The True Story Of Bananagun (album)

Photographer Jamie Wdziekonski’s For The Record: “I’ve only ever really shot bands that I believe in”

| gimmiezine
Original photos by Jamie Wdziekonski / Handmade mixed media collage by B.

We’re excited to be celebrating one of our favourite creatives and humans – photographer and documentarian, Jamie Wdziekonski (Sub-lation) – as he looks towards his first solo exhibition opening this Friday night (May 5) at NGBE Gallery in Naarm/Melbourne. 

Jamie is also releasing a photo-book, For The Record: 2013 – 2023, which highlights Jamie’s photos that feature on albums from bands including, Amyl and the Sniffers, King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard, Kikagaku Moyo, Parsnip, Tropical Fuck Storm, Traffik Island, Zelkova and many more. Pre-orders for the book quickly sold out online, so the only way you’ll be able to get one is heading along to the exhibition. Don’t miss out, you’ve been warned. We love you Jamie! 

After doing what you do for over a decade, why is now the time to finally have your first solo photography exhibition along with accompanying book, For The Record: 2013-2023?

JAMIE WDZIEKONSKI: There was a rush to do it. I got told that the building (53 Lygon Street, East Brunswick) that I have a studio in was being sold; the whole block is going. We have a gallery downstairs that we can use for free (they don’t take commission) and I thought I may as well have a show.

I’ve framed up these Traffik Island offcuts from tests we were doing for the Shrug Of The Shoulders album cover we did at a photo booth; they’ll be at the show. Things basically started with me framing them up. I was going to put those online to sell, but thought they’d look nice in a show. 

I’ve always wanted to do a big Sub-lation ten years of photography book. I knew I couldn’t afford  to make something that big, so I decided to make a condensed version. I was thinking back to the Traffik Island frames and because they were taken for a record cover, I got the idea to put images in a book that were used in album artwork. 

I had thought that when I got back from the Kikagaku Moyo world tour in December, I would start planning it. It’s borderline killed me to get everything together so quickly [laughs], but I’m still here!

Yes, you’ve done it! Yay you!

JW: [Laughs].

Wasn’t Kikagaku Moyo the first album art your photos were featured on?

JW: The first one was The Murlocs’ Loopholes, which was a poster insert with the record, and there was also a lyric booklet with the CD version. There was an image in the gatefold and the front cover of the lyric booklet.

Nice! There’s 58 records featured in the exhibition and book?

JW: Yeah, that I know of [laughs]. I may have forgotten some! I was trying to keep it under 100 pages but then there were just so many releases so it’s now over 300 pages!

Wow! Do you remember how you felt the first time your photos were featured on a release?

JW: It felt really nice. 

The Murlocs’ Loopholes came out in around 2014, right?

JW: Yeah, I think. Let me check the book index… [Picks up a proof of the book and flicks through it].

Is that the finished book? Exciting!

JW: Yeah. Each release has a title page and I’ve written what was happening back then and details of labels and when we took the photo. 

Have you got notes you’ve written from over the years? Was it easy to get all the info together?

JW: I’m so bad! I call myself a documenter, but haven’t done that properly [laughs]. 

Same! It’s only recently I’ve started labelling all my interview files properly with date/time/notes etc.

JW: I pulled out my old iPhone and looked back at texts or Facebook messages. Finding a gig is easy, you can type in something like ‘Amyl and the Sniffers, America, 2021’ and you should find information. But, shoot dates for when it was just me and Amyl at Merri Creek; what was that? 

The metadata on the files fucked me up because it shows the date something was edited, not taken. 

The text bit of the book is what has killed me, the detail that went into the text was definitely an undertaking! 

Congrats on all of the hard work! It looks amazing! 

JW: Thank you! I’m happy with it. Ben Jones designed the book cover for me.

It’s very cool. Let’s talk about some of the images featured in For The Record. What can you tell us about the shoot for The True Story of Bananagun? That cover is so beautiful.

JW: Nick from Bananagun found the location, the Royal Botanic Gardens in Naarm/Melbourne. 

We went out there one day with the intention of shooting without booking a boat and found out you have to book. The guy operating the boats said we could sit in the boat while it’s docked for a couple of photos that we used for press photos, but we had the intention we’d go back for a proper shoot. 

We rang them up one day and said we wanted to book one of the gondolas and the guy there goes, “It’s not a gondola it’s a punta.” [Laughs]. You can hire them for an hour and they take you around the lake. The guy that was steering the gondola was picking all of the nice spots to show us. It was one of the easiest shoots because everything was so beautiful and you couldn’t really take a bad photo. 

I especially love the photo on the back cover where it’s a bit of a longer distance shot of the band on the boat and there’s like reeds in the foreground.

JW: I took that photo when I first got there. We were going to meet at Fed Square but they all went ahead because I was late. They were already on the boat when I got there and I took that photo as I joined the group. All the colours came up so nice. 

Totally! What are some other shoots that you have vivid memories of?

JW: The Amyl and the Sniffers’ Big Attraction & Giddy Up split EP has a photo of Amy in red. It was from my first night watching Amyl & the Sniffers. I had heard their name around and had checked out their ‘70s Street Munchies’ clip on YouTube and thought they looked really cool and that Amy looked really interesting. 

They were opening for The Murlocs with Parsnip at Howler. I didn’t meet them until after they played. I didn’t know what to expect – at that point I had never seen a punk band. Amy came out on stage and she was darting back and forth across it, jumping off the foldback speakers. It was the most energetic thing that I had shot at that point. I had only been shooting psychedelic bands, even though everyone is moving they’re still kind of stationery in their spot, this was the first time I’d shot someone that wasn’t—Amy was upside down and everywhere!

I have fond memories of that night. I love Amy, Amy and I are close. I love the Sniffers too. I really connected with them, they were  so genuine. It was the biggest show that they had played at that point. They were all wide-eyed and like, ‘You get chips backstage! That’s crazy!’

Amy is totally lovely! I spied the comment she left on your post about your exhibition and book. She said: “You change lives” – and that you’ve changed hers.

JW: That was so sweet. It’s a mutual feeling, they’re changed my life as much as she reckons I’ve changed hers. There’s a mutual uplifting to both of our creative outlets – I love their music and they love my photos and they gel well together.

I know that a lot of people’s introduction to many of the bands you shoot is via the compelling and genuine images you’ve captured.

JW: Amyl and the Sniffers are really fun to shoot!

Your images are really important in raising the visibility and profile of the artists you shoot.

JW: That was the idea and intention behind photographing music. I always wanted to just promote the music that I like and hope that other people will like it too. I never did it because I wanted my work to be in Rolling Stone or something [laughs].

I know that Traffik Island’s album A Shrug Of The Shoulders was a big one for you, as you did the entire layout as well as shooting the photos.

JW: From concept to doing the shoot to layout, even suggesting track listing, which was cool. I’m probably the most proud of that one and the Leah Senior cover for The Passing Scene. They were the albums whose art was my concept. For them to put that trust in me means so much, I really wanted to deliver something cool for them. I think both covers really suits the mood of the album. 

Is there specific things you take into consideration when working on a cover project?

JW: Other than those two, most of the other times my photos were used for album covers were photos that I took not knowing they would be used as artwork for a cover; they were live or press shots that were used later. 

Are you ever surprised at the photo/s that end up being used?

JW: Yeah. There’s some where I would have chosen different images, but that’s just down to personal taste. 

In a way, this exhibition I’m having is curated by everyone – all of the bands that chose those images for their artwork.

That’s really cool to think of it in that way and it’s very much in the spirit of something really important to you—community. I remember you telling me about the studio space you work from in Lygon Street being a real creative community hub.

JW: I don’t love too much attention personally, I much prefer the attention to be on the bands.

Same! That’s how we are with Gimmie too—it’s all about the bands, not us.

JW: [Laughs] Yeah, you know what I mean! It’s weird people asking me for radio interviews and stuff; I feel out of place. It’s nice they care about what I’m doing though. 

What you do is totally art, Jamie! You’re an artist in your own right… even though you’re uncomfortable with that…

JW: [Laughs] I feel like if I call myself an artist though I have to deliver. 

I was working out that in the last decade your photos have been featured on around ten releases per year.

JW: Yeah.

In 2021, I think there were around 13 releases with your photos. That’s a lot! Very cool. On the opening night of your solo show there’s two bands/artists that you’ve shot photos for their releases that will be launched – Howard Eynon and Zelkova.

JW: I shot a single cover especially for Zelkova, which was cool. It went so well. 

Yeah, you showed me the mock up that you’d made in preparation for the shoot and because it was outside I was crossing my fingers all day for you that it wouldn’t rain.

JW: It was a really fun day! There’s a lamp post beside the bridge and it lights it all up at night. They brought screwdrivers with them and unscrewed the little plate in the lamp and under it was the power supply, so we hooked up an extension lead and they played live, which was so cool. It was just me, the band, and the guitarist’s girlfriend that was helping out. I thought to myself, ‘Fuck, I wish more people were here to see this, it’s amazing!’ The sound was reverberating around the bridge. We shot it out in Riddells Creek a couple of weekends ago. 

It was the quickest turnaround for me in terms of coming up with a concept, shooting it and designing the artwork for it to be in the book. We shot it on the weekend, I developed the film on Sunday, got it back Monday evening, and had to design the cover Monday evening to be able to put it into my book and submit to the printers in the morning. It was tough but we got there!

Howard is putting out a single, which is really cool. It’s his first official release since his 1974 album.

That’s amazing you were able to inspire him to do that!

JW: I called him and I was like, ‘Howard, I really want you in this show, so I think you’ll have to put out one of your songs in the next two months’ [laughs]. I told him, ‘It’s 2023 – 23 is your favourite number – it’s your year to do it!’ He told me he thought I was right and that he’d really love to.

So good! Howard is so lovely. Thank you for introducing us, it’s always inspiring chatting with him.

JW: Yeah, I’m really stoked that’s happening. 

Is there any other albums we can find your work on that you’d like to share a little about?

JW: The Traffik Island one [A Shrug Of The Shoulders] was very involved. We were up at Howard’s place in Tumbi Umbi and it was the last time we’d be going there because Howard sold that property and moved down to Bruny Island. We were having a send off party, there was a stage outside and all the locals they go swimming with, their doctors, dentist and everyone came out for the house show. 

Howard was throwing out a bunch of stuff like books, lamps and trinkets; there was a book, Photobooth: The Art of the Automatic Portrait. I ended up keeping it. I loved flicking through it.

Before we went up to Howard’s Zak [Olsen] had asked if I could take a photo for his new album cover. We couldn’t really come up with a concept though and we thought we might just take a photo out in nature. We thought to shoot Zak from a distance and that I’d shoot the trees. I don’t think we even got to try though. 

I saw the photobooth book and thought of the idea of shooting the title of the album spelt out in the photobooth. Zak and I still shared a studio at that point so when we got back from Howard’s we knuckled down into planning it out. We went down to the photobooth to measure it out. I stuck up giant post-it notes against the wall of the booth and drew out lines with numbers and shot the test shot so I could see where the frame fits. Luckily the letters needed to be on an A2 size. I brought a bunch of A2 sheets and painted the letters in the studio for ages. We winged it, one night we went down to the booth and it took us three to four hours and put $200 – $300 in gold coins through the photobooth. A few people came up to us thinking we were tagging the photobooth. People were telling us that its heritage listed. Then I took the photobooth strips home and had to scan them into the computer before I could start making the cover. It was really fun! I was so stoked I could do it for Zak because I love his music. He’s probably one of my favourite song writers. 

It was really nice too because I had known those songs as demos for so long. He sent me a few tracks years ago. Sharing a studio I’d asked him, ‘Whatever happened to those songs? Why aren’t they on a record?’ It prompted him to think about other demos he had and he decided to make an album. 

It’s so cool that you can inspire those whose work inspires you!

JW: I’ve been lucky in picking bands before they take off. Even for me now, it’s quite difficult to shoot a bigger band. I can see why some people that are starting to take photos now would struggle. If you’re starting out now and try to go on tour with Amyl and the Sniffers, it’s difficult. If you pick bands that aren’t popular and that are looking for photographers then you have to put in the yards and fund yourself. Pick bands that you think are going to pop off and that you have a good feeling about and follow them and see what happens.

I’ve only ever really shot bands that I believe in. I don’t want to be a photographer that gets hired to shoot Pitchfork Festival or Coachella. I’d hate to have a list of bands to shoot that I don’t know or like, it would be terrible. I do get to see a lot of cool things and go to really nice places that I probably would have never been to on my own accord. Getting to do that with friends is really nice; it’s so nice getting to know each other and know personalities. 

Aside from actually taking photos I think a big, important part of your job is your relationships with people. 

JW: Yeah, you have to have a good relationship with a band in order to be in so many situations that others wouldn’t normally be privy too. A greenroom can be such a sacred space for a band, to have unfamiliar photographer in there with you you’re not going to get the best photographs because the band might not be comfortable around you, there could be a barrier. You have to get to know people and you let your guards down and get to know each other—that can really get some nice photos together. 

You can tell that, especially from a lot of the Amyl and the Sniffers photos you’ve taken.

JW: I’m lucky that we came together early, and asked if we could go to Adelaide together, which was our first time travelling together. One thing I really remember about them is, how many questions they asked me in the van on the way to Adelaide. They were actually interested in trying to get to know me. Often you’re in a van with a band, and not to say people aren’t interested in you, but with Amyl and the Sniffers they really wanted to get to know me. I was like, ‘Are these guys Suss on me?’ [laughs] ‘Why are they asking me so many questions?’ I’m not that much of a talkative person at best! 

I love when people want to really engage and they care about getting to know you and it’s not just about what you can do for them. With Gimmie we never want things to be all business, the humanness is very important. 

JW: Yeah, when they’re interested in you and care about what you’re doing. They respond to what you say and don’t go, ‘Oh yeah, yeah, cool.’ They actually ask you questions!

Totally! I hate when people pretend to be your friend just so they can use you to do something for them. 

JW: Absolutely. You can generally smell that from a mile away [laughs].

Yep. These days I can usually spot someone like that before they even open their mouth. 

JW: [Laughs] I’d believe that.

Anything else you’d like to share with us?

JW: Thank you for writing the foreword for the book.

It’s my pleasure and it was also a privilege. We’ve been a big fan of your work before we even knew you and we became friends. Your images are incredible and important AND besides that you’re one of the loveliest, genuine people we know. When you find incredible people like yourself in life, it’s important to keep them close and look after them. We love you! 

JW: Hell yeah. Love you guys too!

Check out more of Jamie’s work HERE and @sub_lation. More info about For The Record: 2013 – 2023.

FYI, an in-depth interview with Jamie appears in our print issue Gimmie #2.

Bananagun’s Nick Van Bakel: “Nature is a good teacher. Just being around plants… you can get little life philosophies”

| gimmiezine
Original photo by Jamie Wdziekonski. Handmade collage by B.

Melbourne band Bananagun’s sound straddles the sounds of the 60s and 70s with a psychedelic garage feel and an obvious love of exotica, afrobeat and world music, yet with a freshness. They’re getting set to release their colourful, vibrant and punchy debut LP The True Story Of Bananagun in June.  Gimmie chatted to multi-instrumentalist and vocalist, Nick Van Bakel.

NICK VAN BAKEL: I live in Daylesford which is near Ballarat and Castlemaine, it’s in a valley.

Is it a nice place to live? Is it in the country?

NVB: Yeah, it’s real country. It’s beautiful. I’m on the edge of the Wombat State Forest.

Nice! Do you go bushwalking much?

NVB: Yeah, I try and go for a little walk every day.

I’m guessing you love nature?

NVB: I do! It’s bliss out here.

I‘ve noticed with your debut album The True Story of Bananagun there’s a nature and jungle-ish kind of theme, even in the visuals of the cover; have you always had a fascination with that kind of stuff?

NVB: Definitely, I’ve always liked that sort of stuff. In a musical way, I’ve always liked everything jungle-y and exotic-y, nature-y [laughs]. As a kid I always loved being in the bush. I really like the peacefulness of not talking and just walking around in the bush, it’s real nice.

I love bushwalking. The natural world can have such a beautiful energy, from the plants and trees, there is something very peaceful about being out in the bush.

NVB: There is for sure. More recently I found out all that stuff about how trees talk to each other and of them having support networks; if there’s one tree struggling, another tree in the area will put some of its energy down, underground into the network to help out the one that is lagging. They’re a good team! [laughs].

Yes, it’s pretty fascinating. I’ve read you’re a meditator?

NVB: Yeah, I try to as much as possible. I’ve forgotten to today though [laughs].

How did you first get into that?

NVB: I’ve always been interested in it from when I first heard about it in my early 20s, George Harrison and the whole India thing. I thought it seemed really inaccessible though like; what the hell do you do? How do you do it? For ages I was trying to do it, I’d just sit there and be like; am I doing it right? Over time I’ve done research and tried different techniques and found stuff that works for me and feels right for me to do. In the last two years I’ve made way more of an effort. After doing it for a while, there was a good stint over a few months where I did it constantly, I couldn’t believe how different everything was!

Absolutely! I’ve been meditating for the last 20 years and I always say, nothing bad has ever come from meditating. It’s helped me in ways I don’t even realise at the time but, then how I deal with a situation that might come up in my day with calm and clarity and ease, as opposed to me getting fiery or angry or in a bad mood about something like I used to, has really proven to me the benefits of meditation… and that’s only one example. Sometimes my mind totally resists meditation though, usually when I need it most, it’s funny how the brain works sometimes.

NVB: Yeah, sometimes I’ve found it can just be laziness. Sometimes it can be just an effort to sit there, there’s a fear. I think people sometimes don’t like to do things they fail at or think they might fail at; there’s so much room for failure in meditation because you wonder if you’re doing it right. People I’ve suggested it to, sometimes seem to be turned off by it because you can’t just do it straight away and get somewhere with.

I think it’s maybe because people find it hard to sit with themselves, all your thoughts, experiences, problems etc. The mind can be so busy. It’s not always pleasant and blissful to sit, that’s when I think you can make the best breakthroughs though.

NVB: For sure! It’s so important to connect with yourself and face those things, it’s how you progress. You need to find that middle ground between the extremes of high and low.

The middle path. Meditation has always made a positive impact in my life.

NVB: I’m usually a pretty mellow person, sometimes I can get so excited, way too over excited, with music or anything – like when kids get a bit silly [laughs] – it’s good to get a stability to not lose your head, that’s what meditation gives me. Whether you’re excited or feel a bit sad it’s important to realise it’s a passing thing, meditation helps that. One of the coolest things I noticed I got out of it after doing it for some time, you’re more open to signs. When I meditate heaps I feel like I get more messages, more signs, if I have a decision to make, I’ll see something that will talk to me and I’ll find answers in that. You’re more tuned it.

You have more awareness, you’re more mindful of things.

NVB: Yes!

Synchronicity.

NVB: Yes! For sure.

Things flow better because you’re in the flow of life.

NVB: Daily hiccups just roll off your back. If something shit happens, like you get a fine you have to pay or something, you have perspective and you know you’re not going to die or anything from it so it doesn’t really matter as much in the scheme of things. You endure stuff better. I’m all about that sort stuff. If I wasn’t going to do music full-time I thought it’d be a peaceful existence and beneficial to other people being a meditation or yoga teacher.

Totally! Where did your love of the 60s come from?

NVB: I’ve pretty much never had any beef with it [laughs]. Anytime I heard something, even from when I was a kid, even if I didn’t realise it at the time – my mum was really into Donovan and Simon & Garfunkel, stuff like that, The Byrds. I remember liking ‘Mr Tambourine Man’ as a kid, when I heard it when I was fourteen again, it felt so good and familiar. It’s just what I go for.

It was a pretty interesting time in the world too, with all the changes and politics and revolutionary things, so really cool art was made. I do think though every period has cool art that can be a reflection of the times.

NVB: Yeah, for sure.

I’ve heard you have a bit of an obsession with Indian music?

NVB: Yeah. I have an obsession with world music and music in general. I remember getting into The [Rolling] Stones, I remember when that Brian Jonestown documentary came out and seeing all the sitars. There’s an enticing esoteric and mystical quality to it, it kind of feels like the mystery of the Universe. It’s a magnetic thing that I just like. I like classical Indian music too, it’s peaceful and meditative. Sitar music is really nice, I got a sitar for my eighteenth birthday, I play that heaps. I did sitar and tabla lessons in India, which was rad.

Why did you chose to go to India?

NVB: I was with my friend Stella and my ex-girlfriend. We went over for two months. I love everything about India. I wanted to go somewhere that wasn’t Western. I’ve been to Europe a couple of times. I love the food, music, culture and mysticism.

Was there anything that was a culture shock to you?

NVB: Yeah! I keep on thinking that every single sense of your body gets pushed to the absolute extreme. India is everything all at once. You can walk down the street and find a spice market with all these nice aromas and then you turn a corner and there’s an open sewer with human shit everywhere, so salty and stinky and septic, burning your nostrils. You can walk past a window and hear Hindi singing. Then there’s all the chaos of the relentless traffic and Tuk Tuk horns. People pester you so relentlessly, it was such an endurance test. I did bus rides for 48 hours where you couldn’t sleep on the bus because you were in a little upright chair, I’d have all my bags with me and everyone would stare at you because you’re Westerners.

What inspired you to start Bananagun? When you started you were doing it all by yourself?

NVB: Yeah, kind of. I had another band Frowning Clouds and we stopped playing. I had a couple of years without any bands and I was keen to start another band ASAP. Everyone was so busy because they were all in other bands and I found it hard to find members. I always wanted to start a new band. I always thought Jimmy could play drums, he’s my younger cousin. We always talked about doing a band someday.

You don’t want to do the same band twice, I’d done the Frowning Clouds thing, so I couldn’t have another 60s band. I was still really into that music at the time though. I started to be able to see a way to do it that’s different from other stuff I’ve made. I was just looking for a new angle.

Bananagun is like an amalgamation of all of the things you like: the ‘60s, world music, exotica and things like spirituality and mysticism.

NVB: It just feels super natural and organic, not contrived or anything. It all started to inform itself the further it went on, Jimmy came along and then other people came along, time went on and it materialized. It’s such a pain in the arse to have proper songs sometimes, like verse, chorus, verse—I’d probably just prefer music itself, that’s the easy fun part, then lyrics are the drag you have to do to finish it [laughs]. I’ve always dug world music. I thought this band was a clean slate and I could make it what I wanted it to be, a blank canvas. There’s a really great overlap in taste with everyone in the band. It was really essential to have a band where we could all hang out together and not get sick of each other, to have good chemistry. Once we found everyone it was all systems go!

On the new record there’s a 90-second track called ‘Bird Up’; it’s made up of sounds from birds like kookaburras and parrot from around where you love?

NVB: Yeah. The birds inspired me. The album was just track, track, track, track, I thought it needed something to make it more of a left turn so it doesn’t just sound like a Spotify playlist of songs. I wanted to make it kind of like opening credits, it’s a little interlude. There’s so many birds out here and crickets! I want to sample crickets and make a cool nature thing, I could do a Bossa pattern with them and there’s these cool Banjo frogs that make little plunky noises. I just need to get a good hand recorder.

There’s really loud crickets in our area too. When I wake up in morning and it’s still dark, the moment I hear birds calling I know the suns coming up and it’s time to get up.

NVB: It’s beautiful. It’s the soundtrack for the day, you should be up when the birds are chirping [laughs].

I like being in touch with that natural cycle, sometimes when you’re in the city it can feel so removed from nature—just buildings and cars and people and more people.

NVB: Yeah, totally! Sometimes I don’t know if it’s best to abide by the laws of nature or if you should progress and move with the times. I can just imagine myself being an 80-year-old naturalist and trying to pay bills but not being registered with the corps. [laughs]. I feel I’ll be real obsolete and outdated!

Nature never fails to amaze me. Whenever I’m having a hard day or something is getting me down, I just go outside and look at my garden or the trees in the park across the road from me or pat our dog and I’m reminded that the world isn’t such a bad place. Those things snap me out of what I’m feeling and brings me back to what really matters.

NVB: For sure. I think nature is a good teacher. I do gardening for a job, just being around plants heaps you can get little life philosophies from that kind of stuff. You can be like; why is there someone that’s so twisted and evil like Hitler? Then you’ll see a gnarled up rose and you’ll remember that sometimes things come out wonky.

My mum has been sick the last couple of years, they said she had six month to live but it’s been three or four years now; she gets a lot solace from nature. She’ll send me photos and will be like: look my daffodils are blossoming again! She says things to me like: it’s ok sweetheart, it’s just the cycles of life, and things bloom and then die and return.

It’s so great your mother is still here.

NVB: Yeah, she’s totally bad arse!

I wanted to ask you about the song ‘Taking the Present for Granted’; what’s it about?

NVB: I had a good friend at the time that was having a bit of an existential crisis and they were like “nobody knows why we’re here, we’re not here for any reason. What’s the point? We’re all gonna die!” They were afraid of that idea. You could be like, nothing matters, I can do what I want. I don’t have to get a stupid job that I hate, because nothing matters. That’s what that song is sort of about—is it really that bad?

It’s funny trying to talk about songs because it’s usually this vague concept and you’re not really sure. You end up working on it so much so it’s the most precise and articulate way you could say that and when you have to talk to someone about it and expand on it that you just feel like a clumsy fool trying to.

And people find their own meanings in songs.

NDS: Yes, that song could be about kids getting presents for Christmas that they don’t like and taking them for granted [laughs].

With the ‘Bird Up’ track we were talking about before; did you get the title from that from the Eric Andre Bird Up! skit?

NVB: [Laughs] Yes! I made it, bounced it out into iTunes and it asked me; what is the song called? I just said, ‘Bird Up’! I was supposed to change it to something better but I was busy and didn’t get to and got the Masters back and it was still called that so I thought, whatever!

It’s easy for people to think that you’re a serious person and you have to try and show all of your sides with music, try to be a full picture. People don’t just want to hear the serious stuff you’ve got to say. You can express a lot of serious stuff through comedy, it takes the edge off. Comedians talk about serious shit but make it funny and digestible.

It can open up conversation about subjects people may usually feel uncomfortable with. I was listening to your song ‘The Master’ and I got the vibe from it that it’s about not comparing yourself to others and to be your own master; is comparing yourself to others something you’ve done yourself?

NVB: Yeah for sure. Just all my peers and people around you. I remember too, listening to The Beatles and thinking, fuck, what’s the point?! That’s the bench mark. I have to get my shit together [laughs]. It’s toxic to get into that comparing kind of thinking.

What helps you with that stuff?

NVB: Just realising it’s stupid and stopping it. It was worse when I was younger. As you get older and come into yourself, you realise it’s stupid and that everyone else is probably thinking the same thing!

I love the album cover for The True Story of Bananagun!

NVB: Thank you! I’m happy with that, the colours are amazing! Everything that Jamie [Wdziekonski] shoots is amazing.

There is always so much depth and feeling and life in Jamie’s photos, he really captures beautiful moments. He’s one of my favourite modern day photographers.

NVB: Cool. The idea was that we needed to make album art and it’s really time consuming so we thought, let’s just get Jamie to take a real sweet photo and let that do most of the talking… then we just need to put a border around it or something [laughs].

One of the overarching themes that I’ve found on your album is beauty and finding it; where do you find beauty?

NVB: Yep, cool. Probably mostly in nature and people. This is going to be such a wanky conversation from here on but… I like thinking about beauty not as a conventionally beautiful person or something like that but like Lou Reed talking about seeing something like a real hideous guitar and being like, “oh, that’s beautiful!” Beauty is good because it has a different meaning for everybody. Then there’s stuff that just knocks you on your arse because it’s so undeniably beautiful. Maybe that’s Indian music for me or when you hear stuff that’s so pure and beautiful it’s ridiculous! It almost has an authority kind of presence, it sits you down and it’s a mystical experience. I see a lot of beauty in people’s expressions too or when people just unintentionally just do beautiful stuff in a selfless way.

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