were like, “Right, into cars we go! We’re driving to Bristol! We’re doing a gig!” So, it really took a while for us to realise that not only was this all happening but it was happening really quickly. We’ve, all of sudden, got all these people giving us advice for our career, we’ve got one of the biggest festivals in the UK to play, we’ve got the opportunity to produce a really good EP, all of it just at once, and it was one of the most fun experiences, I think. Like, going into that studio, all of us just on top of the world because we don’t know what to expect. And I really wouldn’t change a thing in the way that we started our career, in that sense. Honestly, just so much fun. And we got to work with [the producer] Romesh [Dodangoda], who is incredible, and learnt so much from him that we’re still using to this day, that we’re putting into our new music. Even now, you can look back and know that it had such an effect on everything that we’ve done since, and we’re just immensely grateful for it, really.

That’s cool. You were talking about Romesh there and, obviously, he has such an insane pedigree. When you get to work with someone who’s had the clientele that he’s had, it’s so otherworldly, I can imagine. What was that like for you, as collaborators? Did he produce both EPs or was he just mixing and mastering [the new one]?

Ben: Just the first one. He produced and mixed and mastered the first one and then only mixed and mastered this one. It was insane. Firstly, you’re in the Marshall control room, and the equipment there…By all accounts, Dark Side of the Moon went through the mixing desk in front of you. You’re like, “Noted. OK.” [All laugh] “So, our music is going to go through that? Okie doke!” Let alone the absolute talent with Romesh and Tom [Cory], who are just smashing it out, all things considered, with a fairly… – not crazy tight – …but it was a few days we had scheduled for it. And, as a drummer, I noticed where it was really prevalent was, I would play something, and he was meticulous and very much needed because [Laughs] I’m a little bit erratic and like to go off a bit, and then was like, “Hang on, wait, this is the recording. Let’s just serve the song; let’s not go too mad,” and he was on it, straight away, just like, “No, let’s do that again. Do that again,” and I was like, “Yeah, I can hear where he’s altering it to serve more impact and those things.” But some of that was just really cool, really eye-opening to see.

Kira: I think the main thing that we all noticed is that he really focused on you as performers and musicians. He didn’t want to take any shortcuts, he didn’t want just to do it all as electronics, even though that’s such a huge part of music these days. He really did push you to be a better musician and be a better band, and that’s something that’s really stuck with us going forward, is making sure that our recording is the absolute best that it can be no matter how many takes it takes or how much criticism it might take. But, also, at the same time, he made it so relaxed. He just knew exactly what he was doing and you could tell that he had so much experience, that we were just like, “OK!” [Laughs]

Ben: In safe hands.

Kira: “We’ll listen to all your advice,” and, yeah, safe hands. “We completely trust you with this EP,” and, luckily for us, it, obviously, turned out exactly how we wanted it and amazing, so we were super happy when we heard that he was mastering this one, as well, because we just knew from previously that it was going to be amazing this time, as well.

And, actually, speaking of this new EP, Carousel, it was released about two weeks ago. How have you found the critical reception to it?

Kira: Yeah, I think it’s been really good. We’ve had some critical reception from social media and some from gigs, and what we love is when people say the songs really hit live because that’s a major part of music for us, that it’s not just a record or it’s not just a gig, that everything, collectively, is of really good quality. So, we’ve heard really good things about “Puppeteer,” really good things about the EP as a whole. We’ve been really excited about the reviews that we’ve seen. And, obviously, we’re just really excited to have it out because we’ve been working on it for quite a long time. Like, people don’t see behind the scenes, how long it takes or how much effort’s been put into it. So, we’ve just been sitting on it, waiting for it to come out. So, so far, we’ve been so excited and we’re hoping to just push it and push it further over the coming months and keep doing events around it. So, yeah, super excited so far.

Also, the other thing I wanted to ask, how do you think this EP differs from your previous one? The thing I initially picked up on is, in a way, it’s a lot less heavy, I think. It’s probably lighter in that sense, but it feels consistent. It just feels like the production has altered the sound somewhat, but not in a totally alien way, I guess. I was wondering what you find the distinction between the two EPs is.

Kira: I think we’ve got quite a lot of things. Obviously, it’s your second EP. You’ve got a debut once and then you are just kind of continuing your career as a band and exploring the sound you want to go into. But, also, all those things we were talking about, with references and stuff, new music has come out since our last EP that has had a huge influence on us, so we’ve just been trying to progress our writing, progress our production. Max, our bassist, actually does a lot of synths and things like that, and he really wanted to go head-first into that this time around. Taking everything that we learnt, just from the first time, and pushing it. We’re still experimenting, like Ben said earlier, but we really want to push what we learnt so far. And just everything surrounding it, we knew slightly more about going into what we needed to do, behind the scenes, and what we wanted out of it. And, yeah, it was still a little bit stressful. I think it always is. You still want to make it the best that it can be, and you want to go further than you did the previous time but, honestly, it was just a lot of experimentation and exploring what we’ve already learnt from Romesh and the guys from Marshall Studios that we work with, and just taking that further with this EP.

One of the final things I’ll ask is, you guys have been playing around, doing a lot of touring and playing shows, how many places have you been to now? Has it all been within the UK? And, generally, where would you like to play? I mean, there are so many great festivals throughout the continent, like Rock am Ring, Hellfest, Resurrection Fest, all these really cool festivals. But beyond just traditional hard rock and metal festivals, I could see you guys playing something like Reading and Leeds, or even Glastonbury or Roskilde or any of these festivals that are not exclusively heavy. I was also wondering, has the versatility on display opened you up to the possibility of being considered for festivals outside, I guess, of what people would typically think of your sound?

Kira: Yeah, I think that we definitely wanted to go in that direction. From the start of our career and onwards, we’ve been on a lot of rock line-ups, metal line-ups, rock/pop line-ups, but we’d love the opportunity to explore more than that because, as we’ve said, we aren’t just a rock band, we have a lot that goes into it, and we want to progress in a way that takes inspiration from everywhere. So, it would be amazing to do a variety of festivals and, like you said, Reading and Leeds, I think Max, especially, has said that’s up there with one of the big goals on our list. That would be incredible. I think joining other bands and doing massive support tours and stuff would be something that’s hugely on our radar for the future, and we’d love to venture out to the north of the UK and, also, eventually, into Europe because that’s really where I think the scene gets even more lively than we’ve already seen. We’ve done a lot of the UK midlands down to the south, but, again, just exploring every part of the UK and Europe that we can would be insane. I do think that our genre leaves it a little bit open to interpretation and it would be so fun to continue in that direction and see what opportunities come up because some of them do have an idea going in if they’d want a band like us or not, so some of the people arranging the festival will have the idea of the vibe of the show. But we’d love to be considered and we’d love to go in that direction.

Ben: Um. Yes, the versatility is something that’s been a byproduct of all of these different influences and ideas that have gone into the writing, where maybe we’ve said “Yes” to too many stuff. [Laughs] Maybe too many options have been said “Yes” to and greenlit, and then they’ve made it to the songs! But, yeah, I think for a band, as a viewer of a band, I do appreciate when artists have all these different flavours. Don’t get me wrong, when they do the one thing right and it’s a mental gig and you know what you’re getting yourself in for. But, at this point, like we said, we just want to try all this different stuff and give a more versatile and more different-shaping performance, especially in the live shows. And with the electronics that we’re getting into, it’s definitely going to be a key element of the next stuff, for sure.

Actually, something I want to ask, based on what you just said there, do you find when you do shows…if you were to do a festival and you have an idea of what the expected sound of that festival is, do you find that you’d potentially cater your set to match that expected vibe or do you think you’re going to be unapologetically yourselves and if people are into it, they’re into it? I was wondering if you ever thought about that. Would the place you play influence your set?

Ben: Um… tricky one. I suppose you almost want to. You want to cater and you want to be adaptable and malleable, but then, at the same time, we do what we want to do. We want to promote our new stuff. We’re not going to drop one of the EP songs [Laughs] because it doesn’t quite fit. Like, we want to promote it and we want to play our sound out there, but, yeah, it’s a hard one.

Kira: I think, overall, being unapologetic has got us where we are so far, so we do really value that we have our own sense of sound and, even though it’s still explorative [and] we’re going through lots of different changes with it, it is something we really cling to. But I think doing a little change, gig-to-gig, regardless of the genre of the gig, anyway, just brings another element to the live shows, and it makes them worthwhile to watch, and it makes fans realise that each song is going to have something different, and I think that keeps it exciting. So, when we do start to branch out into a lot more different experiences, I think that is something we’d like to get into, it’s just not going to take away from the sound that we created for ourselves; it’s going to be something additional, I say. Like, we’ve talked for a little while about…like, we’ve got a song that was really early on. We released our second song ever, “Claustrophobia,” and we’ve talked about potentially doing something with that song and maybe bringing it up to speed with the sound we’ve developed, and maybe that’s something that we could do in the future at one of our gigs.

Actually, one final, final thing – I’ll try not to be too long – but do you ever wonder, as you grow a fanbase, they have expected anticipation of what each release is going to be; do you often have that in consideration, what your fanbase is going to think of a certain song or a certain direction, or, again, is it primarily, “If it feels right, we know it’s going to be us, regardless, and the fans will come along”?

Kira: I think it’s really interesting because if you look at any artist that’s out there, they all kind of reinvent themselves along the way, and you might lose fans, but the majority of people, if it’s a well-received song or EP or album, will go, “Hold on a minute, that’s cool. I like this version of this artist.” It doesn’t take away from anything they’ve done before. You can think of any artist out there – like Ariana Grande, Beyoncé, Bring Me the Horizon – any band that’s changed over the course of their career, and I think you do take the majority of your fanbase with you if you have that core element still left. But, obviously, we’ll take anything that people say into consideration, in general. Like, we love to hear our feedback – especially at live shows, we get a lot of people offering us feedback – and that’s amazing to bear in mind, but, at the end of the day, if something feels right and you are making a change as an artist, then hopefully it’s for the better and hopefully a lot of people will follow along with you and see it as you’re growing rather than you’re changing, if that makes sense.

Yeah, totally. Yeah, I think, also, one thing that’s beneficial now – and I guess you guys are examples of it – we are living in an era where people have so much music at their fingertips that it seems ridiculous that anybody would just conceal themselves to a single genre or a single mode of listening, and I think, in some ways, it is good because it’s making art and music a lot more interesting because people feel that they have that room for experimentation, and branching off, and trying new things, and spicing things up, even between songs on a single record. I think people are a lot more receptive to that than they may have been before, where if you bought a CD or an album, there was a financial risk of, “Will I like this? I should probably just stick to something I know I’ll like.” But now, because I think a lot of that risk is gone and people can listen to stuff with relative ease, it’s diminished a lot of that. Do you find that’s a knock-on effect of the modern era?

Kira: I think a perfect example of that is a band that we all really like, which is Sleep Token. I feel like they are a band that’s really hard to put in a box, and that is exactly what we’ve started striving for. We’ve not really cared about being genre-conforming, and I feel like it’s a really good thing. Like you said, you’re not going to get the same music over and over. People used to stick to one thing, but now, just because it’s so accessible, I think people are more willing to hear out new bands, and especially if they have that spark to them, it just gives them something they haven’t heard a million times before. And listening to Sleep Token, especially their most recent album, is definitely something we’ve taken into consideration. They’re not just rock, they’re not just electronic, the melodies aren’t just pop; they’re just Sleep Token! And I think that’s what we’d like to get to in the end, is explore for a bit longer and continue exploring for the rest of our career, but we’d like to settle on, “What is ANIIMALIA, and what do we want that to become over the course of our career?”

ANIIMALIA’s recent EP, Carousel, is on all streaming platforms now. You can keep up with any updates on their career through their Linktree.

Aaron Kavanagh

Aaron Kavanagh is the Founder and Editor-in-Chief of Post-Burnout. His writing can also be found in the Irish Daily Star, Buzz.ie, Totally Dublin, The GOO, Headstuff, New Noise Magazine, XS Noize, DSCVRD and more.