ABOUT

The Day band photo

The Day are Laura Loeters from Antwerp/Belgium and Hamburg/Germany based Gregor Sonnenberg. Since meeting at ‘Hogeschool voor de kunsten’ in Arnhem the two keep reconciling distances, differences and always new musical approaches and perspectives.

The Day is where whimsical Dream Pop meets a DIY ethos learned from hardcore, which allows for Lo-Fi moments in production. A sparse, springy and rapturous dynamic alternates with a wildly imaginative dream-pop harmony, rock and synths create just as inspiring contrasts as great sound bursts and refreshing, reduced postpunk references. This is continued in the songs by themes that connect and contrast the private and the political as often as possible. In addition, the music expresses utopia as well as melancholy in its escapism and thus refuses to be interpreted in an overly fixed way. The Day is most of all an international long-distance constellation meeting an almost celebratory pan-European idea of unification (which sadly can’t be emphasized too often in recent months).

On stage The Day is a real 4-piece live band: drums, bass, guitar, vocals. .

The Day have recorded two EPs by themselves, and released their debut album ‘Midnight Parade’ in early 2019 on Berlin based label Sinnbus which made them newcomer of the week at Deutschlandfunk Kultur and album of the day on bandcamp. The band was constantly on the road, touring with the likes of Kae Tempest and Turnover, also headlining two succesful tours themselves leading to their first London show in October 2019.

Finding peace in the omnipresent noise, developing coping strategies, growing in the face of the outside world and themselves: THE DAY will release their second album “The Kids Are Alright” on 10 May 2024, exploring different shades of loneliness.

While Laura Loeters and Gregor Sonnenberg explored expansive worlds of sound on their debut album “Midnight Parade”, the band turns to a clearer but also darker and more serene language on “The Kids Are Alright”. After The Day were initially on the road more than ever before with their debut and touring all over Europe, a hard stop came suddenly, as did for everyone.

As luck would have it, singer Laura Loeters moved from Utrecht to Antwerp shortly before the start of the pandemic. What was meant to be a new start in one of the musically most interesting cities in Europe was soon mired in the monotony and uncertainty of the first lockdown. Without being able to build up a social network, Loeters found herself stranded on an island in the still unfamiliar city. In addition to all the other difficulties, the common bond also faces closed borders and different national regulations. For a pan-European project like The Day, there is simply no everyday life during the pandemic, no basis that allows them to work together in the same place.

“I was really lonely for the first time,” Loeters looks back. At the same time, she observes a shift in perspective: The Day used to have a penchant for escapism, for escaping into imaginative and surreal alternative worlds in which utopias can be sketched or simply a temporary escape is possible. Now, however, there is hardly any solace to be found there. The decoupling has reached its dark end. “It was loneliness of a negative kind,” says Loeters, “it was tangible, I was not alone with myself, but quite specifically isolated from everyone else.”

The feeling of inability to act that gripped many people during this time inevitably gave rise to other questions, bigger questions. Loeters explains: “The pandemic has brought about a change of light. What triggered it has remained, even if it is no longer in the foreground. The English word ‘anxiety’, which cannot be fully translated with the German word ‘Angst’, sums it up well. It also has a lot to do with an almost physical tension, with pressure, it is charged differently.” And of course, the poly crisis throws one back to elementary considerations. Loeters continues: “Am I right where I am? Am I doing the right thing? What about my family, my environment? Where am I in life, am I happy?”

More to reassure themselves, and simply to reassure their band, The Day begin to work on a series of tasteful cover versions (of which “Tenderfoot” eventually even makes it onto the current album). Loeters begins to familiarise herself with recording software and production. And after a long and gloomy phase, she starts writing again. “June” is the first track to break through the torpor, a warm, nostalgic coming-of-age song that tells of friendship and what was lost on the way to growing up.

Once in motion, The Day now begin the creative process under new conditions. Sonnenberg, who in turn sees working in solitude as more than just a disadvantage, says: “It was inspiring to get vocal recordings that were as good as finished. Before, we were both basically present in the room for every recorded sound. And now suddenly there’s a completely different immediacy!” Loeters adds: “It was a challenge, but also a cool discovery to do so much myself. I now had a much clearer idea of the music and the way of working from the outset!”

To this end, The Day question their set-up. Loeters only wants to concentrate on the vocals. Bassist Pauline Timmerbeil joins drummer Jens Golücke for the permanent live version of the band. A change that not only has a positive effect on the band structure. “The songs are no longer so extravagant,” says Sonnenberg, “They have become shorter for the recordings. In return, we now have more space on stage. The difference has become bigger and clearer. But also much more interesting.”

The much younger Timmerbeil also brings a broader view of the world and its future, which Loeters also addresses: “Why are voices that deny the climate catastrophe given so much disproportionate space in the name of balance, while the world is literally burning down? Why must the concerns of a few hundred people with dangerous views and dangerous flags be taken seriously every week, but not those of several million young people who want to take the future into their own hands?”

How social grievances extend into the personal is a common thread running through the album’s tracks. It tells of a lack of perspective, of the feeling of powerlessness. Of disillusionment and exhaustion, as in “Empty”. It tells of the feeling that important discussions and social trends are always drowned out in the general noise or fail because of gatekeepers. Pieces like “Sidelines” or “Parasite”, on the other hand, are about the search for one’s own position. About learning to deal with your own shadows. Finding ways to get up again, learn and carry on. In dealing with loneliness and the threat of losing control, The Day want to offer themselves and their listeners a place of peace and reassurance. But also a hopeful starting point to overcome isolation and inability to act together.

With “The Kids Are Alright”, The Day have recorded an album that, in its darker areas, photographs moments of uncertainty and tension in the midst of multiple crises. Its nostalgic traits serve to reassure and encourage. And which no longer wants to wait at its angry edges. “There is so much that needs to be done. So much that needs to change for this world. And then we always come up against limits and glass ceilings. We need to listen much more to the youth, to the new generation!” says Loeters, and Sonnenberg adds: “All those who are outraged are in the right. We are on their side. Anything that is a counter-movement is good.”

Are the kids alright? Definitely!

The Day continues to formulate their own version of pop music. A music that is intimate without being imposing. That is meant to connect and looks forward. Restrained, melancholic and always touching the heart.

Deutsch:

The Day sind Laura Loeters aus Antwerpen/Belgien und der in Hamburg lebende Gregor Sonnenberg. Beide lernen sich auf dem Konservatorium in Arnhem kennen, tauschen musikalische Ansätze und Ansichten aus und bringen Entfernungen, Unterschiede und immer neue Blickwinkel in ihrer Band unter einen gemeinsamen Nenner.

Träumerisch anmutender Dream-Pop trifft auf einen von Hardcore gelernten und gelebten DIY-Ethos. Karge, federnde und entrückende Dynamik wechselt sich mit einer wild träumenden Harmonik ab, Rock und Synthies schaffen ebenso anregende Kontraste wie abendkühle, reduzierte Postpunk Referenzen. Daran schließen sich Thematiken an, die Privates und Politisches genausooft verbinden wie gegenüberstellen. The Day spielen eine Musik, die sich in ihrem Eskapismus der Utopie genauso zuneigt wie einer gepflegten Schwermütigkeit und sich so gegen allzu festgelegte Deutungszusammenhänge verwehrt. The Day ist vor allem eine internationale Fernbeziehungskonstellation, ein fast schon feierlich ausgedrückter paneuropäischer Gedanke der Vereinigung (der gerade in diesen Monaten nicht zu oft betont werden kann).

The Day haben bisher zwei sehr schöne EPs in Eigenregie aufgenommen und Anfang 2019 ihr Debütalbum “Midnight Parade” beim Berliner Label Sinnbus veröffentlicht, mit dem sie zum Newcomer der Woche bei Deutschlandfunk Kultur und zum Album des Tages auf Bandcamp gekührt wurden. Sie sind unentwegt unterwegs, eröffnen für Kae Tempest, sind mit Turnover auf Tour, und spielen nicht zuletzt mit dem Album zwei erfolgreiche Headline-Touren, die sie im Herbst 2019 erstmals sogar bis nach London bringen.

Über das letzte Jahr hinweg hatten The Day nicht nur mit verschiedenen Lockdowns zu tun. Ihrer gemeinsamen Band standen zudem geschlossene Grenzen und unterschiedliche nationale Regelungen im Weg. Für ein pan-europäisches Projekt wie The Day gibt es während der Pandemie einfach keinen gemeinsamen Alltag, keine Grundlage, die eine gemeinsame Arbeit am gleichen Ort zulässt. Mit den Lockerungen wird eine Band, wie The Day die ihre sehen, nun wieder möglich. The Day haben nun einen neuen hoffnungsvollen Startpunkt.

Mit der Veröffentlichung geschmackvoller Coverversionen und mehrerer Singles öffnet The Day einen Ausblick auf sein zweites Album, das 2023 endlich erscheinen wird.
Die Band arbeitet hiermit weiter an der Formulierung ihrer eigenen Version von Popmusik. Einer Musik, die intim ist, ohne sich aufzudrängen. Die verbinden soll und nach vorn blickt. Zurückgenommen, melancholisch und immer zu Herzen gehend.

Laura Loeters and Gregor Sonnenberg alias The Day are a duo that not only admits their differences, but celebrates them with indulgence. Why else would a band with such a freely interpretable name call their first full album “Midnight Parade”? Aside from this charming contrast, one can also say that they are more contradictory than explicit. But that just makes things more exciting, as so often.

After all, The Day is where whimsical Dream Pop meets a DIY ethos learned from hardcore, which allows for Lo-Fi moments in production. An international long-distance constellation meets an almost celebratory pan-European idea of unification (which sadly can’t be emphasized too often in recent months). This is continued in the songs by themes that connect and contrast the private and the political as often as possible. In addition, the music expresses utopia as well as melancholy in its escapism and thus refuses to be interpreted in an overly fixed way.
As confusing as it may seem to read, “Midnight Parade” also sounds as vibrant.

Loeters and Sonnenberg once met as students at the Hogeschool voor de Kunsten in Arnhem, the Netherlands, and quickly began making music together. Their style developed steadily and over several years, while the two collected further residences in their biographies and finally landed in Utrecht and Hamburg respectively. Two EPs were released gradually moving them from folk and indie pop to postpunk, dream and synth pop. Now they have arrived at “Midnight Parade”, and the rich sound and style variety of this LP underlines a respectable development in ambition and skill, which generally only bands can show, who have been working on themselves diligently and for years.

“Midnight Parade” has everything you could wish for on an album from this style conglomerate: A sparse, springy and rapturous dynamic alternates with a wildly imaginative dream-pop harmony, rock and synths create just as inspiring contrasts as great sound bursts and artistically contextualizing interludes. “Grow” with its funky synth pop is a flawless hit, while songs like “Yet To Come” or “Island” with their refreshing, reduced postpunk open references to heroes of the Warpaint price range or the blessed The Organ. With “Berlin” the band dares to do more rock and more reverberation and reminds here most clearly of The xx, and so it goes on and on: The Day are sometimes poppy, sometimes serious, sometimes out of place. They can be tender and hard as well as abstract, and it’s this broad range of skills that makes their album so extraordinary and so good.

Loeters and Sonnenberg did all this almost alone. Both the recordings and the production were done by them, only the drum tracks were recorded by musician friends. In this context, their great video for “Yet To Come” marks an exception, perhaps even a turning point: for the first time, they gave the artistic direction for a The Day output out of their hands to the Finnish-French director Lumi Lausas, whom they held in high esteem. The clip is thus not only the first external artistic input for The Day, but also emphasizes the European idea that this band lives – and that one listens to in their music.

– Christian Steinbrink

Laura Loeters und Gregor Sonnenberg alias The Day sind ein Duo, das seine Gegensätze nicht nur zulässt, sondern sogar genussvoll zelebriert. Wieso sonst sollte eine Band mit so einem frei deutbaren Namen ihr erstes volles Album ausgerechnet “Midnight Parade” nennen? Auch abseits von diesem reizenden Kontrast gilt: Man stößt bei ihnen eher auf Widersprüche als auch Eindeutigkeiten. Aber das macht die Sache wie so oft nur noch spannender.

Schließlich trifft bei The Day ein träumerisch anmutender Dream-Pop auf einen von Hardcore gelernten DIY-Ethos, der Lo-Fi-Schwellen in der Produktion ausdrücklich zulässt. Eine internationale Fernbeziehungskonstellation trifft auf einen fast schon feierlich ausgedrückten paneuropäischen Gedanken der Vereinigung (der traurigerweise gerade in diesen Monaten nicht zu oft betont werden kann). Daran schließen sich in den Songs Thematiken an, die Privates und Politisches genausooft verbinden wie gegenüberstellen. Außerdem eine Musik, die in ihrem Eskapismus Utopie genauso ausdrückt wie Melancholie und sich so gegen allzu festgelegte Deutungszusammenhänge verwehrt.
So verworren sich das lesen mag, so stark klingt “Midnight Parade” aber auch.

Loeters und Sonnenberg trafen sich einst als Studierende an der Hogeschool voor de Kunsten im niederländischen Arnheim und begannen rasch, gemeinsam Musik zu machen. Ihr Stil entwickelte sich stetig und über mehrere Jahre, während die beiden in ihren Biographien weitere Wohnorte sammelten und letztendlich in Utrecht respektive Hamburg landeten. Zwei EPs erschienen, mit denen sich sie langsam von Folk und Indie-Pop in Richtung Postpunk, Dream- und Synthie-Pop entwickelten. Nun sind sie bei “Midnight Parade” angekommen, und die reiche Klang- und Stilvielfalt dieser LP unterstreicht eine respektable Entwicklung in Vision und Können, die gemeinhin nur Bands vorweisen können, die wirklich emsig und über Jahre an sich gearbeitet haben.

Denn “Midnight Parade” besitzt alles, was man sich von einem Album aus diesem Stilkonglomerat wünschen kann: Eine karge, federnde und entrückende Dynamik wechselt sich mit einer wild träumenden Dream-Pop-Harmonik ab, Rock und Synthies schaffen ebenso anregende Kontraste wie großartige Sound-Sprengsel und künstlerisch kontextualisierende Interludes. “Grow” ist mit seinem funky Synthie-Pop ein lupenreiner Hit, während Songs wie “Yet To Come” oder “Island” mit ihrem abendkühlen, reduzierten Postpunk Referenzen an Helden der Preisklasse von Warpaint oder den seligen The Organ aufmachen. Mit “Berlin” traut sich die Band mehr Rock und mehr Hall und erinnert hier am deutlichsten an The xx, und so geht es immer weiter: The Day sind mal poppig, mal ernst, mal verstiegen. Sie können zart und hart genauso wie abstrakt, und eben dieses breitgefächerte Können macht ihr Album so außerordentlich und so gut.

Geschafft haben Loeters und Sonnenberg all das nahezu allein. Sowohl Aufnahmen als auch Produktion haben sie zu zweit gestemmt, nur die Schlagzeug-Spuren wurden von befreundeten Musikern eingespielt. In diesem Kontext markiert ihr großartiges Video zu “Yet To Come” eine Ausnahme, vielleicht sogar einen Wendepunkt: Erstmals gaben sie die künstlerische Leitung für einen The-Day-Output aus der Hand, und zwar an die von ihnen hochverehrte finnisch-französische Regisseurin Lumi Lausas. Der Clip stellt so nicht nur den ersten externen künstlerischen Input für The Day dar, sondern betont wie nebenbei auch den europäischen Gedanken, den diese Band lebt – und den man ihrer Musik auch anhört.

– Christian Steinbrink