Q&A: Koyal Inside the Making of "breathe in. breathe out"
INTERVIEW
INTERVIEW
KOYAL’S SOPHOPHORE ALBUM breathe in. breathe out is a vibrant tapestry of indie pop and rock, woven with threads of personal revelation and artistic liberation. Born from the crucible of post-college uncertainty and a burning desire for authentic expression, the album is a testament to the trio's unwavering friendship and shared vision. From the "spooky" atmosphere of Dr. Dog's Headroom Studios to the raw emotion captured in "half alive," a track that emerged from a 4 AM creative awakening, Koyal's journey is one of fearless exploration.
In this interview, we delve into the heart of "breathe in. breathe out," exploring the personal experiences that fueled its creation, the intricate production process, and the band's unique blend of musical influences. Pooja Prabakaran, Noah Weinstein, and Wallace share insights into their collaborative dynamic, their engineering-minded approach to songwriting, and the powerful message of vulnerability and self-discovery that permeates their music.
LUNA: breathe in. breathe out is described as a meditation on breaking free from various obstacles. What personal experiences or revelations inspired these themes?
PRABAKARAN: We made this record while Noah (guitar) and Wallace (drums) were in their final year of college, and I was in my first year working out of college. There was a lot of expectation for us to find technical careers, but we all knew at that point that we wanted to pursue music. There was this growing tension about what we would do when Noah and Wallace finished school. There were late nights, tough discussions with family members, but our collective decision was made. We were going all-in, and this collective decision really united us. As our friends were taking jobs at Facebook, Lockheed Martin, and wherever else, I had just quit mine - we were going to LA. The stress of that year for us, the faith we had in ourselves, and the celebration of each other is all baked into breathe in. breathe out.
There was another layer to this decision that was extremely personal for me. Growing up, I never felt like there was an artist who perfectly captured my experience. Representation is so important, and I’ve had several people in the past I respect tell me that the stage or the arts weren’t for brown people. I disagree, it’s for everyone.
Moving with the band helped me break away from these sticky molds that were provided for us and it provided fuel for some of the most emotional moments of the album.
LUNA: You recorded the album at Dr. Dog's studio, Headroom Studios. How did that environment influence the sound and overall feel of the record?
PRABAKARAN: Dr. Dog is a phenomenal band, and it felt special creating art in a space charged with so much creative energy. They had little pieces of art from their albums up on the walls, including a massive tapestry of their album art for “Fate.” It’s a spooky piece that we had to walk past every day for two weeks while we recorded. The studio was very charming, built in a warehouse a little removed from a nearby town. It got very cold during the Philly winter, and so we’d huddle in the control room a lot. Picture me wrapped up in a blanket in between my vocal takes
They also have an incredible selection of analog gear that they’ve built up over the years to influence their sound, and those sounds definitely transferred over as we were trying to hone the textures we were looking for. On our last day just as we were leaving the studio, we bumped into two members of Dr. Dog walking in for their rehearsal!
LUNA: Noah, you mentioned co-producing with Jeff Lucci. Can you describe the collaborative process and how you navigated the sonic direction of the album?
WEINSTEIN: Coming into our sessions with Jeff Lucci, I had produced our demos, so a lot of our collaboration was creating a polished final product based on the sonic direction of the demos. When we were creating in the studio, everything that we were recording was going through gear like guitar pedals, amps, and makeshift echo chambers as well as directly into the computer. So each time we were recording drums, guitars, or even vocals, we had so many textures to choose from. Some are straight forward distortion that adds grit to the recording, and others are almost like ambient sounds that feel like they’re reacting to whatever was being recorded.
The end result of these sounds make the instrumental track feel like it’s breathing with the vocals and other instruments. My and Jeff’s collaboration consisted of turning knobs in the studio and it extended into after the recording process where we all took the raw sounds we had collected and decided which to use in the forefront and which we didn’t need at all.
LUNA: "half alive" is a particularly powerful track, born from a moment of creative frustration. Can you elaborate on the journey from that 4 AM voice note to the final, layered production?
PRABAKARAN: “half alive” is a song that any creative who has needed to balance making art with a career that pays your bills can relate to. Right out of college, I was working a job that didn’t leave me any time or mental energy to create music. After about 6 months of living like clockwork and not making art, I woke up at 4 AM with the song pounding in my head. I reached for my phone in the dark, and recorded a voice memo for it.
The next day we put down some chords to it, and when I played it for my friends, I noticed that people were responding to it ardently despite its length. It might be the darkest song that we’ve written, but it’s very raw and honest.
Noah envisioned the song as a climactic slow burn, and he added production with a very beautiful tension that constantly keeps building. The tempo also changes through the song, like it’s a living, breathing thing. Wallace unleashes his drums right at the very end with all the instrumentation howling “set me free.”
In the studio, we added many more textures that we created through me screaming into guitar pick-ups, and playing various instruments into pedals that we then recorded through an amp blaring into a distant hallway. “half alive” is the most creative and inventive we’ve been in crafting a sonic landscape, and we’re very, very proud of it.
LUNA: Pooja, you created the animations for the "half alive" lyric video. How does your visual artistry connect with your musical expression within Koyal?
PRABAKARAN: The visual artistry I create within Koyal is to enhance the music, and it was really fun creating the animations for the “half alive” music video. We filmed it in a very bleak setting, a desert in the sunset, with the camera lens a little hazy to symbolize the song’s concept of feeling incomplete. This gave the animations a blank canvas as well. To draw attention towards the heavier lyrics in the first two-thirds of the song, I made the drawings very simple and muted. However at the end, the designs explode into a new, colorful, and intricate canvas every couple frames, to emphasize the crescendoing instrumentation and overwhelming emotion of the narrator’s desire to break free of everything holding her back.
I also created the bright and playful animations in our lyric video for “hiatus” and illustrations for each song in our breathe in. breathe out. lyric booklet! It’s meant to look like the drawings you made in your notebook when you were a kid and not paying attention in class. These drawings are much more pop, fun, and doodle style, and breathe life into the words. I love listening to a song and reading the lyrics simultaneously, and so I hope people will enjoy flipping through the pages and looking at the drawings as much as I do.
LUNA: Koyal's sound blends indie pop and rock with elements of disco and dance. How do you balance these diverse influences and create a cohesive sound?
WALLACE: What’s exciting about writing music is that you can take all that your ear loves and use it as the medium for your ideas. As a band, we coalesced around a few different sonic avenues and then used them to paint the emotional range of what we were experiencing in the year we were writing. A big theme was breaking free of the obstacles we were facing, and we couldn’t possibly paint the whole emotional space we were feeling within one genre.
In “we’re alright”, we chose this rock guitar sound to bring out this grand, sweeping declaration of freedom we felt being together on a journey, while in “hiatus” we captured the joy of being free of everything with this disco pulse. And we took on this eerie soundscape for “half alive” to really bring the intensity and set the stakes for what it means when you don’t have the freedom you want.
Also, there are many textures and sound design choices that tie together the different songs that are both audible and imperceptible, but always felt. For instance, vocal chops taken from the soft and reflective “alone interlude” are all across the club dance sound of intoxicated. Even the tension driven half alive and fiery gasoline have shared samples that Noah took from his phone, and many of the parts are played on the same instruments too. Using the same tools for different sounds can create a powerful common identity.
LUNA: You all met in an Atlanta college basement and have engineering degrees. How does your background in engineering influence your approach to music production and songwriting?
WALLACE: Back in Atlanta, we would rehearse in Noah’s apartment, which was an issue initially because it shared walls with neighbors. But luckily, we had this in-ear monitoring rig (a.k.a. “Riggy”) that Noah literally built himself which allowed us to practice for shows without getting evicted ;) Being able to tinker solutions for our hard problems has made us pretty adaptive, which is cool.
It helps a lot with songwriting too. A lot of the time when you’re writing a song, it will feel “almost there”, but something is either missing or extra, and you don’t know what’s wrong. I think we’re really good at patiently trying to iterate and figure out how to fix it like an engineer:
“Is it the vocals? Let’s try a lower harmony there. No, not working? Higher harmony? Oh, that sounds better - we’re missing some high end frequencies in this section. Let’s try to adjust the EQ on the bass to fill in the sound here…”
We all can get into that mindset pretty quick, and that kind of problem-solving can feel kind of addictive once you’re on a roll.
LUNA: You've built a strong live presence, including sold-out shows and festival appearances. How does your live performance experience shape your approach to recording and writing new music?
WALLACE: Having played several rooms in between our first and second albums, we’ve learned which songs really excite the audience. One rule of thumb I’ve taken away is that if a part isn’t fun to play, it’s probably not fun to listen to! Jacob Collier, one of my favorites, always gives the songwriting advice, “What music do you want to hear?” On this album, one thing we asked a lot this time was - “what music do we want to perform?
As a drummer, I thought about how the pulse or groove is going to feel in the room - “If I was an audience member walking in late, could I dance to this? Or would I be lost?” Whether it’s the chanting on “we’re alright” or the groove of “hiatus”, breathe in. breathe out was meant to be played and enjoyed live.
LUNA: The album seems to emphasize the importance of vulnerability and honesty. What do you hope listeners take away from the emotional landscape explored in ‘breathe in. breathe out’?
PRABAKARAN: Here are our top 4 lessons we’ve discovered while writing our songs.
You are a powerful person, and if you don’t like a situation you’re in, you can take steps to change it - “we’re alright”, “half alive”
You deserve to be heard - “gasoline”
Go dance with your hot crush - “Gravity”, “intoxicated”, “lotus lake”
Celebrate your friends, and being wholesome is cool B) - “bummer song”, “hiatus”
- Pooja & Wallace
LUNA: With the album out, what are Koyal's plans for the rest of 2025?
KOYAL: On March 11th, our “gasoline” music video drops. It will rock your boots
On April 25th, we'll play our breathe in. breathe out album release show at The Virgil in Los Angeles https://www.koyal.band/ticket-store/p/album-release-show-ticket
TBA Fall 2025 - We’re releasing a remix album for breathe in. breathe out later this year. Each song has a different producer from various cities around the US and also France!
We’re also looking forward to playing more shows, festivals, and writing more music!
