“I guess now as the band has grown and we’ve taken more things on, and we have more elaborate promo and marketing – plus long term things overseas happening – I guess all that starts to weigh in on it. Plus there is less opportunity to be writing all the time. I guess that’s how we started out with all the EPs, and that time isn’t there as much anymore,” Tom ponders.
The first taste of Not Art came in the form of the sedate track Phil Collins, which was followed soon after with the notably disparate Luck Now. As Tom explains, the selection of tracks was a ploy to misdirect. “That was totally the plan. We released Phil Collins first knowing that it wasn’t a single at all. It’s kind of moody, there’s no real catchy chorus. I guess we just thought it was more of a mood-setter for the album. Bands tend to put the catchiest, poppiest out first as the single, then everyone is expecting a bright, catchy album to follow it. A lot of the time that isn’t the case. We wanted to suggest that it would be a darker record, and we definitely tried to keep people guessing a bit.”
Luck Now sees Tom boldly push his production chops, employing sonic elements found in the genres of dubstep and hip hop. “Well that one was a completely new thing, and it was a song that dictated how we approached it due to circumstances. We did a lot of touring early in the year last year, then Jo went overseas travelling,” Tom recalls. “I was at home and had to make loops and beats on the computer, as opposed to live percussion. That’s what started the track off, these electronic loops. It was more meant to be a demo, and we later tried to do acoustic versions of those dubsteppy type beats, but it just didn’t quite have the same vibe. In the end we just went with it and laid things over the top. It was very much the opposite of how we did things in the past. It was interesting, coming up with that one in the end.”
As is the case with most two-piece bands, the sonic evolution in the studio has resulted in the decision to expand the live outfit with a supplementary member. As Tom explains, Big Scary were never sanctimonious about retaining the duo formation on the stage.
“We never ruled it out, really. It was just a matter of finding the right person and the right way to involve them. Definitely with these new songs, even with Vacation, we couldn’t really replicate it live with just the two of us. We had to adapt the songs and almost do different versions of them. It just means that there is more scope for possibility when touring. But it’s still a challenge, because we’re probably still one person short,” Tom states. “You could always use another pair of hands, but we’re nutting it all out.”
The tail end of 2012 saw the Melbourne duo wrap up their Vacation touring stint with an extensive US tour, which was then followed into a voyage performing around India.
“In the States there is that interest in Aussie music, they know who the Aussie bands are. Even in India, it’s still young students who find music on the internet and become fans like anyone else. The venues aren’t that different than what you find here or in the States; I think we even played at a Hard Rock Café. It was a cool experience,” Tom recalls. “I guess the reactions are a bit different, because metal is the big thing in India. We toured with Karnivool and they played to thousands of people at the festival we played at. It’s pretty crazy.”
The Big Scary that are about to release Not Art have come a long way from the Big Scary that emerged with a wealth of EPs, but as Tom reasons, the band have been adaptive in their approach.
“It’s been something that we’ve tried to get our heads around, it’s changing all the time,” Tom muses. “It’s not as if there has been one sweeping change. The truth is that we’re always evolving, we both have to still work and have lives outside of the band. It’s become trickier as the band has evolved. We have less playing time together; we don’t have those whole weeks where we can play. We do have to be more focussed. We’re doing longer tours, plus heading overseas, so a lot of our time is about getting ready for that – when it used to be about writing, finding something new.
“We very much still feel like we’re up and coming, we don’t feel like we’ve made it in that sense. I guess what we do have over a lot of bands playing in local pubs is experience. There’s a lot of myths out there that you hold to be true when you’re a young band. We’re no Flume or Gotye or any kind of breakthrough artist, we’re still hammering away like everyone else.”
BY LACHLAN KANONIUK
