You can’t keep a good band down, and for sassy trailblazers Hussy Hicks the past few months has seen them throw themselves back into their pre-Covid reality of making music and taking it to the people.
Since early 2020 the band’s core duo of singer-songwriter Leesa Gentz and guitarist Julz Parker were presented with some overwhelming challenges, culminating in the loss of their house and recording studio during the recent devastating Northern NSW floods.
Having escaped the rising waters of their flooded residence by boat (as well as rescuing an elderly neighbour by kayak along the way) the band have once again stepped up and stepped out, delivering a unique new EP as well as playing a stack of shows both locally and abroad.
The newest fruits of their recorded muse have come in the form of a belting new EP, ‘Same Boat’, another passionate distillation of their gutsy core sound, while also melding in their love of classic 80’s rock.
The newest single from the EP, ‘I Am Not A Dog’ also sees the band getting political and unleashing a stomping blues-rock howl of punk-ish defiance at the bias given to the propping up of the sporting and gaming industry during Covid, while music and the arts were left to flounder.
This is no ordinary EP though, with the band embracing the technology age and accompanying the EP with a mobile gaming app, featuring three 8-bit video games for each song, as well as band related news and tour dates. To say that it was somewhat of a hit would be an understatement, with the app hitting no. 2 in the Apple app charts upon release!
We recently had a chat with Julz to discuss the newest EP as well as find out where they’ll be taking their live show next.
Congratulations on the release of your new EP, ‘Same Boat’. I was hearing a bit of a classic 80s rock era influence in the tracks ‘Same Boat’ and ‘Capitulation’. Is this EP a precursor to a new album to follow on from your last long player, ‘Gather Up the People’?
There is definitely a huge nod to our 80s influences in the Same Boat EP. Leesa in particular loves artists such as Cindy Lauper, Pat Benatar and Chrissy Amphlett and the song ‘Same Boat’ really lent itself to those 80s vibes. We started a full length album late last year with these tracks and a whole bunch more, but when we lost the studio to the February 2022 floods (and spent a lot of time cleaning mud off everything) we decided to focus on getting the EP finished first. Having a musical project to dive into really helped us keep some semblance of sanity.
I was intrigued by the unique angle you’ve taken with this release, in making it available in conjunction with your own custom designed mobile gaming app! How did the process play out? Pretty wild that it hit number 2 in the Apple app charts – a hit of a different kind for the band!
I had always wanted to release a song with a playable film clip/game and it just got to the time when we were about to release ‘Same Boat’ and our friends James and Jordan from Monkey Noise just took the ball and ran with it. I think within hours we were all 8-bit characters and the storyline was in place. We all had so much fun with that game that the boys suggested they would make games for the other two songs on the EP. One thing led to another and the app was born. It was pretty amazing watching it zoom up the charts on release week.
The last few years have been particularly challenging for you, with the impacts of Covid, combined with the trauma of the devastating floods. How are you feeling about the foreseeable future and have you managed to get yourselves back on your feet again after the impacts of the floods to your house and recording studio?
It’s definitely been a crazy couple of years and we’ve had to learn how to do some things we didn’t expect to learn. We are really excited to be back touring and can’t wait to get back into the studio and finish the album we started just before the floods.
How have the current shows been playing out – the gigs seem to be coming through thick and fast again now!
We’ve been having a ball - we just got back from our first trip to Europe since 2020 and we just finishing off a WA run of gigs with a sold-out show in Fremantle. So much of our life is enhanced by playing live shows, so as soon as we felt it was doable again we pretty much released the ‘Same Boat’ EP and booked shows everywhere we could get to.
We are back in Europe again for a few weeks in December and have some shows in place for the European summer / festival season - it’s been great to us over the years and it’s so good to see those dates as part of our year again.
In the midst of another epic run of shows, the erstwhile juggernaut known as the Hussy Hicks will shortly be jetting off on yet another European tour, before returning for a whole bunch of extra Australian shows throughout the first quarter of 2023.