“Nick J. Harvey isn’t just bringing back rock—he’s injecting it with raw emotion, grit, and modern fire,” reads the Melbourne musician and producer’s bio on his website. Debuting with his EP Blues ‘n Greens in 2017, Nick combined his years of theory, performance and production to craft a multilayered instrumental expression that took elements from blues and rock ‘n’ roll and transformed them into a cinematic landscape.

Blues ‘n Greens was followed by the single “El Largo Adios” in 2018. Then his releases stopped. At the beginning of last month, Nick released his first single since 2018, with “Careful With The Bacon, Steven.” We chatted with Nick about the song, his return to music, what happened in between, and what this release means for the future of his project.

—

I guess I’ll start with the basic question to begin with, which is about your background and how you got into music?

How I got into music? Look, my earliest memories of music, or what got me going, was listening to AM radio during the ‘70s. I can remember The Doors being on; “Riders in the Storm” [and] some of those tracks. My grandfather and my dad played guitar, so that musicality was in the family. I remember being a kid, my dad would play guitar to me before I’d go to bed, and things like that. As it moved along, I discovered his 45 singles, which were all of these early ‘60s instrumentals – like The Shadows, The Ventures, probably some early Dick Dale, and some early ‘60s pop – and I remember spinning them up as a seven year-old through this Fred Flintstone recorder, which probably had got an absolutely terrible speaker that I would be horrified as a producer and engineer to listen to now!

[Laughs] You were using a pelican as the needle!

[Laughs] Yeah, as the needle! And I remember spinning those discs, like “Apache,” “F.B.I.,” those tunes from The Shadows, continuously. So, I think that sort of sparked a bit of an interest into that sound or the sonics of the guitar. But the thing for me, funnily enough, is I actually got into playing music late, because I picked up the guitar at seventeen, and that really derived from a visit to the local guitar shop where my parents were living, up in Ivanhoe, and my dad sort of switching out from a Gretsch 6120 to a Stratocaster. I remember walking around, and just walls of Stratocasters, black and white with maple necks, and I went, “Yeah, can I get involved in this?”, [Laughs] and my dad went, “Really?!” I went, “Yeah, yeah, yeah.” So, it was like, “Oh, OK, we’ll see if we can straggle a deal with a base-level sort of Stratocaster to play with.” Then, from there, I was sort of going, “Well, OK, that’s interesting.” I really took to it early on, and I seemed to sort of make a lot of steps fast and forward, because my dad was teaching chords and things like that. So, that sort of gave me the impetus to really get into music and start working it.

It’s interesting, starting with an electric [guitar], because I’ve talked to other artists about this. I think starting with an acoustic and getting the foundations is sort of a good first step, and then, once you have the foundations, getting into electric, then, because then you have the additions of tone and getting the settings right to make it sound the way you want it to sound. Was that something you dealt with, just in terms of getting the tone?

That was certainly it. Like, if I sort of think back to that, and also, where I am now, and my relationship with the acoustic guitar, which I love. I love twelve-strings, and orchestrating things, and all that, but to get back to those earlier times, it was sort of like going, “Oh, I can hear this sort of trebly back pickup sound on a record. How do you get that? What’s going on there?” This was probably the important part; you’re going, “I can hear the guitar, but there’s other stuff around this that’s affecting this.” It’s the context. The context of what’s going on is affecting the overall effect upon the guitar. The other big thing I discovered in my dad’s garage – which is one of those big “Dad’s Garages”; like, double garage, endless amounts of crap – is, “Oh, you’ve got a two-track tape deck.” This was reel-to-reel stuff. I was like, “Yeah, yeah, can I play with that?” He was like, “Yeah, sure.” So, I set that up in my bedroom, and that was sort of where those pennies started to drop. I began to multilayer parts. You’ve got limited skills, you’ve got very limited knowledge, but you’re beginning to experiment with playing around, putting layers together, and you’re starting to go, “Oh, that’s interesting. I can sound like blah-blah-blah record.” You don’t, by a mile-and-a-half at that stage, [Laughs] but you’ve got the idea, at least.

You mentioned that you started at seventeen, so where did you go from there? Did you play in bands? Obviously, the music that you’re doing now is so dense, versatile, and cinematic and operatic in a lot of ways. It’s really about creating mood and atmosphere. Did you start by playing traditional rock and pop, or were you always more geared towards trying to create an atmosphere and a world with your music?

What sort of grabbed me…You’re right about the atmosphere, but what sort of grabbed me with the atmosphere was… – and, again, this is working off the Fred Flintstone record player [Laughs] – …my dad had a 78 transfer to a 45 of Josh White singing “Motherless Child.” And you’re listening to this and you’re just going… – this is even as a kid! – …you’re going, “There’s something going on here. I probably don’t quite understand, but there’s something compelling here.” Then I remember listening back to that as a teenager and an adult later, as you got your skills up, and you’re sitting there going, “You’re creating a mood. You’re actually setting both a period piece of the time with the acoustics, but you’re creating a mood.” That was sort of going, “Now, that’s interesting.” You’ve got just an old guy on an acoustic guitar, but then he’s creating a space that’s going on, that’s transporting you back to…I can’t remember. When was that recorded? Maybe in the ‘30s, or taking you back to the ‘30s. [Editor’s Note: According to an archive of his releases, White’s version of “Motherless Child” was released as a B-side to the single “Jesus Gonna Make Up My Dying Bed,” which was recorded on August 15^th, 1933, and released later that year. It has appeared on several rereleases since.] It’s the same with Robert Johnson, if you’re talking about the blues guys, and things like “Hellhound on My Trail.” I mean, that’s really scary stuff when you break it down. I remember that’s got that peril of, like, “Oh, no, I’m about to slip on a banana skin, and this is all about to go wrong for me.” So, that painting of the mood really sort of got me interested in guitar. Then it was like, “Oh, I can start to do things,” and, through making mistakes, you might play instead of an A minor chord, an A with a B, and suddenly it’s a ninth, and that’s got a different feel to a normal A minor that you’re strumming away as a strummer. So, you start to get this textuality that you’re beginning to explore.

You were mentioning the blues influence there, but I was wondering, were you also influenced in any way by cinematic scores? I think the music you’ve released really does complement that. If it was to be underlaid in a film scene, I think it would be very complimentary.

Um. As I began to develop and get a little bit of a handle on playing and music theory, the two things were Pink Floyd… – I remember that early Pink Floyd – …but also, somebody…I must have been in my early twenties, and my friend gave me this CD. He just gives it to me and goes, “Listen to this, Nick. I think you’ll dig this, but I don’t want you to research who it is; I just want you to put it in, off you go.” So, I drop it in, and it’s Mike Oldfield’s Tubular Bells. And it’s this wonderful journey of layering, and movement, and change, and expression, and it’s also, for me, you start to pull back the curtain. You’re going, “Oh, I can hear parts. I can actually hear parts incrementally added one over the other, over the other that creates a totality,” but then you’re going, “Oh, hang on, if I go back, I can actually work out how this is layered. What’s going on here? The rhythm and things like that.” So, both that sort of early Pink Floyd… – it was Atom Heart Mother. The album with the cow on it. [Laughs] – …and that Oldfield record, especially side one, just before you begin to rock. That end section where you start to rock out with the bass, [Vocalises part of the bassline of “Tubular Bells, Part One”], and it begins to layer up, that you’re starting to go, “Oh, that’s interesting. Yeah, we can do some cool things with the electric guitar.” Then it’s like, “So, how do you do that?”

It’s interesting because I was thinking of the Mike Oldfield thing you were mentioning there, and I remember listening to that record, and part of me couldn’t divorce it from The Exorcist, because I had seen The Exorcist before I had listened to it. It’s an interesting thing when music becomes so synonymous with a film that it sort of…I don’t know if you felt this way, but for me, it kind of ruined my interpretation of the music a little bit. [Laughs]

That, too, I must admit. Because, yeah, I remember watching The Exorcist, and, yeah, that’s one scary movie, especially if you’ve come from an Irish Roman Catholic background! I reckon that adds just that extra edge of, “I’m not sure! That might be true, but I’m not quite…you know?” [Both laugh]

I think no matter how lapsed you are, those things never leave! [Laughs]

You could be seriously lapsed! You could be Richard-Dawkins-atheist-level! If you watch The Exorcist, you’re going, “Ugh! I don’t know! It could go bad for me!”

And you also hear that it’s based on a true story, you’re like, “Oohh!”

Yeah, “Oohh!” That did take a few listens to get through that initial stage. Again, what is it, about eight minutes? Five? I don’t remember.

Yeah, something like that.

And then off we go. I did write a blog about that, as in that whole first side, and that was really interesting to sort of break it up into sections that you could write paragraphs about themes, and about fairies flying around, and mist appearing, you know? So, you’ve got a reasonable written piece. Then, you know, you’re rocking out in the end. But it did take that initial getting over the hump, and getting that Exorcist theme to be owned by Mike Oldfield again, as opposed to the scary girl in the bed [Both laugh], walking down backwards on the stairs!

That’s an interesting point you were mentioning, about writing about the album. I was wondering, do you find that, as a composer yourself, writing about other people’s compositions, or just writing about your own interpretations and feelings about those things, does that aid you, then, in creating your own art? And, generally, some musicians don’t like to be too analytical about music – they like it to just be pure emotions and vibes – and others are more about the theory side, of trying to didactically understand what a musician is doing in terms of creating the atmosphere. How’s your relationship with those things?

Probably in that sense, I’m a little schizophrenic, in that I can operate serving both zones, because to work up and sort of be able to play guitar to some level and to do studio and mixing, that’s a lot of blood, sweat and tears, and you’ve got to know your stuff to a point. It’s not some miraculous thing, you’re just sitting there, “Oh, I can play great riffs!” This is the thing we’re not necessarily told. Like, all the greats – Jimmy Page, Hendrix, Clapton – those guys worked really hard, and that’s what you’ve got to do. You’ve got to learn your theory, and you’ve got to get those things together, and then you learn how songs are structured and composition. Quite a few years ago, I did a course on how to write like Mozart. [Mimes his head exploding] It blew the brain. A, that put me into creating something classical, but also just how voicings work, and harmony resolution, leading voice, those things. Suddenly you go, “Oh, that’s good. I can bring that into rock ‘n’ roll and blues.” Just to enlighten your awareness of what you’re doing. Like you said, writing stuff, I remember there was another blog I did, which was talking about the Howlin’ Wolf song, “I Asked for Water (She Gave Me Gasoline),” and sort of looking at that, and you sort of set that into the time. I remember sort of writing it, cinematically, like, “He’s walking into the church to meet his bride…and blah, blah…happiness,” and you’re perhaps using some of those classic images you’ve seen in cinema and TV to sort of build-up and to think about that, and you get that deeper context that it’s the music, the mood, but also, the pictures of people living. That was probably the thing that I brought back from that track, was the organic nature of “Howlin’ Wolf letting it go,” you know? That sort of thing, and singing, “I asked for water. She brought me gasoline.” That tension. Now, to flip the other side of what you’re saying, one of the things that I talk about… – and people go, “Oh, man! I need inspiration, man!” – …I find, for me, it’s just going fishing. Out in the universe, there’s enough riffs and stuff still out there, luckily, that if you fish long enough, you can start to pull ‘em in and then begin to go, “OK, that’s cool. That’s something.” Then, it’s the process of, “Now, we need to work on that.” It’s like a kid. You’ve been given a child or a kid that’s pretty raw, now it’s your job to grow up with it and let it grow into where you might think it might go, or, alternatively, it might just go, “Well, screw you. I want to go out in this direction,” and then you go, “OK, I’ve got to be cool about that because you’re actually something different or special.” So, it is that balance of the two.

The other thing that I was very interested in… – just before we talk about your career now – …from the music that you’ve released under your own name so far, they’ve been instrumental and without vocals. Is that an intentional thing, in terms of allowing different interpretations of the art, or is it also an element of trying to be conscious of space, and the production, and the atmosphere, and all those things, and adding vocals would distract from that atmosphere? What’s the reason for being primarily music-focused?

Especially with “Careful With The Bacon, Steven,” I had a few people going, “Oh, man, put a shred melody on that!” Don’t know why, but anyway. Then you’ve had a few people, “Oh, put some lyrics on that,” and whatever, and, fair enough, I thought about it. I kicked it around. And then I went off and I listened to different types of music, and I’ve gone, “You know what? I actually don’t think I have to. I think that would actually spoil what that thing that’s been given to me to work through [is].” Sometimes, if you start putting lyrics, you’re kind of imposing your worldview, and sometimes that’s what you want to do, but in this particular piece, it’s like, “No, I don’t want, necessarily, your perspective.” And again, because of media and things like that, you’ve got to provide a description or give some thoughts, and it was interesting for me to go back to it, because I had recorded it a while ago. It’s like, “Oh, I’m actually going to have to think about my own piece here. I remember recording it, but I can’t remember any of the whys or whatever. I suppose I’ll just talk about my interpretation of what it is, which might be different to someone else’s.” I think that’s sometimes interesting with music and, especially, I find, with guitar playing, that you turn up… – let’s say you’re professional, you execute your chops, and you’re all good, in time, you know? Bang, bang. – …and then people come up to you at the end of the night and go, “Oh, man, that was really something. That meant so much to me. You know, you really lifted my spirits,” and you’re sitting there, going, “I was just trying to get through the gig, you know, man? [Both laugh] You know, just trying to get through the songs that we knew and do something,” and then, in a funny way, you’ve actually, unintentionally, reached out to people, or shifted people’s mood, or you’ve added something positive to the universe. So, that’s where it gets interesting with “Careful With The Bacon, Steven”; you don’t overanalyse it. Just go with the journey.

You were mentioning earlier about working with your dad’s reel-to-reel. I was wondering, how do you find production now in the digital age versus when things were tape and analogue? Because, obviously, you don’t have to physically cut and Sellotape bits anymore. Do you find that that’s been a great aid for you, or do you have nostalgia for tape?

Well, that’s a fantastic question, Aaron, and I’m so happy you’ve asked it! [Both laugh] Actually, that’s a really good point of, “Where do we sit with the technology?”, and also, “Where do we sit with the gear, now?” OK, so that’s an important point: Gear during the 2000s versus gear, we’ll say, in the last five years, and, obviously, tape. I mean, obviously, the [reason] why we like the records that we’ve got in our record collection is because they’ve got some particular sonic characteristics. Generally, they’re kind of a bit tubby in the middle. A little bit of highs, but not much. If you pair something pure digital during the ‘90s, it’s all pure digital sound; so, it’s all clean and sparkling, and you’ve got harshness and all those things that are going on. It’s not just the music and recording and performance; it’s the extra stuff that tape and an 1176 compressor does, and going through this particular EQ, and that type of thing. So, that’s almost part of building up the sound. It’s not just capturing it digitally; it’s capturing it raw that makes the difference in where the technology is. I think The Beatles, they replaced the console at Abbey Road at one point, and they went, “Oh, this sounds crap. We like the old one.” Because you’ve got to think, you’re trying to get sound, a big piece of sound, into a tiny little pipe, and how that’s done – the harmonics, whether you hit the levels or not – it’s the construction of all the little sounds, and the effects, and the depths of it that brings it into a totality. I remember, for me, I started getting into what we call digital audio in, probably, about the 2000s, right? To get any of the really good stuff was, like, twenty- or thirty-thousand bucks, and everybody was chucking out their old valve stuff – “Oh, yeah, we’re over that and tape!” – and it was good, but what was interesting for me… – and I had some good bits of gear – … [is] that I couldn’t create what I create today with that gear that I got. Now, mind you, you’ve got a lot more knowledge, and you know how some of this stuff was put together in the ‘70s and ‘60s, but even then, I still think you’d be a little bit challenged if you got put back into the 2000s and had to use that gear to get those sounds. Now, the great part, now, is, essentially, I’ve got a studio now that I can recreate Olympic Studios in 1972, with all the same gear that, for example, Led Zeppelin was using: Helios consoles, Studer tapes, 1176, valve stuff. All of that is at your fingertips right now, and it sounds really, really good. Even with the emulation pedals now…like, Universal Audio has released those pedals, and one of them is the UA line. Now, it’s very hard to turn up a 100-watt Marshall in a domestic situation! For both your neighbours and your partner, as well! [Both laugh] But, with these pedals now, they just sound so real. They sound like the real thing, and if you put your headphones on, if you play through the speakers, you’re getting that same feel out of that. So, in a sense, we’re kind of at this fantastic point where we’ve taken this stuff from the past, we’ve transported it into the digital domain, and now you’ve gotten access to use it. Now, here’s the tricky part: Just because you’ve got the great gear doesn’t mean you know how to use it. And that’s where I think, for me, if I sort of look back, I reckon it took me about, maybe, five years to really get good at mixing. Look, I had the ideas and knew it, but through a couple of revisions of interfaces, and gear, and stuff like that, and also getting some great coaching from friends at Nashville and things like that, it took five years to develop that level of mastery, to come to terms with it and really get to know your gear. The sad part is, you’ve got guys out there on YouTube and in Facebook groups, “When’s the next plugin coming?” Well, guess what, we’ve probably got more than enough, and have you actually mastered all your old stuff to get a good sound? So, yeah, I think we’re at a fantastic point in time.

Yeah, and I also think for a lot of kids coming up now, they’re getting into production through DAWs and things like that, but also, I think for third-level education [institutes] that are teaching music production, as well as any studios – if people intern or things like that – it’s kind of a benefit to your knowledge to know the older stuff, as well. I think it’s a similar thing with cinema; when digital came in, all the cinemas replaced their 35mm projectors, and now they’re trying to bring it back, but projectionists, now, are specialists. Being a projectionist with film is a specialist vocation, now. So, I do think that having a holistic approach to things, having that full swath of knowledge, is very imperative.

I mean, I worked my way through the UA manual with, like, the history of 1176s and 6110 preamps, and tried to understand that. And I think the other thing…the kicker for me, also, too, was actually starting to get some of these physical versions of the products. I’ve got a 6610 preamp that I use, and I don’t know, it’s a human thing. Being able to fiddle knobs, having that tactile experience, suddenly you’re getting it together much quicker. And then, when you use the plugin version, you kind of know how to set the things; you just go, [Mimes turning different knobs and buttons] “Yeah. Duh-duh-duh-duh. Bang. Yep. Mate, that’s a great sound. Bang, and off we go.” So, I think that tactile…So, for me, I think that little bit of the approach of having a bit of a hybrid studio, of having the valve preamps and some real compressors, and…Also, I think with the real guitar pedals, again, it’s being tactile. I can look at it, I can see it. Whereas, if it’s a menu behind a menu, behind a menu…well, you spend about half your time trying to get to the third menu to get the spring reverb of the 1954 Fender amp [Laughs], rather than just sort of having it at your disposal, going, “Yep. Click. Reverb. Bang. Off we go.” Also, the ability to work quickly, that’s sort of the thing that I sort of worked out, going, “If I set this up in a way, I’m not going to get bogged down by the technology.”

I wanted to ask about starting the current project under your own name, the current solo project you’re on. What was the impetus for that, if there was a specific catalyst for going, “I have these songs, and I want to release them under Nick J. Harvey”?

That’s a good question. Look, I’ve always wanted to play guitar professionally, do music professionally, compose, and things like that, and, stupidly, in the 2000s, I think it was, I thought I’d start an IT business to actually help me aid to do that. The problem was that the business overtook my life, with IT being one of the problems. And I think it was around about 2008, and we were starting to put the bullet in the business, that someone recommended that I watch the documentary, It Might Get Loud. I watched that and was like, “Right, count me in, dudes. I’m working on this.” And, at that point, I knew music. I hadn’t forgotten all about guitar playing, but my chops had fallen off quite substantially. Then it was there, like, “Right, I’m going to get on top of this,” and, really, it was from that point – that 2008 point – that I started to work towards that. I remember I got a Les Paul and started to work on those skills, and also started to really dive into mixing, mastering, and composition. So, it’s like, “Oh, yeah, I was good instinctively, but I need to know more stuff.” And what was interesting…out of that journey, I did a couple of trips to the U.S. over that ten years, and what was fascinating was going to Nashville. Walking into Nashville, and you go, “Oh, my God! This is a music industry!” You know, in Australia, our industries are we like to dig stuff out of the ground, and we like to resell homes, and have a banking industry, you know? [Laughs] So, you sort of go, “Oh, my God. There’s all these musicians, and they’re skilled, and they know stuff, and blah, blah, blah.” And it’s always good to talk to the Americans because they’re always encouraging. You say, “Oh, I’ve got this idea. You know, I want to do classic rock that’s a bit cinematic, but I still want to rock out with some blues, you know?”, and they’re like, [Doing an American accent] “Yeah, I really like that idea, Nick. I can see an opportunity in the market for that. I think you’re in the right place. C’mon down a little bit more.” [Laughs, then back to his own voice] And you go, “Yeah, OK! Good stuff!”

Yeah, I once heard an American comedian explain why Americans are like that for people who aren’t from the States. His argument was that the reason Americans have that kind of “can-do” attitude is because they [descend from] the ancestors of the people from the Old World who went, “Yeah, let’s go there! Let’s just see what’s over there!” [Both laugh] Which I think might hold water as a theory!

Look, I reckon it could. What was interesting was that my exposure to American culture was, obviously, through American media, and through that classic period of American television of I Dream of Jeannie and Bewitched and all of those shows, and you get a particular version of America, and then when you get there, there’s two things of, “Well, that actually doesn’t exist, or doesn’t exist anymore,” but also that you go, “Oh, there’s this really gung-ho, entrepreneur, ‘Let’s get out there’ attitude, no matter what,” and you sort of go, “I’m liking this. This is good. This is encouraging,” you know? With the Americans, especially in Nashville, it’s very relationship-based. That was probably the great lesson I learnt in music and business: relationships, relationships, relationships, and the importance of talking to people coming out. And, like, you got kudos that you flew over there and you’re spending time there, and they’re actually taking you seriously, and, “If John can’t help you, I’ll send you to Bob. Bob knows about that.” What’s interesting is, someone you might have known and talked to five years ago suddenly becomes the President of the Nashville Blues Society, you know? “Oh, we’ve got an in to the Blues Society!”, you know? So, yeah, that’s sort of fascinating, just how the Americans work and what their music industry is.

Yeah, I’ve never been to Nashville myself, but I’ve talked to other artists who either are from there or currently live there, and they all kind of make the same point, which is that they feel the Nashville scene, in particular…First of all, everyone there is a really talented musician, so there’s a bit of humility there because you know that the barista that’s serving you your coffee can play you under the table. But, also, it’s not cutthroat; it is all very encouraging, as you’ve mentioned. I think there are probably other scenes in the United States… – because it’s such a vast country with different cultures – …so, maybe, in certain pockets of the country, it wouldn’t be like that. Maybe in New York, L.A., perhaps. But, apparently, Nashville is a great hub for fostering that community. I can’t speak from personal experience, obviously. [Laughs]

And I think what’s interesting when you talk to these guys, a lot of those people there… – I mean, it might have changed a little bit now – …but, at that time, most people were imports. They’ve come from somewhere else. They’ve been on the same journey that you’re experiencing, so they’re very happy to give you a bit of a leg up in getting into that network.

Actually, how do you find that geography, and touring, and seeing other places have influenced your own attitude towards music? I assume you’re somebody that if you went to a different place, you’d want to check out the local music scene. So, I was wondering how you feel that seeing places outside of your immediate proximity influences your opinion once you return home?

Well, when I’m thinking back, especially Nashville, it was kind of like going to the gates of Valhalla. It was like a mythical place that you read on the back of records. Like, Chet Atkins recording at RCA Studio B, and all this sort of stuff. So, it was almost this mythical sort of land of tales you’ve been told, and then when you go there, you’re walking on the same streets that Chet Atkins walked on, for argument’s sake, or you’re trying to find Chet Atkins’ former office and stuff like that. So, one thing I noticed was the history of the place, and you begin to really respect it, and you begin to understand what went on. You go, “Well, Elvis drove down this street, obviously, because he needed to get to Studio A!” So, again, you kind of take it back a step and go, “Even Elvis – dare I say – was a human being! Was like an ordinary person at one level. He was just a damn fine singer and a great performer, but, at the end of it, we’re all humans!” So, that sort of puts it at that base connection level, too. You’re talking to all different people, and it is interesting to go to different cities with different attitudes towards music.

I want to plug your new single and talk about that, but before I do, we were talking about the development of technology. The advancements in technology have offered people the ability to self-release and get music heard on a global level. It’s not just burning CD-Rs anymore; it’s not just making tapes and trying to sell them in your immediate proximity. You don’t have to, now, answer to anyone, in terms of trying to get distribution; you can make the music you want to make and let it find an audience organically. How do you feel about the ability to self-release on a global level for the kind of music that you’re creating?

Look, Aaron, I think it’s a fundamentally fairly exciting time we’re living in, to do this. This is the key: There’s in-the-studio recording, playing music, creating, and that’s its bubble. Then there’s the execution of that, of the business, and that’s really the kicker, because that will give you the exposure, it will give you the dollars to buy gear, and guitars, and live, and eat, and go to nice restaurants, and tour, and all those sorts of things. Part of the drive behind “Careful With The Bacon, Steven” was developing a team around me. That’s really what you need to do as an independent artist, because you can’t do it all by yourself, but also tapping into some of the networks. Like, for example, we’re distributing with MGM, and we’ve developed a relationship with those guys. [Editor’s Note: By “MGM,” Nick is referring to the independent Australian distributor Metropolitan Groove Merchants. Not to be confused with Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, who no longer distribute music] You’re saying, “OK, I’ll work with that.” Then, you’re trying to talk to other people because they can get you on playlists, they can do things like that. So, it’s sort of like developing your own business and developing what material you want to do. And here’s the scary part from what I can work out and from talking to some of the industry people I follow and do courses with, is that the record companies really don’t know what they’re doing in this environment. They’re like, “Well, we don’t really understand Facebook ads, so we’ll outsource it to somebody,” rather than trying to develop in-house talent to come to terms with different campaign strategies and what works and what doesn’t work. So, in that sense, you’re sitting there, going, “Well, I really don’t want to jump in bed with a record company, because they might even know less than I do!” So, I think part of that is working with people and trying to develop your team and your contacts, and getting to work with people to get a plan and get out there and start swinging. That was always sort of the objective with “Careful With The Bacon, Steven,” was like, “Right, we’re going to try to set up all the little business elements. The merch shop. Get a new logo…” – and, my God, that took so long to get right. Anyway, that’s another story – you know, “…Get your website.” Now that was a painful process! Get all those things. Get your Instagram page. Let’s get a social media strategy. You know, all of this stuff takes time, and, for me, the first step was, “Let’s just get this guy out the door and get as much as we can. Then, we’ll start chomping away at all the other elements.” And also, now that we look like we’re professional, and we’ve got some press articles, and we’re talking to wonderful people like you, it’s like, “Oh, we kind of look like we’re professionals!”

Yeah, so, obviously, there was a big gap between this single that you were mentioning, “Careful With The Bacon, Steven,” and your previous single, “El Largo Adios.” I assume COVID, perhaps, was a contributor to that, because the timelines sync up, but does this new single feel like a revitalisation of that Nick J. Harvey project?

Oh, totally! We’re coming out the door, thank you very much, and we’re not going back! Yeah, we’ve really pushed it. And we’re also starting to work on a release schedule of getting some more singles out the door, getting stuff into an EP, getting it into an album, things like that. So, for example, I’m working on a punchy version of “Wonderwall.” You know, a bit more punch, a little bit of aggression, that sort of thing. A bit of slide guitar. You know, a bit more bluesy, but taking some of the elements to say, “Well, that’s a track that people like. That might get some attention.” So, you know, part of that process of building up, getting attention here through something like that, and then releasing another one of your originals. What I also want to do is start releasing a few more bluesy-er things, as well, and, again, a few more rockier things.

With “Bacon,” why did you decide on this track as a reintroduction to the project?

Um…what I wanted to do with reintroducing the Nick J. Harvey thing to the world was sort of say, “Well, here are some of the elements we want to present,” you know? “And here are some of the things that were on about: Tone, shifts, structure, rocking out,” you know? That kind of thing. Then arrangement, production, the sound, all those sort of things. So, I sort of thought, “Yeah, I think that’s a good introduction track.”

And one final thing I’ll ask before I let you go was, was the COVID-19 pandemic part of the reason for the sabbatical? And, generally, what was that time like for you as a musician? I know Australia is a federalist state, so I’m not sure if the lockdowns were handled state-by-state or if it was the federal government making the decisions, so I was wondering, how restrictive was it, in terms of the ability to play or even see gigs?

It was highly restrictive in the state of Victoria. We were locked down like Wuhan. There were periods where you weren’t allowed to go out after six o’clock or seven o’clock. I mean, that’s pretty freaky if you think about that, curfews. Then we had the five-kilometre ring. You couldn’t go beyond your five-kilometre ring.

We had that here, too, yeah. [Laughs]

Then I remember we had police checkpoints. You had to show your papers, comrade. That sort of thing. [Both laugh] So, we were locked down pretty hard, and it went on pretty long. That certainly killed the local music industry here. It really kicked it around. And the other thing, sadly, I think it also kicked around people’s social interactions. I mean, you take it for granted, the ability just to have a conversation and stuff like that, but, actually, if you don’t practice that, you kind of lose the edge, then it becomes this sort of strange experience of trying to talk to somebody. I remember talking to friends in Nashville about this, because they [didn’t get] locked down like we did, but they felt the consequences of that, and they felt the same. Fundamentally, everybody kind of got isolated into their own house, and they couldn’t go anywhere. Pre-that, I had done some work, things were looking good, I had set up some things in Nashville, “Yep, yep. I think we’re going to get this done.” “No, no. Hit restart.” COVID comes through, and that was like, “Yep. Chuck it out the window.”

Well, one thing you mentioned was about people not really remembering how to socialise. I noticed there was an uptick over here when the COVID-19 pandemic ended, where cinemas and public transport certainly got a lot noisier. [Laughs] But then I was thinking, if you were a little kid when it started – if you were, like, four years old, and then you come out of it six or seven – you probably don’t know how to interact in a cinema or something like that, you know?

Oh, yeah, absolutely! You’ve just been out of the loop! If you’re not getting this stuff in kindergarten, what’s it going to be like?

I’ll let you go now, but do you think there was any silver lining to that? Because one thing I noticed was that, during the pandemic, people were really starving, were really hungry for live music, and I noticed that after the pandemic, all the gigs were really filling up. People really wanted to see stuff. But I don’t know if that’s kind of plateaued now, just because people have reaccustomed to it and they’ve started to take it for granted once again. I don’t know how you feel about that, but do you think there’s any silver lining, at a personal level, in terms of it allowing you to have this revitalisation of the project or in people’s interest and appetite for music?

Alright, there’s two parts to that. The first part is, yeah, I think people have started going back to taking it a little bit for granted. I think that’s, actually, a fair comment. “Yeah, yeah. Just more of the same.” Now, for me, it was actually probably a few more years I could work on craft, and, obviously, get my hard disk filled up with more ideas that I’ve got to work through. Look, I made good of the time. I just kept working at stuff, reading composition, and listening. Just listening to records, trying to break them down, and trying to use your tools. During that time, I picked up a twelve-string and was like, “Whoa! Twelve-string acoustic! Man, there’s a lot there!” Especially, if you begin to play parts. Not full barre chords; just parts and bits and pieces, that’s a world unto itself, too. So, yeah, for me, it was a time of, “OK, I got let off the hook. Just go back, keep learning, work your craft,” and, at the end of it, you sort of look back and go, “That’s a good idea.” You kind of feel solid in what you can do, and you go, “Right, not a problem. I can get in there and just go and do the stuff.”

Perfect, Nick. I guess one of the final things I’ll ask is, what can people expect from you going forward?

Well, hopefully, we’ll be getting more singles out on a regular basis. And, essentially, what we’re keen to do is the evolution of the Nick J. Harvey sound. That has the elements of being punchy and rocky, but also, I’m quite happy to release a softer piano piece that might start off in piano, and then might climax to something at the end.

Well, I have to say, your music so far has really allowed that wiggle room to experiment and to add and incorporate different elements. It’s allowed room for expansion. Was that something you were conscious of from the beginning? I think your sound is distinctive, but it’s also very amorphous, too, if that makes sense. Was that always something that was a deliberate, intentional decision from the get-go?

Absolutely. Especially with the Americans, they love to put you into a musical box. “Oh, OK, that’s how this game works? OK.” So, you sit back and you go, “Well, I just don’t want to be in that box, and I just don’t want to be in that box, but what about if we redefine the box a little bit and make it a little bit wider and go, ‘Well, this is the box’?” And then it’s like, “OK! Yeah, man! That’s really cool! I like that box!”, and then everyone’s on board!

Perfect, man. Is there anything you’d like to add before we wrap up?

I’ve got to say, Aaron, I’m really excited by how things have gone over the last couple of weeks since the release. I know at the moment, we’ve got five or six articles, talking to you, we’re getting a little bit of interest off Instagram, bits and pieces, the website traffic’s starting to move, and, obviously, you’re not going to conquer the world in one single, but you’re starting to see a little bit of movement, and, hopefully, I’m getting people on board that are going, “Yeah, I like that. It’s making me happy,” or, “It takes me to a place, and, yeah, I want to get on board.” So, yeah, pretty exciting times.

Nick J. Harvey’s latest single, “Careful With The Bacon, Steven,” is on all streaming platforms now. You can keep up with Nick through his website.

Aaron Kavanagh

Aaron Kavanagh is the Founder and Editor-in-Chief of Post-Burnout. His writing can also be found in the Irish Daily Star, Buzz.ie, Totally Dublin, The GOO, Headstuff, New Noise Magazine, XS Noize, DSCVRD and more.