What’s The Rush

Text: Gabriel Knowles Images: Tristan Ceddia

Much is made of the apparent lack of time taken by Eddy Current Suppression Ring to record their critically acclaimed and award winning albums. Urban legend dictates that their debut was wrapped up in an afternoon over a few beers and word that their latest release Rush to Relax was done after only six hours in studio. Bassist Brad Barry tells Gabriel Knowles why those stories aren’t strictly true.

“We weren’t 100% sure we were making the album but in the end everything turned out to be good enough to be used for the album. It was only because we had enough new songs to record that we that we figured let’s just start recording and see what happens and if we have to have another couple of goes at it another day we would have done it. In the end it just turned out that what we had was very usable.” Barry aka Rob Solid explains from his home in Melbourne.

“You can spend years and years in the studio and not be happy with the results. I figure if you capture the songs in their infancy there’s still some nerves about whether or not you’re going to pull the song off. If you catch a bit of that rather than running the song down and catching it after it has lost its new pizazz I think that’s great.”

“Just going into a rehearsal studio where we would jam anyway you feel like you’re playing it not for the first time but when it’s new so you don’t want to stuff up and you’re concentrating on trying to play it right rather than just knowing it.”

Brevity always seems to have been a core component of the band. Their first song infamously recorded ad-lib into a dictaphone during a Christmas party at the vinyl factory where the other band members Brendan Huntley and the Young brothers – Mikey and Danny, all worked. They followed that track up with two albums, the first self titled and a second entitled Primary Colours, both of which relied heavily upon terse garage punk to make their mark. Their songs of minimal length left lasting impressions on both fans and critics alike and culminated the band picking up the prestigious AMP award in 2009, a testament to their philosophy of just doing what they think is best.

“We never do anything we don’t really want to do and we’re always happy with the stuff we do and what we have done.” Barry confirms.

“It’s always good, even just jamming is good. I guess you feed off your live shows with the interaction with the crowd and the feedback where as with your album you don’t get that. That’s why we try to capture that live sound as much as we can when we record the albums because that’s what we enjoy the most.”

Rush to Relax is however, a departure of sorts from the blueprint of strictly short and sharp songs. A few tracks stretch far beyond the usual three and half minutes and one even enters the previously unimaginable dimension of a ballad. As if by way of evening things up there are still a couple of numbers that come in at an intense minute flat. Despite moving into new territory the unmistakeable twang of Eddy Current is ever present. Even the twenty minutes of beach sounds at the end of the album doesn’t seem out of place, in fact it almost seems symptomatic of the album title until Barry dismisses that theory.

“That ties in with the song and not necessarily the theme of the album, it’s just about relaxing at the end. It’s almost subliminal, you don’t know it’s on but then when you sink into you realise relaxing is good.”

Eddy Current Suppression Ring’s third album Rush To Relax is out now.

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