The sounds of Nebula Sun are rooted in psychedelia, energy, and a fusion of inspirations. The Norwich-based quintet have just released their debut album, Breath Into Form, which was recorded in a DIY studio, deep in the Norfolk countryside. I caught up with guitarist Tommy Jonson about their journey making the album, and what has inspired and influenced them as both a collective and a group of friends.
“We’re always writing, so we never set out to ‘write an album’,” Tommy tells me. “We just started recording our favourite songs from our live set at that time. The concept of the album was simply to capture who we were as a band at the time we were recording it. We set up a DIY studio on a piece of land out in the Norfolk countryside and slowly recorded everything over the space of roughly a year,” he continues. “The whole thing has been a massive learning process; with money being tight, we did everything ourselves – apart from mixing, mastering and the cover painting.”
The main intention for Nebula Sun going into this project centred capturing energy, evolving their sound, and exploring their respective musical tastes. “This album was all about making something that held all the energy and feeling from our live shows,” Tommy explains, “whilst also being a project we could expand our creative ideas with and inject lots of interesting layers, production and sound design. Although the record was made for anyone to be listened to anywhere, it was always going to be an album for true music lovers who will spend the time deep diving into the music and going on a journey with it.”
The album is certainly a sonic journey: a journey which began long before the sounds now reach your ears. “The process began long before we hit record. A couple of years earlier, we started by building our studio from the empty shell of an old farm building, which in itself was a journey. Finishing it felt like a proud milestone. When we finally began recording, it was tough at first. We were determined to get everything sounding right, which made the process painstaking at times. The real pride came from pushing through those hurdles and refining our approach with each new track.”
Nebula Sun implement what they call an ‘organic writing process’, when creating their music. “It’s rooted in jamming and deep listening. It usually starts with one element: a riff, a groove, a horn line, and we build from there, layering ideas in real time. Everyone brings something unique to the table, so it’s very fluid and collaborative. The process isn’t about chasing a formula, it’s about feeling our way into the sound together and letting the song emerge naturally.”
A creative process centred around collaboration is not without its difficulties, as Nebula Sun realised throughout the creation of this project. “One of the biggest challenges is the time and patience it requires,” Tommy continues. “When you’re creating something collectively, there can be creative friction or moments of uncertainty about where it’s going. But that tension often leads to breakthroughs. We’ve learned to trust the process even when it feels chaotic because the songs that come out of it always feel more alive – more meaningful. This approach pushes us to evolve as musicians and as a band. It’s not the fastest way to write, but it brings out our best work because it reflects who we are individually and together.”
From the first chords in opening track Master Healer, much of the the album is guitar-driven, pulsating and rock influenced. In other places, such as Radio Child and Traces, there are indicators of a more jazzy rooting, with groovy horn lines, chants and solos – and in others, there is a furious frenzy of noise, such as in Reflections.
These wide range of elements from jazz, funk and soul, to psychadelia, grunge and rock, is thanks to the amalgamation of the band’s diverse tastes and personalities. “We don’t really have specific influences as a band,” Tommy tells me. “We are five individuals who all bring our own influences, and try to play like ourselves. The combination is what creates our sound. There are overlaps of course, but we don’t all listen to the same music. “
“Azzy and I have spent time learning Batu rhythms from the Caribbean, and Dave had a bit of a folk phase – which led some of the horn lines to sound like Christmas carols.”
“Rob has always liked lots of out there music, which added a bit of spice. As time went by, I got more guitar effects and started to lean more into a more rocky sound, and Paul’s influence from his indie-rock past started to come through more.”
There are of course some common shared loves, Tommy continues: “Folk music from around the world is something that most of us have delved into. It’s a subtle but important element that unifies our sound. Afrobeat was a major influence in our early years (as you can hear on our first EP), and whilst we have evolved away from that genre it’s still somewhere in the background.”
As you listen through Breathe Into Form, the subtle, shared influences are certainly present; tracks like Into Form have a certain afrobeat edge to them, whilst picks like Sonar feel very much inspired by folk.
Much of the diversity in sound and style can be traced back to Nebula Sun’s inception. Despite Breathe Into Form being the group’s first album, they’ve been creating music together for over ten years, Tommy tells me. “When the band began in 2014 the common ground between members was mostly around jazz, funk and soul,” he continues. “The first track we wrote together was a funky soul number with a bit of a hip-hop beat.”
“As we started playing together more and sharing music we began trying to emulate aspects of bands we were fond of – like Nubiyan Twist, who did such a great job of mixing dub, afrobeat and jazz. This fed heavily into the sound we arrived at by the time of our first EP. Even at that stage, our sound was never a straightforward copy of anything, which had a lot to do with the eclectic nature of all the musical tastes in the band.”
“With more guitar effects, we started to lean into longer psychedelic instrumental sections too. This makes the album feel much more deliberate than the EP. We had a clearer idea of what sound we wanted to arrive at by the end of the process, and we took lots of time to record and get a mixing engineer who could create the kind of sound we wanted.”
Another key influence to Nebula Sun’s sound is being surrounded by nature, and wildlife. “I think having our studio immersed in nature and having all that beauty around us meant we were always being inspired and informed by it.” Tommy tells me. “It was always going to weave its way into our music, even if we weren’t intentionally thinking about it.”
Nature and the outdoors are not the only non-musical inspiration to Nebula Sun. As you might feel through the muisc, myths and legends are another force which permeates through the noise. “Myths are incredibly powerful,” Tommy tells me. “They can communicate ideas that might seem impossible to the rational mind yet can feel truly meaningful and important to us. This idea of expressing both the ‘closely intimate’ and the ‘expansive beyond’ is something inherent in this album and our music in general.”
Discussing which piece Tommy would play to someone who’d never heard the group’s sound before, he tells me: “I would choose the penultimate track from the album, Radio Child…Part of the enjoyment we get from Nebula Sun is the freedom to experiment with genre and not feel like ‘we’re going to have to make a side project to play this with’. Mostly anything goes and we know each other well enough for it to always sound within our world. Radio Child is a good example of this process and if you like any section of the track you’re going to find others like it elsewhere in our catalogue.”
Looking to the future, Nebula Sun are focussed on the here and now, whilst still with plenty coming up to be excited about. “We love this album and showing it to our people and hopefully some new people is what we’re most excited and nervous for right now,” Tommy tells me. “With that said, the process carries on and new songs are sitting in the background. We’re getting to know our new rehearsal space and look forward to seeing what emerges from there. We are working with our Bristol crew, Diplomats of Sound, and are looking forward to building that relationship. We have an exciting home town (Norwich) show coming up in the summer with an absolutely flooring lineup for the Wild Paths festival which we’re honoured to be part of.”
“Other than that, it’s a case of checking our socials and your local service stations as we will be there.”
Listen to Breathe Into Form by Nebula Sun across major streaming platforms, and keep an eye out on their socials for details on their upcoming events and shows.
Waxing Lyrical 