You’ve been classified as “guitar music,” which creates this binary of rock vs. pop and R&B. I don’t sense you buy into any of that.

CP: Pop and R&B is sick.

GG: We’re not trying to reply to anything. A lot of people think if you like one type of music, you can’t like another. But it’s not the sound that makes something good, it’s the melody, the rhythm. The sound is just the invitation.

Your singing voice is very distinctive, Geordie. Did you always know you had one?

GG: Not necessarily. I never sang when I was growing up. It’s not something I was interested in. I’m not a shy guy, but I just thought it was silly to do vocals. When I found out what I actually wanted to do with my voice, then it was a lot easier. With almost every guitar band like us, the singer’s doing the shouting macho thing. But when we started playing live, I thought, There’s no point doing something poorly that’s been done a million times.

How did you know that wasn’t your thing?

GG: I’m not a big macho guy, so why am I gonna do this Jim Morrison stuff? It’s been done better, and it’s gonna be done better. I wanted to do something more melodic.

What’s the earliest music you all remember getting into?

GG: I thought that song “Gay Bar” [by Electric Six] was a big banger when I was 6. I got into that game Guitar Hero as well as learning real guitar, and my dad lent me his Led Zeppelin and Black Sabbath CDs when I was about 8. Then he gave me Genesis, Pink Floyd, King Crimson. I was like, “This is badass, man.” So he was like, “If you like that, listen to this Miles Davis.” Then, when I went to school, my music teacher showed me D’Angelo, and I used to jam with my electronics teacher. He gave me Frank Zappa—we did “Willie the Pimp” at the winter concert.

Matt Kwasniewski-Kelvin: I used to be a skater boy when I was young, listening to Green Day, Sum 41, Good Charlotte. My dad was in a party band, and I started to jam with them, playing guitar solos over everything. But at BRIT, Geordie introduced me to different stuff. I got interested in harsh noise, drone music, Merzbow.

CP: I used to listen to CDs my dad bought me, like the Best of David Bowie, and the guitar music that was No. 1 at the time—Arctic Monkeys, Franz Ferdinand. When I got older, [I got into] that first Lady Gaga song that was massive, “Just Dance.”

Rest of the band: [singing in sync] Just da-aance...

CP: One day, I was watching these Johnny Marr tutorials online when the algorithm suggested some Congolese soukous. My dad’s best mate, from Ghana, used to show me highlife music when I was a kid, so we ended up doing some lessons in soukous-style guitar.