Beauty in imperfection
Rufus’ second album allows the Aussie indie trio to bloom, writes Ashley Ropati.
Listening to Australian indie-house trio Rufus’ new album Bloom, the trio’s second studio attempt, you’d never guess they’ve only been making music together for six years.
Sydney-based vocalist Tyrone Lindqvist, drummer James Hunt, and keyboardist Jon George credit their recent international success to a culmination of factors.
Having just finished a United States tour circuit, which included playing the iconic Coachella festival, they are well aware of how surreal it all sounds.
‘‘Coachella was definitely on the bucket list,’’ says vocalist Lindqvist.
‘‘I think we actually got the opportunity to play Coachella last year but it didn’t work out,’’ he said.
‘‘You can’t just say ‘oh, we’ll do it next year’ it’s whether they actually want you or not. It worked out for us, the promoters came and saw a show of ours in LA, they loved it and they said they’d look after us.’’
Lindqvist said the group came about by chance, after discovering they shared a mutual admiration for the music of electronic duo Booka Shade and Trentemoller.
‘‘There was no real direction. It started with me and Jon [George] in Byron Bay, he was doing his sound engineering degree and I was just doing shitty, little acoustics alternative stuff,’’ he said.
‘‘We made four or five songs and then we were working up a live show, got James [Hunt] on board, and then during our second EP, it was when we were ‘We are constantly fulfilled because we do what we love, so we make the song that we want to hear, and we make the song that we love.’ all finding just how we were working together, where we all sat.’’
‘‘It was by that first record it was just a nice machine where everyone felt, I don’t know, felt valued.’’
Now on the back of their sophomore album tour, the trio acknowledge that this time around they’re proud of the raw, imperfection that Bloom offers.
‘‘I think Ty [Lindqvist] said something I thought was very true, that we’re excited to let the imperfections really be a part of the second album,’’ said keyboardist George.
‘‘We really focused on making [the first album] Atlas perfect, we were really happy and proud and it was everything we wanted Atlas to be, and then we really wanted to push ourselves and found the things that were imperfect with this album were what let us take it that extra step,’’ he said.
‘‘People can really relate, like Innerbloom – the last vocals to that song were improvised, lyrically, and the fact that it was just a one-take thing early on in that song’s process, we tried to redo it, over and over, early on, like we do for all the songs we sort of lay down a vocal idea.".
The whimsical Innerbloom has already racked up 169,333 online streams in New Zealand alone.
‘‘We just couldn’t recreate that moment any better, it just sort of remained – a demo vocal on the album.’’
The trio say after a couple of years touring they were ready to get back in the studio and start working on Bloom, after ‘‘catching the bug’’ says drummer James Hunt.
‘‘I think after a year or two years of touring the first album, we were eager to get back into writing,’’ Hunt said.
‘‘There was a lot of music that we were sharing, especially towards the end of that touring cycle and we were getting re-inspired about new parts of the production, the feeling of these songs.
‘‘That was a big driving factor I think, you know, at the start of that writing process there are a lot of points of reference, features within the music that were really inspiring to us. We were listening to a lot of sampled music, with old strings and soulful choir voices.’’
Boasting a debut album that successfully topped the Australian music charts and garnered a staggering six ARIA nominations, the boys from Byron have become accustomed to working a crowd a long way from home.
With an upcoming festival circuit that includes Firefly festival in Delaware, Electric Forest festival in Michigan, Chicago’s Lollapalooza, San Francisco’s Outside Lands and New York’s upcoming Panorama, the trio have some sage advice for aspiring musicians hoping to follow suit.
‘‘Just do it for the right reasons and by right I mean do it because you love it,’’ said Lindqvist.
‘‘You’re never going to get an outcome if you’re setting out for an outcome,’’ he said.
‘‘I don’t know, we are constantly fulfilled because we do what we love, so we make the song that we want to hear, and we make the song that we love.’’