The Brisbane music scene continues to generate a wealth of talented musicians. To shine a light on these often unrecognised artists, enthusiastic locals Luke Hansford and Cam Smith began a blog dubbed, Before Hollywood. After eighteen months work, the pair decided to take it up a notch and create a three-disc compilation of 42 Brisbane bands, Stranded.
Stranded will launch at The Zoo with The Rational Academy (pictured) headlining, with able support from Tragic Athletic, Nova Scotia, Ambitious Lovers and Monster Monster.
Where did they get this idea for compilation?
Luke Hansford: We basically wanted to celebrate the first anniversary of Before Hollywood being up and running. A few ideas were bandied about and a CD was the one we came up with. Originally it was to be a lot smaller but everything ended up snowballing into the final product we have now.
Why did you call it Stranded?
LH: Two reasons. Firstly we were trying to keep in theme with the title of the blog, with Before Hollywood and Stranded recognising albums by Brisbane’s two most loved bands [The Go-Betweens and The Saints]. Secondly, I think it really describes Brisbane’s music scene. We are stranded up here in the north, with bands getting little attention from Sydney or Melbourne.
How did you choose which artists to put on the discs?
Cam Smith: Basically we created a big list of all of the local bands that we liked, which I think was maybe up towards 60 or 70 bands. We had to cut that down somewhat, and eventually came up with a ‘short’ list of 50 bands. I think our original intention was to get in contact with maybe 20 bands and then if any of those turned us down then we’d contact some of the others, but somewhere along the line we just ended up asking all 50 bands to be on it. We thought at least half of them would say no, but in the end almost everyone agreed to be on the compilation! It was at that stage we realised that this was going to have to be a triple CD.
What's the significance of the beautiful artwork on the cover?
LH: The painting on the cover was actually done by Samantha Norman, with Mel Tickle doing the design and booklet stuff. As far as the artwork went, we gave them free range on everything, and we’re quite happy with the end result. Though I wouldn’t say there is any direct significance, it certainly gives off the right kind of vibe for the compilation.
Were there any people or groups that took a particular interest and helped out?
CS: The willingness of the bands to participate, and their trust that we would make something of worth out of their art is the most significant thing. In addition to that, it has been heartening to see people rally behind a project like this, both in terms of the bands, the fans and some of the elements of the local music industry.
Why did you choose to give the proceeds to the Australian Red Cross and the Center for Young People in the Valley?
CS: When it started to dawn on us how big the compilation was potentially going to be, we thought that instead of handing over a little bit of money to so many acts, it would be more beneficial for the community, for us to just give all of the profits to charity. Obviously we never wanted to make any money out of this for ourselves, and it seemed like such a great way for our little project to actually have a real-world benefit that meant something in the grand scheme of things. The Centre for Young People seemed like the perfect choice.
What do you hope this CD set will achieve for the Brisbane music scene?
CS: I don't know that there’s necessarily anything that we’re trying to achieve, per se, other than just to make a document of the bands that are creating great music in Brisbane right now. With any luck we’ll turn some people onto some new acts, and maybe open people’s ears a little bit. We’re hoping that people will come along to the launch to see bands that they normally wouldn’t see and get a copy of the compilation in order to hear bands that they might not have heard otherwise.
The thing is that even with 42 bands on the compilation, we’re really only covering a fairly small subset of the Brisbane music community – there are entire genres that we just don’t know enough about, so they’re not really represented on these discs. Hopefully someone out there will become inspired by what we’ve done and they’ll go and fill in the blanks.
Is this a one-time thing or are there plans to do something similar in the future?
CS: There are no real plans to make another one of these, but then again there are no plans to NOT do another one. If there’s enough interest in this one and enough new bands in the next year to make another one viable then I'm sure we’ll consider it. I know that, personally, there were a bunch of acts that I would have liked to have included on Stranded that we either just couldn’t fit on, or who appeared after we’d already started putting it all together.
Stranded to be launch at The Zoo Friday 15 August 2008. Check our gig guide for details.
