Deep Dive: Swiims – Given To Me

Toronto-based Swiims released their Into The Blue Night album last November, and have just dropped a video for featured track Given To Me.  We caught up with them to find out more about the track and video, and as a bonus, the band gave us an insight to the recording of the LP! The album’s lush and light tones will resonate with fans of DIIV,  Alvvays, and Slowdive.

Genesis of the song and lyrics

Given To Me was a song that Colin had written the music for a few years before we starting working on our LP Into The Blue Night.  We loved the upbeat guitar strumming and catchy opening riff.  Mai set out to write lyrics for it, using the beginnings of a new blooming relationship for inspiration. 

The song explores the process of begrudgingly giving in to someone new.  The melting away of the exterior walls that protect us in our daily interactions and wrestling with the decision to do so.

Instrumentation and recording

We recorded the entire record at Candle Studios, a small boutique studio here is Toronto.  We chose Candle because Josh Korody, the owner of the studio, is someone that we had wanted to work with.  He has a history of working with great Toronto bands and we really wanted an impartial eye and opinion on how to get the most out of the songs. 

Most of the record had been written in the early stages of the pandemic and we had a year or more with each one before committing them to tape, so a fresh set of ears was important to us. 

The song is guitar driven, with basic instrumentation.  A couple of guitar parts, bass and drums.  We wanted to rely of the indie quality of guitar rock for the sound of this one. Leaving lots of room for Mai’s beautiful melody and soaring vocals.

Making the video

One of the things that we love about SWiiMS is that we do pretty much everything in house. Both Mai and Cian are amazing with film and graphic work and making our own visuals and videos is a lot of fun. But we chose to go in a different direction with the video for Given To Me.  We met a talented animator and artist from Argentina and thought it would be fun to animate the video.  The idea for the video was one that Colin has had for a while, we loved the idea of the band going to deserted and desolate planets and bringing them to life with music. 

Where does this particular track fit within your wider body of work?

SWiiMS doesn’t feel the need to live within a specific genre of music.  We like to incorporate different stylistic elements from a bunch of inspirational sources. Given To Me, to us, is a straightforward indie rocker type of song, with a few other elements mixed in. 

What are you up to in the coming months?

With the bulk of our time as a band being in the pandemic years, we played our first show this past summer, so we are loving getting out and playing for people. In fact, even our first EP Through Waves had never been performed live as it was released a few months into the pandemic. It’s so much fun to get to interact with a live audience! 

We have a few things coming up, we are heading down to New York to play a few showcases for our label, Mint 400 Records, to help promot the record there.  We are also slated to play at NXNE this June and we’re excited about that!

Into The Blue Night can be heard in full on Spotify, Apple Music, and Soundcloud. For further information on streaming and downloading the album, head over to Swiim’s TikTok, Twitter, Instagram and Facebook socials. You can pick up the vinyl edition on the album right here.