World News Interview: "The Moment You Try to Copy Something Else, You're Stuffed"

Early June in Berlin is perfect light-jacket weather: a mild 20 degrees in the afternoon, dipping toward 14 once the sun goes down. World News—whom I’m about to see live for the first time at Neue Zukunft, a cultural complex in Friedrichshain—are in no particular rush to put theirs on. Backstage in the green room, four men who look as though they could be minutes away from presenting quarterly results are remarkably unbothered. Pressed shirts and loosely knotted ties can wait until showtime; at this stage, playing gigs is hardly uncharted territory for them.

Image Credit: Sean O'Shea

The London quartet already boast three EPs, a long trail of singles, and years of touring behind their backs. In the six years since the band first began recording together, its sound has meandered through dry post-punk, college-rock jangle, shades of Britpop, and the brighter corners of ’80s indie—picking up traces of R.E.M., The Smiths, and The Feelies along the way. Yet, World News increasingly sound less like a mosaic of their influences than simply like themselves. On record, their music feels architectural: two chiming guitars kept in careful conversation, a restless, melodic bass line, dry drums, and arrangements that are never in any hurry to reveal where they’re headed. Live, that precision unravels in the best possible way. Songs expand organically out of the instrumentation; extended intros and outro sections begin to feel no longer like detours, but essential parts of the journey.  By the time a chorus arrives, you’ve likely stopped waiting for it altogether.

In mid-October, World News finally delivered their debut album, In Purgatory, after years spent existing in the limbo between being a new act and having a substantial history. The record is a neat expression of their DIY ethos: released via their own Pie & Mash Records and shaped by a band accustomed to managing every corner of their sonic universe, it was recorded alongside producer Tommy Bosustow (mary in the junkyard, Porridge Radio) at London’s legendary RAK Studios. There, they committed the tracks to tape across a handful of full takes rather than endlessly assembling songs piece by piece—an old-school approach that suits a group whose relationship with the past has always felt affectionate rather than nostalgic.

Tape Wounds caught up with World News to discuss how In Purgatory came together, the chemistry between melancholy lyrics and life-affirming music, the records that shaped their guitar sound, and how a band navigating one of indie rock’s most crowded corners carves out a space entirely its own.

Humor is very important to us as a band. It’s essential when you’re crammed in the back of a van every day on tour or working away in the studio. It’s a way of coping.

For anyone discovering you for the first time, how would you introduce yourselves—and beyond who plays what instrument, who holds the unofficial titles in the band (like 'the designated driver' or 'the perfectionist' etc)?

We are World News. We play jangly alt-rock. I, Alex, play guitar and I’m the singer; my duties in the band include doing the main bulk of songwriting and being the go-to person for all things audio-wise (producing, recording, mastering, vinyl cutting, etc.).

Rory plays bass, and he is the rock of the band. He steers the ship and has got a serious business brain, but most importantly can split the G of a pint of Guinness 94% of the time.

Malte plays drums, and aside from being the engine of the band, he’s in charge of finding the best food spots when we’re touring and packing the tour van (he’s very much a perfectionist when it comes to this).

Jack plays guitar, and he’s a demon designer. He’s in charge of a lot of our UX stuff, but his main talent lies in being able to sleep in any scenario. It's actually a huge skill when touring.

We tend to share the driving between myself, Rory, and our tour manager Bert (shout out to him).

As a child, seeing the phrase “World News” on television always gave me a strange, almost reverent sense of something very important. Over time—especially as the global climate has grown increasingly bleak—those words have taken on a very different connotation. What does “world news” mean to you today? Placed beside the title of your forthcoming album, In Purgatory, the combination feels oddly, almost poetically fitting.

When we chose the name, it was the first name that we didn’t think was completely rubbish, so we stuck with it. It could be seen as a big statement calling your band World News; however, that was not the intention. I agree, we are living in very troubling times, and there are so many problems and issues that need fixing. It can often feel like we’re living in a purgatory world with what’s being printed in the news these days.

Before we dive into the new album, I have to ask: before you officially settled on the name World News, what were some of the worst alternative band names that almost made the cut?

We used to be called Tinman, but had to change it after people came to one of our early gigs and mistook us for the Austrian DJ with the same name. I thought it would be a good idea to change the T to a B, which would have birthed Binman—which, in hindsight, wasn’t the greatest idea. As a joke, we thought it might be good to incorporate the words “honey” or “moon” into our name, as there seemed to be a ton of bands doing well at that time; then I remember a band appearing called Honeymoon, which made me laugh. That's all I can remember...

Speaking of the new record: you released your first single back in 2019, but your debut full-length is only arriving now. To my ears, there’s been a clear shift from drier, post-punk rhythms toward richer melodies and bright, intertwining guitars—but I’m curious about what was happening behind the scenes, and how you yourselves have evolved as a band over that period.

We have always been evolving musically, and I think a lot of that has happened unconsciously. With the amount of EPs and singles we’ve released, there are easily two albums' worth of material there, but the vibe of the songs only felt right grouped together as EPs. Also, we used to be a three-piece, and since we got Jack in, that has beefed up the sound live—plus it’s always good to bounce ideas off each other. After we released the Mindsnap EP, it just felt like the right time to do an album.

If World News had stayed in Brighton, do you think the band would carry a different sound today?

That’s an interesting question. On record, we might have recorded at different studios, which could affect the sound, but I don’t think our live sound would have been drastically altered in any way. Also, it could have inspired some different songs altogether—maybe songs about a seagull stealing my chips, or how they started charging people to go on the pier (unbelievable). It would be cool to check out an alternate reality.

In Purgatory brings together songs written at very different points in your lives—some date back to around 2020, while others were written right before entering the studio. When you listen to the album as a whole, can you hear distinct versions of yourselves across the tracklist? And how difficult was it to make material written years apart feel cohesive?

It’s interesting because some songs were a lot easier to arrange and nail in the studio than others. I think the older songs were a bit trickier in the sense that I had to put myself back in that mindset. But when I listen to the album post-recording process, it feels coherent as one whole piece that we’ve all worked on together. It runs smoothly, and I’m super proud of it.

The album title suggests a fairly dark emotional space, to put it mildly. And yet, in terms of their arrangements, the singles you’ve released so far—“Everything Is Coming Up Roses” and “The Way It Goes”—are among the most joyful and life-affirming songs I’ve heard in years. What draws you to pairing heavier, darker subject matter with music that feels so euphoric, and how do you navigate that contrast when you’re writing together?

I write most of the lyrics, and I must admit I do tend to draw inspiration from darker/melancholic themes, but I like to remind myself that things are actually alright and life is a beautiful thing. I’m always trying to be positive, even when life throws some absolute curveballs at me. In a strange way, it's a bit like therapy; the darker things in life are things I find difficult to talk about, so music is an avenue where I can express how I feel.

Alongside the immediate hooks and melodies, I was struck by how the new album makes room for styles I wouldn’t previously have associated with World News—elements of progressive rock, shoegaze even, and heavier alternative music. What drove that move toward a broader sonic palette, and how did your individual personal tastes feed into making those distinct textures work together?

As a band, we’ve always been into these types of music. Bands like Yes, Pink Floyd, Can, Ride, My Bloody Valentine, Radiohead, and DIIV, just to name a small few, have always been in heavy rotation in our music libraries. We’re always trying to put our own spin on things, though. I would put it down to evolving as a band. I think we’ve improved as musicians and writers in the last three or four years, and we’re always trying to improve and put everything into the project in order to grow. Another thing is that we were experimenting with different instruments. I think originally we just rocked up to the studio and went with the flow, whereas now we’re a lot more conscious about which particular guitar, drum, or microphone should be used in order to get a specific sound (without annoying Tommy too much).

Bands emerging from the same scene often end up absorbing elements of one another’s sound, but I find there’s something very distinctive about the shimmer in your guitars. What records were you listening to that inspired the sound of the album?

I have my staple albums that I listen to a lot. Albums like Quadrophenia by The Who, the Jar of Flies EP by Alice in Chains, A Storm in Heaven by The Verve, Dire Straits' first album, and Jeff Buckley’s Grace, just to name a few. Perhaps that might shine some light on the way I approach playing guitar and writing music. In terms of current music, I’ve really been enjoying a New Zealand band called Ringlets, whom we got to play with when we toured Europe.

You have an interesting internal dynamic: two of you are brothers, two of you have known each other since school, and the full lineup came together over several years. When the four of you disagree musically, how does the final decision get made—and what triggers your most frequent debates?

On the whole, we seem to steer the same way musically when we’re writing/jamming, but on the rare occasion where one or two of us aren't vibing with what’s going on, we will say, “This sounds rubbish,” or “This is too similar to blah blah blah,” and we will try to work through it or change things to make it work. I think everyone feels they can say what they feel, and we try to leave egos at the door before walking in.

Having built a self-sufficient DIY foundation through your own label, Pie & Mash, recording your debut at RAK Studios with Tommy Bosustow is a notable transition. What did he hear in World News that perhaps you hadn’t noticed yourselves? And was there anything you had to consciously let go of to allow an outside producer to take the wheel?

Shout out to Pie & Mash Records (probably the best record label in the world). I first approached Tommy during the mixing process of the Escape EP, where I was about 95% done with the mixes. I wanted to get an outside set of ears on the tracks, and he made some tweaks that I really liked. You would have to ask him what he saw in us, haha! But he was really good at keeping our feet on the ground and making us feel comfortable in the studio so we could do some good takes. We were recording to tape, and I liked the old-school approach of “let’s do a few takes and go with the best one.” He effectively was in charge of choosing the best one; at the time, one of us might have thought a different take was better, but we would come back the next day, listen to them again, and he was always right. I don’t think we had to let go of anything—if anything, Tommy was great at listening to what we wanted and bringing the album to life.

Alex mentioned that the lyrics for “The Way It Goes” function more as a collection of thoughts and phrases than a story with a clear beginning and end. How central is literal meaning to you when writing lyrics, and where do you draw the line between using words to tell a specific story versus using them purely for their sound, rhythm, and texture?

I usually try and tell a story with my songs, and “The Way It Goes” is a rare song where it was more a case of fitting the right-sounding words in the right place. I really like Sting's approach to writing lyrics, where you come up with the title first and write from there, but I don’t always stick to that. There are so many different approaches, and I’m not a very regimental person.

On In Purgatory, a monumental title like "Purgatory" sits right alongside track titles like "Frog," "Vinegar Swimming Pool," and "Wet, Dry, I Can’t Fly." Where do names like those come from? How important are humor and absurdity to World News, particularly given that the emotional core of your music is often anything but funny?

Humor is very important to us as a band. It’s essential when you’re crammed in the back of a van every day on tour or working away in the studio. It’s a way of coping. One of the lyrics in “Purgatory” is “I think this place won’t serve us booze, oh no,” which is a pretty stupid lyric that I almost took out, but then I thought it was actually good because it diffuses the strange nature of being stuck in purgatory. It eases the situation.

There’s a very clear sense of musical history in your arrangements, but at the same time, you don’t strike me as a band interested in nostalgia for its own sake. How do you draw on the past without letting it turn into a pastiche?

I play and write the way I play and write, and there’s not much I can do to change that. I’ve never had to force myself to write or play a certain way; it comes from within. That’s what being an artist is about. Everyone has their influences, and for me, it flows out when I’m writing and making demos in my room to show the band. Obviously, there have been occasions where I’ve listened back or shown them to the other guys and we’ve gone, “Actually, that sounds a bit like blah blah blah,” and we ditch it, but it's never intentional. I think lots of songwriters have run into this issue at some point. But you’ve got to write what comes most naturally to you, and the moment you try to emulate or copy something else, you’re stuffed.

The current indie scene moves fast and can often feel quite crowded. What place or identity do you hope World News carves out for itself within it, and what are your biggest ambitions for what this debut album achieves for you?

It would be great to make a dent outside of the UK and be able to quit our day jobs and do it full-time. So hopefully this album is a step closer in that direction. You’re right in terms of the indie guitar music market being crowded, but we’re just going to keep making music and touring ourselves into the ground because we love doing it and it makes us happy.

If you could seal a message in a bottle today for the four of you to open five or ten years down the line, what would you write to your future selves?

“We hope the juice was worth the squeeze.”