The dynamics of a band are always insightful into how it works behind the scenes. For married couple Anne and Bryce, sitting down to intentionally write a song is never on the cards. Bryce leads with, “Yeah, we don’t jam together. We’re very much like a studio band in the way that like The Gorillaz are or MGMT. Like, they’re not bands that get together and jam. They’re studio people, you know – and that’s definitely my background. Jamming with people is fun but I think what I really love is kind of getting lost in the studio on my own or with someone if it vibes right.” Like many, the creative process is never a set thing and for these, it works. “Messing around with a drum beat or a bass line or playing a synth […] just doing that until you find little hooks or a little bit is good – and then we just build from there.”

Anne agrees. “Yeah, he’s constantly recording bits – there’s probably thousands of bits.”

“Too many bits. It’s terrible,” replies Bryce. “And you know, sometimes you come back to a bit. That’s the good thing about a bit is [that] it’s so unformed, you can always come back or grab it and put it in some other bit that you’re working on.” Fittingly, Anne finishes the point, “To make a full bit, it feels like we’re talking about engineering!”
It was only a matter of time before these “bits” came together, of course. “I feel like I’ll get obsessed something for like a month and all the bits kind of stem from that,” Bryce recollects. “There was a month where i was working in my friends’ studio in Seattle and I was obsessed with disco beats, disco bass and the JUNO and this Mellotron that he had. And so you know for that month, I was going hard into disco. So I wrote hundreds of riffs and the Dance Dance Dance, Mama and Land of Fun all came from that little span of a month going into those disco vibes. Sometimes I worry, it can feel like a bad habit – being bored is the wrong word,” continues Bryce.

“But wanting to explore new sounds is so important for new artists, but I feel like it’s also good to sit in a certain zone and even if you’re feeling uninspired, sometimes if you just hammer away, some real cool things can surface. So you know, maybe there’s a balance of sitting through the boredom rather than just moving on.”

When it comes to lyrics, that’s Anne’s wheelhouse and since the start, that food influence has always been there. “The food thing wasn’t like an intentional thing, “let’s about eating,” Anne expands. “It really came out of me not having a deep enough Chinese vocabulary to write about anything deeper. I can’t really write as much about deep emotional feelings or like philosophy. My Chinese is really limited to like daily life, and food is a really big part of our daily life. so that’s kind of how it came about.”

And how ultimately Chinese American Bear ultimately came to be. That’s what they are all about – uncomplicated bouts of fun wrapped in fuzzy feel-good grooves. There’s a reason why they’re coined as one of the hungriest bands in the world. After my chat about all things food, I was feeling slightly peckish myself.

I asked the two what songs on their new record was their favourite. Anne opted for Forever Lover, a stand-out to perform live while Bryce picked Dance, Dance, Dance – a bustling rave that actually doesn’t feature on stream yet, the pair are saving that for a separate release come Autumn. This exclusive is only available to listen live or on physical. Naturally, the band still have a few tricks up their sleeve.