From Akron/Family with love

Man, we're just crazy busy, Matt Seaton of Akron/Family explains apologetically. After an hour of trying, The Skinny has tracked them down to Burlington, Vermont, a place Seaton describes as "a great little hippy town."

Their brilliant third album Love Is Simple has recently hit the UK and is, by all accounts, a great little hippy album. It emphatically encourages us to love freely and without question, drifting unbounded hither and thither so frequently, the listener is left wondering how it manages to end up anywhere (Seaton admits "it's a little back and forth"). In the style of a true free spirit, it refuses to conform. Love Is Simple sticks two fingers up to the Man, before giving him a big hug and telling him to chill the fuck out. Akron/Family are on the way up, and boy, do they know it:

"They got nice food for us here and there's a masseuse to rub our shoulders. This place is hot! Man, I've actually been given 400 pairs of tube socks on this tour alone!" Tube socks and massages are a far cry from the last time we spoke to Seaton. In 2006 he spoke of how they were too broke to live in New York. Now, with people ostensibly falling over each other to help them out, their lives have changed immeasurably. "When you become publicly known, people's opinions become known. People are deciding that we're all doing lots of drugs or that we're crazy religious types."

It's a change that the erstwhile relaxed Seaton seems none too comfortable with. "You can look inside and find out what people think about you, whereas when you're not in that position you never know what people are thinking about you unless they tell you. That's the hardest thing for me."

"Crazy religious types" is an accusation that's been angled at them before, but spirituality is not something Akron/Family shy away from. "From my personal life," Seaton explains, "I think it's a big factor, and of course music tends to reflect a person's personal life." Indeed, the most beatified parts of Love Is Simple could certainly be construed as songs of praise, whomever your God of choice. Seaton however, is unsure. "It is if you like. It's not for me to say "Hey! This is everything to everybody." Take from it what you will, that's what it's there for!" From Akron/Family with love; gifts don't come much lovelier than this.