Brisbane alt-rockers Selfish Sons showcase a year of growth and development on their new single 'Sleep'.
'Sleep' is the first release from Selfish Sons since the trio's debut EP 'Sixfour' in early 2019.A year on and bandleader Jordy Polbodetto says the new song is all about finding a real connection with their listeners.
“Especially with our new single, the biggest thing is touching base into real things, things that kids are going through now,” Jordy explains, “not necessarily what people used to go through or generic things, but it's taking what someone has already done and paraphrasing it in a different way to make things our own.”
Jordy goes on to explain how 'Sleep' was written from his own experiences with mental health issues and how music offered him the ideal outlet for dealing with his restless predicament.
“With this new single, I struggled for a long time with mental health and all that stuff, and didn't really talk to anyone; the insomnia I suffered through came out in the music rather than by me talking about it,” he says.
“Without the music for me, I would have been in a lot more trouble mentally, so that's why I take a lot of pride in this song, because it's not only us releasing something for the sake of wanting to play it as as a band, but it's also releasing something for the sake of our own health.
“It was almost like a little bit of healing and moving past a phase and point in my life. I want people to feel the same release and relief when we play that I feel when we do, that's the big thing.”
Beyond the thematics of 'Sleep', the new single also marks a new era of collaborative songwriting for the band that stands in contrast to that of 'Sixfour'. “The major thing was that 'Sixfour' was a lot of my own songwriting and accumulated over a lot of years,” Jordy says about how the band has developed since the EP.
“Whereas a lot of the new music, especially 'Sleep', coming out now is a lot more collaborative and there's been more input from every member of the band more so than one person writing the track and the rest of us playing it.
“This was my experience mentally, but musically we have evolved so much more in terms of collaboration. Just between us as a band, I think the music has come so far just because of that collaborative aspect.”
With the new single out in the world, Selfish Sons will embark on a tour in support of 'Sleep' in March, and Jordy says it's onstage that the band show their true grit and worth.
“As a band, our number-one thing always has been playing live – that's how we started, that's how we write, that's how we do everything in this band,” he says.
“Live is everything to us, so I can't stress it enough that people have to come and see it to really understand it and really get it. So that's the thing with us, is we are totally 100 per cent live. It's our bread and butter, we love it so much.”
'Sleep' is out now.
Selfish Sons 2020 Tour Dates
Fri 13 Mar - Oxford Art Factory (Sydney)Sat 14 Mar - Wrangler Studios (Melbourne)
Fri 20 Mar - The Foundry (Brisbane)
