Jeremy Marou - Busby Marou (29/10/2013)
The 59th Sound spoke to Jeremy Marou from the duo Busby Marou about their upcoming album, tours and spontaneous song production.
Hey Jeremy, where are you calling from today?
I just jumped off a plane from Brisbane, we’re just doing some promotion at the moment. We’re in Melbourne tomorrow and then Sydney so we’re doing a lot of radio interviews and stuff.
For those who don’t know, who is the main vocalist in the duo?
Tom is the lead singer and I produce all the harmonies. Tom’s the songwriter as well, he’ll write the song and I’ll put the music around it and structure the song.
Have you guys been friends for a long time?
Yeah, we’re both from Rockhampton, Queensland. Tom’s a few years older than me so we grew up together and we used to knock around. We met through mutual friends, then most of our friends moved away and we started to make music together.
Can you tell us about your new single, Get Me Out Of Here?
Yeah, I guess its just one of those songs. When we were thrashing the demo versions in Byron Bay, Tom and I sang it and we just had that feeling like it was gonna be a great song. Even though it didn’t turn out the first way we’d envisioned, when we tracked the demo versions it turned out really good.
Which artists influence Busby Marou
It’s really different because Tom and I have different influences. My influences are John Mayer, Zac Brown, that style of music, whereas Tom is more Paul Kelly, INXS. He’s more into the singer song/songwriter, folk style. So I guess when you put them together you get what we have. It might not necessarily be a country song, it might not necessarily be a folk song, it’ll be a Busby Marou song.
Even with our single, we had to make it for radio. We had to take the guitar solo out, take the bridge out so it didn’t sound to country or folk. We had to make it sound more mainstream to get that recognition. We have very different influences but if you listen to it you’ll find them all in there.
You have supported acts like Birds of Tokyo, K.D. Lang, Dolly Parton and Pete Murray, have these tour spots allowed you to develop as a band?
Probably not as a band, but in terms of Tom and I as a duo we have because most of those shows we did acoustically except for Pete Murray where we had a band. In terms of us playing as a duo, song writing and structuring songs and how we play together with the natural harmonies, playing with Tom brings it out of you and I love those support tours. Our support tours set up our fan base, we’re lucky enough to get those support slots, so now we can play our own shows and sell tickets.
What was it like appearing at festivals like SXSW and Bluesfest?
Festivals are unreal, we get to let our hair down and make the most of it and party on with the people who are professionals. SXSW was a lot of fun, just seeing where the music industry is on a world scale and seeing where Australia fits in with the rest of the world was really cool. Playing at festivals in Australia like Bluefest in front of big crowds is great. Having 5000-10000 people watching you play is a great feeling and hopefully this festival season we play at as many festivals as we can.
On the first album, yourself and Tom were a duo, and now you have become a full band, what has changed to make that transition?
It is a challenge, because as a duo it took us a while to find a band to play for ‘us’. We had some great ‘musos’ in the band but they weren’t playing for ‘us’. It was a bit of a struggle to get the right band and we went through a lot of players. For us its not just about being a good player and playing the way we want, you’ve also gotta be a good bloke.
When you tour as much as we do it’s so important not to have a dickhead in there. It took awhile but we’ve nailed it now, we’ve got the best band in the country we think, I’m a little bit biased though. They’re all our mates now and we took them to Nashville to record the new album to make sure they are a part of the family.
You guys had success with the single, Biding My Time, can you tell me what that songs all about?
Its one of those songs that we didn’t pre record, Tom started playing the melody line and singing Biding My Time when we were waiting for sound to be fixed, we happened to have the record button on so we had a listen back and we thought it was a really good melody line. Then the next day we recorded the whole song. Basically Tom chucked the poem in there with the chorus of Biding My Time, with some nice harmonies about it. It was just one of those songs that came about. It wasn’t pre recorded, it wasn’t pre written, it was done on the run in the studio. That song set us up with the mainstream airplay it got. Even some of the songs on the new album are songs off the cuff that we pulled off in the studio.
Are you excited for the release of your new album, Farewell Fitzroy?
Yeah we are very excited, it’s been a tricky album. It’s been nearly five years and we’ve got some new songs to play. We played the old songs too many times now, just purely to get these new songs and put them in our live set. I’m more excited than ever. Our family and friends have been waiting for new material and we’ve finally done it and we can tour it, which is really exciting.
Are there any other plans for Busby Marou that you could enlighten us to?
This next tour is gonna be great then were gonna follow it up with a coastal run down south. The next 12 months were hoping to cover most of Australia, that’s what we’ve set out to do. It’ll be a lot of hard work but a lot of fun in the process.
Thanks for your time Jeremy, good luck with the tour and the new album.
Too easy, thanks mate.
Mitch Guy
@Mitchell_Guy1
Hey Jeremy, where are you calling from today?
I just jumped off a plane from Brisbane, we’re just doing some promotion at the moment. We’re in Melbourne tomorrow and then Sydney so we’re doing a lot of radio interviews and stuff.
For those who don’t know, who is the main vocalist in the duo?
Tom is the lead singer and I produce all the harmonies. Tom’s the songwriter as well, he’ll write the song and I’ll put the music around it and structure the song.
Have you guys been friends for a long time?
Yeah, we’re both from Rockhampton, Queensland. Tom’s a few years older than me so we grew up together and we used to knock around. We met through mutual friends, then most of our friends moved away and we started to make music together.
Can you tell us about your new single, Get Me Out Of Here?
Yeah, I guess its just one of those songs. When we were thrashing the demo versions in Byron Bay, Tom and I sang it and we just had that feeling like it was gonna be a great song. Even though it didn’t turn out the first way we’d envisioned, when we tracked the demo versions it turned out really good.
Which artists influence Busby Marou
It’s really different because Tom and I have different influences. My influences are John Mayer, Zac Brown, that style of music, whereas Tom is more Paul Kelly, INXS. He’s more into the singer song/songwriter, folk style. So I guess when you put them together you get what we have. It might not necessarily be a country song, it might not necessarily be a folk song, it’ll be a Busby Marou song.
Even with our single, we had to make it for radio. We had to take the guitar solo out, take the bridge out so it didn’t sound to country or folk. We had to make it sound more mainstream to get that recognition. We have very different influences but if you listen to it you’ll find them all in there.
You have supported acts like Birds of Tokyo, K.D. Lang, Dolly Parton and Pete Murray, have these tour spots allowed you to develop as a band?
Probably not as a band, but in terms of Tom and I as a duo we have because most of those shows we did acoustically except for Pete Murray where we had a band. In terms of us playing as a duo, song writing and structuring songs and how we play together with the natural harmonies, playing with Tom brings it out of you and I love those support tours. Our support tours set up our fan base, we’re lucky enough to get those support slots, so now we can play our own shows and sell tickets.
What was it like appearing at festivals like SXSW and Bluesfest?
Festivals are unreal, we get to let our hair down and make the most of it and party on with the people who are professionals. SXSW was a lot of fun, just seeing where the music industry is on a world scale and seeing where Australia fits in with the rest of the world was really cool. Playing at festivals in Australia like Bluefest in front of big crowds is great. Having 5000-10000 people watching you play is a great feeling and hopefully this festival season we play at as many festivals as we can.
On the first album, yourself and Tom were a duo, and now you have become a full band, what has changed to make that transition?
It is a challenge, because as a duo it took us a while to find a band to play for ‘us’. We had some great ‘musos’ in the band but they weren’t playing for ‘us’. It was a bit of a struggle to get the right band and we went through a lot of players. For us its not just about being a good player and playing the way we want, you’ve also gotta be a good bloke.
When you tour as much as we do it’s so important not to have a dickhead in there. It took awhile but we’ve nailed it now, we’ve got the best band in the country we think, I’m a little bit biased though. They’re all our mates now and we took them to Nashville to record the new album to make sure they are a part of the family.
You guys had success with the single, Biding My Time, can you tell me what that songs all about?
Its one of those songs that we didn’t pre record, Tom started playing the melody line and singing Biding My Time when we were waiting for sound to be fixed, we happened to have the record button on so we had a listen back and we thought it was a really good melody line. Then the next day we recorded the whole song. Basically Tom chucked the poem in there with the chorus of Biding My Time, with some nice harmonies about it. It was just one of those songs that came about. It wasn’t pre recorded, it wasn’t pre written, it was done on the run in the studio. That song set us up with the mainstream airplay it got. Even some of the songs on the new album are songs off the cuff that we pulled off in the studio.
Are you excited for the release of your new album, Farewell Fitzroy?
Yeah we are very excited, it’s been a tricky album. It’s been nearly five years and we’ve got some new songs to play. We played the old songs too many times now, just purely to get these new songs and put them in our live set. I’m more excited than ever. Our family and friends have been waiting for new material and we’ve finally done it and we can tour it, which is really exciting.
Are there any other plans for Busby Marou that you could enlighten us to?
This next tour is gonna be great then were gonna follow it up with a coastal run down south. The next 12 months were hoping to cover most of Australia, that’s what we’ve set out to do. It’ll be a lot of hard work but a lot of fun in the process.
Thanks for your time Jeremy, good luck with the tour and the new album.
Too easy, thanks mate.
Mitch Guy
@Mitchell_Guy1