With their genre-melding ways, Polo Club are at first a tricky listen given that most will look for indicators to place them neatly into one category or another. However, like other electro-hip hop experimentalists before them, they soon become an intriguing listen across their second EP Live For Tonight released this month.
“Some people stand back and go, 'Are these guys hip hop or are they indie? Are they dance? What are they?'” laughs MC Dylan Thomas. “We don't really like to tie ourselves down to anything. Whatever we're inspired by at the time, 'cause there's four people in the band and everyone listens to completely different music. That can sometimes not work when you're together writing but it seems to work alright with Polo.”
Evolving from a production duo with the release of their first album The 13 in 2009, Thomas explains how this changed the sound of Polo Club. “When me and Cam [Chapman] first hooked up we were both listening to different stuff; I'm more from the hip hop side of things and he was more from the dancey sort of indie background.
“The new stuff's very different,” says Thomas of Live For Tonight and its companion EP She Will Never Know released last year. “We didn't sit down and say, 'We're gonna write this type of music', we just sort of started writing together and it just turned out the monster that is Polo Club; there was never too much conscious thought about the direction and sound, it just sort of evolved as we were listening to different things and we got the other two guys on board – Adam [Fitzgerald] and Aidan [McLaren]. Adam's got such a distinct style and he's got the more indie style; it just fits well with the band and I s'pose that's what makes Polo Club stand out from a lot of other hip hop that's coming out of Australia – the aesthetics, and that everything track's a bit left of centre for hip hop. But people seem to dig it which is good.”
Regardless of audience or genre, Thomas declares that the premise of Polo Club is very simple.
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“I would just say that it's just about four dudes tryin' to write music that they enjoy and having fun with it – that's really all we've ever been about. As soon as you lose those things I think the arse end can fall out of stuff, so as long as you keep it tight and fun and enjoy what you're doing all will be well. That's the motto that we live by. And you know, like any other band we take the piss out of ourselves and all that sort of jazz, but to sum it up Polo's just about fun I s'pose. There's also a bit of Jekyll and Hyde 'cause there is a split personality in there – there is some dark shit as well.”
Heading out on a seven-date east coast tour to show off the new EP, Thomas is audibly hyper as he explains his level of excitement for getting on the road.
“I can't wait – it's gonna be awesome. I love goin' on tour; it's the second best part, apart from writing music – I just love playin' shows,” the MC enthuses. “We've been together a while now so we've got a pretty decent show goin' if I do say so myself, so if people come down they can always expect fun, that's for sure. Even if there's one person in the room it's high energy – I can't help myself. I hope there's some shit there to jump off!”
