Treasureseason is a musical duo made up of David Powell and Jess Bartlet. They make saturated soundscapes with electro pop vibes. On October 3, they played The Old Blue Last in London.
Tell us a bit about yourselves. We’re David Powell and Jess Bartlet and together make up treasureseason. We make electronic pop, kind of inspired by lots of lo-fi resampling and an influence of palpable 80’s soundtracks amongst other things.
How long have you lived in your cities and what brought you there? We both studied at UEA in Norwich, which is kind of how we met. Dave had heard some of my other material on Soundcloud and was looking for a new singer. I heard the tracks, loved the sound and really wanted to get on board, so we arranged to have a jam. Norwich has a decent live music scene and lots of independent venues etc, so a great place to go to University. Dave’s still based there for now, although I’ve moved to London. We have lots of gigs in London, so it’s pretty convenient!
How has living in your current city affected your music? It’s funny because you can really notice the difference in the sound when Dave was based in San Francisco; everything had much more of a chillwave, dreamy, lo-fi element, whereas the new EP ‘Julep’ is more accessible electronic indie/pop I guess. We’re still influenced a lot by traveling, but I think London has had a big influence on us this year. I mean you only have to listen to ‘The City’ .
What are some of your recent projects you’re working on? We’ve just finished our new EP, which has taken us more time than expected, but I guess that’s always the way! In the mean time we’ve been gigging a lot as well, but it’s kind of exciting to finally have new music on the horizon. We also have some great gigs ahead this year, so all in all, lots to look forward too!
What other bands/musicians are you interested in right now? I think we both have a really eclectic taste in music. I guess some of our current influences as treasureseason come from bands like CHVRCHES, Naked and Famous, Haim and St Lucia, as well as a load of the classic 80s soundtracks.
How did your interest in music begin? I think we’ve both learnt a number of different instruments from a young age, but it wasn’t until much later that we really got into electronic stuff though, and it’s made things interesting in terms of our live set-up.
Can you share one of the best or worst reactions you have gotten as a result of your music? We played Truck Festival in Oxford this year, and had a crazy positive response from people. It was so nice, people were just randomly coming up to us, being super complimentary and hugging us! I think that’s been one of our favorite gigs this summer, and we met loads of really cool people there as well.
