Everything Must Make Sense! Inside The Sherlocks’ Most Ambitious Record Yet”

In a thunderous return that rewrites expectations, The Sherlocks are charging full speed toward their most ambitious goal yet: a number-one album. Fresh from the announcement of their fifth record, Everything Must Make Sense!, the South Yorkshire rock outfit sat down with FAULT Magazine to discuss how five albums in, they’re still discovering new ways to surprise themselves and their fans.

FAULT Magazine: Can you walk us through the creative process of making “Bones” and how tuning experiments shaped it?

The Sherlocks: Yeah, well done for noticing by the way. Tuning played a massive part in the creative process for this song actually. I don’t know how I arrived at the tuning I did but I wanted to have some fun with it and that opening riff was just calling out to me—it had to be lower… and lower… and even lower. I think it ended up being tuned down to like drop C. Which is mental. But yeah, as far getting the song together, it came together just like normal where I start it off and write the bones (excuse the pun) of the song and then the rest of the lads will sort of get it together. Although for this one, I do seem to remember all the parts were pretty much written except the middle eight and Alex’s solo at the end.

FAULT Magazine: With five records now under your belt, how do you approach experimentation in the studio? Was there a specific moment during recording where you felt like you truly broke new ground?

The Sherlocks: Good question. To be honest we don’t plan stuff too much and if it happens it happens. But like you say, there is a slight feeling of freedom that comes with it and sometimes you do throw caution to the wind. We honestly feel more excited to be in the studio than ever. That feeling never goes away because ultimately you’re in a space where you can create anything and make it sound however you want. That’s a really exciting place as far as I’m concerned. I think we had that feeling of breaking new ground a number of times on a bunch of different songs—that feeling of, “this is something new for us… it’s class.” We buzz off it!!

FAULT Magazine: The album title, Everything Must Make Sense!—how does that theme resonate within the music and lyrics?

The Sherlocks: To us, this album sounds quite different sonically to anything we’ve done before. We think it has a bit more of a heavier, driving sound. All the songs sound massive and have a lot of high energy! So because we experimented more with this album, we thought Everything Must Make Sense was the perfect title. We had to make sure when recording the songs that what we were doing still made sense for our band. We knew we wanted to take a different approach to recording this album, but we didn’t want to lose The Sherlocks sound that people already know us for. I think we managed to do this perfectly, and everyone will be able to tell when they listen to the full album.

FAULT Magazine: You said, “If you can’t try out mad ideas by now, when can you?” Can you share a moment during recording when a risk paid off in an unexpected way?

The Sherlocks: I think when recording this album, we did take a few risks and experiment a bit more compared to previous albums. Producer Dave Radahd-Jones pushed us all out of our comfort zones too. When recording, we would go through the songs a section at a time so he could tell us to change up the drum part or guitar part for this section, which makes the songs not feel the same all the way through.

Think the biggest risk we took that really paid off was with the song “Bones.” For the last three albums, we’ve decided we wanted to have one dancey song that’s very different to the rest. The third album was our first time experimenting with this—we made a club-style dance song called “Sorry,” which worked really well. So for this album, we decided to do the same, but we think “Bones” has more of a Drum ‘n’ Bass style to it.

We didn’t know how it was going to turn out. An indie/rock band doing Drum ‘n’ Bass? That could be a big risk. There’s not actually many guitars in the song—it’s mainly a lot of different sounding synths with a different drum style that we’ve never done before, combined with about four different bass tracks which we’ve never tried before either! The whole song is something new for us, and we think it turned out to be one of the best sounding songs on the album!

FAULT Magazine: How has your dynamic as a band evolved over five albums, and how does that reflect in Everything Must Make Sense!?

The Sherlocks: Obviously as a band we’ve grown so much as musicians and we had a line-up change after the second album. We’ve learnt lots of different tricks and tips working with different producers over the years. The new album certainly reflects this and it is our greatest album yet! Can’t wait for the fans to hear it.

FAULT Magazine: How do you balance creating something big and bold while staying connected to your fans?

The Sherlocks: We have such a great fanbase who have been behind every album we have done. The main thing we can do is create a great piece of work that we are really proud of. The Sherlock Army are always behind us! It’s always fun pushing the boundaries but there is a limit as to how far we will go. You won’t see us rapping!

FAULT Magazine: You’ve toured extensively and built a loyal fanbase. How do your live shows feed into your studio recordings?

The Sherlocks: We are a band that thrives off playing live… anyone who has been to see us knows that we are well connected to the crowd and that’s what makes the gigs so special. We’ve done the past two albums in between touring, so it’s always great to get in the studio and capture a bit of that excitement. Some of the songs were written whilst on tour in new surroundings—for example, the title track Everything Must Make Sense was written in Paris. The environment certainly influences the songs and sparks new ideas and directions.

FAULT Magazine: Looking back on your earlier albums and now at your fifth, how has your songwriting matured?

The Sherlocks: Kiaran has developed as a songwriter naturally and I think he’s getting better and better. The new batch of songs are very strong. I do believe the influence of all the band members makes a huge difference to how we shape the songs—we all have such a diverse taste in music.

FAULT Magazine: Last time we spoke, you said your FAULT was “overthinking stuff and being a perfectionist.” Has that changed?

The Sherlocks: In all honesty? No, not really. I’m still nuts about everything being right and feeling right but I have learnt how to just chill and let certain things be as they are. But it only comes from a place of really caring what it sounds like… it’s never just to be a control freak. I care what our records sound like. Not for other people either—for me and the rest of the lads so we’re proud of it to begin with. And if other people catch on and like it, then that’s a bonus! I think if you were writing and recording songs with too much thought of what the listener is going to think, you’d go nuts and end up changing it a million times.