CREATIVE CONVERSATIONS 156: BIRDLAND | PERTH TRIPLETS WRITING THE FUTURE OF INDIE POP ONE HOOK AT A TIME
Interview by AJ Mahar.
Despite much of the Australian musical landscape having a decade on them, Perth band, Birdland, continue to show an understanding of feel-good catchy tunes on par with the elders on their new single, On My Mind. The impact of their hooks appeared quickly upon my arrival at a leafy suburbs café to meet the teenage triplets when the group were recognised by a server. We eventually settled into a chat over flat whites, and one decadent looking Tim Tam milkshake.
FMM: The new song On My Mind, shows a really quick development from the previous song Seven Months Ago. What did you guys do differently in the creation of this one?
Francis: So, we had recorded the drum track for On My Mind at the same time we did for Seven Months Ago. The song had already been written and everything. The song took quite a long time to write. But when we started to record, we were going to the studio Thursday after schools and working on it and just kept stabbing at it. We knew what we wanted this time as well; with Seven Months Ago, that was the first time we were properly trying to record a song, so we were getting used to what we could do and this time we kind of knew what we were able to do.
FMM: You’re quite present on social media. Do you find it interrupts your music making? Or have you found some balance to that?
Conrad: Yes, we spend a lot of time filming videos. Some of them take an hour to an hour and a half. Then we need to practise songs and stuff for gigs, but we also want to create a video. I feel like the video making sort of eats into our time that we can practise.
Oscar: We enjoy the video time. I think though now that we've been creating videos, our musical skills have improved because we've been learning new songs every week. But for me it also kind of counts as practise because we learn the song on the night and then we play it. Sometimes I think maybe we practise a bit less with our other stuff. But it's still practise at the end of the day, because we're still playing.
FMM: Obviously you guys go way back, being triplets, but when did the music really enter your lives?
Oscar: We've always played music together; I played cello, and Francis, and Conrad played guitar and drums. We really started playing in a band together in 2019 because I picked up bass guitar. We pretty much started writing straight away. Especially Francis. Francis was writing songs off the bat.
FMM: There's quite an eclectic mix of influences with great pop sensibility, judging by your covers that you post. What in particular was influencing you with this new song?
Francis: Vampire by Olivia Rodrigo. I'm sure a lot of people know that song. I love the structure because it starts off with this piano and then it seamlessly evolves to this mix of all these other instruments, and the song just gains momentum in it. You don't really notice its transformation, but in the last chorus, it's just so epic and so big. And it's like I was thinking, ‘how can we do that in our band?’ I really studied that structure, then I brought it to the brothers. We listened to the song together and we brainstormed, and we came up with a structure for On My Mind where it kind of brings you forward. It shows you the band a bit, takes it back, and then it starts up. Also, Pluto Projector by Rex Orange County, not like I was with Vampire, but it still played a part.
FMM: How do you manage your schooling with the band?
Oscar: Like, I guess it's fine. I do the emailing and whatever. I get emails pop up during the day and I always get excited to look at emails because I like thinking, ‘oh, what's, it gonna be? What's someone talking about?’ Like sometimes it's offers or whatever. And then I usually take time, and I respond to them at night, like I put an hour aside. It’s just emails at the end of the day.
FMM: It sounds like the excitement gives you that spring in your step to do it
Oscar: Yeah. I think I stepped up. I think we as a band have stepped up with admin stuff this year. I used to be so bad at emails; I'd get an email, and I'd put it to my spam email account, and I wouldn't save the important ones. But now, I have different accounts, like one from when people email me, and one where I reach out to other people. I'm a lot more organised now.
FMM: Any exciting plans in the pipeline for the future after this next single?
Oscar: I think more singles to come; it might be a bit too early for an EP. But I'm thinking if we maybe keep releasing singles like, three months apart, or whatever, then we can keep growing like our listeners before we put something big out there.
FMM: It sounds like you’re actually going through quite a backlog of songs you've already written.
Francis: We've got probably nine, ten original songs in the bag right now. So, if people come to our, gigs, see us live anywhere, we're definitely throwing those out for the crowd.