Art of Sleeping’s Caleb Hodge is getting ready to head off on the bands national tour when he calls OUTinPerth.
The Brisbane band are used to sunshine and warm weather and Hodge confesses that having check the forecast for Canberra, where their tour is heading, he’s been searching for some long underwear.
The five piece band have been Triple J favourites sine their first track ‘Empty Hands’ came out in 2012. Hodge is the vocalist and guitarist in the band alongside drummer Jean-Paul Malengret, keyboardist Jarryd Shuker, guitarist Patrick Silver and bassist Francois Malengret.
The indie band who continue to have a rapidly growing fan base are excited about hitting the road and sharing the sounds of their recently recorded album.
“It’s been awesome,” Hodge said, “We actually recorded it all and finished mixing and mastering late last year, so it’s been burning holes in our pockets as we’ve been waiting to release it. We’ve put out a few singles, ‘Voodoo’ and ‘Crazy’ but we can’t wait for people to hear all the music.”
“It drives you insane.” Hodge said of the waiting game for new music to be released. “Being creative people we always want to move on to the next thing, that’s inherent to my personality, but the songs feel so old by the time you release them. You have to remind yourself as an artist that nobody else has heard them.”
The band are also excited to be heading back to Perth with shows at Mojos in Fremantle, Amplifier in the city and a trip down south on the agenda too.
“We’re so excited because we haven’t been to Perth for about two years and we really fought with our management and label to let us come to Perth, it’s something we really wanted to do.” Hodge said. “Our last shows in Perth were so much fun.”
Recently the band created a mix tape for music website Tone Deaf, amongst the bands choice tracks was an unexpected inclusion, a track from the late soul dynamo Barry White.
“Barry White has been a long time fave of ours,” Hodge said, “I think it might have started in Perth. We hadn’t played a lot of shows at the time and we realised that we needed to loosen up a bit before we went on stage, someone chucked some Barry White on, and we all lost it laughing, but it’s become a pre-show ritual. We have a dance to Barry White and then head on stage. You can’t take yourself too seriously after that, and it make sure we have a good time.”
The remainder of the year will see Art of Sleeping completing a number of tours, so the next few months is life on the road.
“The ultimate experience is playing live and the buzz you get from the performance!” Hodge enthused.
Art of Sleeping are playing Mojos in Fremantle on Thursday 18 June, heading down to the Prince of Wales in Bunbury on Friday 19 June and Amplifier in Perth on Saturday 20 June. Jesse Davison and Sunbeam Sound Machine support.
Art of Sleeping’s ‘Shake Shiver’ album is released on 17 July.
