Tropical F#ck Storm on their debut A Laughing Death in Meatspace

There’s nothing subtle about this band. Consisting of members of The Drones, High Tension and Harmony (Gareth Liddiard, Fiona Kitschin, Lauren Hammel and Erica Dunn), Tropical F#ck Storm is their name and A Laughing Death in Meatspace is the name of their swanky debut album.
In the lead up to the album drop, Tropical F#ck Storm made it known they weren’t here to replicate their original bands with sweltering singles ‘Chameleon Paint’, ‘You Let My Tyres Down’ and of course ‘Rubber Bullies’, the crushing finale and the closing track on their debut album. With a focus on electronic drums and synth sounds, the moody and dark singles were a pretty good indication of the album to come, fitting in with the theme of their psychedelic debut album.
“The album is fairly psychedllic, dark, and feels classic ‘Gaz [Gareth Liddiard] songwriting’ in terms of content, and going into pretty detailed descriptions,” explains guitarist and keys player Erica Dunn, known for her place in bands Palm Springs, Harmony and Mod Con.
“There are some really oddball songs; I think one of my favourites off the album is a track about a USSR soviet chess champion, but it sort of ties into the end of the world/robots taking over – it’s quite bizarre. But it’s a fun kind of thing to think about.
“In terms of them being dark, I guess that’s a pretty easy way to describe us,” she continues. “We are having a lot of fun though; a lot of the songs are also sort of tongue in cheek or good analogies of things that we are going through. Sometimes it comes across as being pretty doomsday, but it’s also just one way of trying to come to terms with what the hell is going on in the world today.”
Playing together for less than a year, Tropical F#ck Storm have been on a rollercoaster; spending the end of last year on their Homeric American adventure touring with mates King Gizzard and The Lizard Wizard and Band Of Horses, before spending the summer recording their new album. With their first Australian tour well underway, there’s defiantly a lot of productive work going on for the supergroup.
“Literally, I feel like we just recorded the last song a few weeks ago,” she smiles. “We started only playing really together less than a year ago. Gaz had been thinking about doing something different from the Drones for a little while, and then got in touch with me and I reckon it would have been September when we performed our first show.
“It’s being pretty pedal to the medal ever since in a short period of time, but it’s been heaps of fun,” she continues. “It’s just great being amongst other bandmates who are just mega inspired and really into whatever creative idea comes up onto the table and really just interested in making really original music; it’s just awesome.”
As for the album title, the band coined this one to the malignant affliction visited upon cannibals, and a euphemism for reality utilised by Silicon Valley employees. “The basic premise of that is that ‘meatspace’ is what the Silicon Valley refers to the real world as, opposed to the digital world. I think it’s a fun and terrifying concept for a writer to think about, in terms of human existence being referred to as a meatspace. A laughing death is a reference to what happens to you when you get mad cow disease actually,” she laughs. “It’s kind of another dark observation about humanity and the state of the world. I think when you get mad cow disease, you actually die laughing.”
When & Where: Theatre Royal, Castlemaine – May 26
Written by Chloe Cicero