FEATURE: Modern-Day Queens: The Last Dinner Party

FEATURE:

Modern-Day Queens

PHOTO CREDIT: Rachell Smith for Rolling Stone UK

The Last Dinner Party

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I have featured The Last Dinner Party…

IN THIS PHOTO: The Last Dinner Party backstage on day four at Lollapalooza on Sunday, 4th August, 2024 at Grant Park in Chicago, IL/PHOTO CREDIT: Barry Brecheisen

a few times on my blog. Their debut album, Prelude to Ecstasy, arrived last year. It won a slew of positive critical reviews and saw the group nominated for the Mercury Prize. Consisting of of Abigail Morris, Lizzie Mayland, Emily Roberts, Georgia Davies and Aurora Nishevci, the band have this incredible chemistry and connection. I am looking ahead to their second studio album, From the Pyre, which is due on 17th October. They have said in an interview how this new album is more character-driven and a bit darker than their debut. It will be interesting to see what comes out. Because I feel they are incredible influential and empowering so many women and female artists, I am going to explore The Last Dinner Party in more depth. Specifically, I am including a couple of recent interviews with them. So that you can get a sense of where they are now and what we can expect with From the Pyre. Before getting to a new interview from Rolling Stone UK, I want to head back to last year and an interview from earlier this year first. I am starting out with an interview from The Guardian from last summer. The Last Dinner Party spoke about misogyny, maximalism and making it big:

“From the beginning, the music and aesthetics “came hand in hand”, says Morris. Regular gig-goers themselves, they aspired to generate a sense of occasion and community. “Being in a room of people jumping around, having a great time – that’s what we wanted to create,” says Mayland.

Although they were rehearsing throughout 2021, they didn’t pursue gigs until pandemic restrictions had been lifted fully. “We didn’t want people to be sitting down,” says Morris. “From the beginning, we were taking it so seriously.” They even staged a photoshoot to launch their Instagram account, styling themselves and roping in friends to dress the set and photograph them. Ironically, those images were later held up as evidence that the band was cynically assembled by Island Records, the label to which they had signed. “‘Their first shoot clearly shows loads of money; they’re obviously industry plants,’” Morris laughs, recalling one comment. “But we did that all ourselves.”

The charge dogged TLDP through their early press. I’m not sure myself what an “industry plant” actually is, I admit. “I don’t think anyone is,” says Davies. “There’s no definition. It’s typically just young women who are successful.”

The criticism conflates investment with inauthenticity, she complains. “The Beatles were industry plants. If that’s your definition – ‘the industry helps you’ – then every single artist who’s been aligned with a record label is the same.” I recall Lorde and Billie Eilish – both teenagers when their music was discovered – being tarred with that brush. “Hmm!” Morris cuts in, with her formidable comic timing. “I’m noticing a trend!”

More recently, the criticism has given way to acclaim. Prelude to Ecstasy became the bestselling British debut album by a band since Years and Years’ Communion, in 2015, and received rave reviews. That itself has been “disturbing”, says Morris: “The impostor syndrome sets in – and the confusion.” She doesn’t want to come across as churlish, or disrespectful of fans, she adds. But “when you’re told one thing over and over, it loses the significance and sincerity”.

How has the band learned to protect themselves? “TBD [to be determined],” quips Nishevci, to raucous laughter and rapid‑fire suggestions. “Therapy,” says Roberts in an undertone. “Stop reading comments,” says Mayland. “Stop reading interviews,” adds Morris. Davies: “Just log the fuck out.” They now post to social media via an intermediary, having last year made headlines with their rebuke of some male fans on Twitter: “We see the weird shit you post about us and are highly unimpressed! Have some fucking decorum.” (Davies claims authorship.)

Although squarely gen Z themselves, playing to “screaming women”, as Morris proudly describes their recent crowds, TLDP’s classic rock influences and heavy airplay by 6 Music meant they were embraced, early on, by an older male audience. There is a strand of paternalism to the Darkness frontman Justin Hawkins’ approval of Roberts’s “proper guitar solos”, while interviewers emphasise their youth and style.

“It’s always the tone of surprise with men: ‘You impress me – well done,’” agrees Morris. “It’s a strange kind of avuncular gatekeeping, like they’re the ones who are the arbiters of rock music: ‘Have you heard of the Slits?’” Early on, Davies says, they were treated “like we were the first women to have picked up guitars” – erasing their influences and their individuality (Mayland is non-binary).

They are excited by the possibility of pushing open those rusting gates. At Latitude festival last year, the band was set upon by two small boys who wanted their guitar picks. They had always hoped to inspire young girls, says Morris; now, they are dreaming of helping the next generation of men to be “not afraid of women, or intimated, or angry … It was so wonderful to see young boys, pre‑tarnished by patriarchy, not looking at us in any way other than with awe and respect”.

Speaking with NME from the red carpet at this year’s BRIT Awards, The Last Dinner Party discussed mental health, burnout, and the revelation that new material is on its way. They also stated how, when they started a band, they did not realise that it was so much like starting your own business. Quite an intense lifestyle:

“While at the BRITs, The Last Dinner Party discussed how they want to encourage more discussion around artists’ mental health, and told NME that their second album is on the way.

The band caught up with NME while on the red carpet for this year’s BRIT Awards, where they were nominated for four awards, but walked away with Best New Artist – and used their speech to voice support for grassroots music venues.

During the interview, the band looked back at the milestones they’ve seen since taking home the Rising Star award in 2024, and revealed what changes they have implemented since facing mental health struggles on the road.

Looking back at how they were forced to cancel several live shows at the end of last year due to “emotional, mental, physical burnout”, the group told NME about the realisations they have had going into 2025.

“[It’s about] planning your year with limitations. Not just seizing every single opportunity because it’s great,” bassist Georgia Davies told NME. “You have to value yourself as the greatest thing. If you don’t put that first, everything else will crumble. Setting out your expectations for the year and what your physical and mental limitations are [is vital].

She continued: “We hope other artists learn from that, because we learned a really valuable lesson from having to [cancel shows], and we hope the industry at large absorbs some of it. A lot of other artists have had to do the same thing, and it’s tragic for the fans and everyone involved. I hope it’s something we all learn from going forward.”

Keyboardist Aurora Nishevci agreed, explaining how the band hope to encourage more widespread awareness across the industry: “There is not a lot of discussion. Historically, artists have not had a

She continued: “When you start a band, you just want to write music and play music. It’s something you love, but you don’t think you’re starting a business. You have to set the safeguarding for yourself, you have to learn how to run it and employ people. So when you enter into making any music from music — which is really hard in the first place — then there is that whole other learning curve that comes”.

I am going to start out with an in-depth new interview from Rolling Stone UK. Apologies if it seems a bit random in terms of what I have sourced. I have selected parts of the interview that are of particular interest to me, though do go and check out the complete interview:

“Now, with their excellent second album From the Pyre set for release in October, the band returns to Rolling Stone UK, this time as bonafide cover stars. “This feels like our Almost Famous moment,” singer Abigail Morris says with a smile when we meet the five-piece in the café of the National Theatre a week before the band’s cover shoot. The London group say that this record — which arrives a mere 18 months after their debut — came partly from a desire to embrace the momentum, but also simply because they never stopped writing.

“There’s never been a gap of separation where at one point we were like, ‘OK, it’s now time for album two,’” says Morris. “It was always happening; we wanted to write new songs and we knew that’s what we had to do.”

A listen of the second album reveals that the band’s familiar and brilliant brand of 70s-flecked baroque pop and art-rock bombast is as present as ever, but change is evident too. They began working on the record with producer James Ford in late 2024, but the reins were taken up by Markus Dravs — known for his work with Coldplay and Florence & The Machine — when Ford was diagnosed with leukaemia earlier this year.

Ford — who is now thankfully in remission — told the group in a text message to “have fun, be bold and make a classic record”, and it was these words that loomed large after they were written on a studio whiteboard.

In heeding that advice, they have created an album they believe to be more “fearless” than their debut and more direct too. That’s shown on the bold lead single ‘This Is The Killer Speaking’ — which feels like their first ever country pop moment and is enriched by one of their biggest choruses to date. Fittingly, recent performances have seen Morris striding the stage in a cowboy hat to give the song a powerful dose of yeehaw.

When the Last Dinner Party first emerged in 2023, there was a sense of boldness and an overall feeling that here was a band who knew exactly what they wanted to be from the very start. When ‘Nothing Matters’ arrived in April 2023, it established Morris as a singer with shades of Kate Bush and the face of a band so singular and fully formed in their vision that it felt impossible for many to comprehend.

This — paired with the fact that they landed a record deal with Island before releasing a single — led to accusations that the band were industry plants. The fact of the matter is that a YouTube video of a scrappy early gig near Millwall FC’s ground in deepest south London was enough to spark a label bidding war, but the damage — in the form of vitriolic backlash online — was already done.

It was a tricky time, the band say, but they’re no longer willing to let the truth get distorted on the eve of a new era. It no doubt helps that they’re an incredibly close unit too. There’s an unspoken shorthand throughout our chat where the eyes of each bandmate will collectively land on the person that they feel is most suitable to answer a question. Or, quite simply, the overwhelming sense that they’ve managed to stay really good mates during the kinds of storms that could easily strain a lesser connected band.

“I think we do have thicker skin when it comes to people talking bullshit online about us. We’re more prepared to be like, ‘OK, but that’s a lie,’” says Georgia Davies. “It was quite shocking to see it for the first time and for people to believe it, but at this point we’ve seen it thrown at people who are quite obviously not a plant and have had a well-documented rise like Chappell [Roan]. I think seeing it happen to female artists across the board is just like, ‘OK, mate! Sure!’

“In the band, we live in such a bubble of being so heard and so valued as artists. Our abilities are trusted among each other and among our crew. With that moment and other moments through a woman’s life you realise that misogyny is still a big thing, and it’s very alarming to be like, ‘Oh, you do think that I’m not as smart, as capable, because I’m a woman, and we’re women in the band.’ It’s quite confronting to see someone who thinks there’s no way that this could exist without a man pulling the strings behind it. It’s just very, very sad.”

Then there’s the small matter of the fuel on the fire that engulfed the band last year when an article from The Times asked: “Is there a future for bands?” and featured a quote attributed to Morris which claimed that “people don’t want to listen to post-punk and hear about the cost-of-living crisis anymore.”

The piece then went on to pointedly note that Morris had attended “the liberal boarding school Bedales” in Hampshire “where fees can be £43,000 a year” and suggested that “the cost-of-living crisis probably isn’t a huge issue for Morris.” Within hours of the piece’s publication, Morris was pilloried and deemed “tone deaf”, as an entire Daily Mail article dedicated to the furore noted.

The only problem, as an apology from The Times acknowledged, was that Morris never said those words. They instead came as part of a wider point, stripped of all context, made by Davies in a separate interview some six months previously. She noted how the band’s theatrical music could provide escapism from “the brutality of our current political climate”. But by that point, the quote had spread across the whole internet and back again.

“It was my worst nightmare, and it still stresses me out,” Morris explains. “I get very anxious doing interviews now. I feel fine at the moment, but it hurt me so deeply and made it incredibly hard for me to be confident doing interviews or speaking publicly at all. Even at the BRITs this year I didn’t want to say anything if we won because I didn’t want anyone to perceive me or my voice in a certain way. I’m still getting over it, honestly, because it hurt me, and it was really horrible.”

They supported Olivia Rodrigo at BST Hyde Park in June and say that the US singer was keen to tell them how ‘The Feminine Urge’, a stand-out track from their debut album, will likely take its place in her Spotify Wrapped at the end of the year. There is also the sense that both are moving mountains to make rock music more inclusive, as shown in the thousands of young women in attendance to see both Rodrigo and the band.

“It’s pretty lovely,” notes Nishevci of their young, heavily female crowd. “It’s sweet, it’s wholesome and you feel a sense of community like you’re in something together.”

They also have, as Guitar World noted last year, a “Queen-inspired indie guitar hero” in the form of Emily Roberts, who even invited Brian May to a Hammersmith show last year. Roberts’ solo on ‘Nothing Matters’ was a defining part of the track’s success, and there’s a sense that, to borrow a phrase from another set of guitar gods, she gets to turn it up to 11 on this new record. In the process, she’s inspiring women of all ages to pick up the axe”.

I am looking forward to hearing From the Pyre. Without doubt one of the most important bands around, these queens have no doubt helped to open doors and to break down tired barriers. Even if there are some sections of the media who question them or feel they are inferior to male bands because they are women – a sexism and misogyny that you do still see -, there is this received wisdom that The Last Dinner Party are very special indeed. An important band that we need to listen to. Ahead of their second studio album being released, I wanted to salute and highlight…