FAULT Magazine In Conversation with Miya Miya

Miya Miya have been hard at work this year, exceeding 100 million streams on Spotify and growing a loyal global fanbase. With new single Without Me releasing today, we caught up with the band to discuss their musical journey, their process and of course, their FAULTs.

What was the inspiration behind Without Me?

Miya Miya: It was inspired by that painful breakup we’ve all been through, and that the problem with this day and age is you can’t get away from it, as social media is everywhere, so when you see them doing better without you, it really hurts. We hope people can find their own way of connecting to it, and help them feel a little bit better. 

After the success of H8 Me 2, do you feel added pressure to live up to the success and hype around your previous releases?

Miya Miya: I think there’s always that underlying thought in the back of our heads that says what if the next song doesn’t do as well as the last. We obviously all love the song and want it to be a smash, but at the same time I’ve slowly become to realise it’s not about the numbers, It’s not about the song hitting million’s of streams, one of our favourite songs is a track called Cheap Hotel, by Leon Else, it wasn’t a global hit, but it’s a song that really resonates with us. As long as people resonate with the track we don’t give a fuck if it does better than the last one.

The track is a booming cinematic and epic break-up ballad – do you think being able to transmit those common feelings as a group enables you to reach greater levels of vulnerability as opposed to going through it alone?

Miya Miya: Sometimes when we’re writing alone it can be difficult to know how well others will relate to the lyrics. When we discuss things together and hear we’re all going through similar things, it can really help us not to shy away from ideas we might usually be embarrassed to talk about, as we know we’re not feeling it alone.

What’s been the greatest creative challenge you’ve had to overcome? 

Miya Miya: As a recently independent act we have had to be much more creative with our ideas for music videos, photo shoots etc and that has definitely been a challenge. We would say we’re now professionals at using the self timer mode. It definitely makes it more fun though and makes us think in a different way creatively. 

Another thing is that a huge part of our time goes into our live shows. It’s where we feel we’re really at home, and like to put everything we’ve got into getting them perfect. We’ve played shows in the past where there are probably 6 people in the crowd, but our fans are so amazing, it only takes one of them to make it feel like we’re playing Wembley!

Do you feel that the rise in social media’s influence on the music industry has helped elevate some of the stigma around Pop music? 

I think it’s sad that there has always been this stigma around Pop music, and that too many people it’s not taken as seriously as other genres. But with the rise of these platforms like tiktok, pop music has been used in every aspect of portraying the human experience. It definitely feels that it’s getting some more recognition from people that might have otherwise avoided it. Pop music nowadays has made its way into so many different genres, that I think the majority of listeners wouldn’t be able to tell the difference between ‘Pop’, Rock, Indie, Hip Hop. 

Are you quite strict with your song writing process or do you prefer to let inspiration hit whenever it might be? 

Miya Miya: We wish we could be! Often though some of our favourite ideas seem to always come when we can’t jump in the studio and start working on the tracks. We’ve sent so many voice notes around to each other singing ideas on the tube. When we’re in the studio and try to force an Idea it doesn’t always work.

What are you most looking forward to this winter? 

Miya Miya: Hiding in the studio away from the rain and eating Jordan’s mum’s mince pies.

What’s an experience you haven’t written a song about yet, but you’re dying to get down on the page? 

We recently got a call from a high profile record producer who said they wanted to fly us out to LA, all expenses paid, to write and record an album. We got really excited, but after a week of being ghosted we remembered that if something sounds too good to be true, it usually is. Expect a very strongly worded song on our first album. 

What would you say has been the best musical advice you’ve ever received? 

We’ve been fortunate to spend a lot of time working with Jonas Blue. He drilled into us that if we stay in our lane and stay true to our sound just doing it for the love of music, everything else will follow. 

What is your FAULT?

Being perfectionists. We put everything we’ve got into this band, but sometimes we wish we didn’t care as much as we do, and not have to spend weeks on different production’s of a track to make sure we’ve got it right. We wouldn’t have it any other way though.