The Simple Things In Life

The beat of the drum, some tearing guitar chords and a passionate howl; Japandroids' music comes from little but delivers a hell of a lot. The Vancouver duo's 2012 record, Celebration Rock, is exactly what it says on the box – a burning-hot serving of howling tunes that doesn't relent. Listening to the LP, you can practically see the sweat coming through the stereo.

Fast-talking guitarist/vocalist Brian King is at home in Vancouver; he's keeping an eye on a hockey game, resting and trying not to do very much. When you're in a band like Japandroids though, nothing still means something.

“I had the day off in the sense that I was not on tour – I didn't have to play a show,” says King. “But I spent most of the day doing logistical stuff and getting things ready for the next tour that we're going to do. A band our size, we don't have some army of people working for us to take care of stuff; Dave [Prowse – drums/vocals] and I mostly do everything ourselves still. And it's not like a regular band where you can split things up between five people; everything is split between two or three people, between us and our tour manager we have to take care of this worldwide touring operation, so there's a lot of work behind the scenes that people don't see – work that goes into touring different parts of the world for several months at a time.

“You have to get all these visas to all these places, you have to get all your equipment sorted out, you have to get your flights and transportation sorted out, all your merch has to get from here to there, and we're still practicing to make sure we are tight for all the shows. It's like a full-time job when we're not on tour, just getting ready to go on the next one.”

And get ready they do, for when Japandroids take the stage nothing else is significant. Their shows could be described as a visceral explosion; well-oiled chaos that seems simultaneously teetering on the edge while remaining totally in control. When the Canadians perform they don't massage your soul; they kick you in the arse. They amplify your enthusiasm for every facet of your existence and make you want to be the best fucking human going.

The guys have been slogging it out solidly on the road for a year or so now and are almost ready to start working on album number three. But not before the touring is complete. For as King explains, the band, unsurprisingly, like to keep things simple, and even though they may currently be putting ideas down, little riffs and the like, they're not going to really focus on new music until the road is in their rear vision.

“We're a pretty black and white band in the sense that we don't work seriously on writing songs or writing a record when we're in the middle of touring. We care a lot about our live shows and we tour so much that it kinda occupies all of our time and energy when we're doing it. Our last record that we did, we basically wrote that entirely after we finished touring our first record [2009's Post-Nothing], and a lot of stuff that had been written along the way got left behind and we kinda started from scratch when we got home.”

Japandroids have learnt that if they try and mix the two, it simply means diminished returns on the stage and in the studio. And that result is good for no one, whether you're a band member or merely a fan.

“There's so much that goes into touring in the way that we tour that people don't ever see and don't understand, y'know, because we have a couple of weeks off touring it's easy to think we're just sitting on a beach having fucking cocktails doing fuck all,” King scoffs jokingly. “So it's not until the touring is done and you're like , 'Okay, you've kinda played all the shows you can play on this record, you've gone to as many places as you possibly can, now you're going to take six-to-eight months off, twelve months off, and you're not going to book any shows.' That's actually when you can focus a hundred per cent of your time on trying to write a really great album, and you don't have to worry about all the logistics that go into touring. So that's the plan now, we're going to be touring through to about the fall, and then once the fall hits and we stop playing shows then we can make a plan to take a serious chunk of time off and make another record.”

No question about it, the band's third full-length – although still an afterthought at this stage – is going to stir up some serious anticipation in the time leading towards a release. Since they formed Japandroids proper in 2006, after first connecting during university years before, King and partner in crime Prowse have seemingly made nothing but the right moves. Their DIY idealism and hard-working nature have drawn the affections of punk, rock and garage fans worldwide, while their punchy tunes and to-the-point albums have struck a chord with critics – who credit them with keeping modern rock honest – and festivals, who recognise their ability to destroy on any stage at any time.

“We've definitely taken it further, we're playing better, we're playing harder, if you come and see our own shows we're playing longer and I think we sound a lot better,” King admits, citing the band's biggest improvements in the past 12 months. “I think we've gotten a lot better across the board. But I think as we've gotten better, the bar has been raised for how good we need to be, because we're playing bigger rooms, we're playing for more people, so there's some growing pains in there inherently. Sometimes we've totally nailed it, and sometimes you walk off stage and you feel like, 'Okay, I am officially in over my head.' I think it's a pretty natural learning curve, but I think we've managed to do a fairly good job, all things considered.

“There's a handful of things that have happened in the last year that I can reflect on and go, 'We were clearly not ready for [that] and we clearly fucked up,' but there's also a million times where it's like, 'I was really nervous about this, but we threw it down and we killed it and everyone had a blast and it was awesome.'”

After already laying waste to audiences Down Under as part of Laneway Festival earlier this year, the Canadian two are set to return to play their own shows on their own terms. The environment this time though is set to suit the duo far better than a concrete jungle on a hot summer's day. In those situations – in which Japandroids are finding themselves more frequently – King admits they're still discovering strengths and extending capabilities. Where we're going to experience them this time around, the frontman says they'll be in their element.

“I feel like we've mastered a certain size of indoor club, and we're getting to a point now where when we play clubs we're starting to play the bigger-sized ones, and when we play a festival we're starting to play to more people and starting to not necessarily be on the smaller stage, so there's definitely a learning curve in that – it's a lot different. Playing in the afternoon in a huge fucking tent outside is a lot different than playing a five-hundred capacity club at one o'clock in the morning, which is where we'd typically play, so there's definitely a learning curve. I think we're getting better [overall] but it's still a work in progress.”

And considering there were murmurs that a second Japandroids album wasn't even going to happen – let alone a probable third – to be visiting Australia again and to be kicking goals still makes this incredible ride all the more memorable for Japandroids.

“Part of the advantage of treating the band like every tour might be the last one, every record might be the last one, you actually treat it that way when you're out on the road, and I think that's part of what motivates us to play the way we play on tour,” the frontman levels. “If we decide not to make another record for example, then this might be the last time we ever get to play in this place so we better make it pretty fucking good.”