In an effort to rekindle the optimistic attitudes that faded throughout the pandemic, The Gulls have been on the road, singing their songs across Europe. Whether they're filming videos at 4:30 AM or releasing their latest single, "Sanitation," The Gulls tackle global issues and infuse profound messages into their lyrics. Read on to learn how the band was ready to rock every stage and capture the hearts of new fans on this remarkable journey.

Where are you based?
The band formed in 2020 in Camden and since then we’ve been traveling up and down the country and across Europe pretty much non-stop. We live in our vans, and we usually don’t stay more than a few days in one place so we’d struggle to say we have a set base, but we have deep ties with London, Manchester and Brighton.

The members of The Gulls; Will Fairhead (Blackpool, UK), Kilian Aubertin (Nice, FR), & Tali Knight (Brighton, UK) are from different places, coincidentally all from seaside towns.

What inspired you to form the band?
The band formed just before the pandemic and we only got to play a couple of gigs before lockdown hit. When restrictions let up a bit we set out in Will’s campervan and brought music to the people, we called it our ‘Impossible Tour’ and we bounced around the UK and europe. Seeing people connect with each other and the music, after being locked away was very inspiring and we just never stopped touring.

Are there specific artists or songs that have influenced your band's work?
Leonard Cohen, Led Zepplin, Pink Floyd, The Doors….

Life on the road can be both exhilarating and exhausting. How do you balance music and your personal life while constantly moving from place to place?
We don’t; we leave a trail of burnt bridges and broken hearts and head towards a drug-addled future. All we are trying to do is play some music and see some friends amongst it all. We just try to make our music and happiness the priority.

We love your new single, “Sanitation”. I think a lot of people can relate to it these days. What inspired you to create it? What do you hope your listeners get from it?
“Sanitation” is a playful folk rock/gypsy anthem for all the dirty people that don’t fit into an overly sanitized society. We wanted to do a fun, dirty, singalong party song, and so, it was written in the back of the van on a summer's day as a playful response to the way the world looks right now. It’s like society’s got this surface level sanitary sheen, and everyones carrying their passport in their pocket on the other side of a screen, and buying plastic wrapped dopamine from who knows where it's been, and hiding their taboos and following the rules without asking what they mean, when we all know full well someone must be doing the dirty. Being a traveling rock & roll band living on the road, I guess you could say it's not the easiest for us to keep to the sanitary expectations of society.

We also love your song “Freedom”. Can you tell us a bit about this song?
Freedom was written at a time where even more of people's freedom was being taken away and the whole idea of the song is that if you want to make the world better you have to be willing to do it, it’s that really simple or are you going to give it away.

Your music often touches on themes of personal freedom. How has the concept of freedom evolved for you as a band, and how does it influence your songwriting and performances?
Everyone can feel trapped regardless of what they're doing and it's in those times that we have to remember that freedom is an attitude as well as a state of being. I think this industry can be very harsh and it makes you believe you don’t have the power. But once you start choosing to do whatever you want (putting on gigs in the street, forming your own convoy of artists, etc) you realize that sometimes the only thing in your way is your own doubt. If you end up breaking a few rules along the way, as long as it’s for a good cause most people will understand.

What does freedom mean to you?
Freedom is an attitude, you have to be willing to make your own choices and take responsibilities for them.

“Revolution” is a powerful song. Can you tell us the story behind this song?
Revolution was written during the beginning of the BLM movement. June 2020, in Bristol a statue of an old slave trader was rolled into the harbor. The song is about that and how people have the power to take back control and get things done if they choose to.

Your music has a very 60s/70s feel. In a lot of ways the world feels like we need to go back to this kind of revolutionary and more political influenced music. What are your thoughts on this?
We don’t really see our songs as political, we never sit down and write a song thinking fuck yeah this is gunna change things. I think it just comes from things that piss us off or we are a bit sick of and then all of a sudden it turns into a song.

We heard you pioneered a tour called The Robin Hood Tour. Can you tell us what this means? How is this tour different from other tours?
The Robin Hood Tour was a concept we came up with just after the pandemic. We were aware that people had been struggling, financially, mentally and we wanted to do something positive that wouldn’t cost anything for people to come to. We planned a tour of 10 cities in 14 days and set up big impromptu concerts in public spaces. At the end of each gig we invited anyone in the audience to join the tour with us. It ended up being way more successful than we thought and hundreds of people came out every night. At the end of every gig we’d ask for donations for the food banks and we ended up raising a couple of grand.

How do you organize where you are playing if you are not working with traditional venues?
We ask around the local people and we spend a lot of time scouting for cool spots. Because we live in our vans, we are in different cities all the time and we spend a lot of our spare time outdoors or out of the vans at pubs/cafes etc. so usually we just end up coming across some cool locations.

We love that you use these concerts to raise money for food banks and work with The Trussell Trust. What inspired these tours and your passion to donate the money to The Trussell Trust and food banks?
The ethos of The Robin Hood tour was to bring everybody together through music. Setting these gigs up in public places meant everyone could attend them, from all walks of life entirely free of charge. People who had the money were more than happy to stick some in the bucket, and help out their communities. And if people didn’t have the money to donate that was totally fine too, everyone is welcome to our gigs and the diverse array of people that we meet is great. People work their arses off everyday and are barely scraping by, if food banks can give them even the slightest relief when it comes to helping their families then we want to do everything we can to support that.

Hunger is a huge issue world wide. What would you like the lay population to know more about it?
I think we know about as much as the next people if I’m honest with you, it’s not comfortable and no one should have to suffer through it. We have a responsibility to care for each other.

What has been the most memorable moment on tour?
On the summer solstice we had a pretty crazy time; we decided to film a music video for our single ‘ Nothing's Gonna Stop Me Feeling Good’.

The shoot began at about 4.30am on the 21st of June at Stonehenge, we had an amazing time there and ended up jamming in the stones and meeting some fantastic artists and people. We then hopped in the vans and headed over to Glastonbury where we carried all of our equipment (including our full PA system) up the top of Glastonbury Tor with help form the locals and we played the most insane gig up there for sunset on solstice. It was fucking crazy and the sun went down before we could get the gear down so we spent the whole night on top of The Tor until sunrise eating some magic mushrooms with the locals.

When is your next show? Is it part of your Robin Hood Tour?
We are putting on a gig at New River Studios in London on Saturday the 24th of November in the heart of the warehouse district. It's our final gig in London this year so we are super ready to give it some.

Are there any upcoming projects you would like to share?
We are currently in the studio recording an album, which we are super excited about and on Thursday 26th October we released our latest single The Game.

It's been a crazy past few years. How have you been staying positive?
We are lucky in our lives that we follow our own pathways. None of us spend much time on social media/ reading the news or even watching telly. Since living in our vans we get to go out and live life through our eyes instead of through screens. I think we all feel that there’s so much going on all the time and there’s so much bullshit everywhere, to escape it all you have to be present and get your eyes off your fucking phone.

What is your motto in life?
To ask for forgiveness rather than permission, there’s so many silly rules around these days, most of them are absolute nonsense. As long as your intentions are good, don't be afraid to break a few rules.

To stay connected with The Gulls, please follow the links below
The Gulls
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The Gulls - Rocking the Road