Intercooler play the EkkA on Saturday 16 August 2008.
Six years ago Intercooler released their debut album Old School Is The New School to critical acclaim. They toured extensively up and down the east coast of Australia, and have played at festival favourites Livid and Big Day Out.
With the release of their second album Forever Or Whatever, Intercooler have gone from strength to strength. They return in October to play the new Sounds Of Spring festival but, before that, be sure to catch them at this year’s EkkA – which, in our opinion, is the absolute best reason to go.
We caught up with bassist, Joel Potter.
How was your recent U.S. trip this time around?
Joel Potter: Really good. We did the CMJ festival in New York. We also did some shows in Los Angeles, London and Singapore as well. It was us and Mary Trembles (our drummer Damon Cox’s other band), which worked out really well. We took two bands on the road and because we shared the drumming and all that sort of stuff we had pretty much the same equipment and we’re all pretty good friends as well so it was fun (laughs).
Did you have a favourite spot?
JP: New York and London were really good but Singapore was probably the most crazy. We'd never been to Asia before. I think when you go to New York or London they kinda have a lot of similarities with the way that the culture works and the way people view bands and fashion. The whole process of going to a gig is similar there to what it is here.
Singapore is completely different. We played in this beautiful place with chandeliers, sit down reserved tables and people got really dressed up (laughs) They also had these corded off areas where there are different ticket prices for the room. You get to stand in these more important areas closer to the stage if you bought a more expensive ticket – I don't know how it works exactly but it was really weird for us. Very different to what we're used to. So, that was probably the most amazing part of the trip. They also looked after us really well, picked us up from the airport and put us in really nice hotels, which we are definitely not used to at all. (laughs).
What about New York – surely they have nice hotels?
JP: We stayed at probably the worst hotel we've EVER stayed in. We got to this hotel and went upstairs to walk through this tiny, tiny little hallway, which was like full on Turkish prison kinda stuff (laughs). Then there's this entire row of tiny little blue doors, which were really close together, and we are going 'What the hell is this?' We got to our room number and walked in and the room was basically the size of a walk in wardrobe. Two single beds with a four-inch gap in between the two beds and no roof! They're like boxes literally with a lattice roof. (laughs) It was nasty! Two of the guys actually bailed and found friends to stay with, that's how bad it was (laughs).
Are you looking forward to playing the Sounds Of Spring festival?
JP: Yeah, definitely. It’s gonna be fun. We're also up in a couple weeks doing the EkkA with Faker. Two gigs in Brisbane over the next couple of months and they're both at the Showgrounds (laughs).
Ah, so your status has advanced to 'Showground Band' now, huh?
JP: Yeah we've given up playing 'The Zoo' now we're just doing Showground tours apparently. Somehow we've stepped up but I don't know how that happened. (laughs)
Intercooler play the EkkA on Saturday 16 August 2008 with Faker.
Forever Or Whatever is out now through Plus One Records/Shock.
