Journalism Portfolio: featuring words for Gigwise, Middle Boop Mag, FrenchEntrée, Mixmag and from a variety of my previous University's student publications
Last night, Jagwar Ma played an old crown court in the backstreets of Bristol – and as you can imagine, it was unbelievably awesome. The gig was part of the Lumia Live Sessions, their concept – to showcase emerging artists in the most unusual of settings. Before this show, the sessions have hosted Ella Eyre in a fairground museum in Devon, and Years and Years in a disused tube station in London.
The abandoned courthouse still has its original courtrooms, holding cells, jury boxes and grizzly ageing decor. It made for an incredibly eerie setting, but highly complimented Jagwar Ma’s grungy, almost anarchic presence. A rave in a courtroom, made up of competition winners, who collectively seemed to be their most diehard of fans.
The band were situated in front of the judge’s bench, with fans surrounding them all the way round the courtroom. The room was darkly lit and the acoustics provided by the incredibly tall rustic ceilings were amazingly brilliant.
Jagwar Ma, made up of front man Gabriel Winterfield, guitarist Juno Ma and bassist Jack Freeman played with everything they’d got, opening with ‘What Love’, a ravey little number to get the crowds juices flowing. Gabriel bought his typical ragged, Stones Roses frontman attitude, wearing classic Adidas and leopard print socks.
They played all of their best-known tracks including ‘Uncertainty’, ‘Man I Need’, ‘Exercise’, ‘Let Her Go’, ‘Come Save Me’, and ‘Four’. It was incredible, made up of hit after hit, making for a neat little set, performed with passion, soul and irresistible beats. The volume was incredibly loud and the energy from both the band and energised fans was electric.
Finishing with ‘The Throw’ – their breakout single - the crowd completely lost it. There was one guy in particular, who was almost in tears at the pure elation at how good the whole thing was. Jagwar Ma had obviously clocked him, and noticing how passionate he was, signed his vinyl and gave him one of their plectrums. From a live show, there was nothing left to give. It was perfection, and pretty much iconic.
Jagwar Ma, comprised of Gabriel Winterfield and Jono Ma, and hailing all the way from Sydney, Australia, are already turning out to be one of this year’s most interesting new bands. Their debut single ‘The Throw’ snowballed them into just about every platform of the UK’s music press with a blend of dream pop and acid house that instantly turned heads. With their debut album, Howlin, already turning heads, and having supported the likes of The xx and Foals on tour, the antipodean duo look set to only further their cause across the rest of 2013.
PlanetNotion caught up with one-half of the outfit, Jono Ma, to talk their crammed summer of international festival appearances, the isolation of Australia and avoiding dance music when you’re ill – Jono reckons classical is the only way to soothe a bad head…
PlanetNotion: How did Jagwar Ma form? How long have you known each other?
Jono Ma: Gab and I have known each other for years. We both played in our own bands in Sydney prior to us starting to collaborate. I started this side project called FLRL and asked Gab to join in for one gig, and that was the first time we made music together.
A few years later, we were playing each other respective songs we’d been working on, and Gab ended up singing on a track of mine. That was the very first Jagwar Ma song, and we then formed the band after we realised our skills were quite complimentary to each other.
PN :How does it feel to be acknowledged and celebrated across the UK’s music press?
JM: It really does feel amazing. We’d never imagined this sort of reception from the UK. It’s hard enough getting some recognition in our hometown Sydney, let alone the UK – one of the cultural epicentres of modern music.
PN: Did you imagine ‘The Throw’ was going to go down so well when you were writing it? Did you feel like it was a special track from the offset?
JM: We had no idea it was going to be so well received. We generally don’t think about that stuff when we write. It’s quite toxic for the decision making process I believe. It definitely felt like something good was happening as the song was evolving.
PN: You have been repeatedly compared to the ‘Madchester’ acid beats sound, is this purely accidental or was this something you wanted for your music? JM: It definitely wasn’t intentional. We were initially inspired by loads of 50s and 60s R&B, soul, garage, particularly the old records from Chicago and Detroit. But, I really wanted to keep the production and programming side of things quite modern sounding. Somehow it ended up having a bit of a Manchester house vibe, which is fine by us, but wasn’t something we had set out to do.
PN: Australia is readily exporting a whole host of musical talent recently. Have you found the Australian music scene to be much different from the UK’s? If so, what are the main differences? JM: Yes, very. It’s much smaller to begin with. It’s also much more fractured in that each city is so geographically far apart. It makes touring and cross-pollination difficult. I guess as a result there’s a sense of isolation in Australia as a musician, not only from other musicians in Australia but from the rest of the world. Being in the UK, there seems to be much more of a sense of inclusion and cross-pollination and a feeling of being connected with the rest of the world.
PN: What music are you listening to at the moment, new and old? JM: At the moment, in all honesty, I’ve pretty much just been listening to classical. So, only old. It’s strange but I’ve never really committed myself to classical music and I’ve been quite sick lately and wanted to avoid electronic music and contemporary music for the moment because it made my mind so active. I’ve found some great classic compositions that just let my mind drift off somewhere else.
PN: Which new bands/artists are you rating? JM: We love our fellow Aussies, Tame Impala: they’re pretty hard to look past aren’t they. We love Foals, of course. I need to get out and see some more new bands though. We’ve just been so busy touring and promoting.
PN: What kind of responses have you had from your album so far? JM: It varies. Things like: it’s too long; it’s too short; very Manchester; sounds like the 90s; sounds like the 80s; sounds like the 60s; it’s great; it’s late. It’s mostly been very positive stuff so far, though. We’re not particularly nervous about its release, more excited for it to finally be out there.
San Cisco are a four-piece indie pop outfit, hailing all the way from Perth, Australia. Their blend of low-fi indie has managed to turn heads on the other side of the globe, and they have recently signed a UK deal with Columbia Records.
The band have blown up in their native Oz, scooping eight WAMI awards in the same night, the Australian equivalent to The Brit Awards. We caught up Jordi, Scarlett, Josh and Nick to discuss pre- show jitters, having a pint in a pub (somewhat or a novelty for San Cisco) and their dreams of one day recording at Abbey Road Studios...
Is there a great story to tell about San Cisco formed - or is it as simple as a few friends playing music together?
Jordi: It’s pretty simple, I was just playing solo, and then I got quite bored to be honest. I decided to start playing a few songs with Josh, and then we got really into playing duets. Meanwhile I was also jamming with Scarlett.
Scarlett: He was two timing me… but then I was two timing him too because I was also in another band.
Jordi: We won an award for our track ‘Rocket Ship’, and it was then when we recorded that song that we all came together. After that we started to play some live shows as San Cisco, and that’s when Nick was also bought in.
What’s on San Cisco’s bucket list to achieve as a band?
Jordi: To just be able to make a living out of this would be really awesome.
Scarlett: We’d love to record at Abbey Road. That’s something we all really want to do.
Nick: There are a lot of bands that we would love to tour with too like Collaborations and Tame Impala. They are from Perth where we are from; we’ve met Tame Impala a couple of times.
Having recently signed a deal in the UK - does it feel like a whirlwind of success or a long time coming?
Jordi: It’s been a long time coming really, but in terms of travel it does feel like a bit of a whirlwind. We’ve been playing together for three years, and so it’s not like our success happened overnight.
Scarlett: We want to take the music to the next level now though; we need all the help we can get for the overseas market, so this big deal had to happen for us.
Did you have a feeling that the track ‘Awkward’ was something special when you were writing it?
Scarlett: We didn’t have time to think – it all happened so quickly.
Jordi: We wrote it and I didn’t personally think it was very special – but our managers did. They gave it out to all the radio stations, and then it just completely blew up. That’s when we realised how good it was probably. While we were writing it though I just felt like it was an ordinary pop song.
How does it feel promoting your music so far away from home - and knowing that people love your work on the other side of the world?
Scarlett: It does feel like you’re starting all over again, like when you’re waiting for people to show up for a gig - we haven’t had that in a while, but there is obviously interest over here just not on the same scale…yet.
Scarlett - how do you cope being the only girl in the band?
Yeah it’s alright I’m just so used to it now – I’ve known the boys for ages and I’ve known Jordi since I was three. So we all just feel like brothers and sisters really which is nice.
Australia has a reputation for great pop music. What do you think it is about Australia that results in such great bands?
Jordi: I'd say Isolation – being a long way from anything
Josh: I think because we don’t have direct influences, we only have the internet which is a mix of American music and British music, so Australia seems to create a whole new beast as a result of that.
Scarlett: It’s easier not to get stuck into one genre scene there, so bands like us tend to be able to experiment a lot more.
Which other Australian bands should we be keeping an eye out for?
Jordi: Snakadaktal, they are an indie pop band who is a bit like Foals. They’re form Melbourne. They won a competition which is called Triple J Unearthed which is on one of the major radio stations. They tend to surface a lot of the better acts I think. Ball Park Music There’s quite a few good little bands around at the moment.
What have you been up to since you've been in London and is there anything you really want to see or do?
We’ve done everything we wanted to do, going to Abbey Road studios has been the highlight. London is so very different from Perth – everything’s so much older and there is so much history. Having a beer in a nice little pub is just so cool to us. The little things like that that we’re enjoying.
