TRACK BY TRACK: Breakfast Road’s ‘ROMEO’ Is “The Best Thirty Minutes Of Your Life”

“Heartbreak makes a different man” is the statement that opens up Sydney boyband Breakfast Road’s debut album ROMEO. From the beginning, ROMEO plays out as an emotionally-convoluted rollercoaster, detailing the band’s winding journey of maintaining love and relationships while in the ultimate pursuit of their dreams and passions in music. Guaranteed to be the “best thirty minutes of your life”, Breakfast Road toy the line between lover and fighter, crooning soulfully and longingly on tracks like ENDLESSLY and tapping into the reality of life as a hungry musician on songs like SUPERSTAR SHIT. Still, the project is an earnest proclamation of where the band currently situate themselves within their work.

“ROMEO digs into our experiences balancing a passion for music and personal relationships. There’s this ‘ROMEO’ archetype that we often hold ourselves to, and the album explores this experience through the tracklist,” the band wrote in a press release.

“We’re not lying when we say this is ‘the best 30 minutes of your life’.  We worked on over 50 demos for this album and cut it down to the best of the best to make the project as bulletproof as possible.”

Drawing on the sounds of the nostalgic, gritty 2007 pop-club era, combined with musical influences from the likes of Frank Ocean, Charli XCX, Radiohead and Sonic the Hedgehog, Breakfast Road’s infectious hooks, blend of electronic, pop, rock and R&B and mountainous area pride will always place the band in a lane of their own.

For The Music, we’ve asked PJ, Briant and Ama of Breakfast Road to take us through the inner workings of their debut album ROMEO track-by-track.

PIPE DOWN

PIPE DOWN is a bragadocious, tongue-in-cheek banger we made with SOLLYY almost two years ago now. It’s a song about being on top of the world, and it makes you feel that way when you listen. In context of the record, it serves as a character profile to be picked apart.

SUPERSTAR SHIT

SUPERSTAR SHIT is the misbehaved sibling of PIPE DOWN. It continues the themes from the first track and takes it to the extreme. The song feels like downing two energy drinks after getting 3 hours of sleep. Sure, you’re hyped up now, but the crash is inevitable.

GLOBAL WARMING

For GLOBAL WARMING, we challenged ourselves to write the most out of pocket love song imaginable. It took a while to finish the song after the initial idea came about, because we refused to work on it unless it was scorching hot that day. In context of the album, the track is a huge smack back to reality. There are people that rely on us, we can’t be superstars every day.

HOME ALONE

HOME ALONE is about the second most relatable topic after love songs, bed rotting. Well at least we hope so. Even though it’s one of our funniest tracks, it’s kinda one of our darkest?

IF YOU DON’T

IF YOU DON’T was the last track we wrote for the album, and it almost serves as a mission statement for the project. What do you really know, if you don’t go all the way?

7 DAYS/NIGHTS

7 DAYS/NIGHTS is a burnout anthem. It’s thrashy, it’s energetic and it’s gritty – until it’s not.

ENDLESSLY

ENDLESSLY is our take on a ballad. The production is ethereal yet glitchy, and the drums are almost cursed. Thematically, it shows our sensitive side in a way we haven’t before, setting the tone for the rest of the record.

HEART BRAKE

HEART BRAKE is spelt that way intentionally. It’s a dark song, which is pretty fitting given we wrote it at 2am with SOLLYY in almost complete silence.

WHERE DO WE GO?

WHERE DO WE GO? is our take on a 90’s RnB boyband anthem. It’s a heartwrenching track about giving your all, and still not knowing where to go next. It’s the climax of the album, but almost serves as a cliffhanger thematically.

GUARD DOWN

GUARD DOWN is the most precious song we have ever written. After putting forward our nine most ambitious, larger-than-life productions yet, we knew this was the only way to end the record. The meaning is best left for the listener to decipher, but it’s pretty hard for us to listen to this one without crying a little.

Breakfast Road are embarking on their ROMEO world tour this November in Sydney and Melbourne. Find all details below – tickets can be purchased here.

Breakfast Road Presents
The ROMEO World Tour

Nov 1st
The Lansdowne Sydney NSW
with supports from SOLLY + Chris Vincent

Nov 9th
The Gasometer Hotel Melbourne VIC
with supports from SOLLY + Mizuki

ROMEO is available to listen to now on all streaming platforms.