2010 has already seen Christchurch band O’Lovely play the Big Day Out for the first time; their single A Different Day reach the top of the bFM charts, and work begin on their debut album. Feats which lead singer Laura Lee would have you believe are serendipitous happenstances, when in fact it’s because O’Lovely are a really great band destined to become greater.
O’Lovely’s line-up recently changed. What was the reason for that?
[Original Members] Brooke, Matt and I went overseas and then came back to New Zealand. Brooke was doing Ragamuffin Children, Matt went to uni and I kept doing the band. Our style started changing quite a bit and I started coming up with different stuff, so when I got back from overseas I jammed with some friends and then we recorded and kept the same band name.
What is the current line-up?
Perry [Mahoney, guitar], Tim [Woods, drums] and I are the solid members and Mike [Ellis] is playing bass for us at the moment. We haven’t really had a permanent bass player since we started, so we just get friends to play bass for us. Mike is doing the shows with us at the moment and is coming on tour.
Why don’t you have a permanent bassist?
It’s hard getting someone that could be at every show. Everyone has other stuff going on.
Does it change the dynamic of the band having revolving bassists?
I don’t think so. The three of us have a strong dynamic, so when someone else comes in they end up playing how we’re playing. Everyone we’ve had has the same kind of style as us, so it’s worked out quite well. Perry and Mike work really well together though. They have the same style of playing.
What inspired you to get into playing music in the first place?
I’ve just always played music. I played when I was young, but that was more classical stuff. I did that through high school as well, but at the same time I was writing different music to that completely. Then I teamed up with Brooke and we just mucked around and wrote songs and then ended up playing some gigs. It just happened. I suppose it’s just other bands that I’ve loved and being able to express myself through music personally. I can’t think of a specific point where I decided to do it, it’s just always been there.
Is being in a band how you expected it to be?
Not at all. What we’re in at the moment, it feels like we’re actually doing something. I didn’t expect to play at the Big Day Out or Camp A Low Hum. I didn’t really have any expectations. Perry has always loved to play music and it’s just what we like doing, so it’s just happened that we’ve got to do those things.
So you didn’t have a grand plan?
We like recording and we’re recording an album this month. Our expectations are that we want to produce something that shows what we like and what we’re thinking when we’re playing music. We don’t have any big plans. At the moment we’re concentrating on releasing an album, because we’ve got heaps of songs now, so we really want to do that.
Where are you recording the album?
We’re recording the album in Dunedin with Dale Cotton [Dimmer, HDU]. He’s really good. He recorded A Different Day and some of our other songs that were going to be on an EP, but we just decided to release an album because Native Tongue, who is our publisher, is giving us a bit of money to do it. We can’t really afford to do it ourselves (laughs). So we thought, if we’re going to have the opportunity to do it, we might as well do an album.
Have you got a name for the album?
Not yet. We’ve been thinking about it. The EP was going to be called Lost Luck. Perry’s not keen on that name though (laughs).
What is your writing/recording process?
It’s a tough one. Me and Perry write everything. I will kind of come up with something and Perry will come up with something and that’s how it normally happens. With the songs we’ve written lately, Perry will come up with a structure and I’ll have some lyrics and then it just happens quite fast. We just try and go from there and add stuff to it. We don’t really have a specific way of writing.
You played the Big Day Out for the first time this year. How was it?
It was really good. We played on the local produce stage at about 12:30. We had a reasonably good crowd. It seemed like they let heaps more people in after 1:00 though. I think they’d been waiting and they were finally let in which was weird. But we had a really good crowd anyway, so it was all good.
What are you listening to at the moment?
Perry’s really into Bailterspace right now and God Bows To Math. I listen to heaps of music. I don’t have one particular thing that I listen to. We’re all really into Flying Nun bands as well. Lots of NZ music.
The state of music in NZ is….
I think it’s pretty healthy and flourishing. I think in Christchurch at the moment it’s really good. Everyone’s doing something great, like Tiger Tones and Pikachunes. We’ve played with them quite a bit and we have really good times. Everyone’s coming up with new stuff and it’s never boring.
