Chow Down

Although asking the old 'How did you get your band name?' question is definitely naff these days, there is a certain amount of mystery to naming your band Pat Chow. A quick search reveals no pop culture references. In conversation, lead man Ben Protasiewicz doesn't mention it. Then again, it's probably best to leave it a mystery; Pat Chow's music does speak pretty succinctly for itself.
The powerful three-piece have been pumping out garage jams of the '90s indie variety for a while now, summoning the spirits of Rivers Cuomo, J Mascis and Stephen Malkmus. The result is messy, unforgiving and direct, and many ears have been hooked on their sound. With the trio's upcoming EP, Good Deeds, we'll finally be able to get our hands on some Pat Chow magic. The EP gets launched very soon, so all hands are on deck. Maybe.
“I'm just at the park at the moment; I'm not really doing anything with the band or anything. But yeah, we're still doing it,” Protasiewicz laughs, almost defensively, at the start of our talk. “We're gearing up for all of that, rehearsing a whole lot. The songs have been around for a while, so we know 'em all pretty well. I don't know if you're really supposed to handle a launch any different from a normal show, but we aren't. It just feels like another gig. We're still all excited about it, but yeah, we're just getting ready to play as best we can. It's gonna be a pretty good time.”
Whilst he still handles the whole thing with casual grace, it's been a long road for Protasiewicz, coming from a background in Melbourne's indie circuit, and a band that are currently doing pretty well for themselves as well in The Ocean Party, whose Social Clubs album has been handled with a certain amount of indie charm. Protasiewicz started Pat Chow, originally called The Whores, as his own thing.
“I started out The Whores as a side project, more or less. I was just writing and recording stuff by myself,” he says. “Playing drums, guitar, bass and doing the vocals just as a recording project. It wasn't a live thing. In The Ocean Party, we'd all swap around. Like Lachlan (Denton, guitar/vocals) would get on drums and Curtis (Wakeling, guitar) would get on bass, and we started playing around with it a little bit live. We played three or four shows as The Whores in Melbourne. It was really fun, but I could never get it off the ground in Melbourne because I was on drums in The Ocean Party, and that was it, you know?
“When I moved to Perth, I didn't have any bands. I didn't have anything to do, so I decided I'd start my own thing. I found Jamie on drums and we got Nick Hall at the time to play bass, and we just started from there. The reason I decided to get up the front was not really... I don't know, I didn't want to be a wanker or anything,” Protasiewicz laughs. “I was just doing it; I just wanted to get the music out there.”