Genre-bending Brisbane Trio PLANISPHERE Release New Single ‘WALLS’ - INTERVIEW
Forming in 2020, Planisphere fuse the best parts of rock n’ roll, dance, pop, punk, and metal to create a high-octane blend of music that is genre-bending-binding and just bloody brilliant. Or in their words full of ‘Furious Colossal Monster Riffage’ (new album name?).
With influences from The 1975, DZ Deathrays, Royal Blood, and Darkside oozing in and out of their music along with heavy danceable riffs, Planisphere showcases a cracking live performance, proving that they are the band for anyone and everyone.
The Brissy trio consisting of Lorcan Coates, Sam Turner and Jai Snelling say that their music is designed to create movement. Which they continue to prove with their newest ballad ‘Walls’, a new direction for the band as they add new textures and techniques to their recording process.
We had a chat with the gang about their band and newest single! Oh and what their favourite Brissy venue is… scroll down to find out!
G’day fella’s, how are we!?
LORCAN: Great!
SAM: Excellent
First things first, for anyone that doesn’t know ‘PLANISPHERE’ – describe your band in 4 words…
LORCAN: Furious Colossal Monster Riffage
SAM: Spaghettified by Event Horizon
How did the three of you meet and form the band!?
LORCAN: Sam and I met while we were both still at uni, & started jamming around shortly after that. It took us a while to figure out the whole two piece thing but when we did, it just became addictive fun making so much noise on stage. We put out two EP’s since then and played heaps of shows as a two piece. I've lived with Jai for a couple years now, and when we had the idea to incorporate a synthesizer into the mix, he was an easy pick as Jai is a weapon on the piano.
Now you released a brand new single on January 15th titled ‘Walls’ – talk to us a bit about that! What does the song mean to you guys?
SAM: Walls is definitely a new direction for us! We’ve always written in low key synth parts as accompaniments and additional textures, but Walls is the first track where main riffs have been played on a bass synth, instead of guitar. It was a bit of a difficult writing process since there’s so many different sections, and we were struggling for a bit with how to end it coherently, but it all came together when we came up with the huge psych rock outro!
LORCAN: In terms of the content, I believe it's about the walls we put up emotionally to protect ourselves sometimes, all wrapped up in a couple of metaphors, a love story and some huge riffs.
What’s your typical songwriting and recording process?
LORCAN: Generally I’ll come up with a riff or idea that gets me going, then I'll sit down and jam around it, record something, send it to Sam & Jai. I’ll keep working on lyrics/structure and by the time we meet up, it’s often pretty fleshed out already! We will often then whip it up in Ableton as a demo and the fun experimentation begins, aka throw every plugin known to man at the track till something sticks.
What can fans expect from PLANISPHERE in 2021!?
LORCAN: A whole bunch of new singles, and a whole lot more savage riffs! We’ve got so many different ideas and can’t wait to bring them to life.
SAM: I'm just frothing to get on stage again.
To wrap it up let’s do a few rapid-fire Q’s:
Best song to mosh to?
LORCAN: Parasite Eve – Bring Me The Horizon
SAM: Killing In The Name – Rage Against the Machine
Best Brisbane venue?
LORCAN: Brightside
SAM: Greaser
Best beer?
LORCAN: Green Beacon Wayfarer Tropical XPA
SAM: Stone & Wood
If you could tour with one artist who would it be?
LORCAN: Death From Above
SAM: Probably a terrible fit but Tame Impala.
Cheers fella’s!