Why Eastbourne was perfect recording location for Night Flight

The London-based four-piece features Sam Holmes (lead vocals, rhythm guitar) who grew up in Brede before heading off to Birmingham to train as an actor.

“I went to the Birmingham School of Acting for three years.

“And I was an actor for two or three years before I decided to turn my hand to music instead.

“Already a lot of the acting stuff I was doing was music-based, and I had been writing my own songs since I was 14 or 15.

“There is a period you go through as a song-writer when you start to think that your songs might be good enough to show the world. I was doing a show called Backbeat which was about the early formation of The Beatles.

“And I had quite a lot of time backstage to work on my own material.

“I was in the show from 2011-2013. I was understudying Paul and George, and I only got on as them quite rarely, but I was still in the show doing various other parts. But it was great because it gave me the opportunity to work on my own music.

“And so I went solo in 2013, and I was doing that for four years.

“I was playing with a lot of musicians and it got to the point where it was the same group of musicians I was playing with and we just decided to turn it into a band. It felt like the right time to do something fresh, and so from the middle of 2017 we became the band.

“It has been great.

“There are always ups and downs on whatever journey you go on, but we feel we are in a great place at the moment.

“We have only released EPs so far, but it has now got to the stage where we are looking to do an album. Albums are integral to our thinking.

“I am still a massive fan of putting on a vinyl on a Sunday afternoon and listening to an album. It is what we want to do.”

Inevitably, last year was a strange year: “The first initial lockdown period felt like a bitter-sweet gift in some ways. We had all this time and it felt quite creatively inspiring and there was a lot of togetherness going on. It just felt like a good time to write and to finish a lot of songs.

“But as the pandemic wore on, that enthusiasm was difficult to uphold.

“But we did pretty well in terms of keeping ourselves enthused. We went and recorded this EP in Eastbourne

“For one thing it was cheaper than London, but it also felt great to be in that environment. It was a residency stay.

“We were all staying in the same kind of flat block as each other, and we were there for ten days.

“It was great.”

The resulting EP is called Songs From Echo Zoo and contains the singles Something Going On, Dreaming and Canada.

And to build on the momentum, they have announced an October tour taking in Brighton’s Green Door Store on Wednesday, October 6.

As for the music: “We tend to call it indie-alternative, but that is such a broad description. I think it is better to talk in terms of our influences.

“We are all massive fans of The Band, The Beatles, John Martyn, Paul Simon.

“All the songs come out of that ethos of the classic songwriters.

“But the aim is to have a modern alternative-indie touch to it all. It always feels like we are a song-writers’ band first and foremost.”

Completing the band are Oliver Halverson (bass, synths, BVs), Harry Phillips (lead guitar, BVs), and Dan Webb (drums).

More details about the band on https://nightflightofficial.com.