September 22, 2025 • 38 mins
On this episode of Bringin' It Backwards, Adam and Tera Lisicky sit down with Ivy and Mabel, the sister duo behind the stunning folk act Charm of Finches. Hailing from the heart of Melbourne, Australia, these two share what it was like growing up in a musical family—complete with a mom who led choirs and once performed electronic music standing on her head! From busking as kids outside their dad’s veggie shop to recording their very first EP at just 12 and 14, and then emerging as one of Australia’s most beloved new folk acts, Ivy and Mabel walk us through their remarkable journey.
The sisters chat about carving their own independent path, capturing inspiration during long tours abroad, and the fairytale origins of their latest album’s title—Marlinchen in the Snow. They reflect on how winning the Best Folk Album at the Australian Folk Music Awards changed things, offer real talk about sibling dynamics in music, and open up about learning the DIY side of the industry, from recording at home to editing their own videos. Plus, they’ve got some solid advice for aspiring artists about staying honest in your craft and doing it yourself wherever you can.
Stick around to hear candid stories about life on the road, sisterhood, and why creative vulnerability matters more than ever. Whether you’re gunning for your own spot in the spotlight or just want a peek into the making of today’s rising indie stars, you don’t want to miss this conversation with Charm of Finches.
Listen and subscribe to Bringin' It Backwards wherever you get your podcasts!
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(00:10):
Bring it backwards,
Bring it backwards. Bringing it backwards.
Bringing it backwards. Bringing it backwards.
Bringing it backwards. What is going on? It
is Adam welcome back to Bringing It Backwards, a podcast where both legendary
(00:30):
and rising artists tell their own personal stories of how they
achieve stardom. On this episode we had the
opportunity to hang out with Ivy and Mabel of
the band Charm of Finches over Zoom Video.
Ivy and Mabel are sister is born in the inner city of
Melbourne in Australia and talk about how they got into music.
(00:52):
Their mom was actually very musical, a choir chorus
teacher and she was in a band in the 90s where apparently
she used to sing standing on her head in kind of like an electronic
duo which I thought was a cool story. They both started music
at a very early age. Mabel is two years older than
Ivy and she started writing songs at 12 years old
(01:14):
and their dad ran a veggie shop so they would
busk in front of the veggie shop. Starting when
Ivy was 8 years old they talked about putting out and recording
their very first episode. We actually dive into all of the
albums. The album they released in 2021,
Wonderful Oblivion was all recorded and done during
(01:36):
COVID so they were file sharing back and forth with their
producer in Canada and ended up having the opportunity to go to
Canada to record this new album that
we talked a lot about as well. Talked about the story behind the
title which is a wild fairy
tale that they were told as a seven year olds.
(01:58):
But they dive into the new album and the huge tour they have coming up.
Four month tour through the UK and Sweden and then
through Canada as well. You can watch our interview with
Ivy and Mabel on our Facebook page and YouTube channel at bringing it
Backwards. It would be amazing if you subscribe to our channel
like us on Facebook, follow us on Instagram, Twitter and tick
(02:20):
tock at Bringing back pod. And if you're listening to this on
Spotify, Apple Music, Google Podcast Please please
please rate and review the podcast. It helps us out tremendously.
We'd appreciate your support if you follow and subscribe to our podcast.
Wherever you listen to podcasts, we're bringing. It backwards with
Charm of Finches.
(02:45):
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Awesome. I appreciate you doing this. No worries. Thanks for
(05:20):
having us. Of course. What time is it there?
It's 12am oh my goodness. Thank you
for being willing to either stay up
or wake up. Yeah.
Oh my. Okay. Well, forgive
(05:41):
us if we. You know.
You guys look great.
Awesome. Well, my name's Adam, and this is
about the two. You and your. Your journey in music. And
we'll talk about the new album as well. Great.
Cool. Is it. Is it out? It was. Oh, sorry. I'm
(06:03):
Ivy and this is my room, just by the way. Cool. Cool.
Is the album out? It was supposed to. It. It's
Friday. Okay. Friday. I was wondering.
I saw April. I thought it was last Friday when I was confused, but
I had. I had it in advance, so I just wanted to make sure that
I wasn't. Totally. Yeah.
(06:26):
Amazing. Well, first off, obviously sisters. Who's.
Who's the elder sister? Me.
By how many years? There's a couple or two and a bit. Two and
a half. Two and a half years, I think. Yeah. Okay. Well,
do you both come from a musical family at all?
And where we. You grew up? In Australia. What part of Australia?
(06:49):
We are in Melbourne. We grew up in the inner city
of Melbourne. Yeah. And to answer your question about
our parents, whether they're musical, we. Our
mum was a choir leader when we were little. She also
was in bands in the 90s. No way.
Yeah. She was in an
(07:11):
electronic duo. Yeah. Where she would stand on her head
and sing and the
other person had a laptop on stage. It was like when people were first
putting laptops on stage. And it was weird. Sure.
I remember those days. I'm old.
I. I think. What was your mom's duo called?
(07:35):
Oh, it was called Fimo. Yeah. I don't think it's on the Internet. No.
That's cool. Did you used to go. Or were you all too young?
Mabel. Holding Mabel while she recorded.
Are you serious? That's amazing. But you'd stand
on her head. Have you seen videos of that? Yeah, actually, where
(07:57):
she has the blue. There would be photos. She was. She was
a lot. That's so cool. And I'm sure super
supportive of what you both are doing. Oh, yeah, yeah.
She's been great. Yeah. And dad. Dad's not a
music or. No, he's just a music lover and
was. Is obsessed with Bob Dylan. And so that is
(08:20):
a lot of what we listen to as kids. Okay. Is that where you
got kind of the folky vibe from or
aside from. Yeah, we did listen to lots of
folk music. Yeah. The oh, Brother, Where Art
Thou soundtrack. Yeah, you know that one. Harmonies.
Yeah, we were big into that.
(08:44):
But, yeah, Bob Dylan for sure as well. We. Well,
as kids, we thought that his voice was a bit scratchy.
Yeah. A lot of people did but when you can write that good
of songs, who cares?
One song of his that we did just love was Mr.
Tambourine Man. Okay. His voice was
(09:06):
scratchy as thousands. We love
that one. We would see to it. So, Mabel, you're
older. Did you start. I mean, did you both start music at the same time?
Or were you doing something and then Ivy, you
were, like, intrigued or wanted to, you know, follow your big
sister or. How did that work? Yeah, well, I wrote
(09:28):
my first song when I was 12.
Yeah. And taught myself guitar. And then
Ivy jumped on the harmonies, and I
guess we just kept writing songs. And we used to. We used to
busk a lot when we were. When we were. We started busking when we
were 8 and 11. No way. Oh, my gosh.
(09:53):
Your mom was just like, yeah, go ahead, go out. And you guys would go
out and play. Did you make some money? Yeah, well, we had the
cute factor then. That
doesn't work anymore. Yeah, but our
dad worked at this veggie shop, and we
had another friend singing with us, and we would sing three part
(10:15):
harmonies outside this veggie shop. Yeah. Yeah. No
way. That's so cool. Throw their loose change in every time they
come out. What
instrument did you both start on? Or did you start on different ones? It sound.
Maybe sounds like you learned guitar yourself. But prior to that, were you.
Did you play anything? And I'm sure mom put you all
(10:37):
in or taught you how to sing early on or put you in her class
or. Well, we actually went to Steiner school, which is like.
I don't know if you've heard of Steiner school. You might call it Waldorf
there. It's like an alternative
stream. Okay. And some favorite artists went to
Steiner school, like Sophie on Stevens. He's one of our. Oh, really?
(11:00):
Yeah. Actually diner school. Dylan and Newsom as well. That's
true. Yeah. Yeah. Anyway, it's a stream where music's
like a big part of it. And so you sing every day in class.
And then when you're. I think when you're nine years old, you pick up
a stringed instrument like violin, viola, or cello.
And so I picked up cello when I was nine and I
(11:22):
picked up violin. Wow. So they were our first
instruments. That's cool. Those are such beautiful instruments. I love the
sounds of Violet strings. I think that's cool. They're very frustrating
to learn at the. Very beginning, I would imagine. And I bet your parents were
so happy when they could hear you going.
Early on. I. I would have thought they would have learned
(11:45):
by Mabel's Terrible. Terrible playing at the
start. Okay. Because she started before you.
Yeah, yeah. You got to push through that stage. Yeah. You know. Right?
That's funny. Listen, then busking that early on, you
said 11 and 8ish. And then
you wrote your first song, Mabel at 12. And is that. Have
(12:08):
you both just been playing together since, you know, that early
on and. Or did you, you know, play in different bands
and kind of come back together, or has it always just been the two of
you performing together? It's pretty much always
been us. Yeah. We made
a little EP when we were. How old are we?
(12:31):
12 and 14. And that was, like, where it started, and
we were just gonna do it for our friends and just
burn a couple for our friends, but then we. We ended up just
making a crowdfunding campaign and.
Yeah. Printing them professionally and.
(12:51):
Wow. Now we're just releasing our fourth
album, so. Yeah. And it's. It's just the same.
I mean, that. Basically the same thing. Just
the band essentially started then when that EP came out. Yeah.
Yeah. Wow. With the name then. Yeah.
Yeah. That's crazy. That's. That's so cool. I mean, to be that young
(13:13):
and really start off and put it. Put a. Put
an EP out. That must have been exciting. Yeah,
yeah, yeah. And then we. We started doing gigs. We,
like, Mum helped us apply for folk festivals around
Australia. We started playing those, and
we were like, you know, the youngest band on the lineup.
(13:37):
Oh, my gosh. Was that. That probably was intriguing to people,
too. They're like, who are these two young girls performing? Like, let's go
check them out. And the fact that you were good, just. I'm sure
it was even, you know, it wasn't just, like, this joke. It was like, oh,
my gosh. They're actually really, really talented.
(13:58):
It was a good childhood, that's for sure. Yeah. And you.
I mean, obviously you two are close. Is that like being sisters? I
mean, I've two sons that are, like, fighting all the
time. Like, was that something hard to navigate, or have you
always been, like, really, you know, best friends
are really close. Well, we do live together
(14:20):
as well, and we definitely don't go
without arguments.
Sailing. No, you caught us at a good time.
Oh. Even at this late,
you're like, well, we're delirious. So we're not gonna fire it.
No. But, yeah, we've just. We. Yeah.
(14:43):
We live together our whole lives, and it
works. That's special. That's really. There is a fight
then, you know, after half an hour, it's all fine. Yeah,
Right. You have that unconditional
love. Does that work out? I mean,
I would imagine, like, if you were in a band setting with people that you
(15:05):
weren't that close with, some people could be kind of timid about,
you know, voicing their opinion or their feelings on songs or that
could cause fights and break bands up. Like, just because you are so
close, can Ivy. Can you say, like, oh, that sucks, or whatever?
Massive vice versa, like, that we're not doing that. And then, like, feelings
probably don't get hurt as much. Or if they do, it's like, who cares? We're
(15:27):
back. You know, we're sisters.
Yeah. We shot. Yeah. We definitely
do shut each other down a lot of the time, but I think that it's.
That's a good thing. No. 100. Yeah. Honesty
to get to the good songs, you know, sometimes you just
need someone to be like, nah, you can do better than that. Right,
(15:49):
Right. And you're not gonna have, like, resentment. It's like, okay, yeah, I guess
you're right. You know, instead of move forward, instead of being like, oh, I can't.
You know, she always shuts down my great ideas, and we're
gonna. I'm gonna start something different. Yeah. I mean,
yeah, I think we're pretty good with that. And then even if I don't
agree with you, I'll just be like, I'm just gonna push forward with this,
(16:11):
and then she'll eventually come around. That's
pretty good. And this is vice versa as well. It's not just
me. The. When you
write, I mean, living together, being with each other a lot. Is it. Are
you. I mean, it must be easy to kind of be like, oh, let's write
something, or are you constantly kind of together? And you must
(16:34):
have a lot of songs, I would imagine, going into
each album. Yeah. Yeah. We kind of have
different stages. Like, we have writing stages,
but also. Yeah, living together is super convenient
for, like, if you have an idea late at night or something and just
be like, hey, let's do songwriting.
(16:58):
Yeah, I want to finish this idea. But we.
For the last album, we kind of had a week
away. We sort of set a week aside to go somewhere
nice and do lots of writing together.
Wow. Where did you all go? We went to the
Mornington Peninsula here in Victoria. Here in Victoria.
(17:20):
Yeah. Okay. And, yeah,
it's a beautiful place and pretty inspiring.
Some lovely people let us stay at their huge property
with lots of trees, and, yeah, it was nice and
relaxing, and we. Was it the
summertime or, like, I mean, obviously the album
(17:42):
title is off. That's a tree, right?
It's a tree in the snow. Or am I just totally dumb? Oh, it's.
It's a name of a person. Oh, it is. Because I was trying to
research what it was, and they're. They. They called Juniper trees.
Yeah. So. Yeah. Do you want the story? Yeah, I
would love the story. So the album title
(18:05):
is Marlinchen in the Snow. And
Marlinchen is a girl. Her name's Marlinchen. And
I feel like you're better at telling this story. Do you want to keep. Okay.
So it's. It's like. It's from a Grimm's fairy tale called
the Juniper Tree, which is probably where. You got that from. Okay. And
it is about this little girl called Marlinchen, and she.
(18:29):
It's quite a grim story, by the. Way, like, most fairy
tales are, right? It's like, how are these children's
stories? We were both told
this story when we were like, seven or something.
Anyway, so Ma Lynchin, she
discovers that her mother has killed
(18:51):
her stepbrother. And then he
gathers his bones and puts the bones under this juniper
tree. And then out from the juniper
tree comes this bird, and the
bird has the voice of the brother, and he tells
the story about his death and what happened and the truth of it all.
(19:14):
And anyway, this story, yeah, it
sort of was one of those ones which kind of stayed in our
heads. No way. Yeah. Like, traumatized, you
know, like, is mom gonna kill.
So heavy. Yeah. But we were recording
this album in Nova Scotia, Canada, with
(19:39):
our producer, Daniel Ledwell, and it
was the middle of winter, lots of snow, which is very,
like, surreal and weird for us in Australia.
So we haven't. Yeah, we don't see that much snow.
We've never seen that much snow before. We'd never seen a frozen lake
before. We had this huge frozen lake at our doorstep,
(20:01):
lots of, like, the woods. And we were like, oh, this is.
Like a fairy tale. And then we were
sort of reminded of this fairy tale and started writing this song in the
studio. Okay. So. But this trip that you
took, you know, kind of like to get away, you already had those songs and
then you went to record in. In Canada. So it wasn't like the fairy tale
(20:24):
was the storyline that kind of started the. The
album. It's almost that came when you were recording the album.
So all, like, majority of the songs were all
written before we went to Canada, except for this one song, My
Lunch and In the Snow, which is the title track of the album.
And we wrote that when we're in the studio.
(20:46):
Okay, yeah. Well, just going back a little bit to that
first ep, was that something that you just found somebody
locally to record it or, like. And then how do you kind of
get, like, did you have, like, a moment
or was. Did you have some sort of, like, mentor or somebody kind of championing
you both as. As artists to be like, whoa, you know, the.
(21:08):
This. These girls really have something going on. Like, I want
to kind of help get them to the next level.
Yeah, we've had lots of amazing mentors along the way.
The. Yeah, when we made that first ep, there was
this guy. He was a harp player. He was a friend of our mum's friend.
He saw us play. Michael Johnson was his
(21:31):
name. And he was like, I want to record you.
Come to my studio. And we went to his studio and then
his gear broke on the first day. Oh, my gosh.
And. But he was like, don't worry, I've got this friend
and he'll record you. And so he was like the producer and his
(21:51):
friend was the engineer. And we went
into the studio and I think it was like. Was it two days?
No, it's just the one one day. We recorded six songs.
Yeah. Which was, yeah, an intense
experience, I think. But, kids,
was it. I mean, to be that young and like, obviously, was the. It. The
(22:13):
album or EP must have been received pretty well to then, because you
end up getting signed on the next album. Right? Or on your first album.
No, the next one was another. Oh, what
was that? Was that 2016? Yeah,
yeah, yeah. So, yeah, again, another sort
of. I was, okay, so Staring at the starting ceiling. That was
(22:36):
just like another one that you all like. But
did you work with the same person and kind of have. Or was it, like,
totally new? Like, oh, let's just go to some new people and. And
see what we can do. We have these songs together. Yeah. We
worked with a guy called Nick Huggins on the next two records,
so Staring at the Starry Stealing and your company.
(22:59):
And he was someone, like, who did some amazing
records that we loved of some people here in Melbourne.
And we just loved the sound of all the records he did.
So we went and met him. He lives in Point Lonsdale, which is on the
beach, and he has a little studio at the back.
And he was amazing. He was so encouraging
(23:22):
and, yeah, just so great to work with. Made
us feel, you know, like we could.
Comfy. Yeah, we could really create something special
and explore creatively and be supported.
So, yeah, I think we really Lucked out with working with
Nick. Yeah. And then after that
(23:45):
was. Wonderful. Oblivion.
It was made during lockdown. So we were here. Oh, wow.
Yeah, we were here in Melbourne in.
And we recorded in our house. We
set up a. A vocal booth with, like, big blankets and
(24:07):
vocal mic stands put up as high as they could go and
sort of like a little cubby house made out of those. That was.
Wow. Yeah. And then we worked with Daniel
Ledwell. Who is a new album.
Yeah. But he was in Canada, so we would send
files back and forth and we'd wake up in
(24:29):
the morning to a new mix in our inbox. That's
cool. So you record. Did you both record? Like, you almost
engineered the whole album, that album, because you're at home.
Yeah. So we did all the vocals and all the
guitar and the strings for that one. And
Dan did some instruments on his end as well. So
(24:52):
what was that like? I mean, obviously, what's still so bizarre to me is
that the whole world was locked down. Right. I mean, you're in Australia, all the
way across the whole world and you were sitting in your house
just like I was in, you know, California or whatever.
Like, that just still blows my mind that this old
shut the whole world down. And like, I mean, being
(25:15):
that in that situation, were you all playing a lot of shows or, like, how
did that directly affect you? Were you going to do a tour? I know you
have a tour coming up and, like,
I mean, where were you at when that all really started? And
was that the reason why you kind of had time to do this, that or
that album? Well, we went to a conference in
(25:35):
early 2020, actually, so just before
everything locked down. And we
met Dan at this conference, it's called Folk alliance
in. It was in New Orleans. And,
yeah, we met Dan there. And.
Yeah, then we were meant to go on a UK tour that year.
(25:58):
Obviously didn't end up doing that. So
we just thought, what are we gonna do with ourselves for
this time and try and keep our
music going? And. Yeah, just decided to contact
Dan and try and get some music
together with him. Yeah. That must have been such a different
(26:20):
process. Obviously, you have to figure out how to record yourselves. Have you ever done
that before? Recorded yourselves in that, like, to that level where it's
like, listen, this will probably. This is going to make our album. Like,
you know what I mean? We haven't.
We've done lots of recording before that. But not sort
of engineering it ourselves. Yeah,
(26:42):
yeah. Not stuff that we would then put on the Internet. Yeah.
Yeah, we Recorded strings for ourselves for
the last albums, but I guess that's kind of just underneath.
So this was the first time we were like, recording vocals
and basically, like, you know, being the
(27:02):
producer in the session for each other and going, okay,
that was a good take. Do another one or whatever.
Which was hard, actually. We worked each other way too hard
and made each other brutal.
Yeah. Yeah. We kind of realized afterwards when we
(27:25):
recorded with Dan in person, he was like, okay, I only
record three vocal takes. Yeah. And that's enough.
And then listen to those, and then if you need more, we can do more.
And then. And we were like, oh, what? We, like, did, like,
50 when we recorded it ourselves. But
yeah, three was. Yeah. He was so right. He was very
(27:48):
right. Yeah, I. I've heard that. I heard that a lot. Especially during,
like, Covet and people recording at home, where it's like, you would do these
takes and. Because you were really kind of in the moment right when you're singing
those songs. And then, you know, somebody would say, oh, I recorded this
in my closet with some blankets and a 50 USB
mic from Amazon. And then you go
(28:10):
to this expensive studio and these expensive mics
and that just kind of re.
Redoing that emotion and kind of, like, trying to, you know, recreate
it was just the. The magic wasn't there. Like, did you
try to. And I. That makes sense kind of with those first three takes. Like,
the first three takes are probably. You're okay, this is what I want to
(28:32):
do. This is how I'm going to do it. And then you probably start kind
of falling into, like, more of, like, a rhythm of how you're
almost redoing your same vocal takes. I
would imagine once you get to, like, 47 or.
What we. What we used to do was demo
our songs before going into the studio,
(28:54):
which we kind of found. We What? Our. What? Nick Huggins,
our last producer, used to say demoitis. We get
demoitis, which is like, when you love the
demo so much and you're just spending all this time trying to recreate it.
Yeah. And so for this album we've just
made, we didn't really do much
(29:16):
demoing because we didn't want to, you
know, capture the beautiful moment and then go, oh, wait, this is
not the real thing. Yeah. Yeah. And so with this
new album, there wasn't a whole lot of demoing done. No. Yeah.
It was just mostly rough recordings and stuff for
demos. Yeah, yeah. It was just.
(29:38):
And when. So you decided on. Okay, we're on it. We're gonna
do you have, like. When it comes to having songs and then I love the
fact you do albums, which is kind of a lost art, I feel like. Right.
A lot of people are just doing a song and then two months later a
song, and three months later a song and. All right, it's time for the
ep. I'll. We'll put two on it now. And now we have five or whatever
(29:59):
it may be. When you guys were writing, do you.
Right. Knowing you want to put a full album out, or is it not a
thought? Is it just. Okay, now we have all these songs. Do they kind of.
Are they linear in a way where it makes sense to make an album?
Yeah, well, this one was.
A lot of the songs came out of a time
(30:22):
in 2022 when we went on a very long
tour, UK tour. We spent four months
in the UK and Europe. Wow. Yeah.
Shows and. Yeah, it was a long time
and we loved it. We had a great time and it was
incredible, you know, going to all these different places each night
(30:44):
and discovering, you know, meeting heaps of new people and
then saying bye and meeting another bunch of
new people the next day and. Yeah, we loved it,
but we also missed home a lot and. Yeah.
So I think a lot of the songs on this new album are
linked in that way. Yeah, just a lot
(31:07):
about travel and missing people and then also
wonder and awe of where we are in the world.
That's very cool. So then you decide, okay, let's go to this.
Did. So did you have songs and then decided to take this trip or was
it let's take this trip? Because start fresh here
(31:28):
and. And be inspired and kind of take those feelings from
that tour and. And put together this album
sort of. Came out after that, too, or during that
tour. Yeah, yeah. I think while we're on tour, we
weren't. We didn't really have plans to make the album. I don't think it was.
It was afterwards that we sort of went, okay, let's make a new album.
(31:51):
We have these songs that. That seemed
to. To go in an album. But then
we also went on a UK tour before we went to Canada,
which I think we wrote a few songs on that little trip as well. Yeah,
Just before we recorded. Yeah. Yeah. And the album before
was the one you guys won, like a best folk album, Right. Didn't you win
(32:14):
some huge awards for that album? Yeah,
Best Folk Album in the Australian Folk Music Awards,
I think. Yeah. Wow. That must have been such a huge moment. Was
that, like, even being nominated? I bet you were like, oh my gosh.
Like, we got this. It's really nice to be recognized
(32:34):
in your own country for. Right.
Work that we try and do. Yeah,
yeah, totally. Very, very cool. So this album
is kind of written about, you know, the
missing people and the experiences you had on this tour and
then you get to Canada and kind of see this landscape and is
(32:56):
that what sparked the remembering this.
This kind of fairy tale that you were told as kids and
decided to write that song on it? Yeah, yeah.
I think Story also is kind of about like
female strength as well and like following intuition and
(33:16):
overcoming obstacles, being led by like your
inner voice, which is like another sort of thing
that comes into lots of the other songs and we felt like
that was a nice way to sort of link them as well.
Yeah, very cool. And then you have a big tour coming up, right, to support
the. The new album? Yeah, we've got
(33:39):
our tour in Australia this month and then heading
over to the UK and Sweden as
well, and then also Canada.
So we're going for four months again.
We did say we wouldn't go on a four month tour again,
(34:00):
but we're doing it again. So here we are.
More adventures to come. More songs as well. Yeah, yeah,
yeah. Have you ever played here in the States.
And then. Yeah, just Canada.
Yeah, yeah. I heard it's kind of a nightmare to get like visas in here.
(34:22):
Oh, yeah. We do have a booking agent in the US
so hopefully sometime soon. Very,
very cool. Well, I appreciate you both staying up late and,
and doing this, of course. Thanks for having us.
Yes, of course. I do have. Well, I have one quick
question on the touring, like, at what age did you start, I mean,
(34:44):
putting an album out when you were that young? At what point do you.
In busking, I mean, you had all the live experience and at what
point do you start to tour? Was it on when you put your first album
out? Was it on that EP or. I mean, at what age are you
traveling and playing shows and is mom coming with you
or like, how does that work at that? Young.
(35:06):
Yeah, well, we did play. We did start playing
gigs when I was 11, I think, and you were 14.
And that was where we started doing festivals around
Australia. It was definitely a big, like family thing. We'd
go to the festival together. Yeah. Which was a fun way
to spend. Yeah. And then when we started releasing
(35:28):
albums, we would do, you know, a Sydney show, a Melbourne
show, a Castle main show, which is like
a regional area state that we live in and, you
know, just small regional areas.
Australia's massive. So.
It'S interesting when you see tour dates for bands, it's. There's not a whole
(35:51):
lot of shows on it and it's like. Because you have to fly right? To
pretty much every city unless you're driving like a ton of hours.
We're about to do a tour where we have like
seven hour drives stuff. Yeah. Like an hour
drive. We've decided to drive rather than fly,
but. Yeah. Wow. Yeah.
(36:13):
Oh my gosh. Yeah. That's crazy. Well,
I, I had a chance to hear the album. It's amazing. And
I have one more question for you all before I let you go to sleep.
I want to know if you have any advice for aspiring artists.
Totally. I reckon. Keep
playing and practicing your instrument. Just keep
(36:37):
practicing your craft. Yeah. Really hone in on your
craft and yeah, I think that
if you, yeah. If you put the effort in and you also
like putting your honest
self and you're pouring your heart into the music that you're making,
(36:57):
that's going to come across to audiences and speak to them. So
I think that's for us, I think music's always been about
kind of express expressing honest emotions and so that's kind
of our goal when we write and
I think that connects with people. So I guess
that would be my advice. Yeah. You have anything ivy to add?
(37:21):
Oh, I mean that sort of sums it up, I think.
But.
I love the, the do it yourself approach.
We, you know, we.
Try and learn as much as we can on, you know, music
videos and everything that is involved in being a
(37:44):
musician and putting your music out there. And
you know, we have learned how to
put it out there ourselves and I've learned how to edit music
videos and the more you can do yourself, the better it is
for you. You can just, you know, you can be self. Yeah, yeah,
yeah, yeah. So just learn as much.
(38:15):
Bring it backwards,
Bringing it backward, bringing it backward,
bringing it backward, bringing it backward,
bring it backward.
Bring it backwards,
Bring it backwards. Bringing it backwards.
Bringing it backwards. Bringing it backwards.
Bringing it backwards. What is going on? It
is Adam welcome back to Bringing It Backwards, a podcast where both legendary
(00:30):
and rising artists tell their own personal stories of how they
achieve stardom. On this episode we had the
opportunity to hang out with Ivy and Mabel of
the band Charm of Finches over Zoom Video.
Ivy and Mabel are sister is born in the inner city of
Melbourne in Australia and talk about how they got into music.
(00:52):
Their mom was actually very musical, a choir chorus
teacher and she was in a band in the 90s where apparently
she used to sing standing on her head in kind of like an electronic
duo which I thought was a cool story. They both started music
at a very early age. Mabel is two years older than
Ivy and she started writing songs at 12 years old
(01:14):
and their dad ran a veggie shop so they would
busk in front of the veggie shop. Starting when
Ivy was 8 years old they talked about putting out and recording
their very first episode. We actually dive into all of the
albums. The album they released in 2021,
Wonderful Oblivion was all recorded and done during
(01:36):
COVID so they were file sharing back and forth with their
producer in Canada and ended up having the opportunity to go to
Canada to record this new album that
we talked a lot about as well. Talked about the story behind the
title which is a wild fairy
tale that they were told as a seven year olds.
(01:58):
But they dive into the new album and the huge tour they have coming up.
Four month tour through the UK and Sweden and then
through Canada as well. You can watch our interview with
Ivy and Mabel on our Facebook page and YouTube channel at bringing it
Backwards. It would be amazing if you subscribe to our channel
like us on Facebook, follow us on Instagram, Twitter and tick
(02:20):
tock at Bringing back pod. And if you're listening to this on
Spotify, Apple Music, Google Podcast Please please
please rate and review the podcast. It helps us out tremendously.
We'd appreciate your support if you follow and subscribe to our podcast.
Wherever you listen to podcasts, we're bringing. It backwards with
Charm of Finches.
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Awesome. I appreciate you doing this. No worries. Thanks for
(05:20):
having us. Of course. What time is it there?
It's 12am oh my goodness. Thank you
for being willing to either stay up
or wake up. Yeah.
Oh my. Okay. Well, forgive
(05:41):
us if we. You know.
You guys look great.
Awesome. Well, my name's Adam, and this is
about the two. You and your. Your journey in music. And
we'll talk about the new album as well. Great.
Cool. Is it. Is it out? It was. Oh, sorry. I'm
(06:03):
Ivy and this is my room, just by the way. Cool. Cool.
Is the album out? It was supposed to. It. It's
Friday. Okay. Friday. I was wondering.
I saw April. I thought it was last Friday when I was confused, but
I had. I had it in advance, so I just wanted to make sure that
I wasn't. Totally. Yeah.
(06:26):
Amazing. Well, first off, obviously sisters. Who's.
Who's the elder sister? Me.
By how many years? There's a couple or two and a bit. Two and
a half. Two and a half years, I think. Yeah. Okay. Well,
do you both come from a musical family at all?
And where we. You grew up? In Australia. What part of Australia?
(06:49):
We are in Melbourne. We grew up in the inner city
of Melbourne. Yeah. And to answer your question about
our parents, whether they're musical, we. Our
mum was a choir leader when we were little. She also
was in bands in the 90s. No way.
Yeah. She was in an
(07:11):
electronic duo. Yeah. Where she would stand on her head
and sing and the
other person had a laptop on stage. It was like when people were first
putting laptops on stage. And it was weird. Sure.
I remember those days. I'm old.
I. I think. What was your mom's duo called?
(07:35):
Oh, it was called Fimo. Yeah. I don't think it's on the Internet. No.
That's cool. Did you used to go. Or were you all too young?
Mabel. Holding Mabel while she recorded.
Are you serious? That's amazing. But you'd stand
on her head. Have you seen videos of that? Yeah, actually, where
(07:57):
she has the blue. There would be photos. She was. She was
a lot. That's so cool. And I'm sure super
supportive of what you both are doing. Oh, yeah, yeah.
She's been great. Yeah. And dad. Dad's not a
music or. No, he's just a music lover and
was. Is obsessed with Bob Dylan. And so that is
(08:20):
a lot of what we listen to as kids. Okay. Is that where you
got kind of the folky vibe from or
aside from. Yeah, we did listen to lots of
folk music. Yeah. The oh, Brother, Where Art
Thou soundtrack. Yeah, you know that one. Harmonies.
Yeah, we were big into that.
(08:44):
But, yeah, Bob Dylan for sure as well. We. Well,
as kids, we thought that his voice was a bit scratchy.
Yeah. A lot of people did but when you can write that good
of songs, who cares?
One song of his that we did just love was Mr.
Tambourine Man. Okay. His voice was
(09:06):
scratchy as thousands. We love
that one. We would see to it. So, Mabel, you're
older. Did you start. I mean, did you both start music at the same time?
Or were you doing something and then Ivy, you
were, like, intrigued or wanted to, you know, follow your big
sister or. How did that work? Yeah, well, I wrote
(09:28):
my first song when I was 12.
Yeah. And taught myself guitar. And then
Ivy jumped on the harmonies, and I
guess we just kept writing songs. And we used to. We used to
busk a lot when we were. When we were. We started busking when we
were 8 and 11. No way. Oh, my gosh.
(09:53):
Your mom was just like, yeah, go ahead, go out. And you guys would go
out and play. Did you make some money? Yeah, well, we had the
cute factor then. That
doesn't work anymore. Yeah, but our
dad worked at this veggie shop, and we
had another friend singing with us, and we would sing three part
(10:15):
harmonies outside this veggie shop. Yeah. Yeah. No
way. That's so cool. Throw their loose change in every time they
come out. What
instrument did you both start on? Or did you start on different ones? It sound.
Maybe sounds like you learned guitar yourself. But prior to that, were you.
Did you play anything? And I'm sure mom put you all
(10:37):
in or taught you how to sing early on or put you in her class
or. Well, we actually went to Steiner school, which is like.
I don't know if you've heard of Steiner school. You might call it Waldorf
there. It's like an alternative
stream. Okay. And some favorite artists went to
Steiner school, like Sophie on Stevens. He's one of our. Oh, really?
(11:00):
Yeah. Actually diner school. Dylan and Newsom as well. That's
true. Yeah. Yeah. Anyway, it's a stream where music's
like a big part of it. And so you sing every day in class.
And then when you're. I think when you're nine years old, you pick up
a stringed instrument like violin, viola, or cello.
And so I picked up cello when I was nine and I
(11:22):
picked up violin. Wow. So they were our first
instruments. That's cool. Those are such beautiful instruments. I love the
sounds of Violet strings. I think that's cool. They're very frustrating
to learn at the. Very beginning, I would imagine. And I bet your parents were
so happy when they could hear you going.
Early on. I. I would have thought they would have learned
(11:45):
by Mabel's Terrible. Terrible playing at the
start. Okay. Because she started before you.
Yeah, yeah. You got to push through that stage. Yeah. You know. Right?
That's funny. Listen, then busking that early on, you
said 11 and 8ish. And then
you wrote your first song, Mabel at 12. And is that. Have
(12:08):
you both just been playing together since, you know, that early
on and. Or did you, you know, play in different bands
and kind of come back together, or has it always just been the two of
you performing together? It's pretty much always
been us. Yeah. We made
a little EP when we were. How old are we?
(12:31):
12 and 14. And that was, like, where it started, and
we were just gonna do it for our friends and just
burn a couple for our friends, but then we. We ended up just
making a crowdfunding campaign and.
Yeah. Printing them professionally and.
(12:51):
Wow. Now we're just releasing our fourth
album, so. Yeah. And it's. It's just the same.
I mean, that. Basically the same thing. Just
the band essentially started then when that EP came out. Yeah.
Yeah. Wow. With the name then. Yeah.
Yeah. That's crazy. That's. That's so cool. I mean, to be that young
(13:13):
and really start off and put it. Put a. Put
an EP out. That must have been exciting. Yeah,
yeah, yeah. And then we. We started doing gigs. We,
like, Mum helped us apply for folk festivals around
Australia. We started playing those, and
we were like, you know, the youngest band on the lineup.
(13:37):
Oh, my gosh. Was that. That probably was intriguing to people,
too. They're like, who are these two young girls performing? Like, let's go
check them out. And the fact that you were good, just. I'm sure
it was even, you know, it wasn't just, like, this joke. It was like, oh,
my gosh. They're actually really, really talented.
(13:58):
It was a good childhood, that's for sure. Yeah. And you.
I mean, obviously you two are close. Is that like being sisters? I
mean, I've two sons that are, like, fighting all the
time. Like, was that something hard to navigate, or have you
always been, like, really, you know, best friends
are really close. Well, we do live together
(14:20):
as well, and we definitely don't go
without arguments.
Sailing. No, you caught us at a good time.
Oh. Even at this late,
you're like, well, we're delirious. So we're not gonna fire it.
No. But, yeah, we've just. We. Yeah.
(14:43):
We live together our whole lives, and it
works. That's special. That's really. There is a fight
then, you know, after half an hour, it's all fine. Yeah,
Right. You have that unconditional
love. Does that work out? I mean,
I would imagine, like, if you were in a band setting with people that you
(15:05):
weren't that close with, some people could be kind of timid about,
you know, voicing their opinion or their feelings on songs or that
could cause fights and break bands up. Like, just because you are so
close, can Ivy. Can you say, like, oh, that sucks, or whatever?
Massive vice versa, like, that we're not doing that. And then, like, feelings
probably don't get hurt as much. Or if they do, it's like, who cares? We're
(15:27):
back. You know, we're sisters.
Yeah. We shot. Yeah. We definitely
do shut each other down a lot of the time, but I think that it's.
That's a good thing. No. 100. Yeah. Honesty
to get to the good songs, you know, sometimes you just
need someone to be like, nah, you can do better than that. Right,
(15:49):
Right. And you're not gonna have, like, resentment. It's like, okay, yeah, I guess
you're right. You know, instead of move forward, instead of being like, oh, I can't.
You know, she always shuts down my great ideas, and we're
gonna. I'm gonna start something different. Yeah. I mean,
yeah, I think we're pretty good with that. And then even if I don't
agree with you, I'll just be like, I'm just gonna push forward with this,
(16:11):
and then she'll eventually come around. That's
pretty good. And this is vice versa as well. It's not just
me. The. When you
write, I mean, living together, being with each other a lot. Is it. Are
you. I mean, it must be easy to kind of be like, oh, let's write
something, or are you constantly kind of together? And you must
(16:34):
have a lot of songs, I would imagine, going into
each album. Yeah. Yeah. We kind of have
different stages. Like, we have writing stages,
but also. Yeah, living together is super convenient
for, like, if you have an idea late at night or something and just
be like, hey, let's do songwriting.
(16:58):
Yeah, I want to finish this idea. But we.
For the last album, we kind of had a week
away. We sort of set a week aside to go somewhere
nice and do lots of writing together.
Wow. Where did you all go? We went to the
Mornington Peninsula here in Victoria. Here in Victoria.
(17:20):
Yeah. Okay. And, yeah,
it's a beautiful place and pretty inspiring.
Some lovely people let us stay at their huge property
with lots of trees, and, yeah, it was nice and
relaxing, and we. Was it the
summertime or, like, I mean, obviously the album
(17:42):
title is off. That's a tree, right?
It's a tree in the snow. Or am I just totally dumb? Oh, it's.
It's a name of a person. Oh, it is. Because I was trying to
research what it was, and they're. They. They called Juniper trees.
Yeah. So. Yeah. Do you want the story? Yeah, I
would love the story. So the album title
(18:05):
is Marlinchen in the Snow. And
Marlinchen is a girl. Her name's Marlinchen. And
I feel like you're better at telling this story. Do you want to keep. Okay.
So it's. It's like. It's from a Grimm's fairy tale called
the Juniper Tree, which is probably where. You got that from. Okay. And
it is about this little girl called Marlinchen, and she.
(18:29):
It's quite a grim story, by the. Way, like, most fairy
tales are, right? It's like, how are these children's
stories? We were both told
this story when we were like, seven or something.
Anyway, so Ma Lynchin, she
discovers that her mother has killed
(18:51):
her stepbrother. And then he
gathers his bones and puts the bones under this juniper
tree. And then out from the juniper
tree comes this bird, and the
bird has the voice of the brother, and he tells
the story about his death and what happened and the truth of it all.
(19:14):
And anyway, this story, yeah, it
sort of was one of those ones which kind of stayed in our
heads. No way. Yeah. Like, traumatized, you
know, like, is mom gonna kill.
So heavy. Yeah. But we were recording
this album in Nova Scotia, Canada, with
(19:39):
our producer, Daniel Ledwell, and it
was the middle of winter, lots of snow, which is very,
like, surreal and weird for us in Australia.
So we haven't. Yeah, we don't see that much snow.
We've never seen that much snow before. We'd never seen a frozen lake
before. We had this huge frozen lake at our doorstep,
(20:01):
lots of, like, the woods. And we were like, oh, this is.
Like a fairy tale. And then we were
sort of reminded of this fairy tale and started writing this song in the
studio. Okay. So. But this trip that you
took, you know, kind of like to get away, you already had those songs and
then you went to record in. In Canada. So it wasn't like the fairy tale
(20:24):
was the storyline that kind of started the. The
album. It's almost that came when you were recording the album.
So all, like, majority of the songs were all
written before we went to Canada, except for this one song, My
Lunch and In the Snow, which is the title track of the album.
And we wrote that when we're in the studio.
(20:46):
Okay, yeah. Well, just going back a little bit to that
first ep, was that something that you just found somebody
locally to record it or, like. And then how do you kind of
get, like, did you have, like, a moment
or was. Did you have some sort of, like, mentor or somebody kind of championing
you both as. As artists to be like, whoa, you know, the.
(21:08):
This. These girls really have something going on. Like, I want
to kind of help get them to the next level.
Yeah, we've had lots of amazing mentors along the way.
The. Yeah, when we made that first ep, there was
this guy. He was a harp player. He was a friend of our mum's friend.
He saw us play. Michael Johnson was his
(21:31):
name. And he was like, I want to record you.
Come to my studio. And we went to his studio and then
his gear broke on the first day. Oh, my gosh.
And. But he was like, don't worry, I've got this friend
and he'll record you. And so he was like the producer and his
(21:51):
friend was the engineer. And we went
into the studio and I think it was like. Was it two days?
No, it's just the one one day. We recorded six songs.
Yeah. Which was, yeah, an intense
experience, I think. But, kids,
was it. I mean, to be that young and like, obviously, was the. It. The
(22:13):
album or EP must have been received pretty well to then, because you
end up getting signed on the next album. Right? Or on your first album.
No, the next one was another. Oh, what
was that? Was that 2016? Yeah,
yeah, yeah. So, yeah, again, another sort
of. I was, okay, so Staring at the starting ceiling. That was
(22:36):
just like another one that you all like. But
did you work with the same person and kind of have. Or was it, like,
totally new? Like, oh, let's just go to some new people and. And
see what we can do. We have these songs together. Yeah. We
worked with a guy called Nick Huggins on the next two records,
so Staring at the Starry Stealing and your company.
(22:59):
And he was someone, like, who did some amazing
records that we loved of some people here in Melbourne.
And we just loved the sound of all the records he did.
So we went and met him. He lives in Point Lonsdale, which is on the
beach, and he has a little studio at the back.
And he was amazing. He was so encouraging
(23:22):
and, yeah, just so great to work with. Made
us feel, you know, like we could.
Comfy. Yeah, we could really create something special
and explore creatively and be supported.
So, yeah, I think we really Lucked out with working with
Nick. Yeah. And then after that
(23:45):
was. Wonderful. Oblivion.
It was made during lockdown. So we were here. Oh, wow.
Yeah, we were here in Melbourne in.
And we recorded in our house. We
set up a. A vocal booth with, like, big blankets and
(24:07):
vocal mic stands put up as high as they could go and
sort of like a little cubby house made out of those. That was.
Wow. Yeah. And then we worked with Daniel
Ledwell. Who is a new album.
Yeah. But he was in Canada, so we would send
files back and forth and we'd wake up in
(24:29):
the morning to a new mix in our inbox. That's
cool. So you record. Did you both record? Like, you almost
engineered the whole album, that album, because you're at home.
Yeah. So we did all the vocals and all the
guitar and the strings for that one. And
Dan did some instruments on his end as well. So
(24:52):
what was that like? I mean, obviously, what's still so bizarre to me is
that the whole world was locked down. Right. I mean, you're in Australia, all the
way across the whole world and you were sitting in your house
just like I was in, you know, California or whatever.
Like, that just still blows my mind that this old
shut the whole world down. And like, I mean, being
(25:15):
that in that situation, were you all playing a lot of shows or, like, how
did that directly affect you? Were you going to do a tour? I know you
have a tour coming up and, like,
I mean, where were you at when that all really started? And
was that the reason why you kind of had time to do this, that or
that album? Well, we went to a conference in
(25:35):
early 2020, actually, so just before
everything locked down. And we
met Dan at this conference, it's called Folk alliance
in. It was in New Orleans. And,
yeah, we met Dan there. And.
Yeah, then we were meant to go on a UK tour that year.
(25:58):
Obviously didn't end up doing that. So
we just thought, what are we gonna do with ourselves for
this time and try and keep our
music going? And. Yeah, just decided to contact
Dan and try and get some music
together with him. Yeah. That must have been such a different
(26:20):
process. Obviously, you have to figure out how to record yourselves. Have you ever done
that before? Recorded yourselves in that, like, to that level where it's
like, listen, this will probably. This is going to make our album. Like,
you know what I mean? We haven't.
We've done lots of recording before that. But not sort
of engineering it ourselves. Yeah,
(26:42):
yeah. Not stuff that we would then put on the Internet. Yeah.
Yeah, we Recorded strings for ourselves for
the last albums, but I guess that's kind of just underneath.
So this was the first time we were like, recording vocals
and basically, like, you know, being the
(27:02):
producer in the session for each other and going, okay,
that was a good take. Do another one or whatever.
Which was hard, actually. We worked each other way too hard
and made each other brutal.
Yeah. Yeah. We kind of realized afterwards when we
(27:25):
recorded with Dan in person, he was like, okay, I only
record three vocal takes. Yeah. And that's enough.
And then listen to those, and then if you need more, we can do more.
And then. And we were like, oh, what? We, like, did, like,
50 when we recorded it ourselves. But
yeah, three was. Yeah. He was so right. He was very
(27:48):
right. Yeah, I. I've heard that. I heard that a lot. Especially during,
like, Covet and people recording at home, where it's like, you would do these
takes and. Because you were really kind of in the moment right when you're singing
those songs. And then, you know, somebody would say, oh, I recorded this
in my closet with some blankets and a 50 USB
mic from Amazon. And then you go
(28:10):
to this expensive studio and these expensive mics
and that just kind of re.
Redoing that emotion and kind of, like, trying to, you know, recreate
it was just the. The magic wasn't there. Like, did you
try to. And I. That makes sense kind of with those first three takes. Like,
the first three takes are probably. You're okay, this is what I want to
(28:32):
do. This is how I'm going to do it. And then you probably start kind
of falling into, like, more of, like, a rhythm of how you're
almost redoing your same vocal takes. I
would imagine once you get to, like, 47 or.
What we. What we used to do was demo
our songs before going into the studio,
(28:54):
which we kind of found. We What? Our. What? Nick Huggins,
our last producer, used to say demoitis. We get
demoitis, which is like, when you love the
demo so much and you're just spending all this time trying to recreate it.
Yeah. And so for this album we've just
made, we didn't really do much
(29:16):
demoing because we didn't want to, you
know, capture the beautiful moment and then go, oh, wait, this is
not the real thing. Yeah. Yeah. And so with this
new album, there wasn't a whole lot of demoing done. No. Yeah.
It was just mostly rough recordings and stuff for
demos. Yeah, yeah. It was just.
(29:38):
And when. So you decided on. Okay, we're on it. We're gonna
do you have, like. When it comes to having songs and then I love the
fact you do albums, which is kind of a lost art, I feel like. Right.
A lot of people are just doing a song and then two months later a
song, and three months later a song and. All right, it's time for the
ep. I'll. We'll put two on it now. And now we have five or whatever
(29:59):
it may be. When you guys were writing, do you.
Right. Knowing you want to put a full album out, or is it not a
thought? Is it just. Okay, now we have all these songs. Do they kind of.
Are they linear in a way where it makes sense to make an album?
Yeah, well, this one was.
A lot of the songs came out of a time
(30:22):
in 2022 when we went on a very long
tour, UK tour. We spent four months
in the UK and Europe. Wow. Yeah.
Shows and. Yeah, it was a long time
and we loved it. We had a great time and it was
incredible, you know, going to all these different places each night
(30:44):
and discovering, you know, meeting heaps of new people and
then saying bye and meeting another bunch of
new people the next day and. Yeah, we loved it,
but we also missed home a lot and. Yeah.
So I think a lot of the songs on this new album are
linked in that way. Yeah, just a lot
(31:07):
about travel and missing people and then also
wonder and awe of where we are in the world.
That's very cool. So then you decide, okay, let's go to this.
Did. So did you have songs and then decided to take this trip or was
it let's take this trip? Because start fresh here
(31:28):
and. And be inspired and kind of take those feelings from
that tour and. And put together this album
sort of. Came out after that, too, or during that
tour. Yeah, yeah. I think while we're on tour, we
weren't. We didn't really have plans to make the album. I don't think it was.
It was afterwards that we sort of went, okay, let's make a new album.
(31:51):
We have these songs that. That seemed
to. To go in an album. But then
we also went on a UK tour before we went to Canada,
which I think we wrote a few songs on that little trip as well. Yeah,
Just before we recorded. Yeah. Yeah. And the album before
was the one you guys won, like a best folk album, Right. Didn't you win
(32:14):
some huge awards for that album? Yeah,
Best Folk Album in the Australian Folk Music Awards,
I think. Yeah. Wow. That must have been such a huge moment. Was
that, like, even being nominated? I bet you were like, oh my gosh.
Like, we got this. It's really nice to be recognized
(32:34):
in your own country for. Right.
Work that we try and do. Yeah,
yeah, totally. Very, very cool. So this album
is kind of written about, you know, the
missing people and the experiences you had on this tour and
then you get to Canada and kind of see this landscape and is
(32:56):
that what sparked the remembering this.
This kind of fairy tale that you were told as kids and
decided to write that song on it? Yeah, yeah.
I think Story also is kind of about like
female strength as well and like following intuition and
(33:16):
overcoming obstacles, being led by like your
inner voice, which is like another sort of thing
that comes into lots of the other songs and we felt like
that was a nice way to sort of link them as well.
Yeah, very cool. And then you have a big tour coming up, right, to support
the. The new album? Yeah, we've got
(33:39):
our tour in Australia this month and then heading
over to the UK and Sweden as
well, and then also Canada.
So we're going for four months again.
We did say we wouldn't go on a four month tour again,
(34:00):
but we're doing it again. So here we are.
More adventures to come. More songs as well. Yeah, yeah,
yeah. Have you ever played here in the States.
And then. Yeah, just Canada.
Yeah, yeah. I heard it's kind of a nightmare to get like visas in here.
(34:22):
Oh, yeah. We do have a booking agent in the US
so hopefully sometime soon. Very,
very cool. Well, I appreciate you both staying up late and,
and doing this, of course. Thanks for having us.
Yes, of course. I do have. Well, I have one quick
question on the touring, like, at what age did you start, I mean,
(34:44):
putting an album out when you were that young? At what point do you.
In busking, I mean, you had all the live experience and at what
point do you start to tour? Was it on when you put your first album
out? Was it on that EP or. I mean, at what age are you
traveling and playing shows and is mom coming with you
or like, how does that work at that? Young.
(35:06):
Yeah, well, we did play. We did start playing
gigs when I was 11, I think, and you were 14.
And that was where we started doing festivals around
Australia. It was definitely a big, like family thing. We'd
go to the festival together. Yeah. Which was a fun way
to spend. Yeah. And then when we started releasing
(35:28):
albums, we would do, you know, a Sydney show, a Melbourne
show, a Castle main show, which is like
a regional area state that we live in and, you
know, just small regional areas.
Australia's massive. So.
It'S interesting when you see tour dates for bands, it's. There's not a whole
(35:51):
lot of shows on it and it's like. Because you have to fly right? To
pretty much every city unless you're driving like a ton of hours.
We're about to do a tour where we have like
seven hour drives stuff. Yeah. Like an hour
drive. We've decided to drive rather than fly,
but. Yeah. Wow. Yeah.
(36:13):
Oh my gosh. Yeah. That's crazy. Well,
I, I had a chance to hear the album. It's amazing. And
I have one more question for you all before I let you go to sleep.
I want to know if you have any advice for aspiring artists.
Totally. I reckon. Keep
playing and practicing your instrument. Just keep
(36:37):
practicing your craft. Yeah. Really hone in on your
craft and yeah, I think that
if you, yeah. If you put the effort in and you also
like putting your honest
self and you're pouring your heart into the music that you're making,
(36:57):
that's going to come across to audiences and speak to them. So
I think that's for us, I think music's always been about
kind of express expressing honest emotions and so that's kind
of our goal when we write and
I think that connects with people. So I guess
that would be my advice. Yeah. You have anything ivy to add?
(37:21):
Oh, I mean that sort of sums it up, I think.
But.
I love the, the do it yourself approach.
We, you know, we.
Try and learn as much as we can on, you know, music
videos and everything that is involved in being a
(37:44):
musician and putting your music out there. And
you know, we have learned how to
put it out there ourselves and I've learned how to edit music
videos and the more you can do yourself, the better it is
for you. You can just, you know, you can be self. Yeah, yeah,
yeah, yeah. So just learn as much.
(38:15):
Bring it backwards,
Bringing it backward, bringing it backward,
bringing it backward, bringing it backward,
bring it backward.
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