The Electriceels is an indie band from South Korea, famous for their unpretentious, easy-listening music. Releasing their debut EP ‘Charging’ (충전) in 2011, the trio has caught the attention of fans in their home country. After their first full-length album ‘최고의 연애’ (The Best Date) in 2012, they decided to take a break before finally making a comeback with ‘너의 의미'(I Think of You) this year. We talked with the band that consists of In-Gyeong Hwang, Ye-Seul Kim, and Min-Hyeok Kim about various things, such as their song-writing process and their relationship with Eastern Sidekick.

Please introduce yourself to Indonesian music fans.

Hello, we are The Electriceels. Thank you for listening to our music. We are In-Gyeong Hwang, Ye-Seul Kim, and Min-Hyeok Kim. We usually do concert in Seoul, Korea.

What is the most unique thing from The Electrieels’ music?

Maybe, it could be some kind of the amateurism. We don’t wanna show off the playing technics and singing ability. We just try to concentrate on the basic elements of the band’s music, which we think are good lyrics and good melody.

What and who inspired you in writing songs?

Myself, family, friends and girlfriend. Movie, books, soap opera and TV news. We like to find tiny emotions in common routines. Not the special event or people, but normal daily life.

Your formation changed from a 4-piece band to a 3-piece band. How do you adapt to this change?

There’s no huge change on our music. Heizzy Lee is helping us to play bass as a session member.

After two years without new releases, you finally released ‘너의 의미‘. It seems that you took a long preparation for this. Any special reason why?

There’s no special reason. Before ‘너의 의미'(I Think of You) we released ‘최고의 연애'(The Best Date) in 2012, and it was our first full length album. We need enough time to perform gigs and take a rest.

Your songs are strong in lyrics. If one day your music is internationally well-known, will you change the lyrics so people will understand it easily?

If the question is about a translation of the lyrics, we think it would be impossible. There’s no member in our band who is good at other languages. We don’t wanna let people see lame-translation lyrics.

Where and when is your most memorable concert? Why?

We’ve been producing a series of concert, named ‘희망발전소Hope Plant’. The goal of this series is charity for the poor neighborhood. 1st Hope Plant was held in SangSangMadang in HongDae last year. And 2nd Hope Plant was held in Seoul City Hall this year.

In your last concert, Eastern Sidekick was the guest star. While in ESK’s first concert, you became the guest star. How close are you with ESK actually?

We are very close to fellow bands and good friends. We like each other’s music. In early period of The Electriceels we performed very often in Live Club ‘빵'(‘Bbang’). ESK was similar. At that time there were many cases of making a appearance together in ‘빵’.

If you could write a song for your favourite musician/singer, who would it be?

Weezer. We love Weezer. It could be a great honor to us.

What do you think about Korean indie scene at the moment? What aspects do you want to develop from the scene?

The prime problem is lack of fans in Korean indie scene. We don’t know the solution for it, but we just know this : TV has absolute power in Korea.

[The Electriceels’ official website] [The Electriceels’ Youtube account] [Twitter]

Special thanks goes to Soundholic Ent!