Australian band RüFüS made their first appearence in London this week when they presented their debut album ‘ATLAS’ at Shacklewell Arms in Dalston and delivered an overwhelming live show. The three members, Tyrone, Jon and James are now promoting their upcoming release, which will be published in Europe with Columbia Records in Spring 2014. After being nominated in Australia for a number of awards (including Triple J Award, ARIA Awards and AIR Awards) RüFüS are now touring across the main European cities.

Hi Guys! How does it feel being in London?
Really excited!

Tell us about ‘ATLAS’ and the production. There’s an interesting story behind it.
It’s been a really funny experience. By the time we started producing the album we were really happy with the direction we wanted to take. We knew what music we wanted to make. We physically packed up everything and set up a studio in a remote farmhouse on the NSW South coast. We were there for a month, pretty much worked on the foundation of the album and then we moved to the other coastal Australian area where we set up a new studio in a hollowed out water tank. There, we spent about six-seven months running the rest of the album, finishing it up.

Did your ideas change during the recording and the production?
We had a bunch of initial ideas when we went to the farmhouse but then we reworked them, we were very critical on ourselves. We didn’t want one song on the album to look “pretty good”. We wanted our album to be exactly what we wanted.

So, you would say that you are satisfied with it?
We talked about it last week actually. We all agree that there’s nothing we would like to change. What it is, it’s exactly what it has meant to be. We produced it ourselves; we didn’t want it to be just ‘ok’. We didn’t want settle for mediocrity.

Do you think there is a hit in ‘ATLAS’, one song that really catches the attention?
We didn’t make one song on the album with the intention of it being a hit. It was very much only for us. Realising the songs sounded more like “I wish that particular song out there was like this genre, these influences, that artists”. You don’t personally want a hit. And then, after this process we sit down and see which one we think is the best track for the market.

When did you realize that RüFüS was becoming something big, an amazing reality?
Everything started because we wanted to do music for ourselves. Then, after being together for a couple of years, more people started to like what we were doing and this gave us the opportunity to sit down and write an album together this year. And, yes, when we financially broke even. At the beginning, we weren’t making any money. We were all working jobs alongside. It got to a point last year where we could quit our jobs to make the album and really invest in RüFüS.

How do you create your songs? Is it teamwork?
Generally it’s a team writing. The cool thing for us and maybe because of electronic music as well, is that, it’s pretty easy to bunch up ideas together as a unit. If one is not feeling inspired, the other one can get on with initial ideas and we start working on them. All of us in a room talking about production, at some point we all have good inspiration. We try to put all songs we write in a place, like a little place, like on a beach, in a sunny place. We try to get this feeling across the song. And we did it for the whole album and this is one of the reasons that we called it ‘ATLAS’. It’s cool when you realize that the result is similar to all the ideas we got in our head at the beginning.

What do you enjoy the most, live performances or recording?
It’s like kids for parents; it’s too hard to choose the favourite one between them. We get an adrenaline-rush from both of them.

How would you describe your style?
It’s a mix of influences. We try to get across our feelings. A lot of people connect with it and this might be the biggest thing that people take from our music. We are influenced by a lot of European artists and then naturally we’ve got a lot of influences from Australia and the music that has grown there, so it’s probably a balance between these two worlds, which helps to become whatever it is.

After London, you are going to Paris and Berlin. What are your goals, your dreams? Where do you want to go with RüFüs?
Everywhere. It’s exciting for us that ‘ATLAS’ is now going to be released around the world. We really want to be able to play our music everywhere, constantly touring and hopefully next year we will get the opportunity to show people how we live our live performance as well.

Dreamy and floating notes, catchy dance rhythm and a chilled-out Australian attitude characterize their sound and their live performance. A shimmery production shows through tracks like “Sundream”, “Desert Night” and “Imaginary Air” where magnetic syths and infectious beats match perfectly with melancholic and soaring vocals. “Take Me”, is definitely the most catchy, international and danceable song. It takes just few minutes to get into the rhythm and be captured by the genuine and fascinating performance of these three young artists. On stage, RüFüS share their amusement and passion with the audience. The result is a solid texture of dancing bodies, which seem to connect so well with this captivating and eclectic music. James the drummer gives a unique substance to the sound and Jon with his glittering synths makes every song charismatic. Tyrone, the singer, has a versatile and elegant voice, which is able to slide pleasantly and elegantly across the harmonies and the changes in rhythm. Something in his gestures shows his ambivalent personality. His self-confidence and charisma are mixed with introversion and shyness that give to his voice a particular and intense texture likely to embrace the audience. In a small venue like this, you capture the humanity and modesty of these three friends that succeeded in expanding their music very fast in Australia and are growing quickly both in the US and in Europe. RüFüS’ sounds design extended spaces and slow down the perception of the time. You end up dancing with your hands in the air and your eyes closed, dreaming of some Australian beaches, feeling the coastal breeze.