Sharing Space with LUKE GOWER of COG!
Posted on Jun 15, 2008 / Posted by Ann Allen /
With the success of What If and Bird of Feather, it was no surprise that Luke was kicking back in sunny Bondi, before hitting the road for a national tour. Ann and Lily talked about the new album, Sharing Space, and how the experience was for him recording the new album.
KR: Is song writing something you guys do collectively?
LG: Its a very experimental kind of thing with us… its like… each of us writes on each others instruments as well so.. I think that’s how we kind of achieve our sound.
KR: You wrote some of the songs and recorded Sharing Space in America. Where did you draw inspiration from to write the material?
LG: I think at that stage, obviously, we were really excited to go over there and write… It was going to be six weeks or so, that we were going to be writing new tracks, but it ended up being like three and a half months. I think with comparing the songs that we wrote here to the ones there, the ones there were much more personal and present at the time of what we were going through.
I suppose, being away from your home for any more than three months is a long time, but to be there say, ten months… away from your family and loved ones, not to mention, your friends, is quite a long time. Also, spending a lot of time with each other, holed up in a studio… you know… there can be things that come out of that, positively and negatively. We drew from some of the negative things that were going on over there, but we really tried to draw positive elements too and kind of use those in the material. You know, I don’t think it was much of a conscious decision more of a subconscious one but it worked for us.
KR: Sometimes through tension, creativity becomes really potent.
LG: Yeah it does, it’s a strange thing isn’t it. You know like, you can be kind of really mad or you know, sad or whatever and be having a bit of a moment and through that can come something that is the total opposite and you know that’s the beauty of it I suppose you know….
KR: Do you enjoy jamming and improvising?
LG: It’s all about that for sure. Its never been a lack of ideas its always been a choice to cull which ones… so…. that’s the kind of hardest process with us because we just come up with so many ideas and we all want to put them on because we think that they sound good. But I suppose you know, less is more in some cases.
KR: How was it working with Sylvia Massy, producer, on the new album?
LG: Well we’d already done the New Normal with her so we’d already had a kind of existing relationship, working-wise, and a bit of a friendship there as well. There was definitely a comfort zone thing going into that and… you know, we based our decision on working with her through the last album which we had a really good experience with. She knew the true sound of the band and she really wanted to get involved again. This album was just different because we actually went there and wrote songs and we wanted her to play a much bigger role in this album as a producer and I suppose at the end of the day that kind of thing soured towards the last three months, unfortunately. Our relationship with her kind of… you know, was crumbling just due to other kind of things that happened whilst we were in America.
KR: Would you do it again though for the same result?
LG: Yeah I probably would now that I hear it, you know. We’re really stoked with what we came out with you know, and I think that was the thing that makes it all worth while in the end result and that’s all we had in mind through that last three or four months of recording. We just wanted to get there and we did and we achieved what we wanted to.
KR: How do you guys like being on the road?
LG: I find it’s bit of a vicious cycle I think you know. When you’re not on the road, you long to get back out there and then sometimes when you do get towards the end of a tour you obviously can’t wait to get home so… you know we’ve kind of built our fan base and our foundation for the band on live touring and that’s what we know and love to do. It’s a huge part of us and it’s a thing we try to always better and reinvest our time and money to make it all somewhat more special than it was last time. We want to walk away thinking that it was all worth it
KR: What’s it like being in band with your brother?
LG: It’s actually fine, we never really grew up fighting each other, you know… having punch-ups or anything like that really. It’s always been pretty sweet. There’s another brother in between me and Flynn as well so, we’ve got a pretty good working relationship between us two. We don’t run into too many heated arguments and what-not, like everyone but, you know, I think we’ve got a lot of respect for each other and a good understanding of what each other is like and it seems to work well at the end of the day.
KR: And when you’re doing something that you obviously both love and you’re both drawing passion it’s like you’re half way there aren’t you?
LG: That’s right you know, if we both make money we’ll make money together and if we both lose it well we’ll both lose it.
KR: But you’ll always have each other
LG: That’s right you know. There’s definitely a bit of an unspoken kind of thing, you know, musically, that I feel within when I write and you know, I’m sure that I’m not the only person that’s said that who plays with their brother or their sister or their mum or their dad or whatever it is but you know, there’s definitely been those moments when you’re writing especially, when you just know, nothing needs to be said and you’re both really stoked or you both come up with something together.
KR: Yep, we know exactly what you mean. We’re sisters who work together too, but the biggest plus is, our differences often make for exciting creative energy.
LG: Yea, so you get it. I think in saying that you can have those moments of connection with people you don’t know from a bar of soap and I’m sure they seem somewhat special, but there’s a great dynamic I suppose, when you do create something with a sibling.
KR: Is the rest of your family musical or is it just you and your Flynn?
LG: Everyone loves music in the family. They love listening to it. They don’t all play. Dad used to play – he used to be in a band when he was sixteen. He used to play in New Zealand. He’d ride his bike with his guitar and amplifier 15 kms to play at a party on the beach or something. And there was always a guitar lying around. But we were kind of late bloomers you know, we started getting into it after we left school almost and by that stage dad didn’t really play much anymore. We tried to get our other brother, Zane, involved – he’s a chef. He cooks on boats a majority of the time for surfers out on Islands and what not.
KR: What some of your influences are musically?
LG: Personally, it’s been a mixture of everything and that’s pretty much for all three of us, its everything from Jeff Buckley to Massive Attack, Sepultura you know, I listen to all the Aussie bands from back in the day like Midnight Oil etc.
KR: Same kind of collection as us really – same generation.
LG: You know, Midnight Oil were a huge band that influenced us in the early days and also bands like the Deftones. We had our moments with a few bands but it’s like everything in between those too. It’s Miles Davis and then you might like to throw in something completely different like Bjiork. I can appreciate it all and that’s what comes out when you go to play. If you listen to one style of music and you’re trying to write music yourself you can tend to sort of brick yourself up there if you only listen to one genre, that’s pretty much what will come out when you start playing I think.
KR: Obviously, you’re into metal and the likes. Heavy metal and heavy rock is really beginning to rumble its way into the mainstream again, much like it did in the late 80’s. Is this something you’ve given any thought to or could comment on?
LG: If you look at history it repeats itself all the time doesn’t it. We try to steer away from that kind of metal tag cuz I don’t think we’re really a metal band. I think we love aspects of it and undoubtedly, I was a huge fan of some metals bands when I was a lot younger and I still am but, I think it will move in cycles and I think they need to find a new fraction don’t they? Then associate a band with it and then away you go, there’s your next movement. It seems like rock is due though.
KR: It is due, and it’s time for emo to hurry up and cut itself to death!
LG: It’s like, away with the fringe and back to the skinhead… the crew-cut I should say
KR: Just skip the mullet
LG: Oh Mate, I sported a mullet. It would be about eighteen months ago now. I had a red mullet. It was verging on a Hare Krishna though.
KR: So a variation on the mullet then?
LG: It was a Hare-Mullet
KR: Luke, it’s been a pleasure and we wish you much success over the coming year, but something tells us, it’s already in the bag.
Sharing Space is available through iTunes, your local elitist and indie CD shop, all those multi-national CD shops, perched next to aural atrocities like ‘idol winners’ or via your pirating software, you thieving twats.
Photography by Kane Skennar
