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The Fauves.
Fifteen years after first getting together Melbourne band The Fauves have released a triumphant seventh album after a year of lying low. 'The Fauves' was recorded in only four days, a conscious decision to tackle it in a different way.
"It came together relatively quickly," says Andrew Cox. "We wrote the songs over a period of a few months then learnt them really quickly and then recorded it really quickly. With this record we didn't want to over-think it. It was just a different approach for us to play it live and not really second guess. We took a chance to catch the songs when they were new and fresh and not over-rehearsed."
The Fauves took every opportunity to make the album with a unique sound. "All of our records sound different but this one probably sounds more like the ones we had in the mid-to-late nineties. Our last couple of albums had more instrumentation on them with the keyboards but we've stripped this one back to guitar bass and drums. It's a much rawer record than the others."
Some decisions, like removing the keyboards were made for the band: it turns out that most of them were broken and they couldn't afford to have them fixed. "Next time it might be an all-keyboard album but one consistent thing we've tried to do over our career is make a different record to the previous one. To have put out seven albums, there have only been a handful of Australian artists who have done that. It's a privilege."
A lot can change in fifteen years but the one thing that has always remained is the bands solid foundation. "We were a group of people who were friends and had an interest in music. I think that's been the prime reason why we've stayed together so long. We didn't get together by answering an ad in the paper and because we've had that basis it's really helped us stick at it." Attitudes towards the band it's music and the music scene have naturally evolved over time. "I was a lot more naive and gullible back then. When every band starts out they allow some small part of them to dream the big dream, the massive success rock story but I've certainly been dissuaded of that notion over the years. Through the middle years we were with a major label and it's easy to get sucked in to the business so in a way we've come full circle and have gotten back to playing music when we were first in to it, just because we love it," Cox enthuses.
You could be forgiven for thinking The Fauves lyrics are comical. "I actually think our music tends to focus on the darker side of life. There's a black humour that runs right through it and it's a lot more downbeat than it appears on the surface. A lot of people have said over the years that there's a comical element to our stuff and I run away from that. We use humour to make a point but the point is often a little darker than what people initially pick up on," Cox insists. "It's important for us to put out lyrics that are at least endeavouring to say something in a different way that most pop songs say it. Of the thousands of songs that come out every year they seem to be very narrow in subject matter and ways of expressing it. So many rock lyrics aim so low so we try to aim a little higher. Whether we succeed or fail, well, I can't really be the judge of that."
Smoking Again was chosen as the best song to advertise the album and Cox explains that the lyrics are semi-autobiographical. "We've got one smoker in our band and in a bleak way it's about the training process we've put him through, from the early days to when he was unreformed, would blow smoke in your face and would smoke where and whenever he wanted, to a beaten down person like most smokers are, who has been trained to know when he's got to go outside. That's been a decade long process!"
Kelly Parish
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The Fauves play at Enigma Bar on Sat 31 July with Kaleidoscope and Special Patrol. 'The Fauves' is out now through Shock.
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