We caught up with The Dead Leaves to talk about their debut album, Peats Ridge Festival and much more!
How are you going guys?
Yeah, we’re really good.
We’re here to talk about your debut album, which comes out next month. How long ago now did you finish the record?
We started early January, so a fair while now.
What can we expect from the record based on the songs we’ve already heard such as “If The Shoe Fits” and “Harm”?
In terms of what we’re trying to achieve, we’re trying to go for something quite heavily layered qand textured and with a great sense of ambiance to it. That was sort of the asthetic.
There are some great names attached to the record such as Scott Horscroft and Eric as well. How did they get involved?
We came to Sydney with our manager to speak to some producers and our manager Mike knows Scott. We met Eric beforehand and we instantly got along, he’s a really cool dude. Then it was just sort of proposed that we work together which was great. we had some other producers interested in working with us too, but working with Scott and Eric seemed like it would be a lot of fun.
After the release of your new album can we expect a massive tour straight after it? No tour dates have been announced as of yet.
Yeah, the tour dates should be out soon. We’ll be hitting up Sydney, Brisbane, Gold Coast and Melbourne for sure, and probably heading over to New Zealand at some point.
You’ve got a show at the Opera House. That is pretty spectacular!
Yeah, we’ll be hitting up Brisbane, Sydney and Melbourne with Kate Miller-Heidke which will be good.
You’ve been touring off and on for the past year. You finished off last year at Peats Ridge Festival where I caught you on the main stage. What was that experience like?
Yeah, it was really fun. When we came onto the main stage it was absolutely bucketing down. I was really surprised there was anyone there, but lots of people showed up. We just had a really good time. We love playing big stages, it’s not often we get to play a main stage and we were just relishing in it.
I dare say that you have a festival sound to you.You certainly fitted well into the atmosphere.
We wanted that. We love the festival vibe, so it’s good that it’s come across.
Looking at the progression of your sound over the years, you listen to the early most acoustic based performances you’ve definitely progressed from what i’ve heard of the new singles off your debut album and what i’ve heard live. How do you feel your sound has progressed in the last three or four years?
There is certainly progression from an artists point of view, but the acousitic stuff mostly came from Matt Joe Gow’s material more so than dead leaves. I was saying earlier that I wasn’t born an old country musician, so I haven’t really become an indie musician if you want to call it that. This is just the way we’re happy to be expressing our music. I guess it’s a lot different if people ever heard Matt Joe Gow’s solo music to The Dead Leaves project. I just hope our music is of a high calibre and people will just focus on that.
It’s been great hearing The Dead Leaves sound which is so different and much bigger sound, but it’s great.
Yeah, this is the sound of our drummer playing pretty much what he wants to play and Andy obviously collaborated a lot with this album. Basically it was Andy and I working it up from the ground.
When it comes to the influences for the record, who would you say was the biggest influence?
It’s really hard to just nominate one artist who influences you throughout the album. But no one particular who dominated over the other, but we just listened to music that we were relating to at the time listening to the soundscapes and textures to the songs it influences.
Moving forward to 2012, I guess you’re big thing for the year is your album. Can we expect anything else expect from the year ahead?
We’re mostly just excited to get the record out there and start playing it to people. From that point, things start to snowball from there. Might head back to New Zealand as well. There is nothing really top secret, it’s mostly just the album.
—
Catch The Dead Leaves on their east coast tour near you!
Their record Cities On The Sea is in stores tomorrow through Liberation.
March 2nd – GoodGod Small Club – Sydney, NSW
March 3rd – The Old Manly Boatshed – Sydney, NSW
March 8th – Sol Bar – Sunshine Coast, QLD
March 9th – The Joynt – South Brsibane, QLD
March 10th – Ric’s Bar – Brisbane, QLD
March 16th – Sydney Opera House – Sydney, NSW
March 17th – Sydney Opera House – Sydney, NSW
March 18th – Sydney Opera House – Sydney, NSW
