The first thing you learn about Matt Warren – frontman of indie alt-rock band Your Favorite Color – is that he doesn’t just sing. He searches. For meaning, for connection, for that elusive shimmer of feeling you can’t name until a melody wraps around it

In a sun-drenched backyard in Huntington Beach, what began as a song – “Your Favorite Color is Red and Mine is Blue” – became a band name, a metaphor, a mission. “I thought it had a little ring to it,” Matt explains. “So I just ran with it.”

And they haven’t stopped running since – through dreams, breakups, backyard shows, and most recently, the streets of London.

Their newest single, “Less In Love,” available now on all streaming platforms, was born under city lights during their first U.K. tour, a night that keyboardist Nicky Neighbors recalls as a moment when the world went quiet and they became loud within themselves. “There was an overwhelming sense of release,” he wrote. “Like all the opinions and voices from our past suddenly felt so small, like they never mattered.”

It’s not just a song. It’s a refusal. A reclamation. A shimmering synth-drenched liberation.

“Were you less in love? Would you like me better if I was like you?”

Matt says those lyrics came from a happy accident: “When that lyric came, it was because we were working on the instrumental, Nicky and I, and I just kind of was singing … And I thought he was saying a word like the word lesson and then love.” Gibberish caught on tape turned into something fragile, then sharpened into truth. “My mind goes a lot of different ways with this song because it’s a very, very deep feeling, you know, to maybe have broken up with somebody because they wanted you to be somebody else. And they were more in love with an idea of who they thought you were rather than the real you. And kind of going through something like that, it’s like, ‘did you really love me?’”

Written from Nicky’s personal experience, his perspective on the track underscores the theme of self-reflection turned into self-assurance: “Less in love is about resisting the pressure to change into somebody else’s version of who you should be or who they want you to be,” he explains. “The message is real and personal, but we chose to express it in a fun, playful way, almost with an unserious tone to reflect the freedom that comes from letting go. The feeling behind the song came from a night when we were running around London on our first tour in the U.K. and Europe … we were unapologetically ourselves.”

But such a level of salvation doesn’t come easy. And neither did the final cut.

“We did like five completely different versions. And then forty-five revisions,” Matt confesses. “It is very hard to sleep at night when you’re in the middle of that. And when you get a version back and it’s not quite right and you have to wait until the weekend to get back in the studio … working on that is hard, but it’s just the process of being in a band. And ultimately, when everybody in the band says, yep, that song feels good, then we know we got it there.”

Your favorite color isn’t just a band – it’s brotherhood. Guitarist David Silveria, drummer Matthew “Fox” Fosmire, bassist Cameron Pearson, and keyboardist Nicky Neighbors didn’t just join a group – they shaped each other’s lives. Surfing turned to rehearsals. Classical piano met synthesizers. Backyard shows turned into European shows. They taught each other to create. They taught each to feel. “I would be lost without my boys. I’m not meant to do this on my own,” Matt affirms. “I need them. We got to work together. And I love those guys.”

“We’re all so passionate,” Matt adds. “And it’s like when you get tons of passionate people who disagree on something, it’s like, do I just fight them and say, ‘Hey, screw you, we’re doing it my way,’ or do we get really creative and work extra hard to make sure everybody’s happy? And I think that’s the way to go – is to work really hard to be creative and really talk about the specific part someone has an issue with and figure out: what is the issue here? Because I know that you have a great taste in music and I bet you’ll hear what I’m trying to say if you were only in my head for a second.”

“We want to be able to have as much freedom as possible,” Matt says. “It’s very easy to get put in a box… but when you have that thing that pays your soul? That’s the treasure of life.”

And “Less In Love” pays in gold.

The single surges with electronic flourishes and ’80s-inspired melancholy, echoing the band’s signature blend of nostalgic textures and new-age confidence. Think: The Cure meets Phoenix in a club lit by neon heartbreak.

They’ve shared stages with The Driver Era, built a fanbase out of sunburnt sentimentality and KROQ-leaning indie hooks, and they’ve done it while fighting to protect their creative compass.

“If it’s not paying the bills,” Matt shrugs, “it’s got to at least be paying your soul.”

That’s the truth at the heart of Your Favorite Color’s work – the soul is the real currency. Whether it’s the shimmering ache of Matt’s favorite “Medicine” – “It feels like falling in love in a dream,” he envisions – or the anthemic charge of “Forever,” each track is a proof-of-feeling, not just proof-of-concept.

“If someone listened to our whole discography,” says Matt, “I’d want them to feel inspired. Like maybe they uncovered some emotion they didn’t know they needed.

And maybe that’s what Your Favorite Color really means. Not a hue. Not a name. But a possibility. Something you get to decide for yourself.

Something beautiful you didn’t know you could choose.

Your Favorite Color is signed to Prajin Parlay Records and currently finishing a new batch of singles following their 2024 debut LP For You. Catch them live soon. They’re not just coming to your city—they’re coming for your heart.

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