Recurrent Verse

Sydneysiders Bloom are set to release their EP ‘In Passing’ on Friday. The EP is a beautifully crafted journey through death and grief, confronting in places with the literal lyrics, thought provoking and reflective. I sat down with Jarod and Jono to talk about the EP, the band and asked the most important question of all…. is the EP coming out on vinyl!

I have been flogging ‘In Passing’ guys, it’s so good!

 Jarod: Oh yeah you’ve been sent it, I forget that it’s out in the world!

Jono: People have heard it.

Jarod: It’s crazy that people have actually listened to it. It’s been such a long time coming.

Jono: It’s weird because I think we anticipated a different kind of release; I think everyone did. So it’s weird now that oh my god we are four days away from release and obviously people have heard it already. It’s like omg we are doing it I guess!! New music and then we will see when we can do shows.

Jarod: We recorded it almost exactly a year ago.  It was the end of October that we went down to Melbourne and recorded it with Chris Vernon. I think we were all thinking it would be out in March. Stuff with Greyscale started, which pushed it back, then it went into corona virus and now we are here. I’m just happy that it’s happening. I think that it’s a good time to get it out. Other bands like Alpha Wolf, Knuckle Puck and Movements have had successful releases, all be it different to usual. People are still wanting new music.

I think that’s it. Everyone is wanting new music and taking the time to properly listen to what’s coming out.   

Jono: Absolutely

‘In Passing’ is pretty personal EP

Jono:  The EP is sort of written around the passing of my grandfather last year who I didn’t really know all that well. And it was just the time that I remember spending the most with him, while he was on his death bed.  After getting back from New Zealand, where all my extended family are, I came to the boys and said, ‘Hey I know that we are writing at the moment, I would love to do something in vein of this’. It kind of just snowballed from that. We started by throwing up some concepts and things that we all can relate too. So songs like ‘Daylight’ where it is a much more generalized like ‘hey everyone dies’. Everyone has this fear of not knowing when it will be the last interaction with someone. Through to songs that are very literal about it. ‘June’ and ‘The Service’ are very much a play by play, this is how it happened.  I think we really just wanted to take all of the stuff that I personally had been through and feelings that the greater band had and pile it into a nice little package around someone passing.

Is there any reason why it starts with ‘The Service’ and works backward?

Jono: I think it captures people quite quickly. It’s a song that right from the get-go is no bullshit. It sets the tone for the rest of the EP. I think it provides a really nice context around the fact that the next four songs are going to be in this style and quite literal.

Big question… Is it coming out on vinyl because it really needs to be!!

(Then we all laughed!!!)

Jono: All we will say is there is more to come on the vinyl front. It was the first thing that we were asking for but our big daddy Joshua (Greyscale Records) has got some things in motion but that’s all we will say about it for the moment….

Tells about the Bloom story for those that are new to you guys

Jarod: Technically Bloom started in 2016. Jono and I had been around people who had been in bands through high school, heavy bands, and we were never in any of them!  We were the outsiders who were a bit jealous, so we went for it. I remember our first rehearsal was truly awful.

Jono: It was just me and you really!

Jarod: The drummer that came, he didn’t learn any of the songs. We were playing to a guitar pro, fake drums over a lap top speaker. It was such a disaster. We just kept at it, just ourselves, going to a studio that Jono was studying at. We had access to studio time basically for free. We wrote some shitty demos and got our heads around the whole thing and then got some friends to come in. I think that’s when it became real, when we had an actual drummer and an actual bassist!

Jono: We have been really fortunate in the sense that a lot of our friends that we have been super close with, whether it be through music or school, are all really great instrumentalists and love the same sort of music. It was super natural when we went ‘Hey Bloom is just me and Jarod, but we need a guitarist, we need a bassist, we need a drummer” and it was all friends in our circle that we reached out too. And because a lot of the boys we had been close to for a while it just seemed like a no brainer. It was super fortunate because drummers are so hard to find. A bassist who actually played bass and wasn’t a guitarist who was having to take on the bass role. Little things like that we were super fortunate with.

Jarod: Absolutely. And we have noticed how hard it is to find members, with friends who are looking for bands to join or drummers to join their bands. They ask us do we know anyone and the only people I know are drummers who are already in bands.

Damn I should have continued drumming when I left school!! They are the only instrument I can still play, not at that level though …..

Jono: They are in hot demand. All you need to do is keep time and its fine!

That I can do!

Jono: Fantastic. Done.

Jarod: There is such a high demand, so we definitely got lucky there.

Jono: From that we just started playing more and more together and started writing. Like Jarod was saying, writing shitty little demos, and it got to a point where we were like let’s record some music. That’s what you do now. Our first stuff we did was with someone who played in a band that we used to go and see all the time. We were finding our feet. This is back in 2016 that we recorded it, from their it was just like okay now we try and play shows. None of us had been in a band before so it was super new to a lot of us and we didn’t know what we were doing. Over the last 3-4 years I hope that we have learnt from a lot of the mistakes we’ve made, and we have gotten better at things. The band has always been a pretty self-sufficient band, we are good at working and doing stuff in-house.  It’s been cool because we have all got to learn and get better at certain aspects through out the whole experience.

Jarod: I think the big thing now is that we know people. I think that is the biggest hurdle starting out. When we wanted to play a show, we didn’t know anyone who puts on shows. So where do you start.

Jono: Send an email I guess

Jarod: Yeah. Now having three years of being in a band we know promoters, other band members, people who record, mix and master. And we are friends with these people. Its become easier to put on shows and get support from the people who do these things. We can’t put on a show ourselves; you need someone to run the door and sell merch, we have friends and colleagues now that we can reach out to. It’s amazing to have that network.

Jono: We are also really lucky because we have such an incredible wider support network. We have two outstanding managers; we have Josh and Dylan over at Greyscale who are just absolutely rooting for us in every way that they can. Especially with this release. It’s felt like we can take our hands off a little bit more and just sit back and let the shit that we have organised over the last 12 months roll out. It’s been really nice because we haven’t had to do it all ourselves this time around. Having that support network to be able to say, ‘Hey this is what we need to get done’ and people will help us get it done.

You’re only going to get better with experience. Jarod and I have been best friends since year 9. We were lucky, in the sense that when we were 18 or 19 so we just said fuck it lets do music, lets make a band. And it has progressed into this and we are all super stoked with it.

Jarod: When we started you couldn’t really scream

Jono: God no! I couldn’t play an instrument, I couldn’t scream. I had no previous experience.

Jarod: I couldn’t really play guitar. It’s been good for that too; it pushes you to be a better musician. If you put out something bad it comes back on you.

Like you said, having that network now you have people to bounce stuff off as well.

Jono: Absolutely

Jarod: That s the big thing with Chris, I feel like that is something that is going to be really crucial for us moving forward. Taking your stuff to Chris and being able to have his creative input, having that extra set of ears. We obviously have heard the songs for 6 months or so it’s really hard to come up with something new because your brain is ‘this is how it sounds’. You take that to Chris, and he has suggestions for tweaks to phrasing or adding musical bits in, and it’s what the song needed to just get to that next level.  

Jono: When we took ‘Cold’ down it was the first time we had worked with Chris. We looked up to him and all of his bands. When we finally recorded with him, the song we took down to him which eventually became ‘Cold’, there were sections that we couldn’t have even come up with. Little ideas or little moments in the song. If we didn’t do this song, this way with this person it probably wouldn’t have turned out as well as it did.

Jarod: Those little bits that he added were so valuable. Even though it was like one lead line or phrase, it ties everything that we already had together.

Jono: We could not speak more highly of Chris.

He definitely has the love of a lot of people.

Who influences you guys?

Jono: The first two I will throw up on the board would be, the two that we have said since day dot, which is Counteparts and Touché Amore. A nice little happy in between. There are songs that we write that we are like wow we really like this. Sort of more melodic drawn back, less intense sound. But then we also love Counterparts and having those really big heavy hitting moments. We skate on the line between those two. Even when I’m writing lyrics, especially for this release, the Touché Amore album Stage Four was a huge influence because there are not a lot of albums out there that exist in our genre where it is written super literally especially around the concept of death. When I was writing it that was the main thing I was pulling a lot of the writing style, or the phrasing or how to describe things. I guess that in a sense was my biggest influence.

Jarod: Yeah I definitely try, especially since the EP, to take inspiration from random spots. So I take a lot from pop punk, which isn’t super out of our genre, but I feel like I am trying to take stuff from pop a lot more as well. Not big things but you’ll sometimes hear a drum groove or something that is in a Dua Lipa song and you’ll be like that is sick. It really gets you moving, it’s a really driving kind of feeling. Trying to take that and putting it in a heavy setting I found has been quite inspiring. It’s hard to sit here and write 10 demos to take down, by the fifth song you’ve exhausted all of what is in your mind, so you need to broaden your horizon. I find it gets you a better end result because it’s something that might not be as common in hardcore music. If you can bring it over from a different genre and wrap it up into hardcore, it’s something I have been trying to do a lot more. It makes me more creative.

That melding of genres is happening so much more

Jarod: Diamond Construct have just added a DJ so that is separating them from just metalcore because they have that extra element. It’s cool to see the genre mix.

I can’t wait till there is no such thing as a genre!!

Jarod: Yeah it’s all music.

Jono: Yeah, its conforming into that ‘I guess we play this genre sort of, most of the time, except for when we don’t’ It’s more common place these days to mix up genres. Way back when, 2015-2016, around that time you wouldn’t see bands doing trap beats and breakdowns. But bands like Paledusk and Diamond Construct, like a lot of those heavy hitters do it so nicely. They make it totally work.

Just like Bloom have totally made ‘In Passing’ work. ‘In Passing’ is out Friday on all platforms.

https://www.facebook.com/bloomsyd

https://www.instagram.com/bloomsyd/

https://grysclrec.lnk.to/inpassing

Dan Grieg of Lycanthrope – Vocals

James Grieg of Path to Victory – Vocals

Hamish Unahi of Take My Soul – Guitar

Chad Ellis of From Crisis to Collapse – Guitar

Matt Stoja of Lycanthrope – Bass

Chris Hix of Take My Soul – Drums

Faith in Lies have just released a hot new single ‘Burn Me’ if you are a fan of Killswitch Engage this song is for you. This is the second release of what will eventually be an EP, one I am super keen to hear. All members of Faith in Lies are all in other stellar Australian bands and the talent in this group is of a pretty high calibre.

Hamish, Dan and James sat down with me to talk about how this amazing project came to be.

How did Faith in Lies come about because you are all in other bands, so you are kind of like a “supergroup”.

Hamish: Haha ‘Supergroup’!!

James: I like the sound of that.

Hamish: These tunes and riffs have been floating around for a couple of years. When we were recording for Take My Soul I tracked a few things down and some riffs. I’ve had this style of riffage and sound in my head for a while. I’m not sure how I got Dan in, I roped him in somehow!

Dan: You came to a show and you said, “Hey I like what you do, and I want you to do some stuff with me” and I was like” Fucking oath”

Hamish: All the bands that are involved in this have all played quite a few shows together. We are in the same circle. So I did a couple of demos, nothing to serious, just tracked them down with Dan on vocals and basically I was doing everything else. They kind of just sat there for a little bit.  We were doing a show with From Crisis to Collapse and they crashed at mine. We were just hanging out and I just got them to check the demos out. A couple of the boys said “Oh bro what’s this shit, what’s going on here” I’d been showing them the Take My Soul demos too, but when they heard this stuff I saw a bit of a squint in a couple of eyes! I didn’t think much of it and then about 3 or 4 months later Angus (From Crisis to Collapse) randomly texted me and asked what I was doing with the demos and told me to hurry up and do something with them. I was like Ok and that is where it started. I rang Chad straight away and asked him if he was interested in getting involved. I don’t even think he said yes, he just said when do I start!! So there was Chad and I and Dan and it evolved from there. Hix the drummer is from Take My Soul, so he was keen. He and I had actually done some stuff together on the pre demo a few years earlier. So he was familiar with some of the stuff and he just jumped on board. I conned Matty into it, he is just a sick bass player. So we had our line-up.

We were tracking the second demo, which is Burn Me, and we got James to do some guesties on it because he is Dan’s bro.

Dan: Na don’t know this bloke from a bar of soap!

Hamish: They were tracking demos and I watched them together. I didn’t say anything, but I just kept watching them lay stuff down. A week or so later I messaged Dan and James probably hasn’t even heard this, but I asked Dan if he had the opportunity to work with a vocalist, like anyone, who would he choose. We chucked a couple of messages back and forth and then he said what about my bro? I was like that’s exactly what I’m thinking!

Well it sounds sick. When Chad sent it to me I was like holy fuck this is good.

James: Glad you dig it.

Hamish: Awesome

Are you working on an EP or is it just a few singles?

Hamish: No we have other stuff on the go as we speak. The plan is an EP. We don’t really have any time constraints because we haven’t signed anything so we can do it at our own leisure. Covid’s been good for this project because it’s been hard to get out and do live shows. We are all working on our own respective stuff in our other bands. We all have other stuff on the go. We’re just ticking away. We’ve got some really really good stuff, stuff we can’t talk about yet.

Dan: We can’t say right now….. but it’s pretty tasty.

I just want Covid to fuck off actually so that I can gig again!

James: Yeah it can fuck right off!

Hamish: That would be good.

I mean we are lucky that we are in states that we can sort of gig, they are starting to come back.

So who did you draw your inspiration from because like you said this is different to what you guys would normally play.

Hamish: That’s interesting. I’ll give you my run down and then the boys can give you theirs. Every band has their own signature, everyone has different tastes and then it combines. My parents were hippies, so I grew up listening to Frank Zappa, The Rolling Stones all the good stuff. I was listening to Sabbath and Maiden when they first came out, I’ve been around a little while now… I don’t want to tell you how old I am haha. Then I discovered Metallica and the bay area sound. I discovered Slayer and I’ve been a Slayer freak ever since. That’s where my right hand, guitar wise, sits. Then I love As I Lay Dying, Killswitch Engage – that heavy, fast harmony no bullshit. Like Parkway Drive. That’s sort of where mine sits.

Dan: I like anything that is melodic, heavy, has meaning behind it. Bands that try and put meaning behind the songs. I hate bands that it’s all about being tough and angsty. I like it to be a little bit deeper. We grew up watching Rage, so you’d see Korn, Linkin Park, Slipknot, Limp Bizkit. All these bands that were the commercial thing. I guess we weren’t really aware of underground stuff in early high school. Progressing on from that we both used to sing in our bedrooms.

James: Sometimes it would sound good, sometimes it would be great. Our sister used to come in and join us.

Dan: Sometimes Dad would come in and be like stop with your satanic ritual shit. Foaming at the mouth!! Now he loves it. They used to listen to The Beatles, Dean Martin, Elton John, Billy Joel all that sort of stuff. Music was always very abundant in the house.

James: We’d sneak out some mornings and Dad would have fallen asleep on the couch watching all those scary music videos. We’d be what’s this.. and then Dan started frothing it.

Dan: Yeah I like the evil side of stuff.

James: It has to paint a really good picture in detail.

Dan: The styles of music that we grew up listening to just evolved. You go through high school and people show you bands, I love Killswitch as well. They’re awesome. Anything that has screams and cleans, I think that’s basically what Faith in Lies is about. We are both capable of doing that so why not bring it to the forefront. It doesn’t all have to be cleans and it doesn’t all have to be screams.

James: We used to like a lot of rock and grunge and that evolved. Alice in Chains and the like. My partner loves all that and she’s been the most supportive person I know when it comes to us doing this. It’s good listening to all that stuff and then bouncing ideas off your inspirations as well. That’s what we do as musicians, take it all in and then have fun with it. I like performing, everyone likes going out and having fun on stage. Making music and making energy and it needs to come back.

Dan: All of our bands that have sort of merged together to create Faith in Lies have come from solid bands. Take My Soul have just released Misery Miser and that track is fucking huge. That’s what Hamish was saying, about the circle of people in the project. We all play together but its just a continuance, this band coming together is just mates making music for the soul purpose of making music.

Yeah. So your going to get good stuff because your doing it for the love of music and with your mates. That makes all the difference.

Dan: 100%

So will we eventually see a big tour with all the bands together and Faith In Lies????

Hamish: We tossed it up in the air and I think at some point it will probably happen. Once we get the EP going and get that out there we’ll toss up what comes next.

Did you guys record it yourselves?

Hamish: So James Strezov is the singer in Take My Soul. He runs Studio 1618 here in Newcastle.  He did production, engineering and mixed and mastered it. He knows us and he knows what sound we are going for. Richard De Silva from Involuntary Muscle did our video clip.

You’ve had some really good feedback from ‘Burn Me’

Hamish: Yeah the launch of it has exceeded our expectations. When your sitting in your room jamming your riffs out and recording your stuff, I know it’s good in my own head but until you get feedback from someone who isn’t a part of it..

You don’t get that validation

Hamish: Yeah. I have had people message me that I don’t even know that are on our Facebook page saying that it is kickass. It just makes your day. Yesterday I got a random photo of a phone sitting in a gym somewhere with Burn Me playing and the tag ‘Helping me through my day’. Hell yeah boy.

Can we expect another single out before the EP?

Hamish: Yeah there will be. We don’t really have a time frame as such for a release though. I’m just chipping away on a couple more songs for the EP. The next single is sounding real good. Each song is just getting better. We have more work to do on it, but you can see through each stage of each song that they are just getting better.

That will be interesting because Burn Me is pretty damn good… you have a fan here now!!

Dan: There’s plenty left in the tank!

Hamish: There is a bit of a theme with the EP. I’m not political, I am who I am, you are who you are and that’s cool. I’m really cool with that, I’m not into selling anyone anything but my point of view is mine and everyone is entitled to their on point of view. The initial idea of the EP was think for yourself, at the moment the world is fucking crazy. There’s people jamming religion down your throat, conspiracies and crazy shit. People that haven’t taken the time to educate themselves about real life get sucked into it. Don’t get sucked into something you don’t believe in. You have one life, and you have to live it and live it right now.

Hence why I am sitting here talking to you guys. The blog was something I have wanted to do for the last few years. In the end I thought fuck it. If I don’t try I’m never going to know if it will succeed.

Hamish: That is the exact attitude behind this EP. I’m not getting any younger and I have been wanting to do this since I first heard Slayer, Metallica, Anthrax and Megadeath. I want to be a rock’n’roll star. That’s all I ever wanted to be. I’m not a rock’n‘roll star but I’m playing it. I’m on a stage having fun. Chase your dream, like you said don’t worry about the man, just do it. We all have to work to make money to survive.

Cos you don’t make money in music!

James: Exactly!

Hamish: I go to work to live, so I can afford to have a good time and do this sort of thing. I don’t go to work for my life. The EP is thinking for yourself, following your own heart and beliefs. Don’t be a sheep.

Dan: None of us are really religious at all, but in a sense anything religious is just moral guidelines isn’t it.

Yeah your moral compass

Dan: Yeah. People don’t need to use religion as their moral compass if they believe in themselves. If you seize what you are doing and take the opportunities you don’t need anyone to back you because you back yourself.

I sure am glad that these guys have backed themselves because Burn Me is damn fire and if this single is anything to go by we can only expect great things from these guys.

Jump on and follow their socials so you don’t miss out what happens next…….

https://www.facebook.com/faithinlies

https://www.instagram.com/faith_in_lies/

Luke Vaessen – Vocals

Joel Hallam – Guitar, Samples, Keyboard

Owen Broad – Drum

Ryan Barker – Bass

It seems it is Tasmania’s turn to turn for new music! Dark Alt Pop band SPKEZY (pronounced Speakeasy) have just released a new single ‘Dopesick’ and announced their debut EP “Midnight Club. Having already released two standalone singles earlier this year, ‘Dopesick’ is the first single off the forthcoming EP ‘Midnight Club’. I spoke to vocalist Luke Vaessen to find who SPKEZY are and what we can expect from them.

So this song is a little different to your other songs?

I would probably say a lot different. When we first started the band we essentially wanted to try and incorporate rock music, because we were all brought up on rock, with today’s modern type of RNB/Rap music. With this EP, more so with ‘Dopesick’ than the rest of the EP, we tried to incorporate more of our 80’s influences. I think that the main thing for us was to have each band members influences more prevalent than what we have before. The EP is a more cohesive of us as a band than the two stand alone singles we previously released.

You said that your influences are from the 80’s?

Yes. So our guitarist, who is also our producer, is very influenced by 80’s sounding music. It’s more so him that has brought that influence to the band. Especially Huey Lewis and the News, he said he just really wanted to write something that has that sound. We’ve all played in rock and metal bands over the years. Tyson our bass player leans to more that sort of stuff. Our drummer has a very broad range of influences, but he is more dance music orientated whereas I am a lot more hip hop and rap.

You’ve definitely got a lot of genres covered!

I just think that for myself I was finding it hard to write music in a band when I wasn’t listening to that particular genre of music. So for us it was just being able to write music that we enjoy and that we hope other people enjoy. People obviously listen to a lot of different stuff. And I guess when I first started playing metal I was listening to lots of metal. Over the course of when you are touring you are listening to metal bands night in and out and you get to the point where you need to listen to something else. I guess that is where it got to for me, and probably the other guys too. We just needed to do something else.

I have a broad range of musical taste even though I mostly listen to metalcore.

It’s good to have that broad range of musical taste because you get to experience all these different emotions listening to all types of music.

Is the writing process a group thing?

It’s definitely a group thing. We get together at least once a week at our guitarists house and that’s where we will record and write all our stuff because that’s where his studio is. He has taken a much bigger role on in the band this time around. When we had our lockdown he spent a bunch of time relearning all this stuff so we can do everything in-house. It’s made it a lot easier I guess because we know what we want the music to sound like, it’s a little bit harder when you are sending it to someone else and they don’t fully grasp what you are trying to do. It has been good just to be there with each other and just write and if it sucks it suck and if its good its good.

There are more songs floating around than?

Like I said we get together once a week. This EP, while it is probably not the most optimal time to release because we can’t tour with it, we are really proud of the way that it sounds. We want other people to hear it and we hope people enjoy it. For us just to get it out there is the main priority so that we can move on to whatever it is that we are going to do next.

I don’t know that not being able to tour has been really detrimental because most people are in lockdown or some form of quarantine at the moment. Bands releasing stuff are probably getting more attention during this time. There are no gigs, so people are looking to the online content.

I guess I hadn’t thought about it like that. That people can actually connect to it more and spend more time with the product because at the moment they don’t have a lot else to do.

Even though you can’t gig you’re actually building an audience for when gigs return. Laying those foundations for when the world returns to some normality. Bands are interacting with fans more too on social media and making those connections which is awesome. And Australia has such amazing talent.

We really do. It’s become more evident to me over the last couple of years. Obviously there is always good stuff from overseas, but I’ve noticed more really good bands coming out of Australia lately. It’s a very good thing.

I think Australia are leading the way at the moment.

100%.  I feel like a lot of the bands that are coming through, and they are all really young which is really good, are really putting Australia on the map.

‘Dopesick’ has obviously gotten some traction because you’ve already had over 6k streams on Spotify in a week?

We’ve received really good feedback on the song. How it’s written, how its been recorded and all that. But also just on the song itself. People seem to be really enjoying it which is always nice.

What’s the story behind the song?

Essentially it is a conversation between two people, one of which has had substance abuse problems all through their relationship. It’s that person promising to try and get better for the sake of their relationship but realising how hard it is especially with all the outside influences.

Is there a common theme in the EP?

It’s not about substance abuse or anything like that it’s more so a collection of love songs really. However way you want to look at how that love is being portrayed. Essentially they are all love songs but from different views.

How long have you guys been together?

We’ve been together as SPKEZY for about 18 months or so. But we have all played in bands together or in other bands for the better part of 15 years.

Have you played any gigs as SPKEZY yet?

We’ve only played two as SPKEZY and both were in Tasmania. In our previous band we toured around Australia.

Which band was that?

Save the Clocktower.

So is it basically all you guys but with a new name?

Yes essentially, there is one less member. Our bass player joined Save the Clocktower just before we broke up.

I guess you are keen for Covid to end then so you can tour again?

It would be very nice.

Have you got gigs happening over in Tassie?

They have just started up again, but you have to be seated and no dancing

Seems to be the same in every state that has gigs.

Anything you want to tell us?

Just that as a band we really hope that people enjoy the EP. That’s our main aim is for people to enjoy what we do and can find some form of connection to it.

‘Dopesick’ is a dope track with it’s cruisy vibe and made my Sunday morning coffee just that little bit better.

‘Midnight Club’ will be released on 13^th November via all platforms.

https://www.facebook.com/spkezytas/

https://www.instagram.com/spkezyau/

https://spkezyau.bandcamp.com/releases

Spotify – https://tinyurl.com/yxqdlmfg

Apple Music – https://tinyurl.com/yyfoea2f

Deezer – https://tinyurl.com/y3ypvbs5

Google Play – https://tinyurl.com/yylr46nm

“I create music I don’t know how to categorise”

Two years ago I stumbled across a tune called Dwelling by a project called A Boy, A Void. It is a beautiful song. Fast forward two years and a name change to Jack Longo, and Jack is back with a new single.  

I caught up with Jack Longo to find out what he had been up to.

You have a new project, well it’s not really new…

Yeah I guess you could call it a reboot! I’m the main driver, obviously other people are coming on board when I record. I call it a solo project, but I always feel bad, like I’m discounting the people that helped me make it.

Who has jumped on board to help you?

My production and recording engineer is Teddy Flags (Tom Eddy) from the hip hop group Flagstaff.

I know Teddy! Flagstaff were the first band I interviewed and reviewed for Recurrent Verse.

I’ve been friends with Teddy for years. I went to him with my project and said I need you to help me spice it up a little, so he has a lot of influence in there.

I love their music so much. They deserve to have their name out there.

I wish that they had just instantly blown up because the music that he can put out is just insane.  

Do you have an EP or is it just some singles?

There’s a couple of tracks, I’m calling it an EP. There are 3 songs and an instrumental track. Originally the idea was to get a few more features from people in bands that I have met over time, but I haven’t had time to fully flesh that out yet so what we have come to is a little 3 track as a starter. Then I am hoping to do a few more singles with some of the friends I have made along the way.

Obviously Tom (Armstrong, Earthbound) is in the first one, so I am gathering it’s heavy or on the heavier side.

That one I think has a real drive to it, I really like it. Overall my sound is softer than that of metalcore.

You’ve had a name change as well because previously you went under A Boy, A Void.

I started that 2 or 3 years ago so I thought I would start from scratch. I was in bands for a few years but now this is where I am at, so I wanted to start fresh.

Where do you draw your influences from?

Off the top of my head I would say that Citizen and Endless Heights are big influences. Also Trophy Eyes.

I’m a bit nervous. The first single is the heaviest one. It’s my favourite. The other two are a bit softer so I hope people don’t get to disheartened. I like the mixed bag genre, but you never know what other people will think.

I think people are open to listening to new music full stop these days.  Do you have a lot of songs in the bank waiting?

Lots of ideas that I am trying to consolidate. Get this release done and then it will be back to the studio I guess.  There is definitely no chance of playing live! I’m still in two minds about the live situation. I don’t have band members so I would have to hunt some up. I have plenty of friends who I am sure would jump on for a gig or two.

What’s the new single about?

Well the theme around the whole EP is self-sabotage in whatever form. The first single is called Ruin. This song is about self-sabotage. To give up and accept your flaws and punish yourself for them. The only recourse being to apologise that you are the way you are. The song rises and falls like the guilt you may feel when you’re pushing people away but believing it’s for their own good.  

‘Ruin’ is out on Friday 16^th October on all the usual platforms.

https://www.facebook.com/jacklongomusic

https://www.instagram.com/jlongo.music/

https://distrokid.com/hyperfollow/jacklongo/ruin-feat-tom-armstrong

https://open.spotify.com/user/1290918830?si=qPvUJZvcRCqh7d5a8YbA1w

We all know that Covid has well and truly messed with the music scene this year. X Promotions have taken matters into their own hands to promote some of the best local indie pop/rock, soul and hip-hop acts from the Frankston/Peninsula area. This 60 minute event will be live streamed into your lounge room from the Frankston Arts Centre via their Facebook and YouTube pages: https://www.facebook.com/FrankstonArtsCentre

https://www.youtube.com/user/FrankstonArtsCentre

Tickets are priced at whatever you can afford and 100% of ticket sales will go to the artists and guest hosts on the night. Support the artists via the ‘Donate Now’ button at https://bit.ly/2FV8QOz

Ryan McGeary and Andrew Gorman from X Promotions sat down and had a chat with me about what they are doing and why.

Well to start with I guess you better tell me about X Productions and what you guys are about.

Ryan: It’s a pretty new venture into the live-streaming stuff. Andrew and I stumbled upon one another with an interest in putting on live shows. Back in the day it was me with my band. We were looking to get some shows. Andrew had an interest in fostering some live shows. We met while doing separate shows and then came together to do some. This is just our next step in the Covid friendly world.

There isn’t anything friendly about Covid!!

Andrew: Ultimately, as much as we love to see the crowds and bands having a great time, we can only do half of that at the moment. With this event, we saw the Frankston Art Centre putting on live-stream events for the traditional theatre type crowds. We though hey there is no reason why some of the younger music acts couldn’t get in on that as well. Thankfully the theatre have jumped on board and the council has backed it as well. There are a few more big announcements to make in the coming weeks, there are a lot of things going our way. Thankfully everyone is loving it.

That’s a really good thing to hear. Good for the bands and for the fans. So there are just the four bands on this bill

Ryan: Yes we are seeing some really talented bands. We are trying to keep it local, there are some really awesome acts down this way that we thought needed the spotlight shone on them a little bit more. Especially during this lockdown. So we have subcult. Velvet Bloom who are.. how would you describe them Andrew?

Andrew: They are a very grass roots soul act. It’s a really cool sound. It’s not a sound that you expect. Maddy the singer has the smoothest voice.

Ryan: Maddy has that voice that as soon as she starts to sing you just lean in a little more than what you were.

And then we have Teenage Dads who have an indie pop sound.  They are just an awesome bundle of joy on a stage. And then we have Boler Mani who is in the hip hop/rap game. Again he is high energy, really good stuff that is well produced. As soon as I saw him I was like cool. It’s tough when there is one person on stage, tough to get that energy across and he’s got it.

Andrew: He was also lined up 3 or 4 festivals this year, so this was going to be his break through year.  Teenage Dads have some festival experience. Velvet Bloom has been around on the peninsula for a while. She has broken into Melbourne in a big way, she has a big fan base. subcult have a new single out and are releasing their second single on the night of this show. They have all had stuff put on hold.

It’s a good time to be interacting with fans on social media and getting your music out there. Building that fan base so that when gigs return you already have a following.

Ryan: It’s a really good time to ‘gather your supplies’ is what I have been telling people. Strengthen your foundations and get all your processes in place so that when you do get released into the world it goes gangbusters. The really good thing about the acts that we have got at the moment is they were all on the verge of something really great this year. They still are, don’t get me wrong, but using subcult as an example they did shows with Ruby Fields and names like that and it was looking to be a huge year for them. This has delayed them a little bit, but it gives them an opportunity to get more songs under their belt.

Andrew: Support local doesn’t have to be just for your shops. Support your local bands. We aren’t going to see any international acts in Melbourne for at least the next 6-12 months. So we all need to get behind not only Aussie music but the local bands that are in your back yard. All the big bands started out small so let’s help these smaller bands get there quicker.

That’s why I started writing for myself. I want to help promote the smaller grassroot bands that we have in Australia. There is so much talent here. And I’ve been lucky and had so much support from the scene.

Andrew: It’s huge. When Ryan and I were sitting working out how to spread this as far as we can, you don’t discount anyone who has even 50 followers. Speak to whoever you can because it’s not only about getting to 5 big 10,000 follower groups, but also about getting to as many small pages and groups as well. The love comes back and forth amongst these people.

Tell me about And we are LIVE

Ryan: We have four acts that we have mentioned, so Boler Mani, subcult, Velvet Bloom and Teenage Dads. It will be hosted by the awesome Ali Barter and Oscar Dawson (Holy, Holy) we were stoked when we got the call from them saying they wanted to be involved. It’s hosted at the Frankston Art Centre, for us it’s one of those venues in Frankston that everyone has an experience with. Whether its as a kid in your school play, or as an adult in a lot of theatre based things. They haven’t really dabbled in this scene as much so in our conversations with them they were really excited to be expanding their horizons to a new audience.

Once Covid blows over you have yourselves another venue.

Ryan: I’m going to be there as often as possible. There are some awesome spaces within that venue. There’s something like 3-4 performance spaces, each with their own little quirks. Fortunately we get to cover off a few of them in this live stream, so we are doing it in different ‘studio’ spaces which helps with the changeovers and all that. It also showcases what they have to offer as well.

Andrew: The main theatre is 800 seats, so it’s a huge theatre. The Cube theatrette is 200 seats.

Ryan: The Cube 37 is an amazing space. Its an art gallery mixed with a performance space. When it is set up for a live show it is such an awesome spot.

Andrew: It’s not your traditional pub venue. It’s a world class venue that these acts don’t have access too. This event is not for profit, we are doing this for love as well.

It would be a perfect place for AA shows!

Ryan: I was going to mention that. The world is hanging out for AA shows. If you ask people what their favourite show was there is a 90% chance that the answer is we had this all ages show at this hall. It was an awesome atmosphere. It’s almost like you take the alcohol away and everyone is more invested in the music. It’s something that I hope we can foster. 

We then moved on to genres!!

Andrew: Don’t read a book by its cover!! Ryan gets as dark as any.

Ryan: (laughs) This is my formal attire.

I listen to anything from Country to Black Metal!

Ryan: Good. That’s the way to be though. It’s a thing I have always found with people who are so genre bound with their tastes. When you’re not feeling angry and angsty or if you’re not feeling lovey dovey what are you listening too?? You have to embrace it all and each genre has their own advantage. And bringing it back to the event I think we capitalize on the moment by having four acts that arguably you wouldn’t see on a bill together unless it was a festival setting.

There’s been a lot of talk about bringing back the mixed bill line-ups.

 Ryan: I think the only prerequisite should be that they are good.

100% correct

Ryan: I used to be in bands that sort of did the heavier thing and now I’m dabbling in weird electronic stuff. I would love to be able to still play with those bands, I’d love for their to be a scene that ‘Is it good? Yes. Cool let’s do something together’

Andrew: You have to look at the broad brush. If you have a fine artistic brush and you are just appealing to that one corner you might get your 50-100 people along. Where if you have that bill where you can get the boyfriend bringing the girlfriend and her mate because they all love something different that is on the bill it makes for a great night. And you fill the room. And as Ryan said if it’s good you will.

The diversity was key in this line-up. Funnily enough all four acts were the first four acts that we approached. We thought that we could do it with three acts not expecting them all to jump on board. Being a live stream we didn’t want to have them playing 30-40 minute sets so they each have 15 minute sets so if you’re not loving this genre wait 10 minutes and the next act will be on.

After having a listen to these bands make sure you jump on and purchase a ticket because you are in for an hour of great music by some up and coming talented young Australian bands.

Hit the links below and give them a follow on their Facebook pages and check out their YouTube channels:

https://www.facebook.com/xpromotions01

https://www.facebook.com/velvetbloom.music/

https://www.facebook.com/teenagedads/

https://www.facebook.com/subcultaus/

https://www.facebook.com/bolermanitypebeat/