After the success of their EP ‘The Pacific’, and extensive national and overseas touring, Holy Holy have released their first studio album, ‘When The Storms Would Come’, which vocalist/ guitarist Tim Carroll says has been a long time in the making.
“It's been on the horizon for so long it's hard to believe it's actually happening,” he says. “It's been a pretty long journey with lots of different bits and pieces to it: we started out by hitting the studio and did a collection of recordings a few years ago.
“We had almost, what could have been an album back then, but at that stage we had just decided on the band name; even the players in the band were a bit fluid at that time, as in there were different people in and out of the band and we were still working out what it was going to be.”
The end result of those sessions was extended player ‘The Pacific’, featuring singles ‘Impossible Like You’ and ‘House Of Cards’, which enabled Holy Holy to take the next step of touring Australia, Europe and the United Kingdom. “We pulled some tracks out of that collection and released an EP and that allowed us to do a lot of touring, we toured a lot last year, just got out there. It was really good for our live show and a chance for people to see us and get to know us as a band.
“In the meantime we kept writing and recording, and the rest of the album came together over that period and after four, big, national tours last year and a little overseas run this year, all of us together, our label and the band, have decided that now's the right time to drop the record.”
Although Tim and Oscar Dawson form the original core of Holy Holy, they are joined on stage by their permanent touring band consisting of Graham Ritchie on bass, Ryan Strathie (ex-Hungry Kids Of Hungary) on drums and producer Matt Redlich on synthesizer. The addition of Matt, who has worked with artists such as Ball Park Music, Emma Lousie and Thief came about when Holy Holy were organising their UK/ European run and called on his services to man the synth.
Since then, Tim says Matt has become an integral part of the band, his soaring soundscapes essential for achieving the band’s overall sonic quality. “Our records have so many harmonies on them,” Tim says.
“They've also got all this particular synth that Matt has: it's a Prophet-08 synth; it's an analogue synth that always reminds me of ‘Blade Runner’. It's got this really particular sound that's really key to the Holy Holy sound; people may not realise it but there's a certain sound our band has and it's because of this synth, which is across everything.
“We actually have this funny thing that often happens when we're recording where we're tracking and tracking for days and the song's sounding okay and we're almost done. Then right at the end we go, 'we'll put some synth on it' and then we do the synth and we go 'oh… we're done'. It's kind of like the varnish, the last layer that ties everything together, so that's happened a few times.”
The video for the album’s single, ‘Sentimental & Monday’, was conceived and shot by Oscar’s brother, Josh Dawson who created an aerial cloudscape which complements the song’s dreamlike quality.
Based in Berlin, Josh has produced many music video clips and has won awards for his work in short film, as well as advertising. “Over the years Oscar and I have been working together, we’ve always wanted to do something with him and up until now it hasn’t really lined up,” Tim explains.
“Josh was available and he had done a big trip from Berlin to the States; on the plane on the way over he did a bunch of shooting out of the aeroplane and got these epic shots of huge clouds and beautiful landscapes.”
Holy Holy are touring ‘When The Storms Would Come’ nationally throughout August and September before heading back to Europe. For this tour, Tim says fans can look forward to seeing a lot more of what Holy Holy has to offer live. “We'll be playing fairly long sets, so we'll play a bunch of tracks off the album and probably play the singles off the EP.
“I'm hoping we'll get to play a new song that we've been working on over the weekend; I'm not sure if it'll be ready but I'd like to play it because it's fun and it's a good one. I do like playing songs [live] before we record them, so I'm keen to give it a little run because we might record it sometime this year.”
Joining the tour as support is Melbourne artist Fractures. “We were hunting around for a band that was going to fit well with us,” says Tim, “but by the same token, when you’re looking for a support you want something a bit different as well; you want to curate a night that’s exciting, that if I was at home I’d want to go to that gig. So finding something that’s interesting and fresh and a bit different to play with is what we’re about.”
Taking a page from one of the 20th Century’s most prolific singer-songwriters, Holy Holy engage a creative and interpretive approach to their live performances by never playing the same show twice. “I was watching a Tom Petty doco, because Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers were Bob Dylan’s band for a while – for a couple of tours – and they were talking about the way Bob Dylan was always changing things and wouldn’t stick to one thing and that was the magic of his art. So I was inspired by that and thought we should do some of that on this next run.
“We’re all about working together as a band and trying to build some sort of emotional experience in live music. We like to do long, extended, instrumental sections and Ossie goes off piece a bit; each show’s a bit different and he’ll never play the exact same thing, so that keeps us all on our toes.”
'When The Storms Would Come' is out now. Holy Holy's national tour continues until 19 September.
