‘Dark cabaret’ group Silver Sircus will release their latest album later this year and they are not clowning around.
But in the meantime the group will indulge in their first live show in more than 12 months when they play as part of the Queensland Cabaret Festival this month. “We'll be debuting at least four or five of the new album songs with the full ensemble. On top of this we're also going to have a six-piece guest choir. They’re going to be on three songs all together so it’ll be a very dramatic and grand, yet still very intimate experience,” composer and percussionist James Lees says.
“I think the people who like us will see a lot of songs that they enjoy seeing us do with the full complement… the full concert sound and lots of new songs. Right now we’re preparing what I think will be a really wonderful show ... This is the show to come and see. It's a wonderful venue. Everybody is going to be there and it's going to sound great.”
Although their new record is yet to be completed, Lee is anxious to finally have the tracks heard. “To shake things up we have written some stories about some other people, so I guess this record is a little more external. We’re describing other things and telling stories a bit more rather than it being all ‘I I I’. We've written some songs about historical figures as well. We've written a song about Amelia Earhart, the pilot who was very famous and a feminist icon who disappeared [at sea] never to be found. It's kind of quite spooky but also quite loving as well. We've written a few other songs about real things. We've also written about the big rains and floods that have happened in Queensland.
“We are really stripping back our sound a lot more for the new music. Less studio production and less effects on things. No electronic sound because we used electronic on our last stuff quite a bit, so this is much rawer than that. It's simple, natural, raw sounds of the instruments.”
As for the future? “More music, an album and a couple of video clips, all within the next 12 months hopefully.”
Written by Lexi McKee
Silver Sircus play the Brisbane Powerhouse, as part of the Queensland Cabaret Fest, June 12.
