hungry kids of hungary — philadelphia grand jury
Things seem to be going gangbusters for Brisbane indie-popsters Hungry Kids of Hungary at the moment. The band is winning its fair share of hearts and minds, of fans and pundits alike, thanks to the refreshing sound of debut Escapades and an extensive national tour that will bring the ‘Hungries’ to Newcastle this month. “Yeah, we’re all really happy with it,” said singer Kane Mazlin of the album. “With Escapades we spent more time doing pre-production than we did on the EPs (the first one eponymous, then Mega Mountain). We re-recorded the songs on the album from the EPs and there’s just a generally more colourful approach. We got to experiment a bit more on Escapades so there’s definitely a few surprises.” What isn’t surprising is that this colourful approach and experimentation is beginning to pay dividends for Hungry Kids of Hungary. The band recently picked up two ‘Q’ awards — Best Alternative Song and Song of the Year, no les — for the joyful and choppier-than-abutcher’s-sideburns single ‘Wristwatch’. The aforementioned ‘Wristwatch’ (which you’ve now doubt heard, unless you’re in some kind of cultural exile) is but one of a bevy of bristling pop gems on Escapade — not least the brilliantly harmonic ‘Scattered Diamonds’ (originally on Mega Mountain) and the equally hooky opener, ‘Coming Around’. Hungry Kids of Hungary are currently smackbang in the middle of quite an extensive national tour, the band’s most ambitious to date, for which they have recruited guitarist Remy Boccalatte, from Paper and the Plane and Spring Skier, to add an extra dimension. Mazlin said he has
Feeding the Hunger With their debut album, Escapades, finally on the shelves and already picking up some impressive plaudits, Hungry Kids of Hungary certainly have a lot to smile about. Stephen Bisset caught up with singer Kane Mazlin in the middle of the band’s national tour. learned some valuable lessons about surviving on the road since the band first took off on the rock and roll highway after winning Triple J’s Unearthed back in 2008. “I think the most important thing to keeping your sanity is not to sit next to each other,” Mazlin laughed. “But yeah, I really think having your alone time is key. Also trying to get lots of sleep is important.”
Earlier this year the band also got to taste life across the pond, heading to the UK to play a few well-received shows around London and the Great Escape Festival in Brighton with the likes of Broken Social Scene, These New Puritans, The Slits and Aussies Angus and Julia Stone, The Philly Jays and Eskimo Joe. They also sampled the heady world of the US touring
circuit playing such legendary venues as The Viper Room in LA and New York’s Mercury lounge — and it looks like the band may just have a pair of floaties in the unforgiving, sinkor-swim US market. “It was really great over there,” Mazlin said. “I also think there’s a fair bit of interest for going back and doing some more touring there next year which is pretty exciting.” Hungry Kids of Hungary will be playing the Great Northern Hotel in Byron Bay, on Friday, November 5; the Cambridge Hotel, Newcastle, on Sunday, November 14; and the Open Arms Festival, Coffs Harbour, Saturday, November 20. Escapades is out now through Stopstart Records.
Since the launch of their debut album Hope is for Hopers just one year ago, Philadelphia Grand Jury have enjoyed consistent airplay on Triple J, floored audiences at this year’s Splendour in the Grass and Laneway festivals and toured extensively throughout Europe, America and South Africa. On the eve of their ‘Save Our Town’ national tour, Joel Beeson aka MC Bad Genius (bass/keyboards) speaks to Kirsty Visman about the indie trio’s success. A year on from the release of their debut album, Beeson speaks from the band’s London apartment with an audible air of excitement. When asked to reflect upon the past twelve months, he sighed, “Being a musician and being able to live off that is just a dream! On top of that we’ve just been everywhere, touring the UK, Germany, South Africa. You know I don’t get many opportunities to look back on the last year but now that you’ve asked me to I just have the biggest smile on my face!” That smile is well earned. Extensive touring worldwide has garnered the Philly Jays a reputation as a stellar live act and they’ve managed to get this without compromising their musical direction. Proudly self-funded,
country? “We’ve been here for six months now and gathered momentum and a good fan base, sort of like when we first started out back in Sydney. Everyone outside of London, in these small towns, is just so excited to have a live band play! They really go nuts for it! We’ve been as far south as the south western tip of Cornwall and as far north as Stornoway in Scotland and everyone has been so enthusiastic.” After the release of the hugely popular single ‘Save Our Town’, the band is heading back to Australia for a national tour which also coincides with the deluxe re-release of their debut album. I asked Beeson what the story is behind ‘Save Our Town’. “It’s about the Hopetoun [Hotel]
S av i n g Yo u r H o m e T o w n self-produced, self-engineered and selfreleased, the band’s two key members, Beeson and Simon ‘Berkfinger’ Berckelman (guitar/ vocals) are not new on the scene. “We’ve played in bands for years and years and have had to have day jobs and all that so when we decided to come to London, we saved as much as we could so that we can live over here without working and that has been amazing,” Beeson beamed. How has the band’s eclectic mix of rock ’n’ roll, funk and soul been received in the mother 28 reverb
magazine issue #052 — November 2010
in Sydney. We heard while we were over here that they’d closed it down and we were just so disappointed. We’ve seen so many great bands there and loved playing there ourselves so it was such a blow. It’s such a bastion for live music in Sydney and it seems that so often the live music industry just gets screwed over, so yeah that was the main stimulus for ‘Save Our Town’.” “We told Triple J that we had a new song and they were like ‘great, we want to be the first to play it this Friday during breakfast’ and
we were pretty excited about that, but that was Monday and we hadn’t actually finished the song yet. On top of that we were out of London playing shows so we raced back on the Tuesday night and went into the studio on the Wednesday all day just trying to get it right and we finally nailed it. Then we had an insane amount of Red Bull, mixed it overnight and sent it off to Australia to get mastered on the Thursday. It was a crazy deadline and we were wrecked for the next week afterwards so to hear that the song is going well is a relief more than anything [laughs]!”
It certainly has been a magical year for the Philly Jays and with their upcoming return to our shore it’s time to show them how much they’ve been missed. The 26-date national tour will no doubt see the band coming to save a town near you. Philadelphia Grand Jury play the Cambridge Hotel, Newcastle, on Friday, November 12; Beach Hotel, Byron Bay, Thursday, November 18; and the Beachcomber Hotel, Toukley, Thursday, November 25. Follow us on Twitter