{"id":1767756,"date":"2026-02-13T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2026-02-12T21:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/?p=1767756"},"modified":"2026-02-13T00:00:00","modified_gmt":"2026-02-12T21:00:00","slug":"wonderland-33","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/?p=1767756","title":{"rendered":"Wonderland"},"content":{"rendered":"
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\n\t\t\tWonderland<\/span>
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\n\t\t\tHERE\u2019S TO MORE YELLOW DAYS\u00a0<\/span>
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What\u2019s between a Rock And A Hard Place<\/em>? On his wonderful new album, Yellow Days finds the answer. He talks crossroads, clich\u00e9s, and tequila-tinged touring.<\/h3>\n
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Photography by Lewis Vorn, edited by Charlotte Manuel<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n

George van den Broek \u2013 better known by his chosen sobriquet, Yellow Days \u2013 is unfathomably soulful. Since his youthful lo-fi anthems on his 2016 debut project, Harmless Melodies<\/em>, he has shape-shifted dramatically, yet subtly, now being one of the most slept on British artists of his cohort. If you haven\u2019t heard of him, this is your invitation to lose yourself in his gorgeously gravelly tones and spiralling, cinematic musicality.\u00a0<\/p>\n

We\u2019ve been blessed with a new album, playfully and potently titled Rock And A Hard Place, it\u2019s yet another conceptually complex body of music from the innovative artist, pulling from blues, jazz, soul, psychedelic rock and more to concoct a deftly thrilling and infectiously groovy collection of cuts that can only be heard front-to-back, so don\u2019t you dare click stuff.<\/p>\n

van den Broek\u2019s live shows are historic too, and there\u2019ll be a hell of a lot of lineage to add to his legend this spring. He\u2019s off on a world tour<\/a>, from Mexico City on 20th February to wrapping things up in Glasgow on 11th May.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Getting deep on the album and his journey so far, Yellow Days drops by Wonderland to talk digging himself of a hole, finding the formula for seminality, and his love of being on the road.<\/p>\n

Listen to Rock And A Hard Place\u2026<\/em><\/p>\n

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Read the exclusive interview\u2026<\/em><\/p>\n

Where does this new album find you, artistically and personally?<\/strong><\/p>\n

In truth, at the start of making this album, I was at a low point. Financially, emotionally & mentally, I was in a real hole. It was kind of a rubbish time, to be honest. I felt musically really out of touch. My last album, Hotel Heaven<\/a><\/em>, was a lot of fun to make and tour, but it felt like a real diversion musically from where I should be going and definitely wasn\u2019t my best work. In reflection, a lot of it was mostly fuelled by drink and drugs, not the music. I felt pretty useless, sort of fell out of love with Yellow Days and focused on producing for new artists instead of myself. My wife and friends would get upset with me, saying why aren\u2019t you writing your own music and singing? I think I was in a kind of despair. I got so out of love with being Yellow Days, I even tried to start a record label so I could just produce for artists instead, but couldn\u2019t get any funding for it. <\/p>\n

I was out drinking in London after doing a gig I held to try and showcase this label I was trying to start, where I met a bassist called Stan Woodward, who\u2019s a young, fiery Newcastle lad. He sort of beat me up into shape and tried to shake me out of the jaded place I\u2019d found myself. I had a few big breakthroughs writing-wise with songs like California, but it wasn\u2019t till I got in the studio with a big session group that I felt any good about what I was doing. Suddenly, the way the music opened my voice up brought back a love for music and big singing. I feel like I\u2019ve been hiding my voice in effects and production tricks because I didn\u2019t want to really be Yellow Days or a big vocal singer for quite a while. Now I love being Yellow Days again and singing big, but I notice how much I\u2019ve tested and lost a lot of my audience\u2019s patience with it. So it\u2019s a funny feeling \u2013 I\u2019ve finally made the album I\u2019ve been meaning to make for years, but I\u2019ve lost a lot of listeners along the way. Which is fine, but it would be a lie to say my relationship with music hasn\u2019t been complicated in the last 5 years.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Your sound is always such a medley of influences, this new album no less so. But what lies at the core?\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

I don\u2019t really follow any of what my contemporaries are doing right now. In truth, what\u2019s happening in the mainstream doesn\u2019t give me any inspiration, so I just listen to old classic records like Marvin. I\u2019m a hopeless curmudgeon like that \u2013 kind of dismissive and uninterested in what\u2019s going on out there, bar a few exceptions. It\u2019s funny because when I started with the wobbly lo-fi sound, I was very much obsessed with what was going on. After all, there was so much stuff happening that I loved or thought was cool at the time. You are what you eat, so my sound has become more \u2018retro\u2019, which is a label I don\u2019t like at all, and even sometimes called \u2018pastiche\u2019 by people who don\u2019t like it. I understand why to some people it may come across like that, but I think thinking of my music as a retro thing is mistaking retro for my personality, which is definitely one of stubbornness, which I do take pride in as an artist. I think it\u2019s an important characteristic to be able to make a contribution that\u2019s at all interesting\/long-lasting.\u00a0<\/p>\n

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What is the essence of Yellow Days?\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

Being a big singer is really what it\u2019s all about. I got this big voice that I was born with. I had the classic artist cliche of being a little boy watching Ray Charles videos. In terms of singing I now find my first few albums really hard to listen back to. It\u2019s like I knew what I wanted to sound like but didn\u2019t have the articulation to do it. Now, when I tour I sing A Little While & Gap In The Clouds the way I wanted to at the time. I\u2019m nearly 27 and have been working as a musician\/touring for 10 years so after all that, I can comfortably sing like the big singers like Ray Charles etc., without just totally emulating them or falling short with the technique. I see singing alone as a lifelong pursuit to develop it as much as possible. Other than that, my approach to melody and harmony is probably relatively unique. When I work with other singers & musicians, they find my melodies difficult because they bend so much. I\u2019m self-taught, so I put bass notes where they shouldn\u2019t be and put a lot of expression into the notes because I can\u2019t write super complex jazz parts so I have to maximise the parts I can write in that way.\u00a0<\/p>\n

How has your sound grown and matured since the early successes of \u201cHarmless Melodies\u201d?<\/strong><\/p>\n

As I\u2019ve said, it\u2019s definitely been a rocky journey coming out of the success of the first few years of my career. I don\u2019t have a lot of the answers for why that is \u2013 maybe being too young when it happened in order to write a proper a follow up album, putting too much pressure on myself or having lots of failed business relationships behind the scenes \u2013 all these things definitely stunted me. But if I think about where I am now, I feel as if I have arrived at a mature adult version of myself musically and personally, too. In reflection, what I hope is that the discography tells a story of a guy who wasn\u2019t afraid to get it wrong and kept digging into what was possible and bravely so. I have a very intense relationship with music, and if that alone comes across, then I\u2019d be happy with that.\u00a0<\/p>\n

What does the album tackle in terms of its lyrical themes?<\/strong><\/p>\n

At its core, it\u2019s an album about being stuck. Being at a crossroads in your life. To those who don\u2019t relate to it it may feel self-pitying and I suppose it is. It\u2019s kind of a \u2018how I got here\u2019 sort of album. The ups and downs of life and relationships and having to deal with yourself as you get older. There\u2019s a lot of fear and stress in the album, but also a lot of life lessons and acceptance. I mean I\u2019ve just crossed into the second half of my 20s, so I think a lot of it is about being in that stage of your life. Leaving behind the relentless optimism of teenage years & early 20s and replacing it with a more balanced kind of scepticism that comes with understanding the world better.\u00a0<\/p>\n

What lies between a rock and a hard place?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Probably a big scared-y cat. Someone who wants a ton of stuff out of life but doesn\u2019t know how to get it. When I think about the expression between a rock and a hard place, it\u2019s really describing someone who\u2019s stressed. A friend of mine once said stress is the act of not doing, which is a neat way of explaining stress alone, but the expression is saying more than that. It\u2019s really describing a compounded stress that turns into a kind of disbelief. As I said before, I hit hard times financially, creatively and mentally, so I related to the phrase because I kind of think of it as a guy who\u2019s sat in a great big hole that he dug himself. Then I guess the obvious narrative out of that \u2013 which I took \u2013 is him trying to get the hell out of it. Which, hopefully, would be a compelling story, which I thought would be best left inconclusive. You know?\u2026 A good old cliffhanger.<\/p>\n

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You\u2019re setting off on a major North America and European tour in late Feb. how are you feeling about the time on the road? Ready for an adventure?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I hear a lot of people talking about touring in the media in a negative light and it is incredibly hard to make the financial aspect of it work but I love to be on the road. I\u2019m old-fashioned like that; singing and playing in a room full of people is really what being a musician is all about to me. Making albums is amazing, but to me, there\u2019s almost no point if you don\u2019t get to share them with people in person. I\u2019m taking a whole new seven-piece band out this year, and none of them has ever been to the US. They\u2019re all a bunch of 22-year-old jazz musicians who are so excited to hit the road. My old band slowly grew tired of the whole thing but I see it as where I belong. Being in a venue every night is what being a performer is all about. If I could be like an old-timey singer in New York playing the same little venue every night, I\u2019d do that with great joy. Of course, travelling the world too is one of the great privileges of being a musician. The amount of politics, people\u2019s life stories and friends you run into is a great gift and gives you a really worldly perspective on things. I guess big pop stars probably don\u2019t get to meet many people because it would be just too intense for them, but the level of fame I have means I\u2019m treated with respect but sort of normally and get welcomed into nearly any city by really nice people. On top of that just getting to play your music that often, to me it\u2019s such a beautiful thing and right where I want to be.\u00a0<\/p>\n

What\u2019s your tour survival guide?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I\u2019m not really the right person to ask this question. On our last tour, my guitarist and I would drink a bottle of tequila every night and stay up late on the bus listening to music, sleeping in till 4 pm \u2013 getting up just before soundcheck and living off cheeseburgers. So that was our \u2018routine\u2019 if you can call it that. We were putting on great shows, but definitely acting like greedy little piggies. As you can imagine, it led to month-long hangovers and to putting on a lot of weight. I definitely accelerated my ageing, coming back home a few years older. I\u2019m slowly becoming more health-conscious as a person, but I don\u2019t generally worry about things like that. I went through big phases of really paralysing hypochondria when I was a young guy, and I overcame that through a kind of mind-matter outlook on what life\u2019s about. Although having said that, it doesn\u2019t feel good to have a month-long hangover and put on loads of weight, so that \u2018philosophy\u2019 probably becomes less meaningful over time.<\/p>\n

Finally, the big one\u2026 To you, what is yellow days?\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

When I was younger, I would say the band name Yellow Days is about your youth, your heyday. There\u2019s a jazz standard called Yellow Days done by Frank Sinatra, Duke Ellington and even Bobby Caldwell\u2026randomly, so that one is definitely worth a listen. In the jazz standard tune, it\u2019s very much about the good old days. But to me, the meaning has changed over time. I see it now as just a time in your life when nostalgia or emotions are very high. Sometimes life is straightforward, but then you enter an intense patch of depression, falling in love, heartbreak, missing old friends, or any of the above. To me, Yellow Days is about that intense bit.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Words by Ben Tibbits<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/section>\n

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\n\t\t\t\t13 February 2026\t\t\t<\/div>\n
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Feature Interview<\/a><\/div>\n
Music<\/a><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n
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\n\t\t\t\tWonderlist<\/span> <\/span><\/a>\t\t\t<\/div>\n
\n\t\t\t\tThe stars were out for Letters Live in association with Cunard<\/span> <\/span><\/a>\t\t\t<\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Wonderland HERE\u2019S TO MORE YELLOW DAYS\u00a0 What\u2019s between a Rock And A Hard Place? On his wonderful new album, Yellow Days finds the answer. He talks crossroads, clich\u00e9s, and tequila-tinged touring. Photography by Lewis Vorn, edited by Charlotte Manuel George van den Broek \u2013 better known by his chosen sobriquet, Yellow Days \u2013 is unfathomably […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[226,257],"class_list":["post-1767756","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-crawlmanager","tag-wonderlandmagazine-com"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1767756","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1767756"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1767756\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1767756"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1767756"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1767756"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}