Gravity Rules

Album: 5 Billion In Diamonds (2017)
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Songfacts®:

  • 5 Billion In Diamonds is a group comprising Garbage drummer and producer Butch Vig, UK DJ James Grillo and UK producer Andy Jenks. This is the lead single from their self-titled debut album.
  • This song features guest vocals by Ebbott Lundberg from Soundtrack Of Our Lives. Butch Vig told NME how the collaboration came about:

    "Initially the tracks all start as instrumentals but we wanted them to be 'songs'. The record became more focussed and glued together when we had some singers. We sat down and wrote a list of dream vocalists.

    One of the first people that James wrote on there was Ebbot Lundberg from Soundtrack Of Our Lives. We're huge Soundtrack fans. About four years ago when they were getting ready to break up, they did a series of shows up in Stockholm. We went up to see them. James, fuelled by many glasses of vino, just bum-rushed them as said 'hey, Butch and I have a band and we'd like you to sing with us' and he just 'ja, I would like to sing with you'. It really was that easy. He sang on like, four songs. That happened really quickly."
  • Vig told NME the story of the song: "'Gravity Rules' is a bit of an anomaly. It's based on a sample that plays through the whole record. James brought in a sample by a band called Les Enfants Terrible, we tried to recreate it but we just fell in love with it. The song still channels the vibe of the record – moody atmospherics, analogue keyboards, chiming guitars and a minimalistic drum groove. It's one of our favorite tracks on the record."

    "If you hear the sample by itself, it sounds like someone is mumbling 'Gravity Rules' off mic after 40ft away, so Ebbott said 'that's cool', I'll make a lyric out of it."

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