London Fashion Week. That few days every year where the stylishly beautiful from all over the globe flock to the capital to check up on what kind of frocks will be adorned in the coming months. Models stride up and down the catwalk parading the latest designs from Mulberry, Thomas Tait and co, while the leading names in music, film and television glare in the crowd, taking note of what to wear and what to avoid. But tucked away from the glitz and glamour of it all is a hidden gem, a place that celebrates LFW on it’s own.
Beyond Retro is a clothes shop unlike those on the high street. It couldn’t be any different to them in fact, instead preferring to look back to the styles of yesteryear. It takes the best of fashion from the 20th century and puts them all into one relatively small shop, meaning whichever way you look your eyes will light up. There’s a whole corner dedicated to denim jackets, bomber jackets seen from the 80s onwards, knitwear from the 50s and 60s, the list is endless. Beyond Retro don’t look to the future for future fashion ideas, when they know there is still so much hidden treasure to be found. Which can also be said for the day’s headline act, Caviare Days. Effortlessly cool and suave, within seconds of listening to the Swedish group you will immediately feel a throwback to music gone by. A combination of 60s rock with psychedelic dashes thrown in and you have a recipe for good music, which is exactly what is made by the quintet.
Consisting of sister vocalists Lina and Maja Westin, Boris Grubesic on guitar, Marcus Arborelius on keyboards and Timmy Grimm Fredriksson on drums, together they recreate the kind of music that they were bought up listening to, as well as some modern twists depending on the music they are listening to at the time of writing. “We all spent a lot of time listening to the records our parents had when we were younger, and that has kind of shaped our writing style”, claims Lina. “But we all listen to different styles now and bring that into our writing, so we get the best of everything I guess”.
“We don’t like giving our music a specific kind of genre as we just put together everything we listen to into our music”, Maja states. “We just hope that people listen to our stuff and like what they hear, which makes gigs like these so good for us, as people can just come along and check us out and hopefully follow us from then on. As money plays such a big role in the music industry these days we just play where we can and see where it takes us”. Judging by the line up of people wanting to talk to the group after the day’s performance, which includes upcoming single Who Deprived You Of Your Smile, it worked very well for them.
Who can blame them as well. It might not be the kind of machine made, manufactured pop tripe that infests the public’s ears on a daily basis, but that is part of the glory of it. It is incredibly easy to tell just by watching them on stage that they feel free when they are up there, from Maja’s constant jiggling to the exquisite solo’s strummed to perfection from Boris, they feel at home on stage. And if that’s the way they like it, that’s the way they should keep it.
Check out the video for You’ll Qualify below to get an idea of what Caviare Days are like, then go and get their self titled album. It won’t be something you’ll regret.
