Tell us about yourself and your music? I was born in Sweden and moved to Australia at the age of two and a half in 1971. My father was Swedish and my mum is Australian. I grew up here, hopping between mining towns and living in caravans until the age of 12, a ragged free-range white-haired kid.
My father was a free spirit and my childhood memories of him include Safire mines you could sleep in, his abstract artworks painted in strong primary colours, handmade furniture, groups of people playing guitars around fires with endless hordes of grubby children to play with. I remember watching him play honkytonk piano in the local pubs while the patrons plied him with alcohol.
My mother was barely a child with three children. A strong and glamourous protective force who shielded us from the true hardship of this life so all we remember for the most part is a wonderful and creative childhood.
After 12 we settled in the southern highlands and then the Blue Mountains with our loving stepfather Ted who appeared mysteriously on the scene when I was around 8 and just after we left our father in Queensland.
I find it hard to define what I do without rattling off a list. I live in many compartments, I love to cook for large hoards, propagating an endless procession of cuttings on the window ledge and creating ramshackle gardens, I paint, I draw, I make animations and films… All these things feed into my music.
I’ve been playing music since I was in my 20’s. I started out as a bass player accompanying my sister despite being so terrified, I played my first gig with my back to the audience! I felt a lot better about myself when I learned that Jim Morrison did the same thing.
I’ve always believed in doing things that scare you. I was about 30 when I started to perform my own songs in front of friends. Since then I’ve released 2 studio albums and an EP.
Music has been a source of comfort, a way to process complex thoughts and emotions. It’s also a powerful way to tell stories.
The music I write is fairly folk/country based with a strong focus on lyrics but in recent times I’ve journeyed into a bit more experimental improv explorations that I’ve recorded in my home studio. I’ve posted some of those to SoundCloud but they aren’t available anywhere else yet.
In addition to my solo stuff for the last 5 years I’ve been playing with my partner Peter Fenwick in our three-piece CloudBird. In CloudBird my folk influences meet Pete’s funk and rock influences and we have developed an altogether different sound with our drummer who adds a bit of a trance dub vibe. Last year we brought out a debut album on vinyl.
Do you come from a musical family? My father was a musician, he played piano and guitar and both my siblings are musical. There are musicians on both sides of my family and a lot of artists and sculptors. My Great Uncle was Justin O’Brien a fairly famous Australian Artist and I just found out recently that one of my ancestors is the composer Henry Purcell, so the arts go way back in our family.
I Played in a band called Lixivius with my sister for about 8 years, we recorded a couple of EP's when we were in our 20s. I played the bass. I still play with my sister when I get the chance, but these days we loving singing harmonies which is something we didn’t do in lixivius.
Who did you listen to growing up? My father was an avid music lover with a big music collection he had quite eclectic tastes that included ABBA (my father played with Benny before Benny formed ABBA, so there was a strong affinity there). He also loved Gilbert O’Sutherland and Louis Armstrong. He loved Honky Tonk and Jazz. As a child the ones that stuck were ABBA and Gilbert O’Sutherland, still to this day listening to these artists connects me straight back to my childhood. Of course I was also a Countdown addict, so the Bay City rollers and the Sky Hooks were on high rotation.
In my teens I loved the Smiths, the Specials, Hoodoo Gurus, Kim Wild, Cold Chisel, Pink Floyd, The Radiators, Tom Petty, Fleetwood Mac, Melanie, Bruce Springsteen (I could have died for Bruce), Michael Jackson, Ah Ha….It’s a big list really.
Let’s just stay music was a HUGE part of my life growing up and I was always singing and dancing, though I was never really drawn to play and instrument myself until I was about 19.
I love listening to records on vinyl, there so much more you can hear in the tracks…deeper levels of sonics and you also listen in the way the artist intended according to the carefully selected order. I also like it that I have to get up and change the record over, it’s a reminder to move and also forces you to make careful music selections, not just get lost down an algorithm worm hole.
I buy albums on vinyl that I love and plan to listen to over and over. I also love picking up mystery bargains and discovering old music. A recent find is Janis Ian who I love and wasn’t familiar with before.
When did you first know that you wanted to create music? I first started writing songs when I was about 19. My desire to create far surpassed my abilities so my early attempts were pretty rough, and all lost to history.
I kept a lot of journals all through school and still do to a lesser extent to this day. The early journals are fun to go through and a lot of lyric ideas come from random sentences in these journals. I still flick back for ideas when I’m starting new songs.
Who is your greatest musical inspiration? That’s a tough question. My musical inspirations have changed dramatically over the years and I continue to find new inspirations. Sometimes it’s an old artist and sometimes it’s someone who is brand new. Right now I’m loving Big Thief, Bedouine, Melody Pool…I’m also digging back into some 80’s favourites like the Cure and Tom Petty.
How do you come up with ideas/narratives for your video clips? I start by letting images flicker and grabbing a sense of colour and movement, from there I start to piece a story together. Story is important to me and I’m keen to make clips that take the viewer on some sort of journey. I’m currently working on the story line for an animated clip for my song “Night Owl”. This one has taken a different turn and I’m now writing an actual short story to base this clip on. There were a lot of problems with the original story line and things that didn’t quite add up so I thought, I’m going to have to go deep and really solve the issues of this story. As a result I’ve done a lot of research into owl mythology, I’ve spoken to friends who to have roots in different cultures to understand the full spectrum of the symbology of owls. The clip itself will feature two stop animation puppets, a man and an owl that I have created against a snow covered mountain Range.
I’ve created a number of video clips now, mostly for my own songs but more recently I’ve made clips for other artists including Spencer Spark, Matt Thomson and Peter Fenwick. I’ve just been commissioned to work on a clip for a Brisbane artist and I’m currently collaborating with Peter Fenwick on this.
My personal goal is to create a clip for every song on my album “A Pair of Dreamers” so far I have done 6 of the 11 songs.
What has been your greatest achievement to date as an artist? In 2017 my album A Long Way from home won the Anthony Lycenco Best Album award at the Nimbin roots Festival. I was so proud of my little album who took out the prize against the Weeping Willows and Jen Mize, two artists I respect enormously.
Now here we are again in no man’s land, and we are still holding off on booking anything until things are a bit more certain.
We are still trying occasionally to promote our new CloudBird album but selling vinyl is best done at live shows so we live in hope that we can pick up shows again by mid-year?
I also have another set of songs ready for the next solo album I hope to record this year.
Who is the most inspirational person you have worked with? I’d have to say Paul Greene. He produced my last solo album and also our debut Cloudbird Album. He has such a wonderfully chaotic process. It allows for true expression and flexibility. He’s probably the only person I’ve worked with recently who knows how to tap into the true essence of my music and not over engineer it. He’s a hurricane of creativity, a musician, a chef. He can plate up a divine meal and knows when to deliver the prescribed shot of vodka. He is absolutely pitch perfect and can hear melodies within melodies. I think most of all I love his process because I can relate to his insatiable energy to create a community around music and art.
What has been your favourite place to perform so far? We played a little Festival called the Sandy Krak in Emu Park near Rock Hampton in early 2021. It was a true joy, we played well to an appreciative crowd, we had ocean views from the stage and beachside accommodation. It was pretty rock and roll :)
Have you met any of your musical idols? I got to meet Joan and Police Woman! It was brief but she is hands down one of my favourite artists at the moment. I’ve also met Olympia, she’s a friend of my cousin and a lovely person.
I guess one of the biggest highlights for me though was getting off stage after having performed with my old band Danny Wax and Dave Faulkner was in the audience, he came up to me and said ..”you guys were great..” … at that point I had to gush that Mars Needs Guitars was probably the album that got me through adolescence.
What was the last gift you gave someone? I gave a friend of mine one of my miniature paintings. I did a little sequence of these as part of my Covid Mark II exploits. It was probably my favourite one and I know it’s in good hands.
What do you think about when you are alone in the car? Oh geez..! do we really want to go there??? :) ..honestly so much depending on the situation…on a long car trip I am almost always thinking about something to do with a song, a lyric or maybe looking at how colours work in the landscape. Sometimes I also give myself a good talking to :)
If you were a tree, what kind would you be and why? I might be a Boab ;) ..getting a bit thicker around the middle, incredibly attractive, mostly edible and extremely resilient.
How would you sell hot chocolate in QLD in the Summer? I already have the perfect recipe for this! It’s called a speed shot…one shot of espresso, one teaspoon of chocolate powder and a scoop of Ice cream. Hot cold and delicious all your vices in one :)
What kids’ movie is scary to you? I recently saw a snippet of that emoji movie…truly scary stuff… I’m afraid for our future generation and their social skills.
What has been the hardest challenge you have had to overcome as an artist? Definitely my own fears.
What are some bands you like to cover? I don’t really have a huge desire to cover other artists but there are a few I love to attempt that are different to what I do. Abba (So difficult!), The Cure, Velvet Underground.
What are you currently working on? I’m currently fine tuning my song list for the next solo album. As mentioned above I’m working on a couple of video clips, one of my own and one for a Brisbane artist. With CloudBird we’re also working on some new songs. In addition to the music, I’m working on my first collection for a joint painting exhibition this year. I’m aiming for 7 works and at this stage I’m developing a process that I’ll use for the final works.
What are your goals going forward? My goals going forward are to keep creating. To have no expectations about anything and to do art for its sake. To keep making records. To be a healthy and happy person.
I also want to continue to develop my business idea to expand on animation, illustration and videography to generate income from commissions and supplement my income through art.
Happy reading and listening!
Laurelle Lewis