Since winning Triple J’s Unearthed High competition in 2014, Gab Strum, aka Japanese Wallpaper, has wowed audiences nationwide with his ability to create his own brand of heavenly, unmistakably ethereal, hypnotic pop. “Maybe it’s a cathartic thing,” he says, “I guess it just sounds like my brain really.”
The excellent level of production, craftsmanship and creativity of Japanese Wallpaper’s music often makes you forget that he’s just 18 and about to do his VCEs – no small feat considering he’s already had one of his songs featured in a film, was playing over 18 gigs before he was 18 and has earned praise from the likes of fellow critically acclaimed artist Chet Faker.
Having just released his debut self-titled EP, Strum is now on his first tour, which will take him through Brisbane, Sydney, Melbourne and finishing off in a performance at Splendour in the Grass. Dressed in a colourful button-up shirt and his trademark black-rimmed glasses and up-turned cap, I caught up with Strum at the FBi headquarters in Alexandria, fresh off the plane from his Brisbane performance the night before.
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“It was lots of fun, a really good reception. I was pretty nervous about it before… Well, the first show was last night in Brisbane and I was pretty nervous about that, but it went well. Now I’m just excited for the rest of the tour.”
Hailing from Melbourne, Strum seems to be part of a new wave movement of organic electronic music, a scene which caters to the needs of emerging, independent artists. “In the Melbourne scene, there’s a lot more underground stuff. There’s the whole scene with Tornado Wallace and Sleep D, and it’s a bit more techno. here, it all seems to revolve around Astral People and the Future Classic thing.”
But then again, the incredible accessibility and expediency of modern day, easy-to-use, music-making technology, such as your garden-variety programs like Garageband, and online publishing platforms like SoundCloud, means that now, more than ever, young musicians, especially electronic artists, can get the exposure that was once off-limits to them.
“Fifty years ago, whenever kids that wanted to start experimenting with music-making and production, those tools just weren’t really out there. If you wanted to do production, you couldn’t… Booking a studio would be really expensive, and then getting it pressed to vinyl and all of that.”
But no matter what the surrounding circumstances are, cream always rises to the top. The beautiful originality and melancholic ambience his music possesses is a hybrid between his own productive capabilities and many of the collaborations he’s had to date, which can often come as a breath of fresh air when you work mainly as a bedroom producer. “It’s good to have another pair of ears on things. I often find that just producing on my own (music) and sitting at my desk with headphones on and like not moving for hours. You can get really caught up in what you’re doing, but sometimes it’s hard to step back and actually listen objectively.”
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Released just under three weeks ago, Japanese Wallpaper is a collection of ambient, gentle and highly emotional anthems. It is as if the music you hear was dredged from the recesses of your subconscious, the music to theme that dream you once had, but can never recall. Released gradually over SoundCloud, his debut collates all of his original work thus far and recruits the talents of Pepa Knight (co-frontman for Jinja Safari), Jesse Davidson Airling and Wafia; the latter two he counts among his friends.
“I just really liked their music and Airling and I were already friends. I just called [Jesse] up and was like, “Hey, I really like your stuff,” says Strum. “I got really lucky and I mean, everyone that’s on that record I’ve got a lot of respect for,” he adds.
As for playing live, Strum would be the first to say he finds it a little daunting. “I’m not a natural front person,” he admits. “I’m pretty shy in front of a crowd. So it’s pretty scary.” Keen to not just ‘look like a guy checking his emails’ when he gets up on stage, Strum incorporated a variety of other elements into his show, singing on some of his tracks, having guest vocalists feature live and playing keys so “It’s not just like pressing play on a track”. He’s also been thinking about putting a band together for the next round of shows
After he wraps up his tour, Strum’s focus will shift back to his schoolwork. But music is still very much on the horizon for him once that’s out of the way. “Once I finish school, I’m going to be able to get a studio space somewhere and just sit for a couple of months and make a record. So I feel like this is kind of a closing chapter, which is good.”
Spoken like a true musician.
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Japanese Wallpaper tour dates:
Wednesday 8th July (SOLD OUT) – Northcote Social Club, Melbourne (18+) – Tickets
Saturday 11th July (SOLD OUT) – Northcote Social Club, Melbourne (18+) – Tickets
Sunday, 12th July – Northcote Social Club, Melbourne (U18 matinee) – Tickets
Sunday 12th July ( SOLD OUT) – Northcote Social Club, Melbourne – Tickets
Friday, 24th July (SOLD OUT) – Splendour in the Grass, Byron Bay – (You can try buy tickets here)
Check out our review of him here.
Japanese Wallpaper is also available on Spotify and iTunes via Zero By Nine.
Bjork, Lionsong
It’s difficult to write about Bjork. She’s dazzling and unique and brilliant, and not many words can do her justice. Her recent album Vulnicura was a dizzyingly powerfull. Now, we’ve got a video clip to unfold the gorgeous album artwork, created by Bjork in collaboration with famed photographers Inez & Vinoodh, plus visual effects producers Framstore. Watch as the album cover comes to life, in all its beautiful, warped, extremely detailed glory.
Courts, Part Of
We posted about Courts’ wonderfully punky Part Of a couple weeks ago, and now we’ve got a video clip to boot. The clip was filmed while the Essex five-piece were enjoying a holiday. Watch as they drink, swim, party and generally have a great damn time – all to the very sweet sound of their own tune.
Pepa Knight, Coyote Choir
Now very much a solo artist in his own right, Jinja Safari’s Pepa Knight has released the brightly coloured video for his indie-with-an-Indian-flair single, Coyote Choir. The clip couldn’t be more perfect for the song. Bringing together the vast landscapes of Australia and New Zealand, the clip was shot on 8mm film by Sam Kristofski.
Saskwatch, I’ll Be Fine
Saskwatch have had a big week for news. Not only have they announced a huge lineup change (Will, Sam, Nic and Ed – horns and drums – are all leaving), but they’ve announced a new album, tour dates, single, and this video, with beautiful animations courtesy of Jason Galea. The album, Sorry I Let It Come Between Us, is set for a June 12 release and will reportedly be “evolutionary.” Have a listen and watch the first single from the new record:
Wolf Alice, Giant Peach
I was only introduced to Wolf Alice at Falls Festival this year, but they put on a killer show, and I’ve been following them ever since. Now gearing up to release their debut album, My Love Is Cool, on June 19, they’re unveiled the video clip for new single Giant Peach. The clip was directed by S’blood and features a pretty tongue-in-cheek look at the industry: evil managers, a mockumentary and serious partying ensure that chaos ensues from start to end.
Peter Bibby, Goodbye Johnny
I recently had the chance to share brunch with Peter Bibby, whose half-fabricated half-completely-real stories of hazy, romantic, drunken Australiana is, for whatever reason, really really special.The video clip for Goodbye Johnny features the actual Johnny, who the song is about, in a whole range of clips from Bibby’s life in Melbourne, a trip through the Californian desert, music festivals (watch out for cameos from Nick Allbrook and Mac DeMarco) and more.
The wonderful Pepa Knight (frontman at Jinja Safari) has just released his solo debut, Hypnotized vol. 1. Indie-rock beauties with a unique eastern flavour, the album was largely written while Pepa was travelling through India, soaking in the sights and sounds around him.
In true old-school fashion, the release has not only come out online and on CD, but….. on tape! And we’ve got two to give away to YOU!
There’s something utterly nostalgic about tapes and this is your chance to win one that’s pretty damn special.
It’s super easy to win:
1) ‘Like’ us on Facebook!
2) email giveaways@howlandechoes.com with the title ‘PEPA KNIGHT’ and your name.
We’ll draw the winners this Friday at 12 pm, so make sure you get in QUICK!
Pepa Knight is probably better known for his role as frontman of much-loved Aussie band Jinja Safari, but he’s recently launched his solo career, and it sounds a little something like this.
His first single, “Rahh!” made waves, showing off his completely unique sound: combining indie pop with Eastern-inspired sounds. His more recent collaboration with Japanese Wallpaper on “Waves” showcased his velvety vocals. And now, “Coyote Choir” has once again proved that this man knows how to write a beautiful song.
His debut album was written during travels throughout India, and the influence is obvious from the very beginning. Jingly-jangly sitars create this vivacious, vibrant atmosphere, and the increasingly frantic riffs and rhythms somehow make you feel more at ease with each phrase. Meanwhile, the indie guitars and Knight’s full vocals add a rich, contemporary and totally original feel to the whole thing.
Pepa Knight’s debut album Hypnotized Volume 1 comes out on Nov 28th.
Tour dates here!
I originally wrote this for Indie Shuffle
Multi-instrumentalist and 1/5 of Australia’s favourite world music-folk-pop sons, Jinja Safari, Pepa Knight is one talented dude. The tipi dwelling, sitar enthusiast, could-have-been hermit has just released the second single of his solo project, and is onto something pretty special. Clams is the follow up single to Rahh!, and both boast intricate percussion, worldly instruments, beautiful lyrics and live samples recorded from Pepa’s various trips to India. If they’re anything to go by, his upcoming collection of songs, Hypnotized, is going to be a pretty stellar release. We got to chat with him ahead of two intimate shows in Sydney and Melbourne to discuss how a tipi holds up in wild weather, how he considered being classified as legally dead, and what “futuristic Bollywood” means as a dress code.
I’m curious about how you’ve found the responses to your solo material. Has it been positive for you?
To be honest I’ve been really surprised with the support for this project. With Jinja we got pretty lucky there. We got a lot of love from Australia and overseas, but with this- I just wanted to make a bit of a vibe project. I wasn’t really expecting anyone to get into as much or anything. It’s been really nice! It’s good to get these new solo songs, slowly but surely.
How, if at all, has your creative process changed with this project compared to the Jinja Safari process?
With Jinja, it’s completely different. It’s a collaboration between Marcus and I. Collaborations are really good, most of the time, and they bring out the best in your song-writing; having two brains clashing together and you end up writing something you wouldn’t normally come up with. But at the same time, with collaborations, sometimes it doesn’t turn out how you wanted it to be. So with this, it’s been similar in that I’ve been samples from overseas and stuff like that, which I touched on in our last record with Jinja. However, I’ve now started to get deeper into that warm influence and I can get it to more of where I want it to be, so it’s nice in that sense.
In your interview with Rolling Stone India, you said you initially wanted to escape everything and become a sort of hermit! What made you change your mind, and instead start a solo music project and release music to the world? A slight change of lifestyle, I think!
On my first trip to India, it was a big culture shock. For Rahh!, that was written with this sadhu man. I don’t know if you know much about the sadhus, but they’re these holy men and they basically leave their home, and they’re legally dead. They’re classified as dead in India, and they lead these crazy lives. It was a sort of liberating feeling, and I really wanted to do that, and not go back to Australia at all, actually. I wasn’t game enough to actually stay there forever though.
How did you choose the first two songs, out of the others? There are about 12 songs on the Hypnotized collection, right?
For those two singles, I think they were ones I was vibing on. Clams was written really fast, I did it in one full day. I had never done that before and it felt really fresh, so I really wanted to get that one out towards the start. It was ridiculous how fast that came together. It usually takes me months and months to finish a song! Rahh! had a similar sound to what Jinja had, so I wanted that to be the first one to slowly ease into my stuff from the band.
What can we expect from the rest of the songs? Similar vibes?
Yeah, similar vibes! The rest of the album will be along the same lines. I feel like it’s a lot more folk driven, and a lot more “down” songs in the collection. The first two are a bit more pumped up, and hyper. The others are a bit more chilled.
You’re calling Hypnotized a collection, rather than an album – why is that?
I was going to call it an album, and I still do sometimes, but basically I don’t want to release it all in one go. I want to release it in two separate volumes. I still haven’t finished the songs completely – they’re about 95% there – so it gives me more time to complete them too. I think in this day and age as well, people have such a short attention span, and if someone releases a full album these days, a lot of people skim over and don’t care too much. Whereas, if you release it in smaller doses, I think people will appreciate it more.
I totally agree with that. People consume music now in a totally different way than what albums were being made for. Releasing separate songs is probably better for people to take more from them!
Exactly! It helps digest it more, especially with a new project. If it was a new Jinja release, it could be a full album maybe. This way gives me more time too. I accidentally deleted the whole folder that had everything in it, so it’s taking a bit longer to re-record it all.
You’ve had quite the affinity with India and their culture for a while now. Obviously, it’s quite prevalent in Jinja Safari’s music too. How did that come about? What do you find about that culture that is so attractive?
I never really thought I would get so closely attached to that world sound. I have been playing music for a long time. I started off in a punk band, and then went on to rock, nearly emo phase *laughs* I was playing in a band with my brother, and we were in a band for about ten years. I never really thought I’d get so into it, but I love it! I’ve been over three times now, and had some long trips there. I really love the culture, and there is so much to see! It’s a great way of doing music for me. I think you get so inspired when you go to new places. For me, when I went to India, it was a whole combination of the way people lived, and the amazing food, and the crazy musicians that live there.
In my mind, it’s always been Jazz that is the pinnacle of musical talent. I’ve always been like, “Yeah, when I’m 80 or 90, I’m going to be able to play in a jazz band!” But now, since I’ve been to India, it’s next level over there. These people play these instruments all day, every day of their lives, and there is just no way I’ve ever going to be able to compete with that. I’ve certainly lowered my expectations of myself since then *laughs*
You recorded a lot of your samples and sounds whilst you were travelling around. I don’t imagine that being an easy task, especially in a place like India! How did you do that? Where you searching for something in particular?
I just recorded as I went! I have this little portable microphone that records in high quality, so I just recorded as I heard things. If I met a musician that wanted to contribute to the project I could just do it then and there. Or, say, if saw some fireworks or even just ambiance of where I was, I would record that too. I thought that was nice to put in the songs. There is one song called Desert Guy, and throughout the whole song there is the ambiance of what I heard when I was actually in the desert. Because it was so quiet, you could find little sounds like a herd of cows walking past or little flies that are flying around. You could hear so much more out there, so it was fun doing that sort of stuff. I did a bit of it with Jinja, but I got to do it a lot more this time around. I really like it!
The video for Rahh! is such a fun clip! I love watching it! Can you tell me a bit about how you made that, and what was going on in it. I read somewhere that the dress code was “futuristic Bollywood”?
*laughs* Thanks! It was put together really last minute. I spoke to my friend who is a director, and I just mentioned it one Saturday, so he said, “let’s just do it Monday!” So we had two days to come up with a concept, which we didn’t really come up with. We just thought we’d get a few friends to come with whatever outfits they had, and we’d use whatever I had lying around. We shot it in the tipi, and we did it in half a day. It turned out much better than I thought actually! I’m currently working on the film clip for Clams, so I’m keen to get something out for that. We’ve got a lot of footage from a gig I had in my tipi the other night, so I’m keen to get a live video released from that. I ended up recording the audio from that correctly so I’m keen to get that out soon too.
I was just about to ask about your tipi show. I actually saw you post about it on your Instagram!
Oh wow! Well, the tipi show was mainly to test out the songs. I have a new band together to help me play these new songs, and they’re all from where I live in Long Jetty. We’ve been jamming on these songs, so we invited our friends and I got some other people from Facebook and Instagram to come along as well, if they were keen. Because it was in my backyard though, I had to limit the amount of people. I didn’t want anyone stealing my undies!
They could sell them on eBay! Sell them for heaps of money!
*laughs* I don’t know how much money they’d make! I might have to pay someone to buy them! But yeah, it ended up being a nice chilled night. Everyone dressed up and we ended up staying late in the night. I actually hope the neighbours weren’t too pissed off…
They probably enjoyed it too! You’ve got two intimate shows coming up in Sydney and Melbourne soon – what are you expecting from these? Any secrets you can let me in on for them?
No secrets! I’m super pumped to play them though. I’ve been sitting on these songs for a while. It’s so different taking them to the stage and playing them live. I’m really excited about it. The band that I have with me will be awesome too. We had to iron out some kinks with the amount of instruments we have, and the amount of instruments we can travel with… It’s basically a new instrument every song. There is a Chinese Lute that I’ve been using, and is the main instrument in Rahh! It’s such a bitch to tune though! So we’re working on those things, but still excited!
What can we expect next then? Maybe a show up here in Brisbane?
I hope so! I think I’m doing these gigs just for now, but I’d love to do a bigger tour later in the year. I’d love to head up to Brisbane, it would have been good to do now to be a bit warmer! I’ve got five layers on at the moment! We’ve been feeling it a lot more lately because we’ve been sleeping out there in the tipi, and you can feel the elements so much more!
Well hopefully it doesn’t literally get picked up by the wind!
Well funny you say that – the last time there was a huge gust of wind, it felt a bit like a hurricane blowing, and I had forgotten to peg the canvas down properly. We had a few moments in the night where the canvas was just blown into the air and we were just literally in bed, outside.
What do you even do in that situation?!
Well the next morning, I made sure I definitely put the tent pegs down! It’s just so hard to take it down then put it back together again. For the tipi gig, we set it half open, and it’s taken me nearly a week to get it back to normal again and get everything out of it.
And make sure the tent pegs are down before you go back to bed!
Yes! I’ve learned my lesson!
Pepa Knight shows:
Goodgod Small Club, Sydney – August 1
Northcote Social Club, Melbourne – August 8
Originally posted on Scenewave.com