The Valley Fiesta in Brisbane, the Coaster Festival in Gosford, Grazzhopper in Geelong, Sounds of Spring in Brisbane, Sounds in the Grounds and Homebake in Sydney. These are just some of the music festivals rolling out at the onset of the summer season, all to feature the sweaty goodness of bluejuice. yourGigs speaks to bassist Jamie Cibej, starting with the fest that shook off the winter blues, Splendour in the Grass.
yourGigs (yG): You kicked Splendour off to a cracking start. How was it for you?
Jamie Cibej (JC): From our perspective it was just ridiculous. It was just mental - we weren't expecting that. It blew our minds a little bit.
yG: You also scored a support with Tricky. Did you get to hang out with the man at all?
JC: I accidentally walked into his band's dressing room - that was quite embarrassing. The most contact we had with him was Jerry and I were carrying my amps offstage after the show and kind of rammed Tricky and he kindly offered to help us, which we declined. That was about the extent of our contact, ramming him into the wall ... He was lovely about it, probably just stoned.
yG: Some of your newer live songs have a more soulful, melodic feel to them, like 'Broken Leg' and 'I Ain't Telling the Truth'. Is that a new direction you're going in?
JC: Yeah, we're enjoying those new ones ... Most live shows now, half the set is not on previous releases. Probably less straightforward hip hop would be on this next album, I would say. A lot of stuff like 'Broken Leg' is a kind of obnoxiously cheesy, Van Halen rip-off or something. Don't really know what it is!
yG: With two frontmen and three guys on instruments, how would you describe the bluejuice songwriting approach?
JC: There's a few different ways we write - Jake often brings in some rudimentary music ideas which he's written on piano with lyrics which we work to. Other times the band has music there and the guys write their lyrics to it. 'The Reductionist' on our last album was a good example of that. And Stav often has his own lyrics that we put music to.
yG: The rest of the year sees plenty of festivals planned. Are you prepared to wear the mantle of 'festival band'?
JC: Yeah, there's just so many festivals now and we didn't plan on doing a proper tour this half of the year. Having so many opportunities to do festivals, it kind of ended up being a bit of a tour. Most of them are reasonably spread out so hopefully we won't bore everyone shitless too much!
yG: Yet amid all the festivals on offer and interest in live music there's the Great Escape cancellation.
JC: A bit sad, the line-up looked really good. I would have thought it would eventually sell out. But I'm not a promoter, so I don't know.
yG: Anything else bluejuice has planned in the coming months?
JC: We were in the studio last week, laying down some demos. But I think December is the date to start properly recording the new album.
Kilian David
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