STACK #136 Feb 2016

MUSIC FEATURE

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Hayley Mary of The Jezabels talks refusing prototypes, the progress of acceptance and why she’s not fixated on the end of the rainbow. By Zoë Radas

T he aural splendour on Synthia is very visually suggestive, and first impressions of single Come Alive – with its pulsating synth-bass, an insidious, chugging guitar and eerie tin can accents – instantly evokes centipedes churning below the earth as in a David Lynch film. “Oh, I love David Lynch – the whole band is pretty influenced by David Lynch actually,” vocalist Hayley Mary says over the phone from the café in London where she likes to go to write. “We used to have this thing where every time we played in a sh*tty empty room when we were on tour, or some awkward show we didn’t want to be doing, we’d all turn to

each other and go, ‘Just imagine we’re a band in a David Lynch film’ and we’d do that weird thing where they kind of look like they’re lip-synching, and it’s this strange dream vibe.” The Jezabels probably haven’t been relying on David Lynch to get them through anything lately, with Synthia proving the Sydney four-piece are as full of detailed, ethereal ideas as they’ve ever been. The task of circulating those ideas throughout the band’s members – Hayley Mary, keyboardist Heather Shannon, guitarist Samuel Lockwood and drummer Nik Kaloper – has taken on a deliberately visual approach. “This record, I think

You have to take control, otherwise you get misrepresented

MUSIC

we’ve gotten way, way better at communicating with each other visually,” she says. “We’ve got photos and videos that we feel represent us. Otherwise an image is something that just happens to you, and it feels horrid because you’re so proactive in what you’re putting out into the world as musicians. We were a band before Spotify and Instagram and we were actually able to live in denial. We were like, ‘Oh, it doesn’t matter, we’ll just be like Radiohead and make cool music,’” she drawls. “And then we realised that actually, Radiohead have a really well-constructed image! And it doesn’t just accidentally happen; you have to take control, because otherwise you get misrepresented.”

The Jezabels: L-R Samuel Lockwood, Heather Shannon, Hayley Mary and Nik Kaloper.

FEBRUARY 2016

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