Strange Sounds

In a yellowed light, half-naked and made-up, Ryan Adamson sings into an old microphone and stares directly down the barrel of a camera. With an intimacy that's almost uncomfortable to watch, Adamson lays it all out there for the clip to Slume, Regular John's first single back after a three-year break.

Their debut album, The Peaceful Atom Is A Bomb, won the weighty support of triple j, and landed the band the title of Rolling Stone's Best Rock Act for 2009, but rather than rush through a second album to capitalise on this momentum, Regular John took time to work through some growing pains. With Adamson held up for eight months due to spinal surgery, and original member Brock Tengstrom departing the band, their second album Strange Flowers was a slow-burning process.

Ultimately, these setbacks proved to be the making of their new album. Forced confinement brought Adamson's obsession with synths and samplers to a whole new level, helping to create the richer audio tapestry present in their new sound. The addition of guitarist Miles Devine also proved an unexpected blessing in the songwriting process.

“I met [Devine] years ago in a guitar shop. He was just this little cosmic kid, and I figured he's just on the same kind of page as us,” says Adamson.

“He's also a total pedal and keyboard nerd, he could fit in nicely. I trust him to be, at times, an extra set of hands: 'Hey, can you pull this off for me?', and he totally does it.”

One thing that remained consistent across the two albums was the appointment of Tim Powles, drummer of The Church, as producer. Working in Powles' own studio, Adamson says the relationship between producer and band goes beyond the usual bounds of business.

“[There's] a crazy uncle vibe about him, which is very endearing. We're all really good at communicating in very subjective terms – 'I want this to sound like a star is bleeding through space', and he'd be like 'we can do this',” says Adamson.

“So to have that kind of intrinsic connection is very nice, and with the idea to mess with sound, Tim is really happy to run with that… just knowing someone was willing to come with me in weird directions, was kind of an essential, and he was the man for the job.”

Childhood friends and main Regular John collaborators, Adamson and bassist Caleb Gorman co-wrote the bones of the album's material before heading into the studio, with the aim of experimenting and expanding on the sound while recording. This decision took their music from their grunge-rock roots towards a more psychedelic-focused record.

“Going into the studio with the idea of using the studio as a tool, some songs became totally different things. For example, one song on the record called Letters In Braille originally, for lack of better description, was a very '90s sounding thing. It was a great song, but if it was going to sound like this, then I didn't want it on the record,” says Adamson.

“We ended up using the melody and the chord progression and took it into a total new realm. I don't even play guitar on that track, it's just a little thing called an omnichord and a synth. Things like that we just left open for expansion. Some songs that were an old, old idea we just had a crack at in the studio, and that was awesome.”

Their experimental approach in the studio has led to an album that crosses into several genres, and though Adamson assures us they have by no means “reinvented the wheel”, he believes Strange Flowers stands out as something pretty unique in the current Australian musical landscape. The idea that it was possible to create an album like this that is at once eclectic in its influences but still cohesive was inspired by Smashing Pumpkins' 1995 release, Mellon Collie And The Infinite Sadness.

“There's one song that's quite cosmic and spacey, and there's another song that's a country song and another that's almost like a Roy Orbison ballad… to fit all of that on the one record, but still have what I consider a common thread, that's something that I see as intrinsic to that Pumpkins record,” says Adamson.

“So, in that sense I think that album was definitely an influence in the idea that there's no rules. If it's all from you and it's all from the heart, regardless of how different it sounds; if it's pure in its expression then it will still be clear that it's the same band. If it's about expression, you really shouldn't do it to make other people happy. I think it's kind of insulting to people who are in to your music to assume what they'll like, because there's no two people that are the same, so you may as well please yourself.”

With the album cut, tour dates were never going to be too far away. With their debut, the band had scored some enviable live gigs playing as part of the Big Day Out, and scoring the support spot for English rock legends Motorhead, but playing live had never been something that Adamson was comfortable with until recently.

“I never used to [enjoy playing live] until this year, I used to dread it. I'm a perfectionist. I'd just always be chilled and stressing out, and then on stage it's bedlam in an exciting way,” says Adamson.

“I've never been too into it, but the shows we've been playing this year… I've just had a great time and playing these new songs is exciting. There's a bigger emotional connection to the songs this time, so it's much easier to get into it. There's something strange that happens, I'm a really shy person, but I don't mind playing in front of people, kind of like it's not me in a way. It's almost like for that time on stage, I become a medium, with the music coming through you.”

Adamson believes it was this same sense of acting as a medium that got him through the intimate shooting of Slume. Directed by Joel Burrowes, the clip was originally meant to be full of dark, abstract performances and imagery, but when they watched back the one take of Adamson singing solo, they dropped all other footage.

“I'm not inclined to go in such a bold direction, but with the idea that a video should convey the message of the song I think it being that raw and naked, it totally made sense, and everyone felt the same way.

“Even with the performance clip, the idea was to leave people feeling a little odd, almost like reading somebody else's diary. I think some people, even relatives of mine, have been taken back by the make-up stuff, it's pretty full-on and it's still strange.”

Regular John will be playing the following shows:

Friday 5 October - The Patch, Wollongong NSW
Saturday 6 October - Transit Bar, Canberra ACT
Friday 12 October - Great Northern Hotel, Newcastle NSW
Saturday 13 October - Annandale Hotel, Sydney NSW