Fin and I first met at a house party four years ago. He'd just been to see The XX at Maida Vale studios earlier that day, so was feeling musically inspired to start something new. Although we didn't form THIEF that year, we began sending each other music we liked and kept in contact while I was studying at Sussex Uni in Brighton and he was DJing and running club nights in London. As soon as I moved back to London after finishing my degree in 2012, we started THIEF. We knew we wanted our music to be inspired by the electronic dance music Fin was DJing, but also something that you could switch on and relax to.
We drew on the past in order to move forward. Growing up I loved dancing around the kitchen with my mum and sister to early 90's 'soul diva' compilations. We loved Janet Jackson, Soul II Soul, CeCe Peniston, En Vogue, Sade and anything that had a groove and a great vocal delivery. The first music I was listening to as a child is still the type of music that inspires me today. Although our music is contained within the electronic pop genre, we make nostalgic references to the past through our vocal melodies and references to garage, house and trip hop. Massive Attack but also newer bands like SBTRKT and Purity Ring inspire the production. We try to keep the production simple, with vocal melodies being the driving force behind each song. We maintain this simplicity on stage as well: Fin plays keyboards and drums while I sing. It is the emotion of the delivery that drives each performance, along with lighting and a direct performance style. Fin and myself write the songs so they're quite personal which means we can deliver them in an honest way. The themes that tend to preoccupy us are love, lust and loss. We want the songs to say things you can't say out loud, things that you wouldn't necessarily feel so comfortable saying with such honesty.
In November we were able to work with the producer Mark Ralph on three tracks. We released one of those tracks, Friend Lover, on our Soundcloud page. Friend Lover really demonstrates our love of garage and explores the themes of desire and unrequited love. We'll be releasing more songs over the coming months so keep checking back. If you'd like to catch us live we'll be playing the Queen of Hoxton on the 22 February and The Nest on 15 March.