DJO – JOE KEERY: What’s up?\u00a0
COUP DE MAIN: Have you guys seen Vanity Fair’s series of annual interviews with Billie Eilish?
POND – JAY WATSON: Oh yeah.
JOE: No, what is it?
CDM: On the same day each year, since the start of her career, Vanity Fair films an interview with Billie where they ask her the same questions. This chat today is 10 years on from when you first interviewed each other for Coup De Main, so this feels like our equivalent… It’s time for your 10-year reflection.
JOE: I remember talking to you the first time in my parents’ attic. I was calling from home, and I was really worried about the service connecting because I think you were probably…
JAY: I think I was in America on tour.
JOE: Somewhere.
JAY: I was on tour somewhere.
CDM: I think you were on tour in Australia, maybe Gizzfest?
JAY: Oh, maybe it was Gizzfest – yeah, that’s right.<\/p>\n
CDM: You’re now on the road together as part of Tame Impala’s ‘Deadbeat’ Tour, and Pond have also opened for Djo at some recent headline shows. I’m interested to hear if you have different or similar perspectives on touring, as people who have very opposite experiences. Joe, although you’ve lived out of a suitcase a lot for work, this is the first time you’ve toured an album extensively, and Jay, you have toured many an album extensively.
JOE: We were just talking about this yesterday; we were in the sauna talking.
JAY: That’s right.
CDM: You practised? I’m going to grade your answers now.
JOE: Not intentionally, but we sort of practised. Touring’s hard.\u00a0
JAY: Yeah, we were talking about it yesterday. I, personally, was so excited at the start of touring a lot, and then I went through a few years of being a bit exhausted and jaded about it. And then COVID happened, and it was so much time off that I sort of had an epiphany about how lucky I was to do it – play shows. That’s sort of been my arc with it.
JOE: This is kind of my second year of traditional touring. I had done a little bit in Chicago, but not a ton, so last year was really the first big chunk of touring, and it’s definitely different than working in the film industry, where you’re on the road like you said, a lot, but there is a different sort of thing going on when you’re living in a bus. It’s the whole bus element of the thing.
JAY: Are you in the same spot when you go to film something?
JOE: Yeah, you’re not moving every day, and you’re also not with your pals, and that’s very different as well.
JAY: But it’s similar in that, if you have a partner or something, you’re away from them. And after a month or so, you’re ready to go home. That sort of thing?
JOE: Yeah, definitely, but your experience makes a lot of sense to me. I can see that you could definitely burn out on it if you just are doing it a ton.
JAY: I think so.
JOE: You guys just toured so much.
JAY: We did it a lot, yeah.<\/p>\n
JOE: Do you know how many total shows you’ve played?
JAY: Someone worked it out once. Kea, our tour manager, worked it out for us. Kevin [Parker] asked once. It’s like, thousands.
JOE: Yeah, starting from when, I wonder, would they calculate?
JAY: I think you can go back on Setlist FM.
JOE: You guys opening for MGMT or something.
JAY: All that stuff! I’ll ask them again. They worked it out; it was a lot, but yeah, for me, there’s two challenges with it. One is that as much as you want to try and be creative, you’re just tired, or you either want to sleep or go to the gym, or go do something other than be creative, and it takes a lot of work to be making music every day on tour, or writing. And the other thing is just your relationships with people at home. I’ve got kids now, but even before then, with my girlfriend, it was always this struggle between trying to promote the band, or bands, and not have my relationship fall apart because of it. That’s the really tough thing, I think.<\/p>\n