Photo Credit: Tarina Doolittle
[Fly By Midnight](https://www.instagram.com/flybymidnight/?hl=en) has taken the music industry by storm, and continuously crafted their own unique blend of indie-pop anthems and hit singles including “[Lovely,](https://open.spotify.com/track/3GmKMMegOOLPByBUzRxqCS?si=94LnK0Z1RWmZyuUtsk3zMg) [Vinyl](https://open.spotify.com/track/7zChNUykHFRq21B41UG8gh?si=lVp0avRjQqOg5SirA3P5NQ)”, and “[Love Me Like A Friend.](https://open.spotify.com/track/0110a0AM2nOV8yYa9u6kjQ?si=4GPpqwbCRMG3AUUvvb01FA)” Hailing from New York but now based in sunny Los Angeles, the musical duo is composed of Justin Bryte and Slavo. Both songwriters, producers, and multi-instrumentalists in their own right, Justin and Slavo have also added creative directors to their resume. They both produce, direct, and star in all of their own music videos and other visual content on their platforms.
Per their name, both artists spend endless late nights in the studio literally flying by midnight. Doing what they love on the daily, Fly By Midnight have shut down stages all around the globe, displaying their charming personalities while spreading and exuding much-needed good energy.
Having met one another in the studio through writing a few years back, the best friends haven’t looked back since. Justin states, “At the end of the day, this is what people know us for. Not only are we artists and songwriters, we’re brothers. We’re growing it everyday.”
Now the guys are as excited as ever to be tapping Shoffy for their latest release, “[Caffeine](https://flybymidnight.ffm.to/caffeine),” following the success of “[Lost Without You](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BtF85dQUMKg)” featuring Clara Mae earlier this year. The record is a nod to the actual effects of caffeine, which can be comparable to staying up all night thinking about the person you love. While the song’s great in itself, the visual is where Fly By Midnight shine — paying homage to the iconic female artists of the 90’s including Tiffani Thiessen (_Saved By The Bell_), Tyra Banks, and Jennifer Lopez.
Flaunt caught up with Justin and Slavo via Zoom to discuss their upbringing on the East Coast, the moment they realized they could be a duo, the fruition of “Caffeine,” love for coffee, studio essentials, and more!
**Talk about what part of New York you’re from and what the household was like growing up.**
**Slavo:** Long story short, it’s Staten Island. The funny part about Staten Island, specifically for us, is both of our families are from Staten Island. Justin happens to be born and raised there, but my family went down to Florida. When I was 19, I made the decision to come back and I met him in this weird, full-circle moment.
**Justin:** I was born and raised in Staten Island.
**I think of _Jersey Shore_. That’s terrible, I know sorry.**
**Justin:** It’s so funny because when I tell people that I’m from Staten Island, I don’t really have the accent. You’re right, it's a very heavy _Jersey Shore_ accent. Very Italian. For me, it was really cool because doing music on Staten Island was not really a thing. I always felt I was doing something very left of center of what most people were doing on the island, which was exciting to go against the grain in that way.
**How did you guys meet originally?**
**Slavo:** Through a studio. Justin was doing a solo project, I’d finished an apprenticeship in the city and I was looking for places to sink my teeth. I found this studio he was working with and they put us together in a writing session. The first time we ever wrote together was a song called “Brooklyn,” actually Fly By Midnight’s first release ages ago. That was the start of everything. We kept writing together. One day Justin looked to me and said “yo, this is clicking together really well. We work really well together, why don’t we turn this into a duo?” It took me off-guard.
**Justin:** I don’t think we realized what we’re getting ourselves into. If I would’ve asked you that question and you would’ve known that 6 years later we'd be spending everyday with each other, you may have reconsidered it. \[laughs\]
**Slavo:** For sure.
**Was there a turning point you realized you can actually do this as Fly By Midnight?**
**Justin:** Good question. It sounds like a very business answer, but when we’re able to do it full-time. The notion of being able to have fans support you enough that you don’t have to work a day job. The tour was the first time we thought “wow, we’re making good money.”
**Slavo:** The turning point for me was when we’re able to switch from covers to strictly originals. A big part of really being our own brand and having people listen to our original stuff was very important for me specifically, because we’re producing and writing everything. The split of covers was our bread and butter for a while. To be able to transition those fans to our original stuff is always a hard thing when you’re doing the YouTube game, so that’s a cool moment for me.
**Congrats on the release of “Caffeine,” bring us back to when you recorded this one.**
**Slavo:** “Caffeine” we wrote with a writer, who wrote another song “Lovely.” This is a really cool writer, cool friend of ours. He’s from Nashville, he happened to be in LA before the whole pandemic hit. We got together, he brought the idea of “Caffeine.” We’re big coffee-drinkers in general so we always wanted something that had to do with caffeine.
**Justin:** That’s one of those titles we floated for a while. We discussed where we could take that emotion and what that means to us. The song feels nostalgic. There’s nothing more nostalgic than being up all night over someone you’re more infatuated with, even more than you’re in love with them. A very hyper-aggressive crush that keeps you up and you can’t sleep because you wonder what it’d be like to be with this person.That’s how I feel sometimes when I drink coffee after 10pm.
**What’s your relationship with Shoffy?**
**Justin:** Shoffy was a stranger to us before this whole process, which is funny. I was thinking before how ironic it is that now more than ever, we can’t be with people and be creative in the same space, we’re being more collaborative than ever. Shoffy was someone we admired, we reached out to him and he resonated with the song. We’re friends now, we’re homies. We’re able to get together to shoot the video. A really cool dude, really down-to-earth. Someone we resonated with right away, that’s important for us.
**Slavo:** We’re fans of a handful of his songs. What we’re trying to do with this collaboration project, it’s sending off feelers to artists we admire. We admire their craft. It’s always a good thing because honestly between Shoffy and Clara Mae before, they’re fans of what we do as well. That mutual respect for each other’s artistry goes a long way when you’re creating.
**I love the visual and how it pays homage to the 90’s, what was your creative vision?**
**Slavo:** Since day one, we started our project on the premise of being retro pop. We’ve went with something a little more mature. This was a cool mindset of getting super nostalgic and super-retro feeling. We wanted this to feel like a 90’s moment with the references. _Rocket Power_ is in there,you have the 3 girls who are all 90’s rooted.
**Justin:** I’m such a sucker for _Saved by the Bell_ so for me to bring Kelly Kapowski into a video of ours, it’s a dream to have the flexibility to do that. We’re co-directing these videos as well. When you’re on the set, a lot of times you’re stressed out and you don’t realize how special something is until the editing process. This is one of the first videos that on set, wow this is hands down going to be something really special for us.
**How was it releasing it on International Coffee Day and teaming up with Grounds & Hounds.**
**Slavo:** It’s funny, it fell into our laps. We were on a call and somebody brought it up. It was fun, we went to a couple different coffee spots and bought coffee for people, doing some ground-running thing.
**Justin:** Very grassroots, took us back to when we first started telling people about our project. The Grounds & Hounds thing was really cool. One of these last second things that International Coffee Day lined up with it. Their brand really resonates with ours outside of being a coffee brand, but Slavo’s pup, Elon, is a rescue pup.
**Slavo:** He’s 2 years old, he’s a little rescue out of Mississippi. He’s really special to me. It was cool to be able to do something that felt very genuine for us.
**Justin:** What’s cool about releasing a song called “Caffeine” is it’s an emotion in the song, but it’s something we love. Staying up all night and working on music very much resonates with our brand so being able to partner with a coffee company was a lot of fun.
**Justin, do you have a dog?**
**Slavo:** Justin’s actually allergic, it’s hell for him. We kick him out of the studio sometimes.
**Justin:** I love him too, it’s the most tortuous thing being allergic to dogs while you love them.
**3 things you guys need in the studio?**
**Slavo:** Coffee for sure. It’s funny because I want to think musically too, but some guitar is super important.
**Justin:** We need snacks at some point, right?
**Slavo:** Yeah, snacks or cool lighting. I know we try to get the lighting pretty vibey in here at night. We have a little flamingo and neon light. What do we call him again?
**Justin:** Sinatra.
**How much sleep do you guys get?**
**Slavo:** We’re both different because you like to get up early still. I try to sleep in and get the most that I can, but I go to bed probably on average 3am or 4am.
**Justin:** Probably 2am-ish. I don’t know why I wake up early. Since moving to LA, it’s done something where I want to jump out of bed. The simple answer is we don’t get a lot of sleep.
**Slavo:** We try to get our day started every day anywhere between 12 and 1 in the afternoon. That’s our go-to.
**What would you guys be doing if you weren’t doing music?**
**Slavo:** Good question. My story goes, I went to a college in Florida and I was doing football there. I was a D1 NCAA so nothing too crazy, but something I was super passionate about even before music. I like to think I’d still be pursuing football, but who knows where I’d be right now.
**Justin:** That’s crazy to think about. \[laughs\] I’ve always loved writing in general so if not songwriting, some other form of writing. Before we started Fly By Midnight, I was very heavily in the theater world. I wonder if I would’ve turned towards that.
**Talk about the campaigns you did for Urban Outfitters and Superdry. What’s your love for fashion?**
**Slavo:** The clothing collabs we’re always super passionate about. We like to get all dressed up. Urban was super cool. We had a partnership with a company called YesStyle, where every Youtube video we wear their stuff.
**Justin:** What was cool about Superdry around our first album _Rerunning_ was that a guy there was a fan of ours. That’s how a lot of the collaborations came together. We touch base with these clothing brands and it turns out someone knew about the project already. Fly By Midnight to us has always been about more than us singing. We love stepping out of the studio and putting on that artsy model hat for a day. It’s a fun thing for us.
**Goals for yourself as an artist at this point in your career?**
**Slavo:** We’re like what, 6 years in now?
**Justin:** Yeah, close. In the next couple of years, be able to release a song that connects to every part of the world. We’re close, we’ve really touched these different countries. To be able to have a song that we can tour on internationally, is mind-blowing.
**Slavo**: A radio single would be cool. We’ve had radio stations give us love. Something that really opens up that market and that world for us, because radio can still be such a powerful thing. That’d be cool to have something where it’s not streaming-based, that really clicks on radio.
**Justin:** An immediate goal for both of us when the world goes back to normal, there’s some tours we’re excited on about being an opener. Hopefully a headlining tour as well.
**Anything else you want to let us know?**
**Justin:** “Caffeine'' and “Lost Without You” obviously are collaborations, the plan’s to release a couple more. In this time of people being disconnected, we’re excited to release music that’s about connecting different artists, so that’s our immediate goal. We love to tease that to people and get them excited about what’s coming up.
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