Brisbane alt rockers Dead Letter Circus are back from a massive tour of the US, ready to play a couple of local shows before heading overseas again.
Their third album, 'Aesthesis', was released late last year, and the band is keen to spread their wings in new territory (hence all the US shows). Introducing your music to a foreign country has to be daunting. DLC vocalist Kim Benzie says he understands why some bands don't end up taking the plunge. “You have to sort of start from scratch overseas, doing the hard yards, going 'round in a van and not sleeping for days. But the response we got over there was goose-bumpy. It was intense.”
Kim says the recording of 'Aesthesis' was a particularly interesting experience. “There was a point there where we were thinking it might be the last one. We were like 'let's do one more and see how it goes', you know?”
Thankfully for DLC fans, the group show no signs of actually stopping: they're recording their next album at the moment and are hoping to put it out next year. “We had such an amazing time recording 'Aesthesis', there was great chemistry between the band. Halfway through the process I was like, 'holy shit we're actually going to pull this off'. It was great.”
The album's title refers to someone's awareness of sensory perception; Kim describes it as “your first feelings or reactions to something”. He says the inspiration for the title came from the idea that society is so heavily influenced by the media: we can research most things in a second. But what's most important is that first reaction we have. The first feeling, the gut instinct about something.
Music can have a powerful affect on people; for Kim, it was the band Pantera that really made him realise that. Music was initially just background noise to him, he didn't really pay attention to it. Then one day he says he was sitting in the back of “a shitty car with an awesome stereo, listening to Pantera”.
For the first time, Kim says he tapped into what music could actually be. “It just got me in the right mood. I had a full-on moment.” From then on, it was all about music.
This revelation happened to occur when Kim was finishing school. When he was asked what he wanted to do after graduation by his mother, he told her: “I think I'm just gonna be a musician and stay at home for a while, just learning and playing music.”
His mother enrolled him in a horticulture course at TAFE the very next day. “I basically wagged the entire semester, failed everything. I'd drive there as if I was going, but I'd actually go and jam with my friends.”
One thing Kim is proud of when it comes to DLC is that they've never sounded too much like another band. DLC have their various influences – Kim is a massive Tool fan, preferring music with more singing than the scream-heavy stuff he used to like – but he says the band's always been very honest with each other about the music they write. “You know in your heart if you've written something that sounds like another band, and we don't shy away from saying that to each other.”
Always wanting to raise the bar and create something unique, Kim credits DLC's songwriting success mostly to the fact they're great at giving each other that feedback. Does he have any advice for local bands trying to get their start? “It comes down to songwriting, I think. Really honour the moment where you first have some sort of idea for a song. That moment when it first comes to you, that's very important.”
Dead Letter Circus play Mooloolaba Wharf Tavern (Helm Bar) 15 April and Racehorse Hotel Booval 16 April.
