Get To Know Get To Know… Folly Group

Releasing a rework of their debut single today, meet the exciting London collective.

1st April 2021

Hello and welcome to DIY’s introducing feature, Get To Know… getting you a little bit closer to the buzziest new acts that have been catching our eye as of late, and working out what makes them tick.

Recently we’ve met indie trio dad sports, Icelandic rising jazz star Laufey, Norway’s Red Moon, pop star Daya, and now we’re introducing you to buzzy London collective Folly Group.

After grabbing our attention with their incendiary debut single proper ‘Four Wheel Drive’, the group are now sharing their own reworking of the track, ‘Four Wheel Drive (FG’s Club Flip)’, which is inspired by the group’s love of electro and bass music.

“There’s no rule that governs how we approach remixing and repurposing our own work, but doing so is our expression of gratitude for our influences,” the band’s Sean Harper explains. “We let the pace and mood of the original inform what feels appropriate for the flip. I think you can hear lofty aspirations that aim to recreate a sinister yet playful DMX Krew vibe, and hopefully the way in which we’ve fallen short is interesting in itself.”

With new material set for release later this year, we caught up with Sean to find out a lil’ bit more about them.

Describe your music to us in the form of a Tinder bio.
Just here to make friends.

What’s your earliest musical memory?
The true, off-brand answer is leaping around the front room to Busted’s ‘A Present For Everyone’ with my twin brother, aged six, decimated by E numbers, having just received it on CD as a gift on Christmas Day, 2003.

Who were some artists that inspired you when you were just starting out (and why)?
Total Control’s ‘Typical System’ taught me so much about effective instrumental interplay between live and sequenced instruments in loud, fast musical contexts. I loved Loke Rahbek growing up, just about everything he’s involved with has been an inspiration, conscious or otherwise.

You’re from East London! What do you think of the music scene there at the moment?
To be completely honest, other than owing a debt to several venues for taking a chance on us in the very early days, I’m not sure we’re aware of what’s going on musically in East London as relates to Folly Group. If we’re associated with any scene it’s the one south of the river because we really honed our shit at The Windmill but we do what we can to exist in our own little vacuum and create independent of our peers.

Are there any other artists breaking through at the same time that you take inspiration from?
We say it every time, but we played with Modern Woman last year and were floored. Jennifer Walton’s latest for All Centre is a send. 404 Guild every time. Gary, Indiana, too.

Who would be your dream collaborator?
Changes every day! Today it’s Ben Frost because I was working to his ‘A U R o R A’ record (imagine).

Musically or otherwise, what are you most looking forward to this year?
Touring with Do Nothing, PVA and Lazarus Kane and our first headline shows in June. If all that doesn’t feel life-affirming after all this I will find a job in cyber.

If people could take away one thing from your music, what would it be?
I think we should take away my squawking vocals entirely.

Tags: Folly Group, Features, Interviews, Neu, Get to Know