The Holiday Is Over

Musician, engineer, producer, label head. Since Tom Iansek first began treating music as more than a hobby he's always liked to do a mix of things. As he admits, “I prefer to be busy rather than looking for something to do.” At least he won't have to worry about that in the immediate future, with his main project Big Scary enjoying all sorts of success off the back of their stunning second record, Not Art.

In the middle of a schedule playing support for Bernard Fanning on his encompassing national tour, the Melburnian has been enjoying performing in big venues to bigger audiences. “It's been awesome just hanging out with Bernard and his crew. They're pretty seasoned professionals – Bernard especially – and we just think it's funny that this guy we grew up listening to kind of knows who we are and refers to us on stage,” Iansek chuckles.

With his percussive partner Jo Syme, the guitarist, pianist and vocalist has been adapting the group's set with each passing date, working meticulously to create a fluid song list that somehow joins the dots of their wildly varied back catalogue. This constant juggling act means that raindrop piano (Twin Rivers) coexists with wailing guitar solos (Gladiator), and electronic flourishes (Luck Now) can link up with garage freewheeling (Purple), the music seamlessly delivered across a 45-minute stretch.

“Being able to get past the cognitive level of playing where you're not thinking about where you're putting your hands and what notes you're going to sing, and being able to move into the part where you can relax and have a bit of fun and let the song go where it wants to go here and there, all that stuff is a lot of fun,” informs Iansek, speaking of the Big Scary live experience going forward.

Not that these newfound opportunities are unsurprising. The duo's Four Seasons EP series of 2010 showed the grand ambition Big Scary held, while 2011 debut Vacation came as a shock to many, the full-length taking a sharp turn from their garage rock beginnings with an accomplished, contemporary sound. Not Art extends that path further. With their sophomore release, Big Scary have put themselves on the map – permanently. In fact, you'll be hard-pressed to find a more accomplished and dynamic Aussie album released this year.

“The album pushed us and demanded a lot of us and forced us to try new things and go out of our comfort zone,” he tells. “One song called Invest is quite hip hop and required Jo to change the way she played her kick drum, and little things like that, that she's been playing for a decade or something one way, then to change all that for a song or album is what we were pushing for – it was really cool and scary at times. And the other thing was that we wanted an open-ended recording process, so that we could have the time to keep trying and not stopping 'til it felt the way it should and having things develop in their own time.”

Where Vacation was a very fast process, done in a bit over two weeks (“We were a bit naïve,” laments Iansek), this time Big Scary removed the clock, working at their own pace rather than draining themselves with end-to-end all-night sessions. The record took them from east Gippsland to Brisbane, with time in a Fitzroy and New York studio also throw in, the latter locale being where the band worked with Grammy Award winner Tom Elmhirst, an engineer that Iansek credits with helping the vocals across Not Art soar.

“There was one or two songs that were just doing my head in, and I tried at least ten different vocal microphone combinations and just wasn't quite happy with it, so that was the way we approached those things. I wanted the vocals to be a feature – as they should I guess – so we did labour [them]. And then having the mix engineer that we did – Tom really brought them to the fore even more, beyond what we had done, and he did a lot to make those the heroes of the songs.”

The duo also worked with two different bassists, Graham Ritchie (Emma Louise), and Ted O'Neil (The Vasco Era), whose differing styles matched the ideals of Not Art perfectly.

“Getting other people in was an idea I was toying with early on, and then through all this self-production and engineering and endless days of plugging away I almost got sick of my own company – I was crying out for some outside assistance and input,” Iansek admits. “I think opening your songs up to others when you're not used to it can be quite a daunting thing, but after this whole process – being locked up in a room for the winter months slowly chipping away at it – I was really desperate for other people to do stuff to [the songs].”

And they'll maintain this current openness for expansion and interpretation on this forthcoming national tour, expanding their studio duo and current live trio to a headline quartet.

“We're starting to learn the songs and play the songs in a different way and a different light with all the touring we're doing now, so having the addition of Chris Port on the drum pads and the samples for September will give it another lift altogether and take it to a new place,” concludes Iansek. “It'll also mean we can play a lot of songs that we couldn't with just three of us, which is really cool.”