STACK #235 May 2024

MUSIC INTERVIEW

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is named “Cape Forestier”), which is a metaphor for the journey we navigate through life. It’s about the ebb and flow we experience - the arrival and departure of love, the contact with loss and pain, and the pursuit of new starts. Our affinity with water, having spent much of our youth surrounded by it, deeply influences our writing, which was a tip of the hat in the title. The ocean, with its tides and cyclical changes, is so much like life. It’s hard to go past how many ways it mirrors our experience. Cape Forestier is not just a collection of songs; it’s a our personal path from the early days of making music in the family living room to the point we’ve reached today. It’s amazing what a little whistle can do, as in track County Sign .Why do you think a whistled melody adds so much warmth to a song? Not sure why. But you’re right. It’s such a peaceful sound. Angus has a beautiful whistle. So magical. It’s that feeling of watching the world go by. The muted trumpet in The Wedding Song is so lovely. Did you think about making this little melody with a different instrument at any point in the song’s writing/recording? We love putting trumpet on our records. The trumpet as an instrument/sound has such an incredible capacity to carry a melody. Also, I love playing the trumpet live. So, it’s always nice to have moments in the show where I can play. There are some stunning, haunting back-ups and harmonies across the album - especially in City of Lights and Sitting in Seoul . Are they all you two, or did you enlist some help from friends (or foes)? Yes, in both City of Lights and Sitting in Seoul , the harmonies are all us. We love layering our vocals and using our voices in different ways to create the chords. It’s a big part of the fun of recording for us, creating the layers of the backing vocals. Closer Wonder ofYou is less than a minute long, and seems to tell a story without words, before your final line of explanation (“That’s the wonder of you”). How did this one come together? We wanted to sign off the album with a note about the wonder of love, the wonder of music, through a song that we love… It felt like the right way to say, ‘And that’s it! The end.’

Cape Forestier by Angus and Julia Stone is out May 10 via Sony.

BLOOD FROM THE STONES Celebrated sibling duo Angus and Julia Stone have re teamed to concoct Cape Forestier , a vivid vision of lush folk poured through with the blood harmonies for which they’re renowned.We put some questions to Julia about the pair’s first commercial full-length since 2017’s Snow . Words Zoë Radas

made together, and I think that has given us a lot of independently unique ways of writing, producing, and recording our music. So, when we come together now we bring elements of that for sure.

It feels as if ‘Angus and Julia’ is a less amorphous entity than it was on your earlier albums - it’s like you’ve each reclaimed some individual identity, but still come together so beautifully. Does it seem that way to you? I agree. I believe that’s a fundamental part of growing up - growing up together, and then apart. We have both been on a journey that continues to unfold. We have worked with many different people outside of the records we’ve

Where did the album name Cape Forestier come from?

The album title “Cape Forestier” is inspired by the notion of a boat on a voyage (the boat

Coming-of-age films have a tendency to either dissolve into irrelevancy over time, or stand like stone silos as a time capsule of a particular moment in the zeitgeist. The latter is the case for 1994’s Reality Bites , whose soundtrack boasted plenty of diamonds - but none shined (nor remain shining to this day) as brightly as Lisa Loeb’s Stay (I Missed You) . The US folk-rock artist had originally intended to sell her enormously relatable break-up song to Darryl Hall, but decided to keep it for herself - a fortuitous move, because Loeb’s friend and neighbour, actor Ethan Hawke, soon heard the track. Hawke asked if he could fling it to his mate and fellow actor Ben Stiller, for use in Stiller’s upcoming feature directorial debut. Released 30 years ago this month, Stay (I Missed You) was a top five hit in several countries, and earned Loeb a Grammy nom.

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Lisa Loeb in the clip for Stay (I Missed You) , 1994

12 MAY 2024

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