Forget Them Wendy’s “Apple Pie” turns a relaxed summer image into a question about how long comfort can last. Songwriter Laura James and producer-guitarist Oliver Price place acoustic guitar at the center of the release, then let the idea of impermanence push against its warmth. The result fits a project whose name comes from Peter Pan and whose songs repeatedly examine the tension between escape and growing up.
With BBC Introducing support behind the duo and a debut album now finished, the conversation reaches beyond one single. Forget Them Wendy discuss trusting an unexplained lyric, serving a song with restraint, the creative disagreements that sharpen their work, and why the knowledge that a moment will end can deepen its light.
Forget Them Wendy: The Exposed Vocals Interview
Laura, “Life’s an apple pie, let it float on by” arrived before you could fully explain it. What made you trust the line instead of trying to make it more logical?
The flow usually takes you where it needs to so I’ve learned to go with it. In this case for me it’s indulging in the illusion of safety and permanence in a lazy summer afternoon, even though on some level you know the apple pie will spoil and the summer will end.
“Apple Pie” puts acoustic guitar at the center and shows a softer side of the band. What made this the right moment to pull the sound back?
Serving the song, sometimes you want things to be loud, sometimes a gentle reminder is more effective.
The song begins in hazy summer ease, then turns psychedelic and stops abruptly. When did you realize it needed to disturb its own calm?
It’s the precarious nature of comfort, and the brevity that makes it special, hopefully the twist in the song hints at that.
The ending references The Sheltering Sky and ideas of death and impermanence. How did that darker thought find its way into a song about days that seem to last forever?
We couldn’t just leave it straight-up happy could we?! Actually, as I said, in a way the impermanence is actually what gives the carefree it’s importance. It seems dark but it’s actually adding to the depth of the light.
The Cranberries, Smashing Pumpkins and The Breeders are part of your shared vocabulary. How do you use that influence without simply recreating the ’90s?
We are making music in a totally different way, with our laptops and all the technology we have at our disposal now a days, I think that gives it a very distinctive flavour all by itself. Apple Pie flavour…
Your name comes from Peter Pan and the temptation to escape grown-up things. What does that idea mean to the band now?
It’s part of the same theme again I suppose, finding your way through this short and treacherous life while trying not to kill off the innocent child within.
How do Laura’s songwriting instincts and Oliver’s production choices challenge one another during the making of a track?
Very often Olly has a guitar idea and we write over that, mostly it all slots together nicely, but occasionally we knock heads. We have a song on the album called ‘Butterfly’ – Olly wanted it to be called ‘Floating By’, besides ‘Float on by’ being in Apple Pie already, somehow in this context it reminded me of another type of floater, and we clashed before Olly was forced to concede that Butterflies are a nicer image than poo.
You have described the project as owning who you are even when you are not entirely sure who that is. Does writing together create clarity, or make the uncertainty more interesting?
I think as soon as you figure out who you are you’ll change again, that’s life, but exploring it all is part of the fun.
BBC Introducing support has brought real momentum while you are still assembling the debut album. Does outside attention make final decisions easier or add another layer of pressure?
They’ve been so helpful and encouraging for us. It’s been amazing! We already give ourselves enough pressure so it’s nice to have that.
You are releasing songs one at a time while still overthinking the track order. What will tell you that the album is finally finished?
It already is actually… you heard it here first!
For Forget Them Wendy, “Apple Pie” is less an escape from impermanence than a way of holding it in view. The duo’s answers connect the song’s gentle surface to the same restless idea behind their name: protecting wonder while accepting that comfort, identity and even a finished album keep changing shape.
“Apple Pie” by Forget Them Wendy. Press photograph supplied by LPR Agency and used with permission; photographer credit was not specified in the supplied campaign materials.
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