Dustin Tebbutt & Lisa Mitchell Are Touring Together But Are Pretty Much Still Long Distance Pen-Pals

Given Dustin Tebbutt and Lisa Mitchell share members of their backing bands, it makes sense that the two are embarking on a collaborative tour. But, though they know each other from around the traps, they're not, yet, the best of pals. "In terms of actually bro-ing down, we haven't actually spent that much time together," Mitchell laughs. "We know each other from around Sydney, but, at this point, we're more pen-pals, really."

Fittingly, on a three-way rock-interview conversation, Tebbutt and Mitchell aren't in the same hemisphere; Tebbutt in the studio in Sydney, Mitchell at her grandmother's house on the Scottish coast. Mitchell has, notably, just played a show in Manchester, the day after the tragic terrorist attack rocked the city.

"We arrived on the day that the explosion happened," Mitchell recounts. "We were staying close to the venue. We just heard sirens from outside, we had no idea what was going on, we didn't have any news reports coming in. I saw police gathering out the window outside. It was totally terrifying. But it wasn't until we woke up the next day that we discovered that 22 people had been killed. Of course, the mood in the city was pretty sombre. We weren't sure that we were going to be able to play our show... sometimes promoters just cancel everything when things like this happen.

"I really wanted to play," she continues. "Especially for people who'd bought tickets to our show, it would've felt horrible to just cancel it. When awful things happen, music can be such a wonderful vehicle for being able to process feelings... I'm super glad that we played. It felt like the right thing to do."

Tebbutt, in contrast, is alone in the studio, in the middle of psyching himself up for vocal takes ("after this, I'm going to have a whisky, and then I hope I'm good to go"), and working on new recordings. As with his debut LP, First Light (2016), the bulk of which he wrote while living in Sweden, Tebbutt wrote much of the record in the Far North. "I did a bunch of writing in Scandinavia and the Netherlands, and came back with a lot of material that I really cherish," he offers. "So, I've been spending the last little while piecing them together, and they're starting to form into a bit of a body-of-work, but I'm not exactly sure how I'm going to release it."

Tebbutt wonders, now, if writing in faraway countries hasn't become "a bit of a crutch for [him]", but Mitchell — who was living in London when she wrote her 2016 album, Warriors — sees the liberation in a situation that "allows you to step away from who you are in that place, to get out of your own head, to forget yourself".

In turn, Tebbutt and Mitchell have called their collaborative tour Distant Call, evoking both the distance and longing in their music, and in the build-up to the tour thus far. "Our own sets are going to be interwoven, throughout the evening, so it's not really a double bill," says Tebbutt. "And, during that, we'll be doing a few covers together, and jumping on each other's tracks. We haven't really figured out all the logistics yet, because all of this has been done over the internet, and in our minds. We haven't had a chance to actually rehearse yet."

They have, however, collaborated on a track, covering RÜFÜS' Innerbloom; with Mitchell recording her vocals in Berlin, and the version bringing the ten-minute banger but to a sombre four minutes. "When you strip away the production, the song is really beautiful," says Tebbutt. "When we started recording the demo, it really quickly went to a place that was really inspiring."

The pair are looking forward to bringing this dreamt-of collaboration to fruition, and sharing the burden on stage. "It's actually pretty rare to be working with another artist like this," Mitchell says. "As the songwriter, in the 'artist' role, it can be a situation where you're in charge of all these decisions. This way, it feels like someone else is on your side."

"There's definitely been times," Tebbutt furthers, "as I've been doing this thing as a solo artist, like at a festival set, which is this goal that you've been working so hard to get to, and when you've reached the point where you're actually doing it, and you're on stage, sometimes you feel really alone. Like, you've got this team around you, and they're all really good friends, but they're not in there as much as you are, and it's quite hard to share that moment. From our point of view, as artists, it's nice to have someone else sharing that role."