Fabrik joined the Anara Publishing roster in 2018. Here we chat with Shaun from the band about how they formed FABRIK and their thoughts on music publishing and sync.
1. Tell us about how you started making music as FABRIK.
We all had different routes into making music but the four of us drifted together over the course of a few years and bands. Other people kept leaving and we ended up with FABRIK. We’ve really been able to start working our disparate influences and interests into something coherent and, for us, very satisfying.
2. How important do you think music publishing is to emerging artists in today’s industry?
I’d say it’s vital. The whole set-up of the industry is completely different to how it was, say, 10 years ago. Because getting your music potentially available to anyone with a computer is so easy, the scene’s completely saturated. Income from streaming/downloading/physical records seems almost negligible. For emerging musicians as well, so many gigs are paid in a couple of cans of warm Carling and ‘exposure’. The money all going to the already established bands or cover/tribute acts. The only remaining way of generating income for your own music seems to be getting your music placed or synced in film/TV etc.
3. What is your typical songwriting process?
All four of us write and have our own side projects but generally with FABRIK, one of us will bring the bare bones of an idea (a chord sequence, a drum loop, even just an idea of doing something like a record we’ve been listening to) and then we’ll start jamming on that and building it up. Because we don’t have a drummer we effectively record the song as we write it too; adding and taking out and moving bits around and re-recording stuff until it’s ready for mixing. We don’t tend to work out how to actually play it together live until we’ve finished recording. At which point the song often develops again.
4. Describe a pivotal music moment for you in your favourite film, television show, brand partnership etc. Has this influenced any of your own compositions?
The inspiration for a lot of our sound is based on soundtracks or music we’ve heard in films or programmes and so we tend to think in quite visual terms as we’re writing and recording. Dystopian soundtracks like Blade Runner and Clockwork Orange are big with us (we sometimes use the theme from the latter as our walk-on music). The Massive Attack tune that was used as the theme to Luther has influenced us too.
5. Do you have any advice for aspiring songwriters?
Personally, I held myself back for years by not pursuing ideas I’d have because they didn’t fit into the sound of whatever band I was in at the time, or even the idea I had in my head that I wanted to write. Once you stop doing that and follow your instinct (and trust it), that’s when you start to find your own voice and things get interesting.