Rather than brave the chilly walk to Civic or the daunting descent down the stairs at one22, head out to Belconnen and enjoy the musical delight of something that isn’t a poorly done remix of Rush or Padam.
As part of our Artists Series, Woroni Content Editor Lizzie sat down with Teenage Dads to chat about life on tour, crowd culture, and the big scary P word (pop!).
Thank you guys so much for taking the time to chat with me.
That’s okay, we’re not doing much.
That’s surprising because you guys have been busy!
Yeah, I mean, we actually are doing certain things, getting ready for Splendour in the Grass, but the whole point of the next few days is to rest after our US run and then get ready for the festival.
Yeah, absolutely. So you guys have been touring all across Europe, are you guys excited to tour in Australia? Do you find it different to being on the road in Europe, versus you know, being on home turf?
Yeah everyone’s pretty different. It’s kinda weird…we skipped winter this year.
That’s one benefit I’d say. I feel like in our experiences so far overseas, overseas is just set up far better for touring. We were joking with Lime Cordiale a lot how you do a weekend in Australia, you would feel absolutely ruined. Whereas you do two weeks in the UK or Europe and you’ll be fine.
Why is that?
I think partly the distance stuff but also, you don’t really have to fly anywhere. I think the whole process of finishing a gig in Australia, you go to the hotel room, you sleep for a couple of hours, get up, airport, fly, and just that whole process kills you.
Whereas you can just take trains and stuff around Europe and it’s much quicker, much easier on your bodies, I guess?
Yeah. It’s just that’s the way it’s kind of felt anyway, but we’re still really looking forward to being back home. I think it’ll give us a new perspective.
The water is better in Australia.
That I don’t doubt. What are the crowds like over there? Are they different to your home base fans here, who maybe have known you guys for a while?
It’s a little bit different, in different areas the crowd is more cool than other areas, and some places are more inclined to dance and sing, and some places it’s more of like a ‘hands on hips, just watch’. But I feel like people still will come up everywhere and say how much they enjoyed the set. It’s just very, very different in some areas, people don’t show it during the set as much.
I imagined in Australia crowds kind of go a bit more wild. But that might be a stereotype.
I think the big part of it, particularly for us, is you kind of just can’t really compare the two just yet because, like you said we’re an Australian band and we played in Australia for years. So people kind of definitely know who we are, so there’s a more likely chance of fans being really big fans. Whereas overseas they’re seeing us or hearing us for the first time, so they’re not going to be absolutely losing their mind or anything like that.
Having said that, Dublin particularly popped off. They’re really loose people there.
Maybe they have something in the water?
Yeah or just the Guinness, maybe.
All those sorts of cultural differences, like when we did the first Dublin gig, instead of a one more song chant they’ve got “Olé, Olé, Olé!”.
You never get that here. Then you get the odd Australian that’s there being a dickhead going “Aussie, Aussie, Aussie!”
That’s so good. Maybe for some of our readers who aren’t super familiar with your stuff, how would you guys describe your sound to our readers and listeners?
Do we get like, ‘describe your sound in three words or less’?
I’ll be generous. I’ll give you five.
Too many!
2
First word is alright. Yeah. Alright .
Allright…Let me see. That’s four!
What’s the closer?
Rock! Indie rock. We just tell everybody it’s indie rock, indie pop.
I was in a record store the other day in Toronto. It was massive and I was just looking at the way they categorise things. Most of the bands and artists that I listen to were all in indie pop. So I was kinda like,’ all right, I can see us being in the indie pop category, if that’s what this classifies’.
For ages we were scared of those words, we’d go, “yeah, we’re a psychedelic rock band”. You didn’t want to use the word pop, or indie.
And they’re not a surf band!
If you guys could have your way, no strings attached, no limits, who would you love to go on tour with, supporting?
Abba! If they’re free…probably hit them up.
Queen. That would be a good one. Kinda sick.
Prodigy.
Dolly Parton.
Dolly Parton would be sick, do you think her fans would like your stuff?
I think Dolly and I would really get along well.
That’s all that matters.
So true, it’s about the vibes. Great answer. If you guys were to make it really big, which I feel is not too far off, who would you bring on tour to support you, what upcoming artists?
There’s a really cool indie folk artist in Nashville…. Dolly Parton?
Um….. that’s tough.
Let’s plug all the bands that are supporting us on the next tour. We’ve got the Moving Stills, Death by Denim, Betty Taylor, Aleksiah, Siena Rebelo, Bocce in Tassie. I think that’s everyone! It’s always really cool picking support, sometimes you want to… you feel like you need to do it on a strategic basis to help pull more people to the tour and that sort of thing. But it’s also just really fun if you can set that aside and bring your friends along
So what’s next for you guys? I mean, I’m sure you’re exhausted and this is the last thing you want to think about, but the people want to know – are you thinking about another album, less touring, a break maybe? What are you feeling?
We’ve got a new song that we just got back from a master, but apart from that nothing’s really ready to go.
Yeah on the music front, we are working away, but we don’t know when things will be… we don’t have much information to divulge…
That’s all right. Keep your secrets.
We do have this big Australian tour coming up, which will, I think, bring us to nearly 100 shows this year, which will warrant some rest. We don’t have a whole lot planned for the November/ December period, but who knows, things might pop up.
Sounds like you guys are overdue for a little vacation.
Want to stay on campus? Check out the Kambri website to get tickets performances like the DMAs and Safia!
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