Prima Queen
Words by Rosie Lowndes Photographs by Willow Shields
To begin with, when introducing the band, one would be well off with attempting to outline the colours conjured by listening to their discography. Prima Queen are whimsically poppy - the ethereally delicate Chew my Cheeks (one of their most recent singles) somehow manages to call to mind pastel hues - baby blue, pink and purple blending into a swirling soundwave, with slight undertones of a darker obsession.
The lyrics only emphasise this - centring on an unhealthy obsession with an idolised musician, it’s a heart wrenching tale of the pitfalls of placing someone so high on a pedestal, one feels like you couldn’t possibly reach them - something we all may have been able to relate to at some point or another. Music and musician lovers alike will be wistful. This melody of bittersweet pains is softened by the silky sounds of the rhythm. In fact, their whole discography has this effect; sweet vocals, soft drums and rhythmic guitars provide the perfect melodies for drifting through late spring hours. A dual reminder and promise of brighter days provides welcome relief from the cold and grim Scottish weather. If Prima Queen is pastel purple, Glasgow weather makes you feel disturbingly grey. They, then, blissfully provide a bit of light relief.
Beginning in January, we observe the activities of the year gone by, and it’s naturally been an exciting year for Prima Queen. Never ones to sit back, however, they look forward to an even more sensational 2022. Meeting and forming in 2016, they’ve been increasing hugely in momentum, storming London’s underground venues with their characteristic style - “combining vulnerable and nostalgic storytelling with lighthearted lyrical imagery”, and carving out a charming niche for themselves in new-wave indie. They are not, however, to be mistaken for twee. They are neither cutesy nor dainty. They are powerhouses who have been up to a lot recently, including making the music video for their new single, ‘Chew My Cheeks’, and they reminisce to me about their recent triumphs, including finding themselves on the NME ones-to-watch list - “It feels good, coming into the year, having this exciting thing happen so quickly. It’s quite validating”, says Louise, and Kristin agrees - “It’s nice because sometimes something will happen that we’ll find exciting but maybe you’ll tell your mum or someone, or friends from school, and no one will really get what it is, but with something like that it feels cool.” It’s high praise indeed, and one they didn’t expect. Making it even more thrilling is those whom they share it with - bands we all know and love including Wet Leg, Honeyglaze, English Teacher, and (Groupie alumni!) Lime Garden.
I marvel at how exciting it is to be on a list with bands you listen to and respect - it must feel very confirming of their progress in recent years. “Yeah it feels good - I always think when you see lists like that you’ll hope one day you’ll be on it.” In some ways, I suppose, it must mark their progress as a band, and they agree, concluding that “it’s difficult to know if you’re doing the right thing, or if you’re on the right path, and that can feel really hard and scary, and things like this can help.”
A question about stagewear leads us onto the real answers that the cowboy lovers at Groupie HQ are gunning for - known for their exotic choice of headwear on stage, Prima Queen have an absolute monopoly on the Cowboy hat. Only starting through pure coincidence, doing a Christmas country cover at the Windmill Brixton, “We were a Dolly Parton tribute band, and it was with Black Midi. They decided they needed pink cowboy hats for it and putting those hats on for the first time was a transformative experience. We were like, “wow, we feel really good up here. You put the hat on and you’re someone else.” Like a cowboy? I ask, enthralled; “More powerful. More mysterious. You can have it over your face if you don’t feel like making eye contact.” I agree - there must be a certain level of pressure to be extroverted on stage that would be difficult for those with more introverted tendencies. This, combined with the chaos of the crowd and all seven band members on stage, they’ve come up with a genius solution.
The age-old grandeur and pizazz of stagewear has many uses: even making it easier for them to relax and play. “It feels like you’re your room or something ... take away one of your senses, all your other senses are sharpened,” they assure me, “so with the sunglasses on, it feels easier to do harmonies.” This is maximalism at it’s finest - The bigger the hat, the closer to God seems to be a Prima Queen proverb. Despite only having moved to London three years ago, they describe it as ‘spooky serendipity’ as to how it worked out. Meeting at a songwriting course, their connection was seemingly instantaneous. Louise had been trying to start a band, but nothing had been working before Kirsten joined. Touchingly, she remembers calling her mum, “being like ‘yeahIi think she’s the one.”’ They muse to me about their favourite hometown haunts - ranging from underage boat-bar activities in Louise’s native Bristol, to Kristen’s reminiscing on the ‘sco’, her former student union in Ohio, short for ‘disco.’ I always find it fascinating to hear about other culturally significant subcultural haunts, and this sounds nothing short of electric.
They had a “big culture of house gigs, with the students living in old dingy houses clearing out the furniture, and having some big band play. If they were already playing at the Sco, we’d be like ‘do you wanna play another show the next night? In our house?’ And loads of people would come and the whole room would be packed. Me and Louise were standing on a sofa, hanging onto a door frame so we could see all the people!” And what do the rising Indie darlings of Prima Queen listen to in their spare time? Louise favours Matt Malteses’ new album, as well as, surprisingly, a lot of Polish disco. “My friend sent me this one song and I was like ‘wow this is like nothing I’ve ever heard before.’” From here, we get into a veritable wormhole discussing Polish, of which Louise can speak exactly ... one word of. She laughs as she explains what she learned from the magical world of the Web. “Dobrze. Only know that because I’ve just started watching the TV show Sexify on Netflix, with subtitles. It’s good for learning Polish.” Hey, a girl’s gotta have hobbies! Creating some of the recent year’s most fantastic love songs, picking up bi-lingualism on the side, it’s just all in a day’s work.
For them, the band is their marriage and their child, and “we are the baby mommas”. Kristen makes a poignant comparison to an actor from Gilmore Girls making a pact that they’d be never happy unless the other person was happy with the scene, “and it made me think about us. When you’re doing something together, it’s not about either of you. It’s about making both of you happy with what you create, and I just thought that was really nice. That’s what it means to be in a partnership. Being there for each other and advocating for what they need and want as well as what you need and want.”
We finish, the final question of the interview hanging in the air imminently and pressingly, a-la Tantalus and his grapes; what does a Prima Queen eat for breakfast? They respond to my query, keeping it short and sweet with a firm “Eggs. poached.” Bonding first over their love of food, the Queens eat a lot of eggs. And Tuna. “We love tuna”. For them, two-sometimes-long-distance best friends used to making things work on an international level, communication comes into contact with their eating habits - “It’s a big thing for us if we get out of sync with mealtimes. Often we’ll meet for a few hours where we’ll be doing music stuff, and it can be really bad if you’re on different eating schedules.” It’s clear to me that they’ve got their priorities sorted: remain close, have a good time, eat wonderful food and produce pretty, whip-smart music. For The Prima Queens, balancing all this at once comes completely naturally. Louise finishes on a tender note. “I guess it’s like, we’re very in-tune with each other. If one of us isn’t in a good mood, or if we aren’t really in the mood for a gig, or if you don’t want people to look at you, we’ll share the baton.”
Prima Queen know their look, their sound and their stuff, tinting the air far and wide with their soft hued, rosy rhythms.
