“About a year or so ago, I had the idea of putting together a full length album in the format of a movie soundtrack,” he begins. “Different bands would be featured in the movie, only the movie didn’t exist! It was just going to be me predominantly doing all the music, with friends here and there. I wanted to get a ‘placeholder’ online for the bands that were going to be featured on it, and one of them was a band called ‘Thick Line Thin Line’, which was approached by a booking agent called ‘Melbourne Fresh’, asking them to take part in their weekly showcase at Revolver. So I thought, ‘Why not!’ So I got some friends together and see what happens. Six weeks later we had our first gig!”
So essentially, the idea of doing a soundtrack to a non-existent movie by yourself morphed into a full band project? “Yeah, I just had the idea of doing a few different songs all on my own, but it all came to fruition. So it was kind of a happy accident!”
So, after all that, Adam now has a very simple way of describing the band’s sound. “When most people ask me I just say ‘it’s a rock band’,” he states. “We’ve got big hooky vocals, we’ve got crunching guitars, big drums, thundering bass. It’s alternative heavy rock. We’ve got heavier songs, we’ve got softer ballady type songs. We’ve got upbeat songs, we’ve got downbeat songs, it’s just a…rock band!” he laughs.
“We’re not really limited by one genre,” he expands. “We draw influence from a range of different artists, from Deftones and Karnivool to Foo Fighters and Placebo, all the way through to Bjork and a bunch of electronica from the ‘90s.”
The transition from solo pseudo-movie soundtrack to full band production has been so successful, that last week the band took out the prestigious Gunn Music Showcase last week, a weekly band competition held at The Espy every Sunday for most of the year, from a field of literally dozens of other acts. The band were absolutely stoked to win the competition, and believe it will be very important for their immediate and longer term future in the industry.
“That was an absolute trip!” he enthuses. “We actually asked them (Gunn Music) to keep us in mind for any shows they had lined up, and they approached us with this showcase. We’d all been around the Melbourne scene for a while, and we’d never had a chance to play The (Espy’s) Gershwin Room before, so we said, ‘Let’s jump on board that’. And as soon as we got there we were all just completely blown away by how professional everyone was…all the bands that played last week were just phenomenal, and when our name was called out, it was a trip man! I’ve sort of been in a bit of a daze since!
“On the surface, there’s prizes,” he explains. “We’ve got this interview, we got an on air live set on Triple R. We also get put onto Gunn Music’s artist roster, working with them, supporting other bands, playing their shows. And because they’re such a professional company, there’s other places that they work in unison with, and we’ve already been offered a few shows from a few other people.
“We also get an ESP guitar endorsement, which is the biggest trip of all! Some of my favourite guitarists of all time have been endorsed by ESP. It’s a cliché, but it’s a dream come true.”
It’s certainly a massive kickstart for the band for next year, and they already have some very major things planned for 2013, including shows and potentially two new releases.
“Next year we’ve got a few gigs lined up in the first couple of months, with our second EP due for release in probably March,” he informs us. “We recorded that over probably the last three or four months, and we’ve already been demoing stuff for a possible full length release maybe this time next year. Other than that, just getting the name out there, getting the live experience up. Hopefully get out for some regional shows and possibly interstate.”
Thick Line Thin Line are certainly a band to look out for in 2013 and beyond.
BY ROD WHITFIELD
