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I first met The Jezabels back in February at the legendary KOKO venue in London, as part of the NME Tour. Although there hadn’t been much hype about the band in the UK, I was personally excited to finally meet this Sydney band renowned for their intense onstage energy, emotive drumbeats and steely lyrics. Their 2011 debut album Prisoner was successfully launched in Australia to huge local media acclaim, and has since been certified Gold to date, earning the band the 2011 Australian Music Prize.

On 22 February 2012, The Jezabels blew the stage at KOKO, proving themselves to be one of the tightest and most entertaining bands on the international circuit (small wonder that they went on to support the likes of Garbage in anticipation of a Skunk Anansie support slot later in the year). The crowd’s delight was tangible as clumps of Jezabels fans bobbed up and down in the packed out venue. The Jezabels had landed and they weren’t leaving London without a massive bang! In tracking the band, we have found them to be some of the most gracious and down-to-earth artists, each one blessed with brilliant talent, poise and humility. They are a band with something to say, and say it they do through their trademark pounding sounds and hard-hitting lyrics. To my bewilderment, the band is still struggling to win the hearts of the British mainstream media and public, but if the opinions of Shirley Manson and Skin are anything to go by, it’s surely just a matter of time…

Holed up backstage at KOKO, in what has to be one of the best equipped green rooms in town (piano, sofa, TV, foosball table room, actual floor space), I meet and greet 3/4 of the band that is Heather Shannon (keys), Nik Kaloper (drums) and Sam Lockwood (guitar). Shuffled into the tiny-room-within-a-room, huddled around the foosball table, the three charming (and incredibly tall) Jezabels talk to me about commitment, gender equality, and erm… channelling Philip Seymour Hoffman.

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How did you get into music?
NIK KALOPER: When I was about 5, my mum noticed I was just always tapping on everything, so she found some pizza boxes in the trash and gave me a pair of drumsticks, so I could just hit them mercilessly all the time.

Was this a distraction technique of some kind, to stop you hitting the furniture maybe?
NIK: Maybe… We couldn’t afford a drum kit, so just used pizza boxes. That’s like the earliest musical memory I have. When I was 15, I started listening to bands and was really liking music as something to really sink your teeth into, not just as a form of entertainment like anything else. I can’t remember why or exactly how it started at all – it just felt buried in the back of my head.

But when did you start taking it seriously?
NIK: Well, considering the first band I was in was called “Power Flame,” I don’t think I was taking it seriously. But I knew I wanted to be in a band, just to practise being on stage or drumming with other people playing instruments. I guess I was about 19 at that time.

Where did you grow up?
NIK: In California and I moved out to Sydney when I was 15. I lived about the last 12 years in Sydney.

What about you, Sam?
SAM LOCKWOOD: Well, mum forced me to play the piano when I was younger…

It’s always the mums…
SAM: Yeah, it is! I really hated playing the piano at the start, but my mum forced me to and I got to a certain competence in piano. Then I got a guitar for my 15th birthday and since then I really liked guitar. I had a really cool guitar teacher up the road – I’d walk there and he taught me how to play blues and folk music. I always thought that I’d be a musician backing a folk singer, that’s what I used to dream about… I did that for a while in Sydney before The Jezabels but it was actually really fun to play with The Jezabels, so I kept doing that.

And you, Heather?
HEATHER SHANNON: Hayley and I knew each other at school and we used to play little folk songs and stuff on the acoustic guitar. I have been playing piano since I was about 4 doing classical music – I think my grandmother introduced me to the piano…

She was a pianist?
HEATHER: Not particularly – she just liked classical music. So I started learning and I’ve always practised a lot – I’ve played a lot of piano in my life.

Piano is one of those instruments, isn’t it, where if you want to do well in it you have to really keep it going…
HEATHER: Yeah. I went to the conservatorium and I was doing hours a day practicing so I was taking it seriously. It’s always been something that I wanted to do, so I just knew I’d have to put a lot of time and effort into it. And I just fell into playing in a band somehow…

How did you exactly “fall into” this?
HEATHER: You can’t really “plan” this…
SAM: I think the ones that “plan for” it are the tragics… it always happens like this in life: you perform a show, it works for some reason, the manager’s there and they pick you up, and from then on it’s serendipity…
HEATHER: I think when we all first started playing together, we knew we had something that was original. I think we could hear that…
SAM: Yeah.

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A lot of journalists struggle to box your sound and I read somewhere that you called yourselves “gothic pop”?
HEATHER: Yeah, Sam actually made up that word and wrote it on our Facebook page.
SAM: That was like years ago!
HEATHER: It comes up quite often in interviews.

People quote it?
SAM: Yeah.
HEATHER: It sort of just started out as a joke, but then we thought, ”Oh, that’s kind of cool!”

So, Heather, did The Jezabels’ sound start off with you and Hayley?
HEATHER: No, I wouldn’t say the sound started then, but we started the “dream.”

Was that just two girls saying, “We can do it!”?
HEATHER: Yeah, it was totally like that! And we ended up moving to Sydney. We would just spend every weekend after uni trying to find gigs anywhere. We’d find a pub, but they’d be like, “There used to be a stage here but now it’s full of Coke machines, sorry…” We just couldn’t find gigs anywhere. Eventually, we found a couple and played some open mic nights. We just wanted to challenge ourselves and keep playing stuff. And then we met Nik and Sam so we could do the proper full band thing and start playing indie nights and stuff.

So, was there any moment where you thought, “This is a bit crazy actually, what are we doing?”
SAM: It was just a really serious hobby for like 2 years… We spent a lot of time gigging around Sydney when we got together. You can manage a normal life still doing that – you can work and go to uni. But when it started becoming very time consuming going round Australia, that’s when I thought, “Yeah, we can’t do this…”
HEATHER: Yeah we were at uni, working and touring…
NIK: There was about a year in all our lives where we thought we were going to lose it…
HEATHER: Yeah, we had a few breakdowns.
NIK: Yeah…

So, what happened in the rough times – Did you just pick each other up?
HEATHER: Yeah, a little bit – there’s support between us. But I think we also saw more people coming to the gigs each time – it was steadily growing.
NIK: Yeah, there was always that sort of carrot on the stick. We started thinking, “Oh wow, maybe we can try and do that and see what happens…”
HEATHER: Then we’d write another song and think it’s better than our last one, and it just keeps going.

Your songs are very catchy but also darkly romantic in a lot of ways. Who’s the main thrust behind the energy and themes of the songs?
NIK: Phillip Seymour Hoffman.

You channel Phillip Seymour Hoffman…?!
NIK: I channel him to drum.
SAM: Which movie?
NIK: Er, Capote…

He’s your main inspiration, is he…?
NIK: For most things, yeah… [band falls about laughing] No, I’m just being a weirdo right now, I’m sorry…
SAM: I like to see us as collaborators when we write because we just get together and write everything together. But I’d say if there was one person who you could say constructs our sounds for most of our previous recordings, it’d be our producer. We all come together and write songs but he…
HEATHER: …he exaggerates us.
SAM: Yeah, he exaggerates what we do and he can communicate really clearly.
HEATHER: He’s a good facilitator for the 4 of us.

So it’s good to have someone outside of your own creative processes?
SAM: Producers are so underrated in the whole recording process. If you really like a CD and you like the artist, but then they go to another producer, you might not like that artist any more.
NIK: And not only that, but that song could have come out a hundred different ways with a hundred different producers.
SAM: Exactly.
NIK: I mean, you have chord charts and drumbeats on a piece of paper, all the sounds, the sonic landscape that ends up with the signature of that producer at the end of that day…

It’s true – but producers are getting a little more credit now…
SAM: They are, these days. I think that back in the day it was like smoke and mirrors – like some Wizard of Oz behind the scenes…

Your tracks have great balance and it’s been pointed out that your sound and stage performances are very gender-neutral…
HEATHER: Ah, that’s cool! That’s a nice thing to say.

Is that purely accidental?
SAM: Well, it’s something we can all agree on, because we’re all sort of, not politically-minded, but we like talking about issues and that’s the one issue that we all agree on or we all get frustrated by.

So what kind of frustrations are we talking about?
HEATHER: Gender equality.
SAM: Feminism. Because we’ve got 2 girls and 2 boys, it’s a good thing to talk about.
HEATHER: And questions come up. Like this morning when I was doing an interview, I was asked, “Because there are 2 boys and 2 girls, do you guys argue a lot?” And I was like, “Well, we do argue but it’s not because we’re 2 boys and 2 girls…”
SAM: It’s because we’re 4 people!
NIK: It’s because we’re 4 strange people!!

You probably have a lot of other music-related stresses which are way more important…
HEATHER: Yeah!

So Heather, have you ever experienced any negative treatment from the industry or the media in terms of being a female member of the band?
HEATHER: I think Hayley’s probably really different to me actually, but I only notice really small things but not even so much anymore. I think we’ve been really lucky to work with really open-minded people and I’ve never felt like I’ve been treated that differently. But I guess at the start, it was challenging even just in my own mind. It was when we first all got together, when we were in shitty bars and trying to play shows and a guy wouldn’t give me information because I was a girl.

A promoter?
HEATHER: Yeah.

So there is that element of maybe not being taken seriously?
HEATHER: Yeah, just a little bit. And it’s only happened a few times. I really like being a woman behind an instrument — If I say it myself, I really admire that. I can be pretty gender neutral, right?

You’re kind of an enigma in that sense…
SAM: Yeah, I think there are a lot of bands where they have the one female… token females, really…
HEATHER: Yeah, and it seems like it’s artificial. But I feel like with us it’s different because we’ve got equal parts.
NIK: But it’s not like there was any affirmative action at any point: we didn’t fire the third male to get a second female. It feels great that it did end up working out that way.

And a lot of female-fronted bands are actually doing really well…
HEATHER: Yeah, totally! Seems like there’s a movement.

Do you notice any difference between the crowds in Australia and in other countries?
NIK: I struggle with this question because I don’t notice huge differences in crowd energy or crowds. It’s only small, peculiar things, nothing sweeping. Like, Germans seem to be very happy to give you criticism, actually. [laughs]
HEATHER: Yeah!
NIK: They’ll have the biggest smile on their face when they say it, but they’re just letting you know how they felt about it…
SAM: …“The third song didn’t sound too good tonight. But I really like the fourth song.”
HEATHER: They’re very honest.
NIK: When I look out into the crowd from the stage, I would never have any clue what country I was in, based on what I experience just on stage.
HEATHER: Actually, even within Australia if you compare playing a show in Sydney to Melbourne, the Melbourne crowds always seem to just sit back and watch, and London’s a bit like that too.

They’re a bit like, “Impress me!”
HEATHER: Yeah!

You are one of the tightest bands out there – Is that because you’re on the same wavelength not just with the music, but also in other areas?
HEATHER: Yeah, I think that came first actually because we sucked when we first started playing together. It took heaps of practice, writing and stuff to get where we are today. And I think the reason we kept going is because we got along as friends and hung out. We used to just practise really leisurely, have a few beers and talk about stuff.
NIK: I find it peculiar. It doesn’t feel like a sibling thing or a romantic relationship or a friendship, it’s a weird type of relationship.
SAM: It’s very weird.
HEATHER: Spiritual…
SAM: I’d say it’s just below actually dating someone, because you have an intimacy with your partner. But with us, we’re always together and that’s the thing you have to get past. We share a lot of time together, go through stressful situations together – It’s like you’re in an army platoon.
NIK: Exactly!
HEATHER: You know what everyone’s farts smell like!

It’s about having a common goal?
SAM: Totally.

Has it been easy to get a balance between private life and band priorities, or is that something you think needs to be learned by musicians over time?
NIK: I think your balance will affect how far you get.
SAM: Yeah, you have to decide 100% band or relationship…
NIK: I mean, 100% band would probably make you go insane, so maybe give yourself that 3 or 4 percent the rest of the time!
SAM: 96% is the formula for success!

Do you think the commitment issue is the main reason why bands don’t work out?
SAM: It is, totally.
HEATHER: I’ve played with cover bands and stuff, and I just remember I’d take any opportunity that I could just to get experience, and I’d play in pubs and markets and stuff. I used to hate it and I was like, “Why would anyone play in a band that sucks? It’s boring.” I didn’t get it. It was because I didn’t get along with the people in the band, and they didn’t challenge me.

So it’s important to challenge each other?
HEATHER: Yeah, musically you have to challenge each other, to keep each other interested.

So how are you feeling about promoting your debut album Prisoner over here?
SAM: We’ve had a pretty successful run in Australia so I feel happy for it to be out and it’s finally coming out.
NIK: Well, it’s too late to even change anything. You can get pretty fatalistic about it. Everything up until we got it mastered was deliberating and worrying and stressing, and after that you just make it as accessible as possible so if people have an opportunity to listen to it, they’re either going to like it or hate it.

It’s been pretty successful back home.
HEATHER: Yeah it’s done really well.

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So, summarizing everything you’ve just told me in terms of what you’ve gone through and where you’re at now, what advice would you give to yourself 10 years ago or to musicians who want to do what you do?
HEATHER: Practise a shitload.
NIK: Yeah, practise, practise, practise. And I can’t help but think sometimes that there’s an element of timing and luck in all this as well. Half the problem would be finding 4 people who have the same musical ambitions as each other and if you don’t find that, you just don’t find it, no matter how good you are at playing music. So the fact that the 4 of us found each other and we all just, for some reason, knew that we were going to put the band first, that’s just a luck thing and timing.
HEATHER: Also, we’re all from very different backgrounds and we like lots of different music and I think that’s why it works for us. So I’d say: Don’t limit yourself.
NIK: Yeah: Put yourself out there as much as possible. I couldn’t think of 4 people with more different tastes.

What music are you all into then?
HEATHER: I’d probably say Eastern European classical music.
SAM: I like folk music but not pop-folk music. I like traditional Irish folk music or country music from America, but not Gillian Welch and people like that…

I feel like you’re going to say something completely wild, Nik…
NIK: No, it’s not that weird…. It’s just mainly… Hungarian indie pop… No! I’m stuck in the late 90s: American alternative music, post-grunge and a lot of metal: really rough stuff like Cattle Decapitation and Agoraphobic Nosebleed…
HEATHER: And then Hayley loves divas from the 80s. She loves Abba and Queen, really theatrical stuff.
SAM: So it’s basically North, South, East, West…
NIK: There’s no reason that the 4 of us should have been able to make a song!
SAM: But, it’s about the people rather than what they’re into.
HEATHER: Totally!
NIK: My drumming motto from my last band was: Play as much as you can, always. And learn from good people, no matter what their musical taste is.
HEATHER: I’ve totally undone a lot of my classical training as well because I just felt like, “I can’t make things up?! But I need to read it on a piece of paper!” and then slowly…
SAM: …Heather’s going to be a late bloomer! She’ll end up making like 50 albums a week…

So are you feeling positive about the future?
SAM: Yeah, I think we’re all on the same page now where we all just want to tour the world and keep making music. And I think we’re at the stage now where it’s starting to become a possibility, but we still have to get through this period. I think another reason we’re so okay with being together and doing what we’re doing is that we’re not too desperate about it. We see the world as a place where what we’re doing is very awesome but…
HEATHER: …this could all be over in the next month.
NIK: Totally!
SAM: Yeah. I’ve always said this but I’m totally happy to go back to being an English teacher, which I was.
NIK: I wanted to be a science teacher.
SAM: I’d obviously miss the travelling but I’ve been trying to maintain that headspace where if it all ends tomorrow we’ve had a really good run.

You really enjoy what you’re doing, but a lot of bands these days feel pressure to produce and don’t enjoy it…
SAM: Yeah, it’s understandable.
HEATHER: It can get like that sometimes, it’s so overwhelming…
NIK: It’s hard, you walk a tightrope. If you pay no attention to the business considerations of your band you won’t have enough money to go on tour. And if you spend all that time thinking about such things then you’re not really going to write decent music if you’re only focused on charts and stuff.
SAM: That’s why our manager’s good.
NIK: Yeah, our manager’s incredible with everything he does.
SAM: That’s another reason we’re successful at all: because of him. Another message for people who want to get into this is to find people who fit what they do.

Yeah: try to avoid that kiss of death from a commercial manager who doesn’t really care about you…
SAM: That happens a lot.

Thanks very much for the interview, guys!
NIK: That was a really great interview!

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<< READ PART 2 OF THIS INTERVIEW HERE >>

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Merrill Beth Nisker, AKA Peaches, the Berlin-based Canadian electro musician and performance artist is in relaxed, buoyant mood backstage prior to her slamming DJ set at one of the coolest nights in Scotland. Chatting before her appearance at Death Disco at The Arches Glasgow, we ask the inspirational lady some questions while she’s getting ready. As we settle down for our interview, Peaches is enthusing about the recent Cindy Sherman MAC cosmetics campaign. Known for pushing the boundaries of gender and sexual identity, her extravagantly edgy costuming, eye-popping performances and explicit lyrics, Peaches talks frankly about her career trajectory, changes in the industry and life as a multi-instrumentalist producer pioneer.

At the end of the interview, we hear a knock at the dressing room door as one of the club staff brings in the bottles of fizz which 30 minutes later are sprayed from between Peaches thighs over a hot sweaty capacity crowd. Screaming for more as she blasts out her mix of dirty beats, the crowds are treated to some of Peaches’ own finest musical moments.

This girl can still “kick it” for sure!

Since this interview, in May 2012, Peaches starred alongside 6 Opera singers in L’Orfeo, composed by Monteverdi in 1607, in which she played the lead male role. In August of the same year, she put together a video with a number of artists and volunteers, appealing for the release of three members of the Pussy Riot group jailed in Russia to widespread international condemnation. To top it all off, her “anti-jukebox musical” has now been made into her first feature film Peaches Does Herself which is to premiere at the 2012 Toronto International Film Festival.

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So, who or what was your main inspiration when you first started out and were formulating your ideas?
I guess what was important for me and how I got into stuff was that I loved so many local things. For me, it was people that weren’t necessarily famous or somebody that people knew but maybe someone who dressed a little different or talked a little different. I was always drawn to those people and was like, “How are they like that? How does that happen?”

Was there a vibrant scene back then? You’ve worked with a lot of different musicians over the years, like Chilly Gonzales for instance…
I was more into experimental bands, and really into the location of places and the atmosphere. Right now, I’m interested in more conceptual standing of the art, or performative art pieces that last and then go away. I realised that things don’t go away – they come back in waves… it’s always waves. Whether you like it or not, it’s like, “Oh yeah, that waves coming…” Right now, it’s the whole dubstep, drum and bass kind of music… And with house music, that’s something I diverted from and made punkier by doing dirtier stuff. It’s funny to see how thing’s regurgitate and come back. And then you realise that when you first discover it, it’s so important to you. And as the year’s go on, it’s “That’s it again – OK! Wow, yeah!” And with psychologies and philosophies, it’s always up and down like with waves of music – things that turn out to be ghettoised and then turn into huge scenes. It’s funny…

When you first got out there, you were doing it all yourself – do you consider yourself a pioneer in that respect?
It was a funny time because there was all this overproduced house and breakbeat, and I wanted to get back to punk but I also wanted to use these updated electronic sounds. Yeah, it’s really funny because it was so strange, especially in Canada, that somebody would get up there and just have one little tape machine. And it was before people had macs and loads of computers, everybody had their Garage Band or whatever to make music on. Now everybody and their grandma does these playback shows with VJs. But right now, 11 years later, I’m doing more of a DJ/MC thing which is totally going back to how I started. I feel very comfortable with screaming over tracks or whatever it is I do, and it’s funny coz now it’s such a standard but it was so strange then.

Do you feel the music industry has changed a lot since when you first entered it?
Yeah, it’s a different place because of the economics which are completely different. For me, there’s exciting parts of both. I started out before there was a lot of money involved and powerful major labels… in terms of big deals, big video budgets or whatever. I don’t think that’s going on now, which I’m also excited about, but I think it’s cool that people have to reroute and be resourceful.

Do you feel that major labels don’t take risks anymore?
I think there are different views and some don’t really know what to do…

Do you think things have changed also because of online music distribution?
In that regard, people can make music much earlier and easier due to technology. And that also means they can put it out easier on their own.

Do you think women have an easier time in the industry now?
That also goes in waves. With Riot Grrrl and electroclash, it was girls who ruled in that scene. Witch house music – now, girls rule that scene for sure. It’s strange, as there are millions of scenes out there and 5 of them are with girls in the focus. So it’s weird ways. It’s still like, “Oh you’re a girl and you’re a drummer??” Like, I had this taxi driver and we couldn’t really communicate, but he asked me what I do and I said, “I’m a DJ” and he said, “A singer? A singer?” He couldn’t get it. There’s something really undeniable about a woman’s voice and the woman’s voice is way more powerful. Maybe that’s the secret to what they want.

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Recently, you’ve been branching out, as with the Peaches Christ Superstar project?
Yeah! And I wanted to do an opera based on my own person – Peaches Does Herself. I did it in Berlin twice but I would need money to take it anywhere else as it’s a huge show. It’s incredible and I love it. It’s like the next generation of The Rocky Horror Picture Show. I really think a lot of my work is questioning mainstream things that go on – like: what’s the deal with that jukebox musical style? Why are you taking all these great songs from Queen and turning them into a weird ‘there’s a world and there’s no more rock music’ weak plot? So I wanted to make my show more like an opera where the songs are the trajectory for the plot not this bad actor drama stuff.

In 2010, you worked with film director Celine Sciamma (director of films Water Lilies and Tomboy) on Ivory Tower. Do you want to do more film work?
I really do. I have no interest in being part of the whole Hollywood thing, but I really want to get into it. I have made my own videos. My image of what I want and how I want to see myself in film has a lot to do with my age and who I am right now. I don’t want to be hip about it and all young and fresh about it. I made a video for a song and I looked horrible in it. I oiled down my hair and I’m just running all the time in it – but it’s not ironic, I just made it hyper-real.

I don’t know if you saw the video for Show Stopper, but that was a test for a movie we wanted to make. We weren’t thinking of this but it’s similar to that film Berlin Calling (Hannes Stöhr 2008), in that it’s a film about a real DJ. The idea which the director Caroline (Sascha Cogez) proposed to me about 4 years ago was: “I want to make a fictional film but using your reality.” And I said, “Let’s do it, then!” She had the idea that a young girl stows away on my tour bus, but I was like, “No, there’s a woman whose my age in a totally different world.” So that’s what we did with this massage therapist. I really enjoyed doing that but we couldn’t get funding to make the film. But we’re still into doing stuff. It’s more than someone like Celine, as I would like to be more improvisational like in a Mike Leigh style.

So, are you getting a buzz out of going back out on the road and doing these DJ gigs?
Yeah, it’s good rediscovering that down and dirty level, and it’s also fun coz I get to come to places and talk to people more than when I’m doing my show. I want to interact with people and people want to interact with me – instead of me saying, “I’m putting on this show.”

And you don’t have a set game plan on the day?
I take chances, for sure…

You make extraordinary videos and you made many different ones for your last album I Feel Cream – the track Talk To Me is really crazy with the moving hair and THAT hair outfit!
Yeah, I made a video for every song, and for the last song I made two! I have a very good friend Charlie Le Mindu who I met in Berlin – he was a hairdresser who moved to London and became a fashion designer. He’s really amazing and does this incredible stuff. But I remember his first collection before he technically made a ‘first collection’ and he had all these wigs. So, I’m sitting in his apartment and say, “You know, we should do a video with these wigs!” If hair is on your head or eyelashes, it’s beautiful, but if it’s stuck somewhere unusual, it’s fucked up and I’m all about that! I used to sell merkins as merchandise and t-shirts with hair on, and for Impeach My Bush we did a video for Get It with this huge piece of hair that Charlie made that went down to my toes which was wild. A lot of my videos end up like, “Let’s go out onto the street in this weird costume!!”

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What’s next for you?
I’m actually producing another band – a girl band from Taiwan called Go Chic. The main singer is more into the Peaches and Chicks on Speed style, and the one who makes the beats is totally into new sounds… and they have some punky stuff too.

So are you set to become the next Phil Spector with a roster of bands coming through your studio whilst you work the Peaches magic?
[Laughs] I’m just checking it out… It’s fun, because I really like them and it’s a good opportunity. 2010 was the year I gave myself a bunch of presents for my 10th anniversary, so we did a show completely with lasers twice in Berlin and Miami called The Peaches Laser Show. It was an incredible experience playing with all those lasers with people going “Whoa!” And it was good for me because I didn’t have to jump on everybody. It was really effective and FUN! And the other present of course was making the opera. So I’m just trying out a bunch of stuff. It’s about music, but it’s also about much more than music.

You’ve never compromised in your career, and in turn have influenced a lot of people. What would you say to somebody starting out now?
Make sure you really do what you really want to do, even if it’s only because it’s something you question. Look at what’s out there and what you think about it, and how to continue.

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Austra is one of the most enigmatic under-the-radar bands to gather a loyal international following. Hailing from Toronto, they deliver the most spellbinding performances with beautiful vocal harmonies and a slick onstage synchronicity that would put many a commercial band to shame. Pushing the dark electro mood, their down-to-earth approach and distinctive style has made them incredibly popular with fans and has set Austra in a class all of their own. Hypnotizing crowds, they pick you up and entice you along, leaving you high and wanting more. An Austra gig is like taking a “good drug” – and once will never be enough.

Lead singer KATIE STELMANIS has long been working with drummer Maya Postepski of Princess Century and Trust fame, joined by bassist Dorian Wolf, backing singer sisters Sari and Romy Lightman of band Tasseomancy, and keyboardist Ryan Wonsiak, making up this impressive now 6-piece band.

The band’s stunning debut album Feel It Break (featuring Beat And The Pulse, Lose It, The Choke, Hate Crime) was shortlisted for the 2011 Polaris Music Prize, and a highly-anticipated second album is in the pipeline.

We had a brief chat with singer Katie backstage at The Deaf Institute in Manchester, where she talked about the band, Toronto and “trying” to be a freak…

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So Katie, you had a bit of a rough ride getting to Manchester this time?
Oh, it’s just there’s only one ferry a day basically from Dublin to here so we had one option and we were just running late, but it’s okay!

Austra’s really on the up and up and this year’s been a very busy year for you guys. What’s been the highlight for you so far?
I think the most exciting moment for us was we’d just put out our record and we flew to Europe and the first show that we played was in Berlin. We’d never really had people come out to our shows and want to see us play, but I guess when you put a record out, people know about you. We played in Berlin and were supposed to play in a venue for like 200 people but we got bumped up and ended up playing for like 800 people – we were so nervous that we almost threw up before we played!

Germany really seems the place to go if you want a following, especially in electro music.
Totally! Germany’s fucking great – it’s awesome.

I read that you felt Austra had successfully avoided falling into the stereotypes of a “gay” or “female-fronted” band. How did you manage to dodge that bullet?
I think that there are a lot of reasons. I think that firstly, we’re just not coming from a place where the main focus is to focus on sexual identity or any of these things, because we’re not writing about it. I mean, we all personally have our own politics about it, our own beliefs about it – we talk about it openly. But, I just think we’re not originally from a place of wanting to make a statement through music, necessarily. And also, I think it’s significant that most of the women in the band aren’t very visibly gay as well, like someone like JD Samson for example – that’s her thing, you know? She’s got the look, she’s got the butch vibe – and we don’t, so a lot of people don’t know, I think.

I guess what you’re saying is that it’s not an issue, but nor are you hiding it – it’s just the way it is. You do seem to have a large gay following though?
Yeah! That’s the thing – all the people that know are the gays! It’s like, the other ones may not know, but most of the gays know about us…

Yeah, we first heard about Austra from a male gay friend who runs an electro night in London…
There you go!

The band does have a strong female presence and vibe. Is that something you planned from the get-go or did it just evolve that way?
I think it just happened naturally. Like my drummer Maya and I have been playing together for a really long time – she’s the only drummer I’ve ever worked with! And then I have two backing vocalists and they’re women because all my vocal parts are female parts, so it just makes sense to have girls sing them. Yeah, so it just kind of happened like that and most of my friends happen to be girls…

Do you think it’s a good time for female musicians at the moment?
I definitely think it’s a very good time for it. I mean, even now compared to 5 years ago – it’s like people are just really into female-fronted bands. I mean, everything from Bat For Lashes, La Roux, Florence and the Machine, Zola Jesus… All these acts are very prominent right now – it’s a good thing.

Talking about which, the band Kool Thing who supported you tonight were fantastic!
Yeah, they’re awesome!

They just told us that they basically asked to go on tour with you when they met you in Berlin…
Yeah! They opened for us in Berlin and we loved their set – they’ve just been touring with us ever since.

So, any exciting developments for Austra in the coming year?
We’re pretty much just on the road until at least 2012, and then after that I don’t know…

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You’re from Toronto which has a great reputation these days for electro music. How was it to grow up in such a creative, cosmopolitan city?
Toronto’s a really open city. Until I was about 18 or 19, I pretty much just believed that homophobia didn’t even exist anymore. I was just like, “That’s a thing of the past – it’s great now!” I wasn’t out as gay at the time but that was just my belief on the subject. It was just very normal, very accepted in the community where I grew up.

And now you’re touring and seeing so many other cities, does it make you appreciate that openness all the more?
Oh yeah, big time!

Where has surprised you as being much less open, for example?
Kind of everywhere. To be honest, except for maybe a handful of cities, I’ve never been anywhere that has as much visibility as Toronto does, for sure. Toronto’s a very, very open city.

Have you had a chance to check out Manchester?
No – we’re always here only for 24 hours or something…

Oh that’s a shame…
Yeah, we always miss out…!

Finally, based on your own experience, do you have any advice for artists who want to do what you do, especially as the front person?
I would say: Never hold back!

Is that what you do?
I think so – I think you just have to not be afraid of being like the freak and just go with it…

Did you always feel like that?
For a long time…

And you don’t feel like that so much anymore?
Well, I feel like we TRY and be like a freak. I don’t think anyone wants to see something that’s easily digestible: you have to make it a little bit different.

Well, you’re definitely doing something different – and exciting!
Yeah!

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<< READ PART 2 OF THIS INTERVIEW HERE >>

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