Morning Ritual

Description

Chartreuse, a four-piece band from Birmingham, England, is releasing its debut album, which is both folk and dark-pop, and always full of emotion. Even before the band was formed, Chartreuse was first and foremost the story of four childhood friends. Having grown up in Birmingham, UK, the Wagstaff brothers, Harriet Wilson, and Perry Lovering wandered between several musical projects before finally joining forces in what would become Chartreuse. The inseparable quartet then embarked on an adventure that was both folk and dark-pop, but always full of emotion. This bodes well for a promising future for the band, which embraces authenticity and makes it its strength. On their highly anticipated debut album Morning Ritual, Chartreuse found light in the darkness, sifting through the ruins of an anxious era to find hope. "There's a strange optimism in getting out all your negative traits, reviewing them, and putting them back in order," says Mike Wagstaff, commenting on the band's complex and beautiful writing. Chartreuse resists any definition. The four members from the Black Country have been close friends since university. In 2013, Mike and Harriet Wilson started playing folk music together ("We weren't good at all," Harriet laughs), and a year later, they added a rhythm section, with Mike's brother Rory on drums and Perry Lovering on bass. Mike and Rory live together in Kidderminster, West Midlands, while Harriet and Perry live ten minutes away. They are very close friends, and songwriting is an extension of that intimacy. In their songs, Harriet can sing Mike's lyrics, or vice versa. "It takes a lot of trust, because the songs are full of emotion," explains Harriet. Morning Ritual is a long-term project, with Chartreuse having perfected their craft over four well-received EPs and the 2022 standalone single "Satellites," a collaboration with Orlando Weeks. After experimenting with partial production on their previous EPs, Mike became the sole producer for "Is It Autumn Already?" (2021). But they had big decisions to make. Should they build on the tracks from the last EP to make a full album? Would they work with a producer or would Mike do it himself? They had more than enough new material to start an album from scratch, and Mike was ready to produce it. The framework of Morning Ritual was beginning to take shape. "It was a natural progression," Perry asserts.