There’s no stopping Brisbane band Ball Park Music. They’ve been getting plenty of radio love for their song ‘She Only Loves Me When I’m There’, from ‘Puddinghead’, their third studio album in four years. Soon they’ll be hitting WA as part of their Trippin’ the Light Fantastic Tour. We chatted to guitarist Dean Hanson to find the secret to all this productivity.
“I think we just get a bit antsy all the time.” he said. “Whenever we’re out on the road doing tours we’re always thinking about getting back into the studio and coming up with ideas and I think it works vice versa, whenever we’re in the studio making music we can’t wait to get back out onto the road and play that for people so yeah I think we’ve just always had that attitude that if we have material to release then there’s no point really holding it back just in case because I mean, the world could end tomorrow and we’d be pretty upset if we didn’t release material that we’d had. So there’s no point holding it off.”
Ball Park Music’s Trippin’ the Light Fantastic Tour promises a unique experience. According to their press release, the show will feature, instead of the holographic projections, a performance “in 3D without any visual aid! All five members will appear as moving, three-dimensional objects.”, their website promises. Hanson explained the story behind the band’s tongue-in-cheek promotion.
“We were sitting around and we got the initial press release, I’m not sure who wrote it, might have been a publicist that was working for us but we read it and it was a kind of run of the mill press release tha , you know, bands tour all the time and press releases come out every day and we sat around and thought that’s kind of boring. If I read that I wouldn’t want to go and see that show. So we made a piss take press release and wrote it up and said there’d be a lighting show that’s as good if not better than ones we’ve had before.” he laughed.
“But it should be really good, the lighting director we’ve got on board for this tour is designing a really cool show, and yeah, we’re definitely trying our best to make it really great. Everyone in the crowd’s going to get a pair of Ball Park Music 3D glasses to take home, which is totally useless, absolutely will not have any effect on the show whatsoever. But we got 10,000 of them printed just because that’s our style.”
However, not everyone quite understands Ball Park Music’s quirky humour.
“It was kind of a bit of a forehead slap moment with a lot of people asking us when we released that like ‘are you guys actually going to be there or, what’s the deal? Are you guys going to be at the show?’ and we’re like ‘Oh my god, people, come on. You obviously don’t know us, everything we say is sarcastic or not serious.’ So we’re hoping a lot of people get there, get their 3D glasses, put them on and think ‘What? Are these supposed to be working? What’s the go?’ and then hopefully we finish the show and they walk off saying like ‘Wow. That 3D gig was awesome. It was mind blowing. They looked like they were really there. [Laughs]”
In addition to their show at the Astor Theatre on October 24th, the band will also be returning to Margaret River the following Saturday. They previously toured their with Sydney band Boy and Bear.
“We’re playing down there and there’s lots of ticket sales so that’s always exciting. I think you end up staying in a house that the pub owns which is up the road and they have a ping pong table there and it’s just an absolutely ideal situation for touring.
“We’ve got a couple of days off which will be lovely. I think last time we were there there was a bikie convention or something on so we didn’t want to venture out into the town too much but this time maybe there won’t be any bikie conventions and it’ll be safe to explore.” he laughed.
Sophie Joske
Catch Ball Park Music at the Astor Theatre on October 24th and the Settlers’ Tavern in Margaret River on October 25th. More information and tickets available here.
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