So, you're working on your new album, can you tell us a little bit about it?
I'd say we're five songs into what we think will be between a 12-14 song record. The lyrics are completely finished now and I guess they just need to be bashed into melodies and patterns. Lyrically this whole record was written for two years, but then Dean and Jeremy and me were doing the Gay Pariscast one night and I left early to go to a wedding and they stayed out and got drunk and Dean had my hard drive which had all the lyrics on it. So then I had to rewrite it, but it's good because I rewrote the concept of it. So it's still the same theme.
Is it still going to involve Future Wolf again?
Yeah, but he goes by the name Big Joe Hollybone on this record. Because he's gone back in time, and he's making more of an effort to - well he's gone back in time AGAIN - and so he's making more of an effort to fit in and he actually - and this record actually sees Future Wolf show his sensitive side kind of. Because that first record I think comes across to me as Future Wolf's record.
This record is written as an avenue for Future Wolf. I find that he's the moral compass pointing north on this record and his buddies Hustle and Howl just try and get him into all kinds of situations. Because once again it's a concept record, so it does have an underlying 'me bitching about something'.
I think i had some kind of weird existential crisis, so I'm a bit obsessed with if not the afterlife and religion and god, but things that are uniquely human that we have a lot of trouble explaining with science. And I guess you can lump all of that... I'm dressing it up as religion and tearing it to pieces [with the new album].
And not to say that I'm attacking, but because you know there's a little jibe song, which is almost like a limerick where it's just like 'but if there really is a god, then people like me are absolutely fucked'. And that's funny and I can accept that. So yeah that's this record.
Do you have a name for the album?
The record is going to be called 'The Last Good Party' - it's going to be a snapshot... I guess the way that it's going to be set out will be Tarantino-eqsue. Kind of cut and jump to different stories parallel and they all converge and at the end of the record when everyone's at this party.
You've got the old characters like Future Wolf, Fox Queen comes back, the ghost of Jeanne Boulette comes back and there's new characters, my favourite at the moment being Dirty Jesus.
Have you been playing any new tracks live?
We've been playing two. We've been playing 'Black Louie Forgives The Cardinal Sins'
Who will you be working with on this album? Producer-wise?
We gave BZ [Gay Paris' Manager] a list - she said 'give me a list of producers you want to work with'.
We're going to do pre-production with Dave Hammer again because we want someone who will tell us what's shit about our songs and when we've gone over the top as we tend to put too many parts in. So we're gonna work with him on that but we really wanna get, even just for the experience and story, because we like stories, of saying we're going overseas to record.
So we gave BZ our dream list of producers, so like everyone from, it's ridiculous, so Dan Auerbach and then on a more realistic level Forrester Savell. And my personal fucking dream is Chris Funk- he's the guitarist from The Decemberists, but he also did that Red Fang record, which is ridiculously heavy. And then he did The Builders and The Butchers which just sounds like Decemberists Junior, but fantastic lyrics.
So we've just got this ridiculous list and so we don't know where we're going to end up. We do want to go overseas, if we stay in Australia I think we'll go with Forrester Savell. It's an overseas thing, but then you know, that's money.
Are you still looking at touring the US as well?
Yeah we're definitely going to New Orleans in October and we'll live there for six weeks and the plan is to play at least five different residencies through the week, and then on the weekends tour and drive out to the surrounding areas, so hit Texas. And we'll also fly to places, I think we plan on hitting Toronto and LA, as much as I don't think we're an LA band. And I don't know that we're a Brooklyn band either - we're going there because I just fucking want to go to Brooklyn.
Seattle is where we actually want to record the album, Seattle or Portland, that's where two of the producers are. I really want to go to those places, because I don't want to be in stinking hot New Orleans the whole fucking time, I want to get some chill on.
Do you have any highlights from this year? I mean you've played a lot of shows this year.
Yeah I think we've gone from playing, we were playing for the last two shows of Gay Paris we played about 30 shows a year, and I think this year already we've still got another 12 shows before the end of the year - we must've played like 50 shows or something by now.
So I would like that highlights for me, geez, well Katoomba, cos that was the party-boy love-in festival with Jackers [The Rumjacks] and Droppers [The Snowdroppers], that was cool and also because I think it's always good... I don't ever take it for granted, but I don't really achieve satisfaction in my life unless we're playing shows.
When I'm not doing Gay Paris shit, what else? I mean I like to read about Roman history, but I'd rather be...
On tour?
Yeah, spraying someone with drink and drinking their drink as well. So yes highlights were Changing Lanes Festival.
I'm just trying to think... you know even The Beards thing, getting to hang out with The Beards so much, as much as they're joking about something that I'm very serious about, they are just really rad dudes.
Like meeting so many good dudes over the last - I mean we've known the Snowdroppers and Brothers for a while now - this whole Gay Paris trajectory - I've been in bands before and met a lot of good dudes but I think we haven't developed the kind of tight friendships that we've developed with dudes that are in Adelaide and Melbourne. Like I would consider James [Grim - Brothers Grim & The Blue Murders], like minutes spent with him I probably haven't known him for that long, but I feel that he gets it.
We have this real connection. So I'm just thankful that my band got me these kind of people. Like Totally Unicorn - we've known those dudes for the better part of a decade, through being in other bands together- they're some of my best friends in the world too.
Are you guys just going to be working on the new album next year? Or are you going to do the whole extensive touring thing again?
If we don't tour I'll go insane.The first show back next year is the Vanguard which is awesome. On the 14th January.
We're headlining, Surprise Wasp is main support. So it's a frontman-off. And can you have two bands that go onstage and go 'shut up, we're the best, we're the best!'
So I think we'll be touring a lot next year, well we better be. I know we're meant to be concentrating straight on the record but it's meant to be done by March, so that leaves- we need to tour to make money so we can go to the US in October, we don't have the option to not.
It's just a matter of opportunities. I think we sort of have to - we're at a point where we have to do, we actually have to headline a whole tour, we can't... cos we're in a weird limbo between, you know we can pull a safe number of people in Sydney and Wollongong and maybe in Canberra, but we really have to solidify Brisbane and.. actually we've had really good headlining shows in Brisbane, so I think it's in Melbourne that's the top one for us to crack.
