Ball Park Music Fucking Loves You

As far as career trajectories go, Ball Park Music does not subscribe to the gently-gently approach. While the Brisbane five-piece have shown plenty of tender musical moments to counter their reputation as indie-pop jokers who thrive under the spotlight, they’ve released three albums in four years – quite a feat in an age when release strategies often trump the want of artists to create, liberate and move forward. Fresh from a thoroughly played late afternoon slot at the Splendour amphitheatre, Sam Cromack may be gearing up for Puddinghead’s second national tour before repeating the process in Europe, though his thoughts are already on album number four, and what the fuck is supposed to come next.

"It’s almost instinctual to retaliate against what you’ve just done.”

“Even though [Puddinghead] came out in April, that whole project feels like a lifetime ago already,” Cromack reflects. “I spent most of last year making it, so it’s easy as the artist to move on… I got a test pressing of it on vinyl at my house this week which I had to listen to, and it was hard to even get the enthusiasm to want to put it on, but I really enjoyed it once I did listen. I’m just kind of thinking towards the future even though it is only a couple of months after the record. I think a lot of artists are naturally thinking where they’re gonna go next – it’s almost instinctual to retaliate against what you’ve just done.”

Championed by triple j through two laps of the country for each record and billings on every major Australian festival, Ball Park Music have been riding the typically fickle momentum train with great vigour since releasing their debut EP Rolling On The Floor, Laughing Ourselves To Sleep in 2009. Perhaps part of this attitude is simply due to feeling a little tired.

“Yeah absolutely,” Cromack agrees. “I mean I still love playing music, there’s no doubt about that; it really feels super natural – as in, two separate words there; I don’t have special powers! So yeah when someone says you’re going on tour again, I don’t really baulk too much, but I’m reaching a point now where I’m starting to think for the first time, what does the future hold for us? And that doesn’t mean I’m cynical about going on, it just means I’m ready to well and truly shake it up, and just rethink how we do things and how we approach it and what the rules are for us, you know.”

As a skilled lyricist known for phrasing colloquialisms as eloquently as highbrow concepts, he has charmed audiences with the singalong catch-cry “I fucking love you” – packaged and sold neatly as iFly – yet he’ll just as soon dish Shakespearean insults-turned-band in-jokes with an album title like Puddinghead. Together with bandmates Jen Boyce, Paul Furness and Dean and Daniel Hanson, their musical charisma has captured the affection of the common man and the thinking man.

“I accept that Ball Park Music’s not the coolest band,” Cromack admits. “We’ve almost taken the approach of trying to entertain people and perform more than sort of being stubborn about our art and say, ‘This is my song, take it or leave it.’ It’s only now, three records in, where I’m kind of reaching that point where you do do something so much that you’re like, ‘Well, next time around I’m keen to just write whatever I feel like, and I don’t care if anyone likes it or not, and you can take it or leave it.’ But I guess maybe we’re in a better position to do that given that we’ve already done some hard yards.”

"making music either on your own or with your fellow musicians – that is the ultimate high,”

The insightful frontman is hard-pressed to name a single success of Puddinghead that he’s most pleased with, not even its number two ARIA chart debut, reiterating the sentiment that he’s driven by the wondrous possibility of creativity. 

“Oh look, I don’t fuckin’ know…” he spits, exasperated by the thought. “Honestly, I don’t know. That’s another thing I learnt, is that nothing will ever replace the satisfying feeling of making music either on your own or with your fellow musicians – that is the ultimate high,” he says. “It doesn’t matter whether you play for yourselves in the garage or whether you get to perform in front of 10,000 people, I feel like the high is still the same and that’s still the most precious part of music…”