Silk Screens: Southern Shores – “Flashes”
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In our latest installment of Silk Screens, the Balearic-pop lovers Southern Shores (aka Jamie Townsend and Ben Dalton) take us through the process of creating “Flashes”. “Flashes” is one of the standout gems on the duo’s sophomore EP, New World, which will be available tomorrow via our good friends at Cascine.
The creation of “Flashes” started with two simple chords that we were fooling around with on guitar. We decided it would be cool to try to transpose more melodies and chords from guitar to synth because Ben is a much more confident guitar player. We set it out to contrast these two really easy feeling chords with big, forceful drums that would really fill out the sonic space. It was a very spontaneous and natural creation. We didn’t think too much about the song at first and set it aside, agreeing that it sounded a little too much like it belonged on a Donkey Kong game soundtrack. Sometimes you return to discarded ideas and feel like trying something bold, as if really upsetting the current balance might be the only way to turn it in to something truly interesting.
The second part of “Flashes” came a bit later, and grew out of a separate little idea that had no home. We wanted to flesh out our original loop into something that had a bit more of a narrative, that had a stronger feeling of progression to it. Ben had this guitar part that was sort of plaintiff and when we married these two chunks together they provided a compelling contrast. Now we can’t really imagine the two existing apart from one another, they’re very complimentary to us.
Introducing vocals was when the track really took off for us. These arrangements mostly came about by trial and error, taking snippets of acapellas and manipulating them until they felt whole with the song. If you listen hard enough you may hear some Janet, Deborah or maybe even some J-Lo.
The whole song was created with the intention of making something big, forceful, and wide. On New World we came to really love using 808 snares and claps and on “Flashes” we really tried to make them present, really make them snap and pop.
We were very happy to have eventually included it on the record as it’s one of the most direct songs we’ve ever made. Incredibly joyous yet melancholic all at once. We’ve been playing around with it live recently and it’s constantly changing colors in new and unexpected ways. We see it sticking around and keeping us company for a while. We really hope people play it loud.
(Curated by Flashlight Tag)
