Midway through a rain-fucked weekend at Camp A Low Hum, deep within some lush New Zealand forest, Sydney power-sensual triptych Black Vanilla congregates in the centre of a humid cabin. It's humid because of the rain, but it would have turned out pretty humid anyway, with Marcus Whale (Collarbones, Scissor Lock), Lavurn Lee (Guerre, Cassius Select) and Jarred Beeler (Marseilles) concocting a steamy potion of sultry grooves and exquisite R&B vocals. The Camp A Low Hum throwdown was the first overseas jaunt for Black Vanilla but they're on the path to seducing the world one, dance floor at a time.THUMP: I saw you guys in New Zealand a few weekends ago, when did you get back?
Marcus: One week and three days. And you [points to Lavurn] came back two weeks and three days ago.Are the three of you competitive? Inside and outside of Black Vanilla?
Jarred: Only in sports.
Marcus: Jarred and I play tennis together.
Jarred: We play wall ball often.
Marcus: There's a fierce wall ball vibe going on among our friends.
Jarred: But musically, no.
Lavurn: We are as one—the holy trinity.You all have successful established projects. Do you consider Black Vanilla to be a peripheral outlet?
Lavurn: Well, initially it was our fun project on the side.
Jarred: It still is that.
Lavurn: But I think it's taken over more rein. Personally, I'm enjoying that it's becoming my main thing, and these things that were my main projects before are now my side projects. It gives those projects less pressure in some ways.
Marcus: This project is less high-pressure anyway. We don't really care what people want us to sound like. We're just happy to go at our own speed, we're not on some record company's time, and we're not trying to make something that sounds a certain way, not pandering to someone's idea of what is "cool".
Jarred: Our priority is making the songs sound good live. The live show is our main baby. The recording comes second. We just don't put too much pressure on ourselves.There's a humour in your songs that leans towards jokiness—the Destiny's Child shoutouts on "Natural Feeling" for example—is it hard to overcome that with sincerity?
Marcus: I feel like it's very sincere.
Jarred: We first have to look out for what we enjoy playing, if we enjoy it, the audience will respond accordingly.How have things changed in Sydney since you've starting playing? There seems to be a fresh crop of electronic production talent, but I guess that's always been there.
Marcus: I think we've changed, the sort of audience and style that we explore. A lot of this stuff, the new dance music thing, is a bunch of young people doing stuff that has been going on in Sydney for the past 20 years. That's been renewed by this new crop—DJs like Benjamin Fester, nights like Heavenly, producers like Cliques, Dro Carey/Tuff Sherm, and Gardland. Sydney's a really big city, four million people, and there are things going on that we don't know about, and stuff we didn't know about until recently. So I think culturally things have changed, but perhaps they go into sonic zones that have already existed.Your music is decidedly sexy, do you think audiences aren't as awkward about sex as they once were? Is that why kids go to dance shows instead of rock shows?
Marcus: I think there are sexy rock musicians, and sexy rock performers.
Jarred: Like Making.
Marcus: Making are very sexy.
Jarred: People are more responsive now when it comes to getting up and dancing.
Marcus: We used to play slower music, it's become a lot easier to increase the tempo and play in more of a dance music style. I think it's just instinctive for our audience to dance to these faster tempos.What's the grand plan with Black Vanilla?
Lavurn: I think the way we run is that there are no expectations for anything to happen. That's how it started. Not to sound cliché, but it just snowballed from there. We're just playing it by ear. I don't have any end goals, personally.
Marcus: We have one end goal, to get sponsored by Adidas and Pocari Sweat.
Jarred: And to get signed to Planet Mu. But for now we'll just play shows and release mixtapes.Black Vanilla will get down at our Sydney Thump Presents show on 28 March with Softwar and Ariane. It's free. Make sure you RSVP.
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Marcus: One week and three days. And you [points to Lavurn] came back two weeks and three days ago.Are the three of you competitive? Inside and outside of Black Vanilla?
Jarred: Only in sports.
Marcus: Jarred and I play tennis together.
Jarred: We play wall ball often.
Marcus: There's a fierce wall ball vibe going on among our friends.
Jarred: But musically, no.
Lavurn: We are as one—the holy trinity.You all have successful established projects. Do you consider Black Vanilla to be a peripheral outlet?
Lavurn: Well, initially it was our fun project on the side.
Jarred: It still is that.
Lavurn: But I think it's taken over more rein. Personally, I'm enjoying that it's becoming my main thing, and these things that were my main projects before are now my side projects. It gives those projects less pressure in some ways.
Marcus: This project is less high-pressure anyway. We don't really care what people want us to sound like. We're just happy to go at our own speed, we're not on some record company's time, and we're not trying to make something that sounds a certain way, not pandering to someone's idea of what is "cool".
Jarred: Our priority is making the songs sound good live. The live show is our main baby. The recording comes second. We just don't put too much pressure on ourselves.There's a humour in your songs that leans towards jokiness—the Destiny's Child shoutouts on "Natural Feeling" for example—is it hard to overcome that with sincerity?
Marcus: I feel like it's very sincere.
Jarred: We first have to look out for what we enjoy playing, if we enjoy it, the audience will respond accordingly.How have things changed in Sydney since you've starting playing? There seems to be a fresh crop of electronic production talent, but I guess that's always been there.
Marcus: I think we've changed, the sort of audience and style that we explore. A lot of this stuff, the new dance music thing, is a bunch of young people doing stuff that has been going on in Sydney for the past 20 years. That's been renewed by this new crop—DJs like Benjamin Fester, nights like Heavenly, producers like Cliques, Dro Carey/Tuff Sherm, and Gardland. Sydney's a really big city, four million people, and there are things going on that we don't know about, and stuff we didn't know about until recently. So I think culturally things have changed, but perhaps they go into sonic zones that have already existed.Your music is decidedly sexy, do you think audiences aren't as awkward about sex as they once were? Is that why kids go to dance shows instead of rock shows?
Marcus: I think there are sexy rock musicians, and sexy rock performers.
Jarred: Like Making.
Marcus: Making are very sexy.
Jarred: People are more responsive now when it comes to getting up and dancing.
Marcus: We used to play slower music, it's become a lot easier to increase the tempo and play in more of a dance music style. I think it's just instinctive for our audience to dance to these faster tempos.What's the grand plan with Black Vanilla?
Lavurn: I think the way we run is that there are no expectations for anything to happen. That's how it started. Not to sound cliché, but it just snowballed from there. We're just playing it by ear. I don't have any end goals, personally.
Marcus: We have one end goal, to get sponsored by Adidas and Pocari Sweat.
Jarred: And to get signed to Planet Mu. But for now we'll just play shows and release mixtapes.Black Vanilla will get down at our Sydney Thump Presents show on 28 March with Softwar and Ariane. It's free. Make sure you RSVP.