PVRIS lead singer Lynn Gunn talks ahead of Birmingham gig

The sense of alienation, the exhausting schedule of being on the road for two years and the pressures of being in the public eye left her acutely depressed. And those emotions have been explored by the Massachusetts singer in the band’s second album, All We Know of Heaven, All We Need of Hell.

The record was released in August and is being followed by a major tour that includes a headline date at Birmingham’s O2 Academy on November 23. The band will be playing just seven UK dates, having stormed the main stages at Reading and Leeds Festival.

Work started on PVRIS’s new album as they continued the campaign for their break-through debut, White Noise, which hit the stores in November 2014.

Lynn says: “Writing for the record began as soon as White Noise was done. A few months after it was released we’d already started working on new material. We compiled about 40 ideas over the past few years, some snippets, some full songs and some that were completely reworked. There was no rhyme or reason to what we did, it was just about what felt good in the moment.”

The synthpop/alt-rock trio found recording their new record a peculiar experience. They had been immersed in promotion for White Noise for two full years with barely any opportunities for a break.

She adds: “It was tricky when we first started. It was the first actual break from touring that we’d had in two or three years. We’d just been non-stop and there weren’t many opportunities to reflect on anything that we’d been going through. So the second everything stopped we had that opportunity. For me, personally, it was really hard. I ended up in a place I didn’t want to be in. That’s still a work in progress. It’s been very cathartic to write and create. That in itself has been great. It was digging up a lot of things and covering ground to find out what was going on.”

Difficult it may have been, but Lynn and band members Alex Babinski and Brian MacDonald are thrilled with their new record.

She says: “I’m incredibly proud of it. I think we are always looking towards the next step. I think once this is out for a little bit we’ll start work on new material. I’m really happy with it. It came from a real place and a lot of people will pick up on that.

“I don’t think there’s any specific theme. It just kind of happened very naturally. After completing the record, I realised there’s a lot of themes of duality and contrast. They are very subtly thrown in there. People have to look for them. And they are fun to find.”

The band’s ambitions have grown as they have become more successful. Their expectations have increased as they seek to make the perfect sound – and a better record.

“There’s not an issue or a pressure of coming up with ideas or being inspired. I think the issue comes more from having the resources to execute the ideas. You have to have the green light to do these things. You have hundreds of people behind you permitting certain things or limiting things. I think that’s always the case. That tests our creativity and how much we can work within those confines.”

Lynn admits she was deeply unhappy at the end of the band’s White Noise campaign, though she’s reluctant to spend too much time dwelling on her then fragile state of mind. She’s still recovering from the after effects of an exhausting spell in her life and is keen to make further progress.

“I don’t know how much I fully want to dive into it. It was really confusing and really sad at the time. I think so much of the past two years was spent stressed and under pressure from everything going on, from the mindset that I was in.

“The place we were in was survival, survival, survival . . . just get through this to the days that I wasn’t stressed.

“We were pushing through everything and never taking in anything and never feeling anything and never feeling vulnerable in moments. That shut my brain off completely. When we had the chance to reflect and slow down, I think that’s where the sadness came in.”

The opportunity to make All We Know of Heaven, All We Need of Hell gave Lynn the chance to work through those emotions.

“This record is really a healing thing.”