Moving From Experimental To Traditional

"We've got a pretty slick operation now in terms of understanding how to put on our shows and how to record and write," says Towers when asked if it gets any easier being in a seven-piece band. "It's taken us a long time. We've tried a few different ways of doing things and in the last three or four years in particular we have really found a good way to run a sustainable band. So we've found a way to make it work and it seems like we could go for a little while longer using the same sort of model."

Off the back of their 2013 Blackbirds LP, the New Zealand act have changed their creative process for their latest album Bays, released late last year. The tracks had been "road-tested", said their most recent presser, and Towers breaks it down: "We actually locked ourselves away in the studio — it's quite an unusual scenario for us — and part of the reason why it has taken us so long to record in the past is that we're a working band first and foremost," he says. He's explaining the process in which the audience's reaction was an integral part of a track's development when played live. "Our normal process would be to release the record, do some shows then have a bit of a break, and then start writing some new music. But then [we would] go do some more shows of the album that came out and then have a bit of break then write a bit more. Some of those songs might make it into the live set, so it's a bit of a moving feast for our writing process and repertoire.

"Normally, we would be playing songs in a semi-written state in our live set and reacting to how the audience responded to it."

"It would be more exciting for us and the audience if we came back next time with a whole raft of new material. So that was one of the main impedances of doing that, and I guess what we meant by that was we wrote those songs on Bays in an almost audience-free vacuum. Normally, we would be playing songs in a semi-written state in our live set and reacting to how the audience responded to it — crafting the song a little bit in the live environment. So if something really hits from the audience you tend to follow that musical thread."

This is pretty different to the way many bands craft a track, but Fat Freddy's approach to their fourth album is more traditional. 

"This time around, we trusted our own instincts — because we've been doing it for a long time now — so we trusted our own instincts, so I guess that's been the main difference to this record."

A signature of Fat Freddy's Drop has been to package their live routine into a zipped bag album of jams too elaborate for radio, something Towers insists has always been their way.

"Exactly. The album's really a calling-card for the live shows and to give people a chance to get familiar with the new songs, which I think are great in their own way, but they are also a way of presenting these themes that are going to be explored more fully in the live show."