Two brothers are making music in Berlin. The result: quiet sounds combined with beats that let you drift away.
How did you come to making music, especially together?
We come from a very musical and artistic family so music has always been an important part of our lives.
Leo always wanted to become a classical pianist. He studied music here in Germany and at the Juilliard School in NYC.
Rafa has always been into electronic music, DJing, and music production
At some point we decided to make music together to complement each other’s musical backgrounds.
What does inspire you to transform emotions into sound?
Inspiration can come from many things – a chord progression, some random sounds you play on a synth, a sample.. anything that sparks some kind of creative energy can turn small fragments of sounds into a full track. We tend to start most of our tracks by improvising on the piano until we come up with something that feels right and then go from there.
Usually we try to work on new music every day. It is a process and it is about showing up every day and trying to create ideas that mean something to you – where you feel some sense of urgency to keep working on it.
We don’t have a game plan on how to make a track – new ideas are often an accumulation of coincidences and happy accidents.
Your latest single “Phases” seems somehow so calm and reminds of a sunny ride in the „Ringbahn” through Berlin. What feeling did you want to convey with it or what image do you have in front of your inner eye?
To us, “Phases“ is a very ethereal track. When we made the track, all ideas came together very naturally. When we listen back now, we can still feel the creative energy from those studio sessions when we made the track. With each track, we try to explore something new that we haven’t done before, so it sort of reflects the current creative phase that we are in.
Since we do all music videos and artwork ourselves we always have images in mind when we make music. We like to incorporate our surrounding environment into our visuals – Berlin is definitely a recurring theme but also nature shots.
Why do you think music is such a powerful medium to touch people?
Music always takes place in the present. Once the music stops it keeps on living in your memory. We tend to tie feelings, places, or a certain period of time to a specific piece of music and when we listen back to that piece, it can bring back all these memories which can cause strong emotional reactions.
The music video of “Never enough” was made here in Berlin in the year 2020, which took away a certain lightness from us all, but your song doesn’t seem nearly as sorrowful, despite the title “Never enough”. Do you have the feeling that no matter how far you go, it’s just never enough?
You can probably read a lot into the title. Speaking from a creative person’s perspective it is certainly true that you always seek to unleash some of your hidden potential and find new ideas. There is so much out there in the field of music to be discovered, to be experienced. Knowing that you will never be able to finish learning new things, can make you feel “it’s just never enough“.
Music is endless.
How is Berlin an inspiration for you?
The music we make is strongly influenced by everything we are experiencing here in Berlin. We like the fact that it is very easy to connect with fellow artists and people from the music industry. You can learn so much from people who do the same thing as you do.
Interview by Carolin Desiree Becker
All pictures courtesy of Two Lanes
