Melbourne's Pierce Brothers had their names emblazoned on Queensland Country Bank Stadium in 2021, as Townsville prepared for the inaugural Tropic Sounds music festival as part of the North Australian Festival of Arts.
Mere weeks before the event, COVID thwarted any plans for twins Jack and Pat Pierce to head north, as Victoria plunged into yet another lockdown.Take two for the duo – along with 2021's other Tropic Sounds headliner Tones And I – will go ahead at Townsville's Reid Park later this month (27 May) where they'll be joined by Illy, Clews, DJ Dolly Llama and local acts as part of the extended Tropic Fiesta programme of events throughout May.
The show will be one of a number around the country on the Pierce Brothers' first uninhibited tour schedule since COVID. "This is the first run of shows that we've been able to do since 2019 where there's no restrictions or anything," Jack says. "That's been one of the most exciting things."
Although the brothers managed to play a number of shows throughout 2021 and 2022, which included a European tour and a number of festival appearances, it has been a considerable amount of time between drinks in their own backyard.
"We haven't played Sydney, I don't think, since late 2018," Jack says. "We were supposed to play in 2019, but then we were working on a record; so we were booked in to play at the start of 2020, because we didn't want to overplay the market or anything, and we were coming in for the big record release. . . then COVID hit."
The brothers recently returned from a whirlwind tour of South Africa, before Pat left for the Philippines while Jack found himself in isolation.
"I came back from South Africa and I got COVID, and I was just thanking my lucky stars that we didn't have a show on that weekend, because there's nothing you can do about it – you just have to sit around and wait," he says.
"I know you're legally allowed to go out now, but it's just not really the right thing to do. But at least now, I've got it, so now the rest of the tour should be fine."
Pat will return to Australia two days before the tour begins. "He took a guitar with him so he's kind of practicing some stuff while he's away, but there's going to be two days of intense rehearsal and then bang, we're on the road," Jack laughs.
"I was supposed to be recording all the new songs, and putting beds down for them over the last week but I've just been too crook then the kids got crook, so that hasn't happened yet."
The band has "six or seven" new songs written, and plans are in place to finish recording in July. The major difference with this new record, however, will be the addition of keys player Dara Munnis, who Jack says brings a new dynamic to both the studio and the stage.
The trio became fast friends after meeting on a Tash Sultana tour overseas, where Munnis was taking photographs. "We've worked together on a lot of music videos and got him to do a lot of our photography, and then we'd just start jamming together when we were on the road with the Tash tour," Jack explains.
"So we got him in to help play some of the shows, and now we're going to be doing an album together, because he's such a talented writer we wanted to start writing together.
"It's a great way of avoiding bust-ups between me and Pat, to have a third party in there to kind of temper me and Pat when we butt heads."
The brothers' new studio, in the back yard of Jack's fairly recently-purchased family home, is in some ways their attempt to hone their studio craft.
"Artists like Tash, and artists like Tones, that we've gotten to know and watch, have been so good in the studio that we've wanted to lift our game there," he says. "They're inspirational. That's about as simply as I can put it."
The pair recently had a first-hand look at Sultana's studio expertise, when they recorded the single 'High & Unsteady' together.
"We came in with this song, and then Tash started putting down all these different ideas and we'd just sit there and just go with the idea, and it was just incredible to watch," Jack says.
"The way that they put together an idea and then just compound on it and compound on it and then say, 'Alright, here's a Mellotron'. Like, I didn't know what a Mellotron was, then they pulled this out and then started these sounds and I was like, 'This is amazing!'"
Like Tash Sultana and Tones And I, Pierce Brothers began their career busking in the Bourke Street Mall. That, Jack says, taught them everything about live performance.
"Our live performance is directly dictated by busking – probably a little bit too much, I'd say – because we were playing on the street where people were just going to get their lunch, or going shopping, and nobody was there to see live music," he explains.
"So we would really go out of our way to make people stop and look at us, and to do things that would make people say 'wow!'"
From rolling around on the pavement to hitting random things with drumsticks – including his brother's guitar – Jack began clowning around with a purpose.
"We'd use that percussion (from hitting the guitar) and build that into the songs, and it really became the way in which we performed," he says. "Then when we took that to the stage, it kind of elevated our performance in such a way that helped build our career."
After playing a festival in Europe, Jack continues, people began coming back to see their live show. "I mean, Pat and I have never had big hits or anything, but we've been able to build a career purely off the live show, and that's really down to busking."
North Queensland audiences can expect to see that same level of energy at Tropic Sounds later this month. "The plan is to be the biggest show of the day," Jack laughs. "I'm not sure if that will come off, but it's certainly going to be our plan."
Jack says he would love for this to be the start of Pierce Brothers building a regular touring schedule in North Queensland, but says they're keen to start building the touring up around Australia.
"Hopefully this can be the start of us being able to come back and tour North Queensland again, because it's definitely something that we want to keep doing," he says. "It's such an awesome country to tour around – and it's just so much easier to bring my family along now, rather than bringing them to Europe!"
Pierce Brothers join Tones And I and Illy at Tropic Sounds @ Tropic Fiesta at Reid Park (Townsville) 27 May.
Tropic Sounds
Tones And IIlly
Pierce Brothers
Clews
DJ Dolly Llama
Plus local support acts
Pierce Brothers 2023 Tour Dates
Fri 12 May - Oxford Art Factory (Sydney)Sat 13 May - The Brightside (Brisbane)
Fri 19 May - The Corner Hotel (Melbourne)
Sat 27 May - Tropic Sounds @ Reid Park (Townsville)
Fri 9 Jun - Sooki Lounge (Melbourne)
Sat 10 Jun - Haba (Mornington Peninsula)
Sun 11 Jun - Torquay Hotel (Torquay)
Sat 1 Jul - Western Port Hotel (Gippsland)
Wed 5 Jul - Big Red Bash (Birdsville)
Fri 11 Aug - Seabreeze Hotel (Mackay)
Sat 12 Aug - Village Festival (Yeppoon)
Sat 19 Aug - Mundi Mundi Bash (Mundi)
