Last night we had the awesome pleasure of opening for Scottish rock outfit Biffy Clyro who are on tour at the moment in Australia.  The show was at The Hi-Fi and playing that room was a hell of a fun 50 minutes.  A big thanks to the crowd for getting there early and being so amped for a band you didn’t know.  Here are some pics thanks to Kelh from FasterLouder.

In June last year we were fortunate enough to have the opportunity to fly over to the USA to make a record with a producer named Kevin Augunas who has made records with Cold War Kids, Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeroes and Yves Klein Blue to name a few.  Don’t ask us why he wanted to work with a small, independent band from Brisbane, but we are incredibly grateful that he did.

Kevin worked out of an amazing studio called Fairfax Recordings in North Hollywood, Los Angeles, which was more like a museum of awesome vintage gear than any traditional studio we’d ever seen before.  We were over there for about 2 weeks and it was one of the best experiences a new band could possibly hope to have had when starting out I think.

Here’s a bit of a video of our time in the studio with Kevin making our debut self-titled EP.

While we were in Los Angeles last year recording our EP with Kevin Augunas, one day before going into the studio, Kevin decided to take us on a climb up to the Hollywood sign.  At the time we didn’t realise that it was ludicrously illegal to climb up to the sign and that it was freaking difficult to get to. 

After hiking for a couple of hours we finally reached the sign, bruised and bleeding, only to set off motion detectors and an alarm. We stayed up there long enough to get some footage of us sitting on the first “L” before a park ranger came out and chased us away.

If Kevin wasn’t seven feet tall and didn’t pioneer the way through the scrub we probably wouldnt’ have made it. It was ridiculously good fun though and no one in LA would actually believe we went up there.

While we were on tour in Sydney we played an acoustic gig at this little bookstore cafe. Greg and Dave went to find a place to do vocal warmups and stumbled upon an awesome room in the downstairs part of the shop. We felt inspired to record a song down there. So here’s Start a War in a Bookstore.

After touring our EP down the East Coast of Australia for the last two weeks we got home yesterday.  We’ll post about the tour a little later but this one’s all about the Brisbane launch.

To each one of the more than 450 people who made it along to The Zoo on March 5 we’d like to thank you for making our EP launch an amazing night for us.  Thanks to Timothy Carroll and Tin Can Radio for playing some incredible music on the night as well.

Here are some photos and a few videos from the show.  Andrew Tallon and Elleni Toumpas were great behind the lens as always.  Check out their work!

On Friday night we launched our first record, our self-titled EP.  We also premiered our first ever music video for the song “The Rafters”.

It was directed by Brodie Rocca, produced by Bec Blomberg, and stars Chris Beavon and Katrina Lilwall.  Thanks guys for doing such a wonderful job and for working so hard.  We owe you immensely.

So here it is, our first video.

What a way to finish the year!  We had such an amazing time on this tour.  Thank you to everyone who made it special: the bands, the crowds, owners of the couches we slept on, Michael the best taxi driver ever.  Here’s three minutes worth.  See you on the road again next year!

Last night the four of us sat down for the first time in a while and played music the old fashioned way: four blokes sitting in a circle, acoustic guitars, vocals, playing brand new songs for each other for the first time.  It was, dare I say, inspirational.  It was the sort of thing that reminded us why we love music so much.  Before there was TV and internet and mp3s, people used to sit around and play music for each other.  Hearing songs last night that were fresh and raw and unfinished and full of honesty and love was a really powerful thing.  When you hear songs I think you should be hearing and feeling a little part of the person who wrote them.  Songs are like sharing a story, three minutes at a time.  Last night was like that.  I felt privileged to be sharing music in that way with three guys who are a constant inspiration to me.  I don’t want to get all choked up here but the point is it was special.  Music is special.  And we shouldn’t ever forget it.

Hello friends

Our first single “The Rafters” just found its way up onto Triple J Unearthed.  Now that it’s up there we’d love it if you would be so kind as to click your way over to our Unearthed page http://www.triplejunearthed.com/montpelier and have a listen and rate and review the song.

Without asking too much (we hope), while we’re on the subject of Triple J, if you feel like requesting “The Rafters” on Super Request that would also be amazing.  Just head here: http://www.abc.net.au/triplej/requests/make_a_request.htm and request your socks off.

Thank you.

Love Montpelier