Indie Rock Band Bad Neighbour Set To Release New Single ‘House Fire’ - INTERVIEW
Local indie rock band, Bad Neighbour, are set to release a hot new single tomorrow titled ‘House Fire’.
Kicking off 2021 with a busy run of Brissy shows at O’skulligan’s and Mountain Goat Valley Crawl as well as lead singer and guitarist, Cooper Riley, supporting ballad belter Wil Wagner from The Smith Street Band, the single release is just the beginning of what is shaping to be a huge year for the band.
Amidst working on their second EP set for release in late 2021 with the help of new lead guitarist Zoe Middleton, we had a chat to Bad Neighbour about ‘House Fire’, recording and a new direction for the band into a more mature and cultivated sound.
Check it out…
Hey guys, how are we!?
Liam: Fantastic!
Cooper: We're all excellent!
Lovely! Now you’ve just come off a busy run of Brissie shows, O’skulligans with Verum and Sky Valley, Mountain Goat Valley Crawl etc. how good is it to be playing live gigs!? What’s your favourite part about it!
Cooper: I think the best part is having Zoe and that people can stand up and have a dance. Just have fun again. It's pretty cool.
Liam: There's a well overdue amount of energy that's just been waiting to be let out and everyone is going absolutely insane now that everyone can stand up and dance again.
Now, first things first, for anyone that doesn’t know ‘Bad Neighbour’ – describe your band in 4 words…
Cooper: EMO
Liam: Punkish
Taylor: Feisty! NO!! Really ridiculously good looking. That should be the four words.
Zoe: Wow
Okay note taken, Bad Neighbour can’t count - except for Taylor haha! How did you all meet and form the band – and does the band name have a specific meaning behind it or are you all just terrible neighbours to have…..?
Cooper: Me, Taylor and Liam have all known each other since we were like what? 13? Well since I was 13.
Taylor: Cooper dated my sister.
Cooper: Oh yeah I dated Taylor's sister in high school and then he beat me up for it, Liam used to drive me to the skate park, and then we met Zoe through a mutual friend and the rest is history.
You’ve also got a brand new edition to the crew with Nic moving on from the band – Zoe !! How’s joining Bad Neighbour been going so far?
Zoe: It's really good!! 'Cause it's all I really want to do is play gigs and being able to with these guys, I feel like I owe them. I'm very thankful, I owe them everything plus a pair of sunnies (Sorry Taylor).
Now let’s talk music... You’ve got a brand new single coming out tomorrow, Feb 15th, titled ‘House Fire’ which we have been lucky enough to catch a sneak peek of (it’s a TUNE guys, certified mosh pit anthem) talk to us a bit about the song! How did it come about and what does the song mean to you guys?
Cooper: I wrote a short story about a woman burning my house down to the ground which didn't really happen but I thought it would make a good story and then I turned it into a song.
Liam: I thought it was a real story, I was like "Woah, he really picks 'em!"
Cooper: Yeah, that one's just a story, it's not a personal thing, I just like to write like that sometimes, write a short story and then turn it into a song I just think it's cool.
Following on from that, what’s your typical song-writing and recording process?
Cooper: Something bad usually happens to me and I'll bring like the skeleton of a song to band practice and they just help me make it better.
Liam: You bring the skeleton and we bring the guts.
Cooper: And then we take it to Callum (Semantics) to record, who makes it actually good. We lock ourselves in the studio for an undesirable amount of time and then yeah!
You’ve had a hectic-ly busy start to the year always, what else can fans expect from Bad Neighbour in 2021!?
Taylor: BIIIG things
Cooper: A lot, a lot, a lot. We're actually about to go back into the studio in the next couple of months, we've been writing our little tooshies off. A lot of our new stuff is completely different to any of the stuff we've done before. It's a little bit heavier, a little bit bigger, a lot bigger actually. We're really proud of it. The new stuff is a more mature sound for us and we're just really, really, really excited to get these ones out there. They're very personal and writing with Zoe is a lot of fun.
Awesome thanks so much for chatting with us! To wrap it up let’s do a few rapid-fire Q’s:
Best Brisbane venue?
Cooper: The Zoo
Taylor: The Tivoli
Liam: Riverstage
Zoe: Jonny Ringos
Best song to mosh to?
Cooper: "Deliver Me" by Parkway
Taylor: I was going to say Deliver Me but "Masquerade" by Northlane
Liam: "Crown of Sin" by Backrider
Zoe: "Killing In The Name Of"
Best beer?
Cooper: Blue Coopers Summer ale
Taylor: XXXX Bitter
Liam: Great Northern
Zoe: Captain Morgan, IT'S A BEER NOW!!
Your favourite up and coming band/artist from the Brissie music scene?
Cooper: Semantics
Taylor: Semantics
Liam: The Beddy Rays
Zoe: BAD NAY NAY (Bad Neighbour)
If you could tour with one artist who would it be?
Cooper: Against Me
Taylor: Movements
Liam: The Smith Street Band
Zoe: Gun's and Rose's
Cheers legends, happy release day for tomorrow!
Be a legend and presave ‘House Fire’ NOW - out February 15th
Aaaand go check out Bad Neighbour at their single launch at The Zoo next weekend - February 20th!
Joined by Hot Reno and Chelsea Drive.
We’ll be there!
BAD NEIGHBOUR SOCIALS
Article by Darcy Goss.