Interview: Broods talks writing process and tour essentials!

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With the holidays around the corner, the music industry is settling in for a solid few weeks. One that won’t exactly be doing the norm are New Zealand brother/sister duo Broods. With a new record coming out this June and just coming off a US arena run with Two Door Cinema Club, the band is booked to headline Electric Coastline back home in New Zealand! For my chat with Caleb and Georgia, I headed to the back of the arena to catch up on the bus. It was a casual, low key vibe for our chat and was definitely unexpected. The duo is incredibly down to earth and Laughs were had throughout. We talked everything from the writing that they do separately versus when writing together to how this specific project came to be. Keep your eyes peeled for Broods back in the states and for all my international friends, catch the duo out with Tove Lo early next year!

You have a lot going on right now with the new record just coming out in June. Doing your own very successful headlining run and now being out as main support for Two Door Cinema Club. maybe the three things you had to bring with you while on tour?
Georgia: Makeup wipes definitely. Sometimes you can’t have a shower after the show. Laptop.
Caleb: Labtop definitely.
Georgia: So we can work.
Caleb: So we can make stuff. Usually it’s a playstation but I’ve dropped that this time for a bit more productivity this tour. What else?
Georgia: I think just the people on our crew, we can’t live without.
Caleb: These specific people we needed to bring.
Georgia: This tour’s awesome because our whole crew are just people that we’re really close to.
Caleb: The A-Team.

And I know you’re only one show into this run but obviously you played in Boston not that long ago at Royale being at about a thousand capacity but obviously this is a bit of a bigger stage (Agganis Arena). Two Door an international band as well. Maybe how was last night and kind of hopes for this run?
Caleb: Last night was awesome.
Georgia: Yeah it was really cool.
Caleb: It was a smaller room then tonight.
Georgia: But good crowd though. Amazing crowd.
Caleb: Yeah I think on this run, we’ll see a lot more of our fans there as well because I think our fans have similar tastes. Where as like in the past, we’ve traveled with like really big pop acts so maybe a few more people will actually know our music.
Georgia: I felt like that last night. Definitely a decent amount of people knew what was going on.
Caleb: Yeah it was a lot better energy for our music then what we usually get.
Georgia: On a support tour.
Caleb: Usually it’s quite tough. You have to work hard to win people over but last night was easy.
You have a pretty similar fan base.
Georgia: Hopefully that’s not the peak of the tour. It’s really cool. Two Door, they’re such awesome guys. We’ve only just met them but they seem super lovely. Just really nice and relaxed which is always good because sometimes on a big scale touring situation, it’s sometimes really stressful for everybody involved. Some people don’t handle stress very well. Nobody seems to be too grumpy on this tour which is a blessing.
Maybe just grateful I mean you both have toured the states so much and the experience has probably made it a little bit easier.
Caleb: At every level. At every sized venue from 150 to 20,000. Still stressed.

Then speaking of the record, I know it only dropped five months ago. The sophomore record. Obviously you’ve been working together for so long, being brother and sister. Is it something where you’re even working on new music or do you think that’s still a while away?
Georgia: We’re always writing.
Caleb: We’re writing but at the moment I think it’s kind of very separate.
Georgia: Passion stuff. Passion projects.
Caleb: I think at the moment we’re just finding ourselves as writers in a separate sense. Where as like up until now, we’ve only been together.
Georgia: We’ve always been writing an album.
Caleb: So it’s been nice to work on your own skills set in whatever way you want to.
Georgia: Not being on a deadline or anything. Just purely writing.
Caleb: And without Broods in mind.
Georgia: Yeah without setting a goal. Just experimenting and it’s been fun. It’s nice to just kind of take the time to fulfill that part of your needs as a songwriter.
Caleb: Trying to get all the crap out before we get back into the writing routine.
Get out all the weird.
Caleb: All the quirky stuff.
Georgia: Sad stuff.
I interviewed this guy, Dave Monks, who’s the lead singer of this long lasting Canadian band Tokyo Police Club and that’s what he called his solo project. He was like I just need to get out all the weirdness.
Georgia: Yeah and the stuff that we write together is so much more structured and so much more defined and polished. Like when we write our own stuff, especially for me it’s just a vomit of everything.
Caleb: Where as I write by myself and maybe get sixteen bars and then I’m like, well, next one!

I like it! Then I talked about how this is the second record. You guys saying that it’s a little more structured when it’s the two of you versus when you’re on your own. Maybe how does it go for the two of you? Is it something where you’re always in the same room together? You each kind of take the lead on songs in the writing?
Georgia: Majority of the time we’re together for Broods. Especially on this record, like every single song we were in the same room for the whole writing of it. Even like the more down beat songs.
Caleb: It just depends who’s in the right place. Like who leads the composition you know. It could be me, it could be Georgia, it could be Joel.
Maybe how is that? I know you worked with the same person for both records and you obviously have worked on songs with other people like Troye Sivan and Lorde. How is it to kind of bring people into the process? Obviously all talented song writers.
Caleb: It’s just different. Something fresh.
Georgia: It’s always good because it makes you kind of learn from other people for one. Everybody writes in slightly different ways. It’s nice to just kind of be exposed to different ways of doing things and it’s a good way to learn. It’s a good way to remember to prove yourself when we get into the room with somebody that doesn’t know what you’re capable of. You kind of want to show them so you’re always kind of stiff arming. Like, “I promise I’m good! I promise that I do contribute!”

Then is there someone that would be a dream for you to write with? Like current or could be passed as well?
Caleb: I admire a lot of people that do the same stuff as me so I don’t know if I would want to write with them because I would be like well what do I do now.
Georgia: Your dream collaboration would be Robyn.
That’s a good one!
Caleb: Yeah I love everything that she makes.
Georgia: Me too!
Caleb: I think she’d be scary though. I’d be extremely intimidated but I think I’d have a lot of fun.
Georgia: Yeah, I think that’s kind of good though when you feel like you have to step up like I was saying before. Prove that you are doing what you’re doing for a reason.

Then for the two of you, this may obviously be the same thing, the first concert that you can remember going to and the first CD or record you bought?
Caleb: I think it was the same concert. The first one I can remember was our dad’s BeeGees tribute band but that doesn’t really count.
Georgia: The first artist we probably ever saw was Brooke Fraser, a Kiwi act. We went for our mom’s birthday and it was so amazing because she’s an incredible songwriter. Amazing singer and she’s a massive influence of mine from a very, very young age. Yeah me and my sister and my cousin snuck into the backstage of the arena to meet her afterwards. Now we know her which is pretty buzzy.

I’m sure yeah. That’s incredible! Perfect then I know you have a lot coming up from what I understand. You have an overseas tour with Tove Lo in the new year but what is the plan for Broods in these next few months? I know this is a pretty short run with Two Door.
Caleb: After this, we head back down under and do this summer run through Australia/New Zealand so New Year’s festivals and things like that because that’s when like all the festivals happen down where we’re from.
Georgia: Summer. Just chasing summer!
I like it.
Georgia: We just run away from winter months.
You just want summer time all the time.
Caleb: Well I want winter all the time.
Georgia: We just always are doing festivals and they’re summer. You don’t really hear of winter festivals but that’s going to be fun. It’s always fun playing summer home shows. Just a good vibe. After that, I think the next thing that we know about is Tove’s tour which is going to be so much fun. We’re going to so many new places that we’ve never been before which is super exciting.
Caleb: We might have a wee chance to start thinking about new music as well.
You’re together all the time.
Georgia: We don’t have any excuses.
If one of you have an idea, you can just grab the other one.
Georgia: I think we’ll just kind of keep chipping away at stuff.
Caleb: Then bring it together and see what all happens.
Georgia: Just keep working at it.
Caleb: It will probably be something completely different but we’ll see.
Georgia: Who knows but we honestly have no idea what the next record is going to be like or whether if we’re allowed to do another one. If this one does well enough that we can get another one.
I believe in it, I think it’s going to be alright. Already has been doing well so.
Georgia: I mean we’ll just keep doing what we’re doing.
Caleb: There will be a lo-fi one.
Georgia: Might have to engineer and produce.
Caleb: Mom and Dad may have to help us out.

Then maybe to end it off, you guys are obviously still relatively young. Was this something that you always intended to do together? Did you both just enjoy pursuing music and it happened naturally?
Georgia: It was pretty clear that we wanted to do music from a very, very young age.
Caleb: It was always Georgia’s plan.
Georgia: I didn’t have a plan b.
Caleb: I was working on a plan b which I was happy with but this is better.
Georgia: But it has always been a dream to do it as a duo. We’d always play music when we were young. We just kind of didn’t really see it going any other way.
Caleb: I think if someone else came in, it wouldn’t work.
If someone came into the duo?
Caleb: I don’t think another person could handle us. From a writing sense maybe.
Georgia: Joel comes pretty close to being the third member though.
Caleb: Close as he is really.
Georgia: Pretty much.
Caleb: He just gets to stay at home.
Georgia: Doesn’t have to tour but touring is so much fun.
Caleb: He doesn’t get to do the fun stuff.
Georgia: He did come on tour with us for a little bit when we did our album tour in the states. He missed his kids so much.
Caleb: It was the first time he had been away from his kids and his wife, both of them, since his kids were born.
Georgia: And he was just like I just want to go home so bad. We’re too much!

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Colleen

Colleen has been writing about music since 2009. Interviewing bands since the glory days of Warped and has continued to do so for now over fourteen years. As well as doing freelance for other publications, the love for everything rock continues today.

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