INTERVIEW: Rising star Julia Wallace discusses her new EP and playing live
Julia Wallace has been an icon of the Perth music scene for some time now, notably appearing in bands such as Man Sandal and Mal De Mer. Late last year, she released her first song as a solo artist, ‘Warm Light’, a quietly devastating piano-based song with haunting melodies and lyrics. It had an immediate impact, quickly reaching over 100,000 streams and airplay worldwide, including on Australian tastemakers Triple J and RTRFM.
On the 24 March 2021, Julia released her debut EP, Place in Mind, which has gone on to similar success. I was super fortunate to get the chance to talk to her on the phone about the new EP and her live plans, including an upcoming show at Barbes on 8 April. Note that this interview was conducted on the afternoon of 5 April.
IN: Hey Julia, thanks for talking to me. So firstly, you play a whole bunch of instruments on this EP, I was wondering when your music education began? What was your first instrument and where did it go from there?
JW: It’s been a long time learning instruments. My family is huge on classical music and I’m the youngest child by a long way, and my older siblings play classical string instruments and I was like, “I want to be different!” *Laughs* Anyway, I started piano and kind of followed that route. I started when I was five and Mum was one of those parents that made me practice every day before school. At the time, I was like, “This isn’t really what I want to be doing,” but I’m super glad that I did. Then I started trumpet when I was about twelve and went more into the jazz route with trumpet but I still played piano as my break from that, because I’ve always loved playing piano. I’ve always liked singing on the side but never really done much of it. Then a friend asked me to join their band, Man Sandal when it wasn’t Man Sandal.
IN: Belgrade!
JW: Yeah, Belgrade. I was in year 11 or something and I was like, “Yeah, this is cool!” But that was my first experience with something that wasn’t like an orchestra, it was totally different to what I was used to doing. But I really love that. Through that band, we all collaborate and write things and bring our own songs to that band. I started bringing some of my own songs, and then I realised I had a super different sound to the rest of them, we each brought a different sound to it. I thought I wanted to explore it a bit more. Then after I finished school, I went to WAAPA for a year and did jazz trumpet. Even though I knew I didn’t want to do jazz specifically, I just kind of did that because I was a trumpet player. I then quickly realised that wasn’t really my cup of tea, but I’m glad I did it, because I got better at trumpet. So I took a break from that last year in 2020 and that was when I had time to write and record this EP.
IN: So did you start writing songs when you joined Man Sandal or were you writing songs before that?
JW: I was doing a bit of… I wouldn’t say it was writing, they were pretty average. *Laughs* I was kind of playing around with chords and stuff, but I’m always reluctant to write lyrics, that’s always the last thing I do. Man Sandal was probably where I first started writing actual songs, so I’m pretty grateful for them asking me to be in that band because it was a super collaborative space compared to other bands I’ve been in since then.
IN: Yeah, I’m a big fan of that band too.
JW: We played our first gig in about two months on the weekend and it was super fun, it’s nice to play with them again.
IN: So, as you’ve mentioned you’ve played for a while in a few different bands, Man Sandal being one of them, but your solo career is still relatively fresh. I understand you played your first shows as Julia Wallace recently, how did it all go? How has it been translating these songs into a live setting?
JW: Good! I was always really nervous to play it live. When I was recording it, I was like, “Ah, nah, I’ll never play this live, I’ll just be one of those artists that just records things.” But then, people wanted to hear it live, so I had to work out how to do that. I’ve only actually done one show.
IN: In Melbourne?
JW: Yeah, it was in Melbourne when I went over there a month ago. It was a solo show, I have a little loop station with which I can build up the piano parts. I’m still kind of working on the solo show, but more recently I’ve been focussing on translating it to a big band setting for the launch this week. It’s sounding really cool. We actually had a rehearsal this morning and it’s sounding really epic. I’ve got drums, guitar, bass, and three flugelhorns, and then me. It’s a huge band and it sounds great!
IN: Amazing, I can’t wait to hear it! So, I’m a really big fan of the new EP, can you just speak for a bit on what’s inspired and influenced these songs?
JW: Thanks! Yeah, so it was kind of nice because it was totally different to what I was doing with my other bands. In my other bands, we always write to release, like we always have that intention behind writing a song and recording a song. Because no one really knew I did solo singing stuff, it was kind of my own little secret thing and I could take as long as I needed to. Some of these songs, especially Warm Light which was the first song I wrote out of these, probably date back to about 2019. I just kept building on my own sound, and whenever I was stressed with trumpet or doing WAAPA stuff I would come to the piano and write songs and pour out my feelings. *Laughs* Slowly I built up my catalogue.
I went through a little bit of a break-up, but this isn’t a break-up EP, it’s more about the feelings afterwards and finding my sense of self again and just kind of overthinking things. But I don’t really write a song with a specific idea in mind, I just kind of write all the thoughts that are going on in my head at the time. So whenever someone asks what a song is about, it’s not really a straight answer, there’s a lot of little things I pull out and only after I read the lyrics through am I like, “Oh, I guess this is what it’s about.” But I never go in with a straight intention of what I’m going to write about, which I kind of like.
(Image by Annie Harvey, banner image by Ella Grainger)
IN: Can you expand a little bit on how a song that you write typically comes about? Do you have any particular process you follow?
JW: Well, I’ve actually been writing some new stuff at the moment, I’ve been getting back into it, which is exciting. I’ve been sitting on these songs for ages but not really inspired to write new stuff because I kept hearing and listening to the mixes of the old stuff. But anyway, I’ve finally started writing some new stuff, which is cool.
I usually just start with a nice piano idea. Usually my songs are pretty ‘simple’ (in inverted commas); the actual chords are pretty simple, but I build everything out to make them more complex. I’ve always loved listening to music that sounds simple or has a simple foundation but is actually really clever. I start with a piano idea and I think of melodies and hopefully find some lyrics. *Laughs* Which is hard for me but sometimes I strike gold. Usually when I get into a zone, I can turn out sounds pretty quickly, but often it’s a bit of a struggle getting the lyrics done. I then record a demo straight away so I don’t forget anything, and I record horns on top of that as I’m recording it, so I don’t really think of horn parts until afterwards. Not all my songs are verse-chorus-verse-chorus, they’re just little ideas that are manipulated and progress through the song with not very strict structures and built up with different instruments. And it’s turned out to be really fun to play live too, because it’s not always going to be what people expect.
IN: Well, it’s definitely working for you, and getting you a fair bit of attention, so that must feel quite good.
JW: Yeah, as I said I had no expectations for this, so it’s really nice to see people listening to it and sending me messages about it. Super nice and super unexpected. I just want to keep doing it now and keep writing some new stuff.
IN: Well I hope you do! How did you link up with Jono Steer (Angie McMahon, Leif Vollebekk, Hiatus Kaiyote) and what was it like working with him?
JW: Oh, so good, he is such a pro! So, I’m in this jazz orchestra, the WA Youth Jazz Orchestra (WAYJO), and they have this grant every year that they give one of their members to do a project through travel, whether that’s going to a conference or recording something or research or anything to do with music. So I was applying for that saying that I had these songs where I wanted to record them properly with someone that actually knew what they were doing, not just my homemade attempts. So I did a bunch of research with Australian artists that I liked and who mixed their stuff and who worked with them. I looked at Angie McMahon’s Salt album, so good. I found that Jono worked with her for that, so I found an email and sent a demo and he was really keen to make it happen.
But then I couldn’t go over, because that was March last year and we were like, “How’s this going to work?” So, what we ended up doing is I tracked it at home by myself, which was interesting because I have a pretty humble set-up and don’t really know what I am doing, which is kind of nice, I just did what I usually do. I sent it to him and he made it sound great! But I actually met him about a month ago when I went to Melbourne and recorded two songs for the future, so don’t know when that’s going to come out, but it’ll be later down the track. It was really nice to actually record in his space in Castlemaine in Victoria.
IN: Lovely! So, you just said you’re working on new material, I know it’s probably a bit early to be talking about this given the EP is fresh, but do you have any idea of when we might hear it?
JW: Oh, I don’t know about that timing wise, but I’m thinking it’ll be another EP, and I’m hoping to go over to Melbourne again to record the rest of it. I’ve recorded two songs at the moment, I think it might have five tracks. But we’ll see how I go writing some new stuff, I’m excited.
IN: Well, thank you so much for talking to us, can’t wait to see you on Thursday!
JW: Yeah, I’m excited!