It's a lot of hard work to sustain a career in music in this day and age.
Matt Armstrong knows this for certain, working as a music teacher on the Gold Coast. "Music is always a second gig," he says, "but it's a great experience to see [my students] start out on their journey."Hopefully they'll go out and see me at some gigs and see that they can keep going with music after school and keep playing stuff."
Matt has been playing the trumpet since he was in school and has continued with the instrument long after graduating. These days, he can be seen live as part of the horn section of eight-piece funk-soul bands Madison Kat and Heavy Wax.
"Madison Kat is our corporate/ private function arm where we do a whole lot of covers," he says. "Madison Kat has been going for 50 years. [Vocalist Quinn Samin]'s dad started it off back in the '60s. When they were old enough to play in the band they did, and now they've taken it over.
"We've all been playing together for years in Madison Kat. Heavy Wax is pretty much the same musicians, but that's our originals project that we started in 2020. So, some good things came out of COVID."
The band have long held ambitions of writing and performing more originals, but it was only during lockdowns when work schedules cleared up that the group were able to put time and effort into them.
Since then, Heavy Wax have released their self-titled debut album, which was a finalist for Release Of The Year at this year's Gold Coast Music Awards, and performed at Blues On Broadbeach (as well as a skateboarding keg-jumping competition, which excited Matt).
Despite the excellent amount of work on their own, Matt isn't afraid to seek advice on ways to keep the momentum going. It's this instinct that led him to attend Bandcamp, a one-day industry intensive workshop presented by Gold Coast Music Network.
"[Bandcamp] is where you get to sit down, face-to-face, with industry experts and get to pick their brains about various things," Matt says. "It was out of talking with Kristy Gostelow from the Kadence Group I learnt about grants and grant writing, and after that I thought it could be a good thing.
"That led to the Music Merch Grant the Gold Coast City Council has put together for their Music Action Plan." Gold Coast City Council developed their Music Action Plan after the devastating economic effects of the COVID pandemic and lockdowns.
One of the grants developed as part of that plan is the Music Merch Collab Program, supporting Gold Coast bands and musicians to partner with visual artists to design and develop music merchandise for retail sale.
"You could get up to $5,000 to organise merch, employ a graphic designer, and also do some advertising to sell your merch," Matt says.
"The graphic designer that we're working with, Dave Marini from the Gold Coast's Stickytape Graphic Design, has done a lot of our artwork from the album cover to tour posters. It's great working with him and having this different opportunity to push things in a different direction.
"It's a really good way to give bands a kickstart. I was surprised because writing grants seems so full-on, but it was pretty much just put your bio in, tick the various boxes, and then it came up all good for us."
Heavy Wax have now been able to add merchandise such as shirts, hoodies, stubbie coolers, and tote bags. These items are available via their website and will also be at their upcoming support slots with Resin Dogs and recently-reunited Aussie funk heroes Skunkhour.
"I remember seeing Skunkhour at Livid at Davies Park and just being blown away," Matt says. "To think that after watching these guys and now we're sharing the bill with them is crazy."
Next year will be just as packed for Heavy Wax. The band recently recorded a five-track EP with George Carpenter at Byron Bay's Rockinghorse Records that was mastered by Grammy-winner Brian Lucey, who has previously worked with Lizzo, Michael Bublé, and The Black Keys.
"We have fun," Matt says, "and that's the thing: we just try to have fun. Unless we have a one-hit wonder or something that comes out of nowhere and we make it big, we're doing this mainly just to enjoy the journey and tick things off that we've always said would be cool to do."
Heavy Wax 2023 Tour Dates
Fri 17 Nov - St Bernards Hotel (Mt Tambourine)Sat 25 Nov - Verrierdale Hall (Sunshine Coast)* supporting Resin Dogs
Sat 16 Dec - Miami Marketta (Gold Coast)* supporting Skunkhour
