St. John’s-area band lands label

Swimming’s first album set for release this fall

Their mutual love for pop/ emo music is what brought them together, but how they pushed each other creatively is what made them a band.

Swimming is a St. John’s area group made up of three friends: Liam Ryan, vocalist and lead guitar; Nick Hunt, bass player; and Jacob Cherwick, drummer.

Together, they worked to create something that is not only true to them but is also new and fun.

“Our first few times we jammed together it was just Liam and me,” said Cherwick. “We got together in Liam’s parent’s basement because he had some new songs he wanted to try.”

The songs they began playing together eventually made it on the group’s first EP, but back then, they had no idea where they would take it.

“We had a different idea of what we wanted to do but the music sounded so different,” Cherwick says.

COMING TOGETHER

Ryan and Cherwick met while attending the College of the North Atlantic and decided to jam. That’s when they realized something was missing.

Enter Hunt, the final member of the trio. Ryan and Hunt knew each other from high school and had played together in a previous band called Intern. Intern’s run was short because the group lost interest in the music they were playing.

“Because of our past and his musical abilities I knew Hunt would be perfect for the group,” said Ryan.

Hunt adds how joining the band later wasn’t that different.

“Since I had experience with Liam it was a comfortable setting,” said Hunt. “I learned the tunes that they already wrote and from there, it was like I was there the whole time.”

GROWING THEIR MUSIC

The band quickly turned its attention to sharing its music.

“We were going to local shows and we found inspiration from other bands in the city,” said Ryan “I remember we were walking from Peter Easton to another show and that’s when I looked at Jacob and said, ‘We could do this.’”

They decided there and then that the fuzzy sounds of emo music is what they wanted to create.

It was also on that faithful walk that Ryan came up with the band’s name: Swimming.

“It was something we put meaning to afterward. In the beginning, it was just a cool word,” said Ryan.

Creating a record was the next goal they set. Throughout the years, they released demos and EPS, but they wanted to make something that stood out.

“We had a vision board of how we wanted this record to go and who we wanted to feature on it and who was going to mix and master the album when completed,” said Ryan.

DEVASTATING BLOW

“About mid-way through making this album, we had a pretty dramatic moment,” recalls Ryan.

The group had about 15 songs completed for their record when their external drive was dropped and destroyed.

Everything they worked to create had vanished.

Instead of taking this as a loss, they headed back to the drawing board to start anew.

“There were a few songs we started before the album and there were a few tracks on my computer because Jacob’s never had enough space,” said Ryan.

“Then we threw another couple tracks together to complete it. We did do a lot of the original ideas we planned but because of the loss the album became more spontaneous.”

Cherwick adds that in the end, the stronger songs on the album were the ones created after the hard drive was destroyed.

Through this process, Hunt says, their growth as a band was special.

“We got to push our boundaries and hone in on the sound we wanted to create the second time around,” said Hunt. “It was during all of this that we found the true identity of the band.”

WHAT’S IN A LABEL?

After months of recording, the group was ready for the final stages of their album. They wanted the album to be as legit as possible and sent it off for mixing and mastering professionally.

“Liam and I engineered everything ourselves, meaning we put it together,” said Cherwick. “We sent it to Seattle for mixing and it was mastered in California by Jack Sherly, who has worked on some legendary albums. It was my goal from a production standpoint to make it stick out above things that are coming out here and other groups who make this genre of music.”

Although the trio was over the moon with the final product, there was still one step to take: they wanted to release their work through a label.

The group started sending their work off to various indie labels across Canada and the United States.

“There are a lot of small DIY labels that put out this genre of music,” said Cherwick, “A lot of these labels have put out our favourite albums, so we reached out and told them what we had.”

Ryan adds, “It was a goal from the beginning to get the album put out on a label that we were fans of first.”

It eventually caught the eye of Chillwave Records, which allowed the band to produce physical copies of their album in tape and vinyl format. Chillwave will also promote and release the album under its roster.

“It’s just super cool to be a part of something in the music industry,” said Ryan. “You’re forming relationships and building a community with these people which to me is more important. It is more personal.”

Hunt adds, “It almost feels like you’re part of this wave. Being on a label with all these bands makes an excellent discography for the fans.”

With the release of their first full-length album, That’s OK, slated for October 2022, the group hopes to tour Newfoundland when permitted.

In the meantime, they plan to continue their growth while creating music that sets them apart.