Abraham Dunovits 24, Savage Honey The Von Robertsons 26, WAAX + State

SAVAGE HONEY

Meet the Jan Juc-based indie-rockers riding a wave of success

Words by Alex Callan

Considering their short tenure as a band, things have been coming together pretty quickly for Savage Honey. Having gained a tonne of attention from their opening slot for Melbourne/ Naarm based nü jazz outfit Glass Beams, the Jan Juc-based indie-rockers have wasted no time carving a name for themselves in the local gig scene, appearing on gig lineups all around the city.

For the group, it still feels like a fever dream, with lead vocalist Jake Hunniford admitting that even he has been blown away by the immediate warm reception the band has received. Although, for him, it’s a sign that they are on a pretty good trajectory.

“At this point, it feels like the sky's the limit,” he laughs, “Truthfully, when we were first starting I thought a lot about what I wanted to achieve with this band. My biggest goal was to play in a room full of people who like our music. Quite honestly, we are lucky enough to have achieved that already.

“If we never moved further than where we are right now, I don’t think I’d mind. We are still so early on in our career and I am already incredibly proud of what we have done, I feel very privileged in that regard. But that said, we just want to enjoy the ride and push it as far as we can, and if that gets us amazing support slots; headliner tours, or regular radio play, that would be amazing. They are definitely things we want to reach for, but I’m enjoying the process rather than the destination.”

“I think more than having any specific goals that we want to achieve, we just want to make sure that our music is good; something that we are proud of and of a high standard,” affirms the group's keyboardist Alex Mathieson. With the band featuring members from a wealth of different musical backgrounds and levels of experience - including Dom Paver, Savannah Higgs and Jack Wilby, alongside Hunniford and Mathieson, Savage Honey spoke about how their overall mentality and demeanour have shifted to finding solace in the comradery of their bandmates, as opposed to the glorified rockstar lifestyle.

“It’s been therapeutic for me,” states Hunniford, “having spent so many years on the open mic circuit, I’ve played enough gigs hungover or intoxicated and I know that it’s not the way to go.”

“It’s a mindset that we all share. We like having fun, being social and having a party, but we know that partying and making music isn’t necessarily conducive to each other, and we take that seriously. It’s really important for us to be coming in fresh so we can deliver a good performance because that is the most important thing to us.” “I think the trajectory we have been on has definitely been aided by us having that mindset, you know, music first, fun after,” agrees Mathieson.

Having spent the last few months cutting their teeth on the gig scene, the group discussed their plans for recording, with many fans beginning to ask, ‘where can I find your music?’ “We are looking at recording in January,” states Mathieson, “I think Dom is getting keen on the idea of recording, which is pretty evident every time someone comes up after a show to ask where they can find our stuff,” he laughs. “But, it’s something we are looking into.” With the band having “almost an album’s worth of material” ready to be tracked, Hunniford spoke about the group’s writing process, which sees the majority of the lyrical writing done by Hunniford and rhythm guitarist Dom Paver. Having spent so long crafting himself as a solo artist, Hunniford says he’s found it relieving to share songwriting responsibilities.

“I find it refreshing,” he candidly remarks. “I wanted this project to be collaborative, so straight away sharing songwriting duties with Dom and having Jack [Wilby, lead guitar] who is very unapologetic and straightforward has been refreshing. There are certainly times when your ego gets in the way, but you just have to relinquish that control and make sure everyone is heard.” With plans to record over the summer, a recent support slot for surf-rockers Majak Door and some currently unannounced festival appearances, Savage Honey are gearing up for a pretty flat-out couple of months, but according to Hunniford, it’s a level of acceleration the band hopes to maintain.

“There’s no faltering anyone’s commitment. We are all passionate, committed and hungry for opportunities, as long as we keep that up, I feel we will continue on this trajectory.

Keep up with the latest news and gigs on Instagram @savage_honey_

The Von Robertsons

Bring Their Sound Of Music To Next Gen

Words By Tammy Walters

From the Julie Andrews hill-singing Von Trapp family to the Partridge Family which made David Cassidy an instant heartthrob, The Jackson 5 where Michael Jackson shot to stardom and Sister Sledge, family bands have been around for generations. It’s continued with Disney siblings, the Jonas Brothers and has been resurrected with another ‘I Want You Back’ band, Haim. Geelong’s Bellarine has its very own music family, The Von Robertsons. Consisting of members of the Robertson family, mother Andrea Robertson, father David Robertson, son Heath Robertson and daughter Carly Robertson, The Von Robertsons emerged organically out of Andrea and David’s solo careers. “My husband and I are both performing musicians, so I just perform under Andrea Robertson as a songwriter. So I guess it started coming together because the kids have always been around music even before I started doing my own stuff. “When they were babies I was in a band and, you know, when I was pregnant, I was singing so they've always been around music. I play piano and guitar and sing and song-write, and my husband is a drummer, so the kids just started joining in at very young ages. Both showed a lot of natural ability, so we always wanted to give them opportunities, but we never forced them into music. It's just something that they gravitated towards and they got to the point that they used to just jump up and join us on the occasional song at performances and it kind of just grew from there,” explains Andrea Robertson. As the family appearances became more prominent in Andrea’s sets, locals started to brand the unit as The Von Robertsons as a nod to the Austrian singing family. “A lot of locals would say, ‘Here comes The Von Robertsons or the Von Trapp family of Ocean Grove. It was just a bit of a joke, and then it got to the stage where we were performing well enough that we could actually do stuff together and the name just kind of stuck because it had been bestowed upon us anyway,” she continues. It was during lockdown that The Von Robertsons cemented their status as a family band. The proximity and lack of activities to do during the hard lockdowns, The Von Robertsons turned to their common interest to provide them, and in turn, their community, with entertainment.

“We started doing kind of busking at bars and I think there were a couple of gigs, but it was more in the lockdowns that we got more into the full Robertsons idea of doing proper gigs for live streams,” explains youngest Carly Robertson.

Andrea agrees, “We decided to do some live stream gigs and it sort of snowballed from there. That's one way to get through the lockdowns! It was a bit of a lifesaver at times for all of us; our music. I don't know what we would have done if we didn't have that to fall back on. It was a good outlet for us.”

Unlike their namesakes, The Von Robertsons sit in the blues department adding a fresh twist to their stage family dynamic with rotating roles. Andrea takes on vocals and guitar, David sits on drums, Heath, who like his mother is an award-winning artist in his own right, dabbles in vocals and guitar, and rising talent Carly is on vocals and bass, with the three vocalists interchanging singing lead and regularly breaking into stunning three-part harmonies. Their collective music draws on from all of their shared bloodline influences and individual projects to create a distinct Von Robertsons sound.

“My music is very influenced by my parents and I've grown up listening to Ben Harper, Led Zeppelin, Lenny Kravitz and Aretha Franklin. There's so many different elements. Alabama Shakes as well. There’s a collective assortment of genres and artists and Mum’s very influenced by them with her songwriting, and then I'm influenced by them and mum's songwriting. It's a bit of a picture of everything,” Carly explains.

“We’ve all got our own sound going on but it all complements each other and works and I think because we all lived in the same house for so long we just know where we are going with our music. It all falls into place really easily and when we play together it’s very organic,” Andrea agrees.

They’ll be bringing their multi-generational, multi-instrumental high energy act to the Blues Train for the Next Gen Concert Series playing shows on 5 and 12 November 2022 and on 21 January 2023.

It’s not to be missed!

Tickets at www.thebluestrain.com.au/ artist/the-von-robertsons

WAAX

Words by Benjamin Lamb

Going beyond Australian rock and into a weirder, wilder landscape

Brisbane alternative rockers WAAX have come a long way since their first release back in 2014. The group dropped their debut album back in 2019, Big Grief, which hit the number 11 spot on the Aussie charts. The group then supported Rock Heavyweights Fall Out Boy on their Aussie tour. The band just dropped their new record At Least I’m Free, and we caught up with guitarist James Gatling to dive into it all. The album dropped back in August and has received a great deal of audience and critical acclaim, reaching the top 20 of the ARIA charts. When bands have a few albums under their belt, they wouldn’t be blamed for feeling like things get a little bit monotonous and similar, many groups changing up elements here and there.

James notes that while most of the process stayed the same, the extra time they had due to COVID saw elements come out in the album that may have not been the case otherwise.

“There’re some things that are the same between two albums, like who we record with but that's where the similarities stop.

“This album, because it was written over COVID, we had the benefit of having so much time to think about it and to rework songs. We wrote up to 30/40, songs, and some of them got vetted straightaway.

“For some of them, we were like; ‘Oh, we really liked that part’, so we had the benefit of time to explore.”

The idea of spending more time on music and playing around with sounds and motifs that are new and interesting may be a way for the future of WAAX, James adds. “We’ve been experimenting a little bit with sampled sounds and stuff like that. When we do get writing again, we're going to experiment with different ways of doing it.

“I know Maz (Marie DeVita, Vocals) likes to write with different producers and different sorts of collaborators all around the world.”

At Least I’m Free is out now via Dew Process.

State of Mind

Boo Seeka leads the new mental health charity party coming to Torquay

For years now, the team at UNO Presents has been bringing some of the finest names in the live and electronic music movement as well as festival-level productions to regional cities.

Now they’re back with State of Mind, a fundraiser music festival event with the goal to raise awareness, destigmatise, drive conversation and raise funds for mental health support and intervention in Australia.

Taking over the iconic Torquay Hotel on Friday, November 25, the event will welcome electro-pop legend Boo Seeka as event headliner.

Gold Coast-based Boo Seeka has become a staple of the Australian live scene. Delivering a combination of pulsating sounds that bed down layered textures of electronic bass, percussive beats and smooth synths, Boo Seeka has earned himself a reputation as one of the country’s funnest live acts, with incomparable energy making him a must-see every time he comes around. Alongside the massive headliner, State of Mind will feature Eva, House Cat, Meetwally, Soul Shakin’ and DJ Swella, bringing the beats to the loved beachside town, making sure punters are partying well into the night.

Taking cues from UNO Presents’ flagship project Coastal Jam, with world-class music acts, mental health and wellbeing remain at the festival’s heart, bringing the music community together to normalise conversations around it while raising important funds to go to some of the nation’s leading mental health support organisation, as well as local initiatives. It’s no secret that mental health is a huge issue among today’s youth more than ever with the world quickly transitioning online - connecting with each other has never been more important.

The festival’s goal is to support the narrative of creating positive connections, strengthening relationships, and being a catalyst for people to open up to their loved ones/professionals to start that difficult conversation about mental health if they’re suffering in silence.

All profits of State of Mind’s door sales will be donated to Beyond Blue (40%), lifeline (40%) and Feed Me Bellarine (20%).

Tickets via www.stateofmind.net.au