Between Worlds

"Oh, that was very surprising,” Josh Ramsay laughs of Carly Rae Jepsen's mega-hit, Call Me Maybe, which he cowrote and recorded with the Canadian pop star. “It's funny, I'm standing in the room where that was written and recorded right now and it still seems weird to me that everyone in the world seems to know that song. Honestly, it's been amazing because, obviously, what helps Carly helps out my band too.”

Marianas Trench straddle a strange divide. Firmly established within their native Canada as a successful pop act, they've also made an unusual habit of experimenting with their artistic limits. As an example, Ramsay's work with Carly Rae Jepsen has made him a much sought-after professional pop songwriter – but his band have delivered multiple concept albums spanning everything from punk to pop to Broadway. “I really try and not have rules. I think, as soon as you put rules in place for a band's sound, you put a ceiling on what that band can do.

“Bands like Queen, [The] Beach Boys, even The Beatles – the greatest thing about those bands was their sense of adventure. That ability to go, 'Well, that instrument doesn't really go with this genre but we'll do it anyway.' That's the fun of music, I think.”

Their most recent album, Ever After, for example, tells a (surprisingly complicated) fairy tale of a stranger waking up in the land of an evil queen. Composed as a continuous piece of music, Ever After's make-up runs the gamut from gospel to electro. Yet, equally surprisingly, it also produced multiple hit singles. Lead single, Haven't Had Enough, actually reached #1 on Canada's iTunes chart. “I think we've been really lucky. Ever After went gold in Canada in its first week. I'm still shocked that that actually happened. I mean, it's only our third album,” Ramsay laughs.

“I feel really lucky because, really, our first album we were still searching for our sound in a way. Our second record, we kind of started to figure out what we wanted to do as a band. I feel we really kind of came into our own with Ever After.”

At the heart of both the band's dilemma and success is Josh Ramsay. The band's main songwriter, Ramsay is something of a freak. His father owned a recording studio (entertaining clients such as AC/DC and Aerosmith) while his mother was a professional vocal coach. From an early age, he's been indoctrinated with music – currently, he can play eight instruments, works as a professional songwriter and runs his own studio. “It was great. I actually thought everyone in the world was a musician until I was about ten,” Ramsay laughs.

“Everyone in my family was a musician, everyone I met was a musician and, if I went to work with either of my parents, I only ever met other musicians. The great thing was, because everyone in my family was a great musician, every road trip and singalong was like a new lesson about music.

“Like, I think the thing about me is that I'm not the kind of person or musician that only likes one genre. Some people only respond to one genre of music or they have that mentality that says something mainstream can't be good or something indie can't be good. The way I look at music, I just like good songs. I don't care if it's R&B or country or pop or rock or rap – if a song is good, I think it's good. As a result, I write it all. It's all good.”

Marianas Trench will be playing the following shows:

Saturday 22 September - Fat As Butter, Newcastle NSW
Monday 24 September - Corner Hotel, Melbourne VIC
Tuesday 25 September - The Zoo, Brisbane QLD
Wednesday 26 September - Metro Theatre, Sydney NSW