As you may have realised, the boys in The Stiffys have had some time off touring after lead singer and bass player Jason Leigh had a skateboarding accident. Forte caught up with Jason and got the inside scoop on exactly what went down.
“I’ll give you an absolutely honest answer. I was ten feet in the air, my board was on fire and I was doing like a quadruple kick flip and all these ladies saw me in mid air and they were clapping and blowing me air kisses and I suppose, while I was catching all their air kisses in mid-air, I got a bit distracted. I quickly did a back flip and just didn’t land it properly and broke both my elbow and wrist. I actually now have two pins in my elbow and a gnarly scar. Everything I said was absolutely true, but the scar thing is definitely true.”
Luckily, he has recovered and has just released a new EP from the Stiffys Art Rock Two, which is the latter in a two-part EP exploring art rock. This release is very different for Jason and Adam with the inclusion of guitarist Devon D´Arjauro, marking the first release from the band as a three-piece.
According to Leigh, “Often you look back on records and you can’t handle them. After six months you never want to hear that record again, but with this one we are pretty psyched about it.”
Art Rock Two differentiates from the bands prior release, as this is their first record that has included a producer – and not just any producer, Aria nominated Steven Schram.
“We have a lot of different sounds in this record because he just does weird stuff. Like one of the songs in the record ‘I wanna give you all of my love and then you’ll be like oohh baby’, he actually captured all the annoying buzzes that my amp makes and made them the best part of the song. He embraces mistakes. If it was up to us we would try make it too perfect but he wanted all the static and for it to feel real and raw and not over produced,” Leigh says.
In the spirit of exploring the experimentation of Art Rock, The Stiffys will be hitting the road on The Art Rock Two tour stopping at 17 different locations. But this tour is a world first, with the boys actually making the shows entirely 3D.
“It’s a bit top secret at the moment because we are starting this weekend [the tour], but everyone will be wearing 3D glasses and we are going to be just doing some really artistic and modern things that people can only dream of. It’ll all be in a whole new dimension.”
Written by Alex Callan
When & Where: The Loft, Warrnambool – September 24, The Workers Club, Geelong – September 29, Golden Vine Hotel, Bendigo – September 30 & The Eastern, Ballarat – October 1
