Kat Harlton
Only a year after their chance meeting at a neighbourhood jam session, Ludic found themselves performing at some of Vancouver’s most notable music venues. Now, nearing 1 million overall streams on Spotify, Ludic has released a new single “Love Me Like” cementing themselves as one of Canada’s most exciting and fastest growing acts.
We had the opportunity to chat with the trio about their new single, songwriting and how they’re staying connected to their fans.
Kat: Can you talk about the inspiration behind your new single “Love Me Like”?
Ludic: The inspiration instrumentally was guitar driven. We had this really dope guitar part and couldn’t help but build the groove and feel off of that. It came together into this amalgamation of funk jazz and pop. When we were writing the song lyrically, it was focused around the feeling of “one sided love.” It’s not the kind where you’re gushing over someone but they don’t know it yet, it’s frustrated and fed up but not said outward. The speaker is struggling with these issues internally and it’s building up throughout the song. The fun and danceable instrumental exterior is kind of a metaphorical mask for the emotional content we’re singing about.
Kat: Can you talk about your songwriting process?
Ludic: It definitely varies from song to song. Because of recent events we’ve been sending ideas back and forth a lot and working on it remotely. This song was done in a similar way where Max started the idea and we each then crafted and molded it to what it is today. A lot of ideas also actually happen in the studio, as that’s where we’re most hands-on with the music it seems. Entire bridge sections and pre-choruses have been written moments before live tracking it in the studio which is kinda crazy, but super fun and exciting for us. I think recently we’ve been narrowing down on the type of song we want to write before we actually go and write it. We gather references and throw around ideas until we feel like one sticks with the direction we’re going for. In a lot of ways we already know what we want the song to sound like before we’re sure of what the song actually is.
Kat: Do you have any role models or music artists that inspire you? And if so, how they may influence your sound in any way?
Ludic: Yeah we have a bajillion artists between the three of us. I think the eclecticism of our taste is the most defining quality of our sound, because we find ourselves exploring so many different styles of music. We’ll go one by one just cause it seems appropriate. For Max it’s gotta be Prince, Hiatus Kaiyote, and Daft Punk as of right now. Ayla is perhaps the world’s biggest Jimi Hendrix fan, and thinks of musical heroes like Stevie Wonder, Aretha Franklin, James Brown, Joni Mitchell and The Beatles pretty much any time she plays music. She is also very into MonoNeon, Funkadelic and Erykah Badu! Anything that expresses freedom and soul. Rhett often enjoys listening to a more pop-oriented sound that includes artists such as Ariana Grande and Dua Lipa, but for inspiration around drums he’ll look towards Snarky Puppy, Butcher Brown, or KAYTRANADA.
Kat: You’ve supported artists such as Brittany Howard, Lawrence, Snarky Puppy and Catfish & the Bottlemen in some of Vancouver’s most notable music venues, and were also recently named top 10 in the CBC’s annual Searchlight competition out of 1500 other artists. What has been a highlight for you? What have you learned along the way?
Ludic: They’re all highlights for us honestly. Just getting to share a stage with all of those guys, who are our heroes, was definitely life-changing to say the least. It’s a great benchmark as well as an amazing example of how to kill it live. They each do it in their own way, but oh so effectively. CBC’s top 10 was also really special to know that people “up there” like our stuff! I think it just gives a lot of hope and confidence for us to keep pushing the project forward.
Kat: Obviously things have changed due to COVID-19. In the interim how are you connecting with your fans? What’s next?
Ludic: While stuff has changed in a live setting, we’re as active as ever on our socials. We did a quarantine music video for Love Me Like last month, as well as a fan video for the song, which was an absolute blast. Going forward we want to look to the future to help in any way that we can with what’s happening in the world right now. We have a platform and we want to use it to say all the things that need to be said. One of them being Black Lives Matter.
For more on Ludic visit: https://www.ludicofficial.com