High School, Rural Tours, and Magic Dirt: An Interview with Gold Class

With their debut album It's You, Gold Class did something to people. Shortlisted for the Australian Music Prize and thrown onto tours and line ups around the country and the world, the anticipation of their second release has been steadily mounting. As one internet commenter puts it: "About fucking time!"

Drum, the new record from the Melbourne four piece, is a step forward: Louder, wider, stronger, braver. Its power and its tenderness almost remind you how human you are. Lead single "Twist in the Dark" is like a welcome punch to the head. Or maybe that's just me.

Noisey sat down with frontman Adam Curley and guitarist Evan Purdey to talk high school, rural tours, and Magic Dirt.

How are you? Are you doing a lot of press?
Adam: We're doing bits and pieces. It's kind of been feeling scattered. Now I guess we're starting to do more, up until now we've had just the one single to talk about so there's not a lot to…

Well you can always pretend, that's what everyone else does.
Adam: Well everyone that I talk to now had heard the album, so it must be out there.

Oh yeah it's in the emails. Stream and or download. Not to be shared! Under embargo! That kind of thing.
Evan: Wow that's exciting. I mean, not necessarily for us.

Surely it is. How long did you work on it?
Adam: A year or so I guess. It kept getting pushed back. We were really keen to get started because we'd been playing those songs from the last record for so long.
Evan: So there wasn't really that chance to work on anything consistently.
Adam: We started about halfway through last year.

Yeah. And what were you thinking when you were putting it together?
Adam: I think we just wanted to start something fresh.
Evan: The stuff we worked on earlier in the year was kind of on the tail-end of the last record, rather than any removal from what we'd been doing. So it was nice to have a break and start fresh. Even though it's still very us, I think this fresh batch has its own identity to us.
Adam: I think it helps thinking about it as "this is the start of an album," because everyone in their mind had an idea of what they wanted to do on the next record. Evan you wanted to do some more melodic stuff with your guitar.

It seems like people often think that punk or darkwave or whatever has to be like, thematically dark and not pop, but it's so nice to hear when it gets fun.
Adam: That's kind of the thing about this band—particularly like post-punk and darkwave—but no one in the band feels at all attached to them. I think when you talk to people who do want to be in a darkwave band, that's when things get really limiting.

Genres are a pretty weird thing in general aren't they…
Evan: I mean especially now. There's access to anything and the fact that anyone can get so bogged down in what something can be is confusing to me. Yeah, there's still limitations instrumentally when you start a band with drums, bass, and guitar, it is probably going to sound like those things. But to put a box around it and say "it's a post-punk band," I don't know…
Adam: But it's funny how much it happens. Not just on the internet but in music circles, all "those" bands from "that" genre play together. I think we haven't really ever felt like we fit in with that.

Yeah, totally. It's also not very generous to your audience to ask them to sit through four hours of the same thing.
Evan: Yeah, totally, why would you want to see four versions of the same band?

If you could describe the record in three words, what would you say?
Evan: It's… very good?
Adam: Haha! I hope it's weird and also personal. Those were the things I was going for. It's kind of… strutting tunes.

Ha! Do you listen to it while walking around?
Adam: I don't. I just exclusively listen to SZA now.

Oh god. Same.
Adam: It's so good. I was listening to it at home and then I left the house and was like "I guess I'll just listen to that again…" I don't really know anything about her, and I don't know what anyone else thinks of the album.

Well you'll be happy to know it's doing very well.
Adam: I'm glad.

What is your audience like?
Evan: I think we sometimes get bros that are confused that it's not this rock spectacle.
Adam: But also like we never really play outside cities.

You should do a rural tour.
Adam: Yeah, I mean, that seems to be the only way you can be a touring band in Australia. I was going to say "I'd love to do that" but then, I don't know that I would. I grew up in North Queensland and I feel like I've spent my time out there.
Evan: I really admire people that do.
Adam: Yeah. That's why I get almost resentful about even living in Thornbury. My plan was to not ever live in the suburbs again. This is far enough.

What was it like growing up in North Queensland?
Adam: Well I was only there 'til I was eight. Grew up on a mango farm, parents were farmers. Lots of riding motorbikes, picking strawberries. Horses, pigs, chickens.

Sounds beautiful. What about you Evan?
Evan: I didn't grow up on a Mango farm. I grew up in Geelong. I think you can find ice pretty easily there but I didn't, I was a good kid.
Adam: Well, yeah, that's why we left Queensland. Not ice, but my brother was getting to high school age and my parents realised there were lots of drugs and teenage pregnancies in that town. I remember being in Brisbane and my sister's friends who stayed there like maybe five of them being pregnant by the age of 15.

What! No! Oh my god.
Adam: Well there wasn't much going on in that town.

Wow I couldn't even get boys to talk near me let alone have sex with me. But I did go to an all girl's school so I might blame it on that.
Adam: Yeah I went to an all boys school run by priests. The real reason I'm in a punk band!

Haha oh my god. What was that like?
Adam: Funnily enough that's where I started listening to punk music. The school itself was not great because I was into art and music and the school put very little money into art programs, and lots of money into sport. Incredibly stifling and homophobic.

Gross.
Adam: Yeah.

What kind of music were you listening to at school?
Adam: I really liked The Damned. I stole the Sex Pistols CDs from whatever music chain store was big then.
Evan: Very punk.
Adam: Very punk. I listened to a lot of local stuff as well.

Yeah that's great. In Melbourne we had Freeza gigs that were mostly like, pop punk. Kisschasy and ska bands and stuff.

Evan: Yeah I remember learning that and being a bit jealous like, I think I went to two gigs during my adolescence and I think it was probably Magic Dirt both times. Put 'em in a skate park and off you go.

Drum is out August 18 via Barely Dressed / Remote Control.

Gold Class will play Volumes Festival this August in Sydney, who just made their second line up announce:

STRAIGHT ARROWS, HIDEOUS SUN DEMON, TERRY, HUNTLY, EXHIBITIONIST, PUBLIQUE, SHADY NASTY, SUNSCREEN, LUEN JACOBS, MATKA, BURNING ROSE DJs.

Check the full line up below. Tickets available here, with first round tickets almost sold out.