Teleman

Trees Grow High is a taken from Teleman's fourth album Good Time / Hard Time released via Moshi Moshi Records on 7th April. It's their first as a trio and sees them evolve as a force of nature as they navigate new beginnings despite a wealth of experience behind them. Music and lyrical stream of consciousness entwined, the album makes sense of a world in chaos and its words of wisdom are a vital reminder that even when things seem heavy, life is precious. “Nature can teach us so much about patience and how you can’t control everything - you just have to let things happen as it intends… it’s great therapy,” tells the band’s singer and guitarist, Thomas Sanders whose garden-dwelling and park strolls to the studio have inevitably wormed their way into Teleman’s songwriting. “I was reading about forests and how trees help each other, they don’t survive on their own, they grow together… as a band we’ve now grown into each other as a triangle shape after having been a square for so long.” New track ‘Trees Grow High’ furthers this notion, commenting on how our childhood experiences can shape our adult life. “Here’s a track for anyone who had a strange or difficult childhood.” Tom explains. “The chances are you’ll be drawn to someone else with similar experiences, for better or for worse, and this song paints a picture of two people in that situation.” “I often find myself going back to early life experiences when I’m writing lyrics, maybe it's a way of understanding the meaning of childhood. The imagery of ‘trees grow high’ came to me as I imagined a forest of trees like a family or group of friends growing together and supporting, leaning on each other. A solitary tree is much less likely to thrive or even survive, especially when the storms come.” About the video, director prehuman (Jonny Sanders) explains: "I've wanted to make this camcorder + old school TV screen idea for some time and when Tom suggested we make Trees Grow High with camcorders it seemed perfect. When we were younger we used to make videos with these exact cameras so it was a trip down memory lane. I came up with the performance elements and Tom added the more nostalgic day out with the kids filming each other as they adventure through the woods." Tom adds, "I like how the starting point for the video was simply 'lets do something with these old camcorders'. Sometimes it's nice to let the medium be the starting point. It tied in perfectly with the vibe of the song with the lyrics talking about childhood and growing up, and we immediately had this whole 90s nostalgic vibe in place. It's actually really nice to be restricted by things like tape length and battery life... We got to the end of the tapes and said 'ok, that's it- tapes finished! Let's go home and watch it.' Obviously there are lots of popular filters on instagram and tiktok that re-create the camcorder look, but it's great to use the real thing."