Glasshouse: Speaking In Tongues.

Glasshouse launch Doublespeak at the Healer this Friday

Glasshouse are one of those accomplished live bands that can grab an audience’s attention through whatever means necessary. Whether armed simply with acoustic guitars, or providing a fully amped rock show, this Brisbane three-piece can thrill a crowd with their melodic, atmospheric rock/pop.

The evidence of their craftsmanship can be found on their new EP Doublespeak, which features accessible tunes not afraid to dabble in adventurous sonics. It also helps having three members who can all sing.

“Harmonies have always been our big thing live,” says bassist/vocalist Stew. “On this particular record, Dan (guitars, vocals) sings most of the tracks, but that was just track selection. There’s a lot of our songs where you wouldn’t even know who was singing lead, it’s like the Crowded House thing with two voices singing together all the way through.”

It seems Glasshouse have some rather curiously diverse influences. Their press release describes them as being inspired by Crowded House AND Tool!

“Can you hear both those influences on the CD, though?” Stew asks me.

To a degree, I respond. In that it has a both a sense of melodicism and a dark intensity.

“Yeah, kinda like moody melodic music,” says Stew.

“I reckon what we try to do is to be influenced by things and not actually sound like any of them,” explains Dan. “Like our producer (Tane Matheson) is mostly influenced by British electronica. He’s really influenced by Massive Attack and Tricky. I actually come from (the town) Portishead, where all those bands come from. For this CD, just to do the recordings, we took five months. We deliberately took that time, because we wanted to make sure it was finished instead of sending it out and not being happy with it. We wanted to make sure the artwork was perfect and the music sounded immaculate.”

The EP represents a considerable development in the band’s sound. I ask if we can expect a completely different direction again on the next Glasshouse recording.

“Definitely,” says Stew.

“Of course,” agrees Dan. “More developed than different, perhaps. We’re not in a hurry to evolve. Let it come naturally. As long as it sounds really good being played on an acoustic guitar.”