Start Listening To: Cutscenes

Cutscene discuss the making of A Piece Of Life, finding beauty in urban claustrophobia and carving out a space beyond the post-punk revival.

For a debut EP, A Piece Of Life arrives with remarkable confidence. Across five immersive tracks, Manchester-based outfit Cutscene weave together textural guitars, melodic hooks and vivid storytelling, drawing inspiration from the architecture and emotional landscape of their North East upbringing. Rather than following the well-trodden path of contemporary post-punk, the band embrace contrast, balancing vulnerability with aggression to create something that feels distinctly their own.

We caught up with Cutscene to discuss the themes that unite A Piece Of Life, the influence of Durham's imposing skyline, the stories behind standout track 'Shrine (Give Me A Chance)', signing to Heist or Hit and why they're more interested in creating emotional worlds than fitting neatly into a genre.

For those unfamiliar with your music, can you tell us who you are, where you’re from and about the music you make?

Our sound is made up of textural guitars, melodic vocals and driving rhythm. We try to create quite immersive tracks with storytelling that evokes a sense of urban paranoia interrupted with dream-like imagery.

'A Piece Of Life' feels incredibly assured for a debut EP. At what point did you realise these songs belonged together as a single body of work rather than a collection of singles?

It's hard to say an exact moment when we realised. It was a long process of listening to our songs and deciding which five tracks would be best to introduce our music first. After refining the tracks we assembled the EP, finding similar themes throughout, some of which were suffocation and place. A couple of these songs were some of the first tracks we'd written, so it felt natural for them to be included in our first body of work. It felt right to call the EP A Piece Of Life as the EP itself is an emotional arc and journey.

Your press release talks about moving away from the "lumbering masculinity of post-punk alienation." Was that a conscious reaction to where guitar music has been over the last decade, or simply a reflection of the music you naturally wanted to make?

A bit of both. From the start we've always written the music that we wanted to hear and didn't really concern ourselves with trying to fit a particular genre. It wasn't until we became more exposed to the current UK guitar scene that we realised we didn't exactly fit into the typical post-punk sound that's been rising over the past decade. We like the contrast of both vulnerability and aggression in the same song and try to mirror this in our tracks.

There's a real sense of architecture running through the EP, from 'Concrete Line' to 'Shrine', with buildings and places often feeling as important as the people inhabiting them. Why does place play such a central role in your writing?

Durham is an architecturally dominant space. The cathedral and church spires dominate the city's horizon, witnessing everything that's going on below. These buildings encroach on and shape a young person's identity. Beautiful but suffocating at the same time. Even when writing now, these silhouettes are stained into our subconscious, a faded memory of childhood. You can return to these streets or buildings years later and be flooded with nostalgia. We use these places as a way of exploring memory and change.

Secondly, we love the visual language of buildings and are obsessed with films which put architecture at the centre of the viewer's consciousness. Man with a Movie Camera literally takes you through a brilliant string of set pieces showing 1920s Russian city spaces, and we just loved the chaotic energy of that. 'Shrine' kind of tries to do that in a way, but with our hometown instead. We wanted to add a surreal feel to it, to convey the weirdness we felt as young kids running around this city.

'Shrine (Give Me A Chance)' imagines someone fleeing their own wedding. What interested you about telling a story from two opposing perspectives, rather than painting one person as right or wrong?

We like the idea of switching between perspectives to create a sense of madness and unpredictability. In 'Shrine', switching between two people on their wedding day creates a split personality effect, producing perhaps a more captivating live performance.

Also, current digital life can be corrosive. Scrolling demands your attention and you're constantly shifting to the next image. Perhaps this creeps into our everyday being, creating a sense of rapid change, and that makes you feel uncertain about all sorts of things.

The title 'Shrine' suggests devotion turning into obsession. Do you think modern relationships encourage us to chase an ideal that doesn't really exist?

Yeah, I think in the modern world you have these big stars that seem to have perfect, sugary sweet relationships conveyed through a manufactured social media team. However, the real, less beautiful parts don't get any spotlight and this creates an unrealistic view of what a relationship is really like for the viewer. I think what we were trying to do with 'Shrine' was convey the beautiful feelings one may express while giving equal exposure to the gritty thoughts involved in modern love.

Durham seems to loom over these songs almost like another character. How has growing up in the North East shaped both the emotional landscape of your music and the way you see home?

Yeah, the city looms over us sometimes in negative ways as we mentioned earlier. However, it's also a beautiful place full of natural beauty and that has shaped us too. This has always given us a crack of light in what is a somewhat hopeless world at times, a place to go for sanctuary.

Durham is a city surrounded by fields and natural landscapes but also huge monuments like the cathedral placed right next to big slabs of nature. For example, the River Wear runs right through the centre of the city like a calming balm. We would go down there and just hang out for hours.

You've already picked up support from NME, BBC 6 Music and Rough Trade before releasing your first EP. Has that early attention changed your confidence, or has it brought a new kind of pressure?

It has brought some pressure, but we welcome it with open arms. Mostly it has provided us with the confidence that our music belongs. We're really grateful for the early support and we hope that people enjoy the EP and future releases.

Signing with Heist or Hit puts you alongside bands like Her's and Westside Cowboy. What made the label feel like the right home for Cutscene at this stage?

One great thing about Heist is that they have such a wide range of indie artists in different genres on their roster. We don't feel like our sound necessarily runs parallel with any of the other bands on the label and we love that. We are more connected by the fact that everyone is so passionate and confident about what they do, and we're proud to be a part of that.

More than anything, it was the team that made us want to join the label. They care deeply about the music and are prepared to put time and effort into developing artists. They are quite active in the local scene and beyond, whether it's their monthly gig night New Cult or their work with Music Ever More and Friends of Her's, so it really was a no-brainer for us.

What do you love right now?

We love the connected grassroots bands in Manchester, nights like New Cult and Hot Take showcasing new bands, and Free Rider.

What do you hate right now?

There's too much hate in the world currently, but we don't like figures who pretend climate change doesn't exist. Also, the current rhetoric being pushed by political powers causing division in our communities, something that is quite common where we grew up and continues to be a widespread issue across the country. AI in music. AI in general. The job market.

Name an album you're still listening to from when you were younger and why it's still important to you?

Turn On the Bright Lights by Interpol. We've always loved the deeply hypnotic, cinematic and, at points, minimalist world that this album swallows you up in. It was a big inspiration for us while growing up.

When someone hears your music for the first time, what do you hope sticks with them?

We feel our music is deeply personal to us, whilst still being open enough for people to find their own meanings in the songs. For some of these tracks we want to create feelings of claustrophobia while, at other times, euphoria.

Photography By: Gracie Hall