Interview: Milestones - GigslutzGigslutz

Two weeks ago, Milestones took over our Instagram during the filming of their upcoming video for ‘Once Upon A Time,’ We caught up with them afterwards, and a week after the release of their debut album…

Hi! For those who don’t know you, could you start by describing Milestones in three words?

Emo But Happy.

You’ve just released your debut album Red Lights, how are you feeling about it?

We’re all incredibly excited about the release of Red Lights, this is a record we’ve slaved over for two years now and with it being our debut album we couldn’t be more stoked to finally release it. Seeing people’s reactions to the singles has been especially rewarding too.

The red theme seems to run throughout – the title, album artwork and videos release. What’s the story behind this?

When it came to deciding the artwork and the overall theme of the record we always wanted something that would stand out, be easily recognisable and something that people could identify with Milestones. I think quite a lot of people will associate the colour Red with stop signs and overcoming obstacles, which is why we chose that colour in the first place. The album covers a lot of different situations in life where you may have to overcome those obstacles of heartbreak and failure to become the strongest version of yourself.

And the lead single ‘Paranoid’ has been added to a load of Spotify playlists, which seems to be the new way of gaging a tracks success (so well done!) It’s also suggestive of the huge shift to Spotify – do you feel like this affects you as a band at all?

I think it does affect the exposure of the band, being added to those playlists really does give us the opportunity to be heard by people who otherwise wouldn’t have checked out the new songs.

You say the album’s about ‘using the demons in your mind to become the best version of yourself you can be.’ Was there something in particular that sparked that being the topic for the album or did it just come naturally?

Something we noticed throughout the writing process of this record was that some of these new songs have a much more positive and uplifitng sound and message behind them in comparsion to our last release, so it only felt right that the house theme of this album included the vibe of those particular songs.

And how do you think it transpires in all the tracks?

As I’ve mentioned in previous answers some songs go into different forms of hardships and some of the tracks like ‘Against The World’ & ‘This Is My Life’ follow overcoming those hardships, I do feel that the message of becoming the best version of yourself does repeat throughout a lot of the record.

It’s also a topic that requires being quite open/honest – with loads of conversations around about musicians and mental health that seems to be quite important. Was that something you set out to look at or, again, did it just transpire naturally?

It definitely transpired naturally with these songs and the meanings behind them, I think some of the tracks do touch on things relating to mental health that each one of us in the band has gone through at one point in life. We’ve all had records we listened to growing up that have helped us with those issues, it was important to us that we were able to create something people would hopefully relate to in the same way.

On a lighter note, thanks for taking over our Instagram stories the other day for your video shoot for ‘Once Upon A Time’. How/when in the song writing progress do you come up with your video ideas?

The ideas sometimes come to us really quickly once we’ve finished the song in the studio, with Once Upon A Time for example, I remember hearing that song finished and Matt had completely changed the lyrics and theme of the track to the story of a kid having stage fright in a Theatre. We thought it’d be really cool having a full band play on the stage of an old victorian theatre and ideas for the video pretty much followed from there.

And what can we expect to see from the ‘Once Upon A Time’ video?

A lot of drama, a lot of energy and some mad shapes.

Finally, what are your plans for the rest of the year?

We’ve just announced 6 headline shows in March which I’m super excited for as these will be the first shows we get to play Red Lights, near enough in full. Another first this year for us is playing Slam Dunk, we’re playing 3 shows just after SD with Broadside too!

Red Lights is out now
See Milestones live:
March
15 – Think Tank, Newcastle
16 – Café Totem, Sheffield
17 – Asylum, Birmgingham
21 – Sound Basement, Liverpool
22 – The Forum, Tunbridge Wells
23 – The Anvil, Bournemouth
May
6 – Teddy Rocks Festival, Dorset
29 – Thousand Island, London*
30 – Night People, Manchester*
31 – The Garage Attic, Glasgow*
*Supporting Broadside