Interview With Ocean Bones

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So, you’ve taken off to Melbourne escaping the Darwin heat. How’s it all been going? What have you been up to?

Things have been fairly exciting down here for us as of late. Since moving away from Darwin we’ve been spending a lot of time writing, recording and making some really exciting plans for the near future. We’ve just released our new 2 track 7” record titled ‘Regressor’ which is available for free online as well as on Vinyl which is super exciting for me as a Vinyl nerd. 

We see you’ve recruited two new members to the band, how did that all come about?

The first few months down here were honestly pretty filled with stress and uncertainty for Jack and I. We had just packed up our lives, our jobs and our stability in Darwin to move somewhere completely new in the pursuit of moving forward with this band. We spent a good deal of time working with different musicians and ideas trying to find something that fit until one day as a last resort, I decided to post an ad on a local music forum searching for a drummer and a bass player, honestly not expecting anything to come from it.

A few days later I receive an email from Matthew Thompson, who would become the new bass player of Ocean Bones. We got together for a jam with him and he mentioned he had a friend who happened to be an amazing drummer and who was keen to play in our band. We all got together for a rehearsal and everything honestly instantly fell into place. We started working on new music right away and that’s where it all started. It was a very exciting thing for us to be back working in a full line up writing new music.

Is this the first video clip with the 4 of you?

Yeah this is the first time the four of us are on screen together! The video was shot by our good friend and long time collaborator Anthony Grey.

It’s exciting to see and hear the new We don’t need each other tune. What’s the story behind the song?

Thanks so much. This was one of those songs that took a little while to really click. We had so many ideas for where it could go it was honestly overwhelming. The song itself, to me anyway, is about the anxiety that comes along with noticing fundamental differences and conflicts of interest between yourself and others, specifically people you have close relationships with, and trying to decide whether to push against it, or to surrender your beliefs to make things easier.

The new song is tight and is have a real Aussie alt-rock sound to it. It reminds me a bit of Faker meets UK group the Wombats – who do you draw inspiration from when you are creating music?

I think that’s a fair assessment of the sound of this one. We all honestly have too diverse a taste in music to fit into one paragraph. Everything from alt rock to ambient to black metal to pop to hip hop to hardcore haha. In the same breath, I would say there is a strong UK math/dance rock overlap when it comes to our collective interest which is apparent in the drums and some guitar work, but we are always conscious to maintain that solid, full rock sound that we have always stuck to.

How long did the video clip it take to make? Any bloppers you want to share with us?

The forest scenes only took one day, but half of the day was spent trying to find an allan key which was misplaced prior to arriving on location which was literally in the middle of nowhere. So we backtracked to a hardware store before returning and completing the shoot. Delaying a shoot over such a tiny object resulted in some fingers being pointed, some name calling and just generally firing off abuse at each other for awhile before getting on with the task at hand.The other location was Alex our drummers basement. We were fortunate in the sense that his father is a sound gear enthusiast and as you can see, has an incredible collection of equipment from days gone by. Those performance shots were done in half speed so each take took twice the length of the song. We then sped it up to the songs original tempo to create the nice “boppy” effect.

Can you give us a hint into when you’re heading back up to hang out with us again?

I can’t say too much at the moment other than that we are all very keen to head back up north as soon as possible to show the new guys the home ground.

Who is on your music radar at the moment?

The other week we played with a band called DriveTime Commute and HOLY SHIT! The singer ended up bleeding from his forehead. The whole band literally exploded off the stage, as in, they were on the floor, in the crowd, going ballistic! The singer is clearly a big fan of bands like Cattle Decapitation and screams like a absolute madman. We felt like fish out of water playing with them but they were so friendly and welcoming. We both really enjoyed each others sets as well. It’s cool to be able to play with bands of such varying styles and have everyone get on like a house on fire.Also Rad Island are really good friends of ours, they are such talented dudes and are a wealth of experience and knowledge, they are always keen to help out and have a good time. We love playing with bands that love what they do and those dudes are a prime example of what musicians should be doing, making insanely fun music and having a ball while doing it. Definitely check them out if you get the chance!

Do you all little rituals that help you prepare for your gigs?

Nothing to explicit that I can think of as as yet. We’re all just really exciting to be playing together at the moment so the standard practice right now is: show up, hang out, go as hard as possible on stage for 30 minutes or so, have fun doing it, and get off. As well as giving each other plenty of grief before and after the show.

If anyone is looking for your gigs, where can they find you next?

We are about to set off on our “Auspicious Autumn Tour” with our new pals ‘The Treehouse Children’ and you can get your knees up at any of the following dates at your local discotheque.

Fri 8th April – The Public Bar – Melbourne Sat 9th April – The Tote – Melbourne (4pm start) Sat 9th April – Wrangler Studios – Melbourne Thurs 14th April – Club 54 – Launceston (Acoustic) Fri 15th April – Club 54 – Launceston Sat 16th April – Brisbane Hotel – Hobart Fri 22nd April – The Small Ballroom – Newcastle Sat 23rd April – Oxford Arts Factory – Sydney

Check out Ocean Bones latest video