Havea Good Time

In any Australian city, on any night of the week, you'll find a band or singer-songwriter baring their soul on a stage in a venue of some description. Spare a thought also for those Australian artists who left our shores to seek fame, fortune or just a gig somewhere other than in their own backyard. Joel Havea had been enjoying an ever-increasing fanbase with his band The Havea Brothers in Melbourne before deciding to backpack Europe with nothing much more than his guitar slung across his shoulder. “I was backpacking with my guitar and had been on the road for about ten months,” explains Havea. “I had no return ticket back to Australia and went to Berlin on a whim, then fell in love with the place and stayed for five months. After that I moved to Hamburg and it's now been four years and counting. I guess I'm the sort of guy who just goes with the flow and when you remain open for change and new experiences, it's funny where the road can take you.”

Havea has been building a new audience in Hamburg playing regular solo gigs on the famous 'sinful mile', also known as the Reeperbahn. “There is an awesome music scene here,” says Havea of his current home. “The city has a great tradition of music from The Beatles all the way to German hip hop, which has its roots in Hamburg.” It's been a long time coming, but Havea has just released his debut album, You Make Me Believe. The most difficult part of completing the album was culling down a life's worth of songs into a single record. “It was hard to leave certain songs off the final cut,” says Havea. “It was a matter of finding the right balance of songs for the album as a whole, and also trusting my producer's [Achille Fonkam] advice.”

Havea's music has much in common with fellow troubadours such as Jack Johnson and Ben Harper. He is thrilled to be finally coming home to Australia to play the new album tracks to audiences in Melbourne and Sydney over summer. He'll be bringing his trusted Maton EM325 acoustic with him, which he sees more as a companion than a tool of his trade, as well as a more recently acquired Martin D35, which he recorded most of the album's guitar parts on. “It has an amazing full, rich and warm tone and as soon as I first strummed it I knew I had to buy it,” he says of the Martin. “I play with my guitar tuned down to D-standard and use a thicker string gauge. My guitar style is quite rhythmic and groove-based and I find the looseness of the strings helps to add an extra percussive element.”

Joel Havea will be playing the following dates:

Wednesday 19 December - Northcote Social Club, Melbourne VIC
Saturday 22 December - Baha, Rye VIC
Thursday 27 December - The Backroom, Sydney NSW