Panda Band

Make no mistake about the cutely-named Panda Band - when it comes to making quality music, this Western Australian quintet is a machine. And brothers are doin' it for themselves, as lead vocalist/guitarist and pretty much jack of all trades Damian Crosbie explains, "We've been totally independent and on our own from day one."

Just ask him what he's been up to and he'll tell you that "I'm doing awesome stuff like website design for the band's site. We're trying to do the artwork ourselves too...Well, myself."

DIY is the key word here.

"We mixed our album ['This Vital Chapter'] by ourselves too, but it's so much more satisfying having to produce it yourself. From the very conception of the band, it's been pretty much DIY with recording at home. We're definitely home-bodies so you feel a lot more comfortable just playing away at your own computer and coming up with stuff that makes you laugh. It's good fun, but at the end of it all you're pretty exhausted."

Crosbie explains how Panda Band put their recording together - the result basically being a mish-mash of home-recordings and new stuff, "If you asked me right now to go through all the songs, I could probably go 'oh, this has half a bass-line from a home recording and the other half is from the studio'...It's just all over the place!"

So it may seem like a mess, but 'This Vital Chapter' is actually anything but. After all, audiences in the US and UK didn't think so and neither did some major labels who tried to get the band signed a couple of years ago.

"Look, if we'd had the same amount of attention from the majors when we first started out, we probably would have gone with a big label. But now we know better. I mean, we're an independent band, I've said this before that we do all our stuff on our own - we know now that we can look after ourselves, we just don't need the help nor the debt. We're not anti-majors, don't get me wrong, we've actually been looking for more overseas interest with the majors, but the thing remains that you have to know when to sign with them and how to get the best benefit out of that."

Crosbie laughs, "There's no vendetta! The other thing is that I've actually done a college course on the music business, so I am a bit more aware and informed when it comes to signing contracts!"

As for the band's reception at a recent showcase in the 'States, Crosbie admits that he was very surprised at the positive feedback that Panda Band was showered with.

"Yeah, I had a bad attitude going in, but if you treat America as a whole mass entity - the USA as a thing - you get really jaded about the whole thing. As it turned out, when we played Texas and LA, there were people who came because they were seriously interested in your sound and enthusiastic to support your band, not because you are famous but because they respect you. It wasn't like, 'oh, I've never heard of you so I won't give you any of my time'. I started meeting individuals and when you talk to them as people and not as America, it's like, 'oh, wow, you're actually a person'. I mean, there are quite a few people over there that are really embarrassed by how their country is perceived. The other thing was the music industry over there too, I was expecting it to be a bit more hard to get on with, basically, but I was really surprised and I came back very happy."

Crosbie also adds that the band are planning on heading over to the States sometime in September of this year, though he is actually more looking forward to the upcoming national Australian tour which kicks off this month.

"We'd be happy just doing the Australian tour but the overseas one is a bonus, really. It was meant to happen already but there were some setbacks and we had to postpone it for the time being. We would like to concentrate on the US and the UK, but we'll see what happens. Basically, the mind-set we are in right now is that whichever country needs our attention, we'll concentrate on that country. And right now that's Australia."

Nina Bertok

Panda Band play at the Rocket Bar on Fri 18 August. 'This Vital Chapter' is out now independently.