As well as pumping out a brilliant clip for “Unstoppable” (youtube it!), the band just finished up a self-funded tour of Sydney and Melbourne. The line-up consists of Josh Graham on vocals and guitar, Therese Watson on synths and vocals, Matt Niciak on bass and Ben Fitzpatrick on drums. Josh, Therese and Matt were kind enough to take some time out from busy schedules of email checking, blogging and working on debut LP, Good Times Airlines, to sink some beers with the SSH.
Talk us through the process of getting the tour off the ground.
T: Well, we got an email from a venue in Melbourne and that kind of started it. They were like, well we like your stuff and if you guys want to come play, come play, and we thought, yeah, let’s go to Melbourne, let’s go on tour.
J: Yeah, we were just going to go down for a weekend or something but then we thought, let’s book a couple more shows and make it a tour. Originally we were going to do a few more shows in Canberra but it turned out to be a real hassle to promote so we just did Sydney and Melbourne because we really needed a bit more exposure down there.
T: And it wasn’t too long after that that we decided we should probably get a video clip too because NSW Tourism just picked up “Unstoppable” so we thought it would be really cool to have a video clip as well.
M: Yeah, it was a really short, steady gradient between, “Hey guys, there’s this venue that wants us to play in Melbourne and wouldn’t it be funny if we went on a tour and then made a video clip for it?” and then it seemed as if it was the next week and we’re standing in the freezing water shooting the clip the day before we get in the car.
I really love the video. Did you guys have all the computer animations done before you started shooting?
J: Well, we had the concept, we knew it was going to be in there, and then it was just a matter of making it happen, I guess. We were briefing in the animations as we were doing the first shoot and we didn’t really see a first draft until the weekend after the first shoot, but when we saw them we were like, “My god, this is actually going to work!” He’s an amazingly talented illustrator, Kyle Downes. It was all a massive collaboration, I mean, we paid a couple of people but most of it was out of the kindness of their hearts.
M: It made it all really easy to work with as well. Everyone was there because they wanted to do it. Everyone really banded together.
J: Yeah, the first shoot was something like 10 hours.
M: Well, we were jumping into the ocean at about 12.30[am] with one set of dry clothes, one flare left and the director says, “OK, I don’t want to stress you or anything but we have to do this right, we only have one more shot at this”.
T: I was certain I was going to trip or something.
M: And karma comes back around and says, OK, well this is going to be the coldest day of the year and I’m looking at the waves and Ben says, “Hhhmmm, I hope you like the taste of your own spinal fluid”.
So, you guys are starting to see the complications of doing all this yourself. How did that pan out on the tour?
J: Well, it was a bit difficult booking everything because most bands have booking agents for that kind of thing and we had to print and design all our own merch, but really the more you put out there and the more you give everyone else to see, the more booking agents and managers will hopefully come to you and see that you have your head into gear, and we really wanted to have a physical product to hand out.
Any advice for other young bands that might have some of these ideas in mind?
J: Make sure your clip has a concept. I think that’s a really big one, make sure it’s got some kind of binding story running through it.
