Tinpan Orange
Subscribe
X

Subscribe to Forte Magazine

Tinpan Orange

For Emily Lubitz, family and music seem to go hand in hand: her brother Jesse is the guitarist in their band Tinpan Orange, she is married to the Cat Empire’s Harry Angus and their two-year-old son has already been to more gigs and festivals than most people will in their lifetime. And while Lubitz and Angus both being in successful bands is great, it can be hard to find time together, but they’ve found a simple solution – book the same gigs.
“In the last three or so years, we’ve just toured a lot together – which is amazing,” explains Lubitz. “Either we’ve supported them on their big tours in Canada and Europe, or toured in Canada alongside them. Our managers often work together to help the family stay together, so we have amazing support and the people organising it are very sensitive to it, and we are really lucky with that.”
It seems the family who play together certainly do stay together – and that trend will continue when both Tinpan Orange and Cat Empire play this month’s Riverboats Music Festival.
“I think it’s going to be great,” says Lubitz. “I’d actually never heard of it ’til they wanted to book us, and then I saw who they had on their line-up and I was really excited. It’s nice that we are all playing on the same day so we can go down together. It’s good when that happens and you can keep everyone together.”
Lubitz’s list of music family members is no doubt impressive, but it’s still not the most interesting thing about her – after all, how many people can boast over 70 million YouTube views for a song they were hesitant to even record.
“I kind of didn’t want to be associated with advertising and jingles, so I was hesitant,” says Lubitz. “But it became so much more than what I thought it was; it was more than this ad, it was this sort of anthem.”
Lubitz added her flowing vocal to the Metro Trains ad campaign ‘Dumb Ways to Die’ which turned into a viral hit, something that never remotely crossed her mind while recording her part.
“My friend wrote the music and produced … it only took me two hours and I’d told him not to tell anyone and that I wanted to remain anonymous. Then a few weeks later he texted me saying, ‘by the way the campaign’s gone viral’, and in one day it had two million hits, so then I was like, ‘tell them it’s me’,” laughs Lubitz. “It coincided with us releasing our latest album Over the Sun, so it was actually amazing timing.”
2014 is shaping up to be a big year for the band, but even more so for Lubitz personally, with her musical family set to grow.
“We are about to start a little bit of a writing phase in the next few months and we are hopefully going to record something by the end of the year, or even have it out by the end of the year,” says Lubitz. “I’m actually having my second child in June, so that’s very exciting. In a way that puts on the breaks a little bit. I hope to be writing up until then, and [then] we will stop playing shows after April.”
When&Where: WOMADelaide – March 7 to 10
Written by Zach Broadhurst