Indie-pop trio Tors are firmly in the ascendancy, their gift for sumptuous vocal harmonies and immediately enticing melodies leading to shows with Sam Ryder, co-writes with Declan J Donovan and Dean Lewis, and airplay at Radio 1 and Radio 2. They now add to their 500 million career streams to date by teaming up with Lily Williams for the new single ‘I Don’t Miss You (Except For When I Do)’.

Who were your musical influences growing up?

“Our Grandfather was actually a famous guitarist in the 1950s/60s called Bert Weedon, so we grew up idolising him, spending weekends at his house poring over his guitar collection and being fascinated by the rather alien, long haired looking people in his photographs (Brian May, George Harrison, Eric Clapton etc). He’d tell us about them and their music and play us some of their songs. We also listened to music religiously at the dinner table growing up, the Beatles, Nick Drake, Paul Simon and The Gypsy Kings were all on heavy rotation. There was a holiday we once spent in Spain that sticks in our minds rather prevalently too; we were road tripping for two weeks with a Queen Greatest Hits CD being our only form of entertainment, I think we could sing you the words backwards!”

Tell us about your new single I Don’t Miss You (Except For When I Do) and the inspiration behind the lyrics…

“We were fascinated by the universal denial we all harbour following a difficult breakup. It often seems easier to fool ourselves into believing we don’t miss that special someone anymore and that our erratic, lovesick behaviour is entirely normal and healthy. We liked the idea of singing the entire song from this perspective of out-and-out denial but tail-ending the chorus with the only honest line “I don’t miss you, except for when I do”.

How did the duet with Lily Williams come about?

“We wrote this song over Zoom during lockdown with the incredible Lily Williams, it was our first session together and Lily was in LA while we sat in our respective sitting rooms/bedrooms. I believe we were introduced by our manager Ann and we hit it off immediately, Lily is one of those rare talents you have the honour of meeting once in a blue moon. Her lyrical mind lent so much to the song and she challenged us to take it in directions we never would have without her. Also, her voice is like melted butter for your ears”.

Describe your music in 3 words 

“Heartfelt, storytelling, melodic”.

If you could collaborate with any other artist – who would that be?

“That’s a tough question, probably someone vastly different to us to make it an interesting collaboration – if it were any artists dead or alive then maybe someone like Prince, the man was a genius and the other end of the spectrum from us both sonically and in terms of his songwriting”.

You’ve written with lots of other artists including Declan J Donovan and Dean Lewis – how does the writing process differ when writing with other artists?

“Writing with other artists is fascinating for us because everyone writes in such different ways, it’s always a welcome break from working on our own music in our own particular fashion. Often we’ll be challenged to go beyond the realms of what we know and it keeps us learning”.

If you had to be remembered for one thing apart from your music what would you want it to be?

“Our pumpkin farm empire, it hasn’t begun yet but just you wait”.

Have you got any gigs coming up?

“We just finished touring Europe with Duncan Laurence and Sam Ryder respectively so we’re taking a little break but there is a very special show in the mix we’re not allowed to say anything about yet!”

By Siân Parker

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