ARUGULA - TRACK BY TRACK
- ballpointpressbne
- 6 days ago
- 9 min read
Words/Interview: Aysha Swanson
Images: Eve Wickson
When Brisbane band Arugula dropped their debut album Roquette Music, it felt like a backyard fire had been quietly lit under the city’s psych-pop scene—warm, fuzzy, slightly chaotic, and full of heart. The record's title alone carries that signature Arugula wink: “roquette” being just another name for arugula, but also evoking retro girl-group energy, cosmic kitsch, and a general lack of pretension that makes this band so easy to love.
We caught up with frontman Aidan to talk through the album track-by-track, but not before diving into the why behind it all—where that cover came from, what it means to write about love (again and again), and why cringe is not just unavoidable, but maybe even essential.
AYSHA: Hey Aidan thanks so much for meeting with me today, keen to get into Arugula's debut album 'Roquette Music' track by track! First I have some questions about the album as a whole, what was the inspiration behind the title and cover for 'Roquette Music'?
AIDAN: So, yeah, roquette. obviously, is just like the other word for arugula.
AYSHA: Oh my God, I didn't even I think of that, thats so clever, I just read it as like 'rocket music'.
AIDAN: Yeah, well, that's what heaps people are doing, and I'm liking that because then it lends itself to The Ronettes and 60s girl groups and stuff, which I love. So. I kind of like how it has all these random little meanings and I feel the whole project's being built on just shitty puns. To be honest, I probably could have got a lot of bit more creative with the whole name of the record, but I was just like, it's the first record. Say what it is, it's roquette music.
For the artwork we got Luke Player who's from The Pinheads, or Luke Spook is his solo. He's been an artist that I've been in love with for ages. I think the first bit of merch I ever bought was some of his art, I've been a fan for like over 10 years. Yeah, and I just thought, it's our debut album. We may as well go the whole Hog and get someone I love to do it and yeah, he killed it. I'm so stoked with how it came out.
AYSHA: In terms of the content of the album, would you say there is a theme that ties all the songs together?
AIDAN: Yeah, there's a few. I think it's pretty lovecentric. I feel just my almost go-to theme if I start writing a song. I think that's just because all the music that I started listening to was just like love music and especially when I first started writing music myself, it was really simple love songs and whatnot. So I guess that's just still engrained.
I think theres also this theme of like follow your gut a little bit. First song, 'Love, Love, Love' is just straight up about adoration and shit, which is funny and cringe at the same time, then there's, 'Our Love Is Back Again' which is when you've broken up with someone you got back with, then 'The Wringer' is a breakup song, then 'Moving Too Fast' just speaks for itself. Definitely very love centric, like lusty, I guess. There's 'Vanilla Beans' which is kind of a hate song. I didn't really like how more lower class people are treated in Brisbane. I feel there's actually a pretty big divide between city type people, and then you go to The Valley or West End or whatever. So that's what that song's about. So I guess a spectrum of love to hate is very present.
Track 1: 'Love Love Love'
AIDAN: We wanted a song to open the album that wasn't too in your face fuzzy to start it off. I feel that if you did that, there'd be such a large audience that would, “oh, shit, that's what the album's like” and then they don't want to listen to anything. So I wanted it to be a tune that speaks to everyone. It's an old one, I think that was the second track on the album that we wrote - I was trying to rip off 'Malela' by The Brian Jonestown Massacre. I thought it was sort of a song that everyone can get into and kind of has that big drony bit, which I love. I got my housemate Mimi Versace to play violin on that part. Theres also some sitar in there, I think there's one part where there's like three layers of it going, it's real drony kind of sound. Thats inspired a bit by Daisy Rickman who has very drony, interesting stringed instruments which I've been loving. I'd love to incorporate the sitar into our live performances, I saw Alex from Pop Radio play it live down in Brunswick Heads and I was like, "fuck, I need to do that", just for one song, at least.
Track 2: '12 Bar Altered State'
AIDAN: I think I was inspired by Canned Heat a bit, kind of very simple, bluesy music. Then it was like that mixed with droniness of like, Moon Duo and Wooden Shjips. Basically, just lose your mind or disassociate for a bit. That whole song lyrically is about bettering yourself and changing your perception for the better. That's a fun one. I think I like to play this one live the most. It’s probably my second favourite song on the album, its got such a fun intro as well whete I can focus on vocals because I don't play guitar initially. It took ages to get the fuzz tone for that song. I don't know, I've got so many fuzz pedals and I was just like swapping them in and out and in and out. It's so difficult, I've got this, ideal fuzz tone which I'll probably never find.
Track 3: 'Like That (I’m Not Going To Be Spoken To)'
AIDAN: This was our last single before releasing the album. I think there were three others that we released last year, 'Basking the Sun', 'Our Love Is Back Again' and 'Orange Door'. We were recording the album the whole of year last year but we didn't want to just not release anything the whole year. So we did these three songs, released one of them, did three songs released one of them, etc. That was the second last song that we wrote though. I think we're all kind of jazzed talking about releasing it as a single. Super Rolling Stones inspired. It's like Mick Jagaggery - I think this is one of those songs it's like, "oh, that lady, I'm better off without that lady" kind of energy. I guess it's about having self respect and just putting boundaries up with very difficult partners and whatnot. That one's a pretty fun one to play live as well. That breakdown came together really fun as a band. Usually the breakdowns are written as a band and then the verse and chorus I've predominantly written.
Track 4: 'Our Love Is Back Again'
AIDAN: This ones about going back to an old relationship. You know, you're only human and you go back. If it works, it works and sometimes it doesn't. I'm happy to put that as like a time stamp on my life. I'm not going to be someone that deletes music. Even if it's old songs, that's what I was going through in the song. As I was saying, love songs are the first kind of vocally, what pops into my head. I guess I'm probably just always thinking about that stuff, which is good and bad and hard and easy. It was a fun one recording that, we did that all as a band when Annie was still in the band as well doing the backings. I think all five of us sung at least one part in it. In the outro, I was listening to Patchyman and I had like that triplet delay. It's like reggae influence, why we put that in there? I was doing that kind of drunk Viagra Boys- I wasn't actually drunk- but really drunk delivery in the very end of it. Phoenix wrote all the keys parts on that. He had such an awesome old YC-10 organ that his dad or grandad had that he's brought to the band. It's a shame that he's not in the band anymore because that was such an awesome sound.
Track 5: 'Dirty Water'
AIDAN: So this is a cover that I decided to turn into a love song for Brisbane . The original song by The Standells is about Boston, then I heard another one about someone else covered it and dedicated to London. It's funny, like, we've had a couple of old blokes come up at shows being like, "oh, I've heard that cover and this cover, and yours is great". I kind of wanted to add a cover because of all the '60s music that I listen to, there's always always so many covers on there. So I was just like, I want to keep that kind of energy still there. I actually, I want to do a covers EP.
Track 6: 'Vanilla Bean'
AIDAN: This song is kind of about suit guys, just not appreciating artistic types and working class people as humans. The whole song I'm calling them vanilla people. That's the oldest song on the album, we played that at our EP launch like two years ago. I really like Lachie's drums, especially the way he plays on the ride, its fun. That was the hardest song to mix. There were just so many parts, I was just overwhelmed with it for ages, it definitely was the longest to mix. It was actually funny, I recorded the vocals for every single song in the last week before handing it in because I wasn't happy with it all. But yeah theres so many layers of shit in this song, like glockenspiel, three pianos - organs, mellotron and keys. I think pretty much every song has at least Tambourine.
Track 7: 'Bask In The Sun'
AIDAN: Yeah, this was the first single that was released in April last year, so definitely the oldest track. Thats the only song we got mastered by someone else besides Owen Penglis from Straight Arrows. In retrospect probably feels a bit high-fi, a bit wider compared to the thinner sounding tracks.
Track 8: 'The Wringer'
AIDAN: I was listening to a heap of country influence and psych. Theres this band Glyders that are still really monotonous and reverb heavy but have a kind of country influence and I wanted to bring that in. We got Mimi playing more violin on this song as well. This is our favorite song to play live, we kind of jam it a little bit as well, so it's not actually the shortest. That one's about breaking up with your partner, but still living with your partner and feeling awkward doing anything in the house - getting put through the wringer. It's one of two songs that have more of a Fender Rhodes piano sound instead of organ, but there is a bass organ. Yeah, that was the second last song we recorded. I feel it's a dark horse. Yeah, it's a bit different.
Track 9: 'The Orange Door'
AIDAN: This was, I think us trying to mimic Straight Arrows. Pretty poorly, but uh yeah, that's also a fun one. This ones about Savile Row the bar near The Beat in The Valley - there's a little bar with an orange door. It's just a really nice bar I would go to when I was going out heaps as a 18/19 year old maggot. That one's actually about alcoholism, which is kinda serious.
Track 10: 'Moving Too Fast'
AIDAN: This ones the longest on the album, similarly to our last ep we put it the longest at the end of the release. Yeah, I have this idea that hopefully one day I'll have the confidence to ask someone who we're playing with and get them up to do solo. 'Cause there's like this massive dip where someone could, jump on stage and then play. Yeah. I don't know, in my head, I want that to happen because it's so sick when you see the support act coming on stage. 'Moving Too Fast' is about me feeling hyperactive. I feel I can't sit still sometimes. It's like, yeah, just slow down, I guess. Pretty self explanatory. This ones definitely very inspired by The Seeds.
AYSHA: Whats your favorite track on the album?
AIDAN: At the moment it's 'The Wringer' or 'Like That'. Although i cringe at my lyrics on, like, three quarters of the album. But then my housemates say you gotta just lean into your cringe, and I'm like, exactly right. If you're an artist you're always going to be in your head about something. Whether it's the recording or whatever the fuck is. Cause, yeah, when I mixed the album I did it over, like, two months, but I feel like I was just in my room for, like, six hours a day looking at the computer putting cables into different bits of hardware or whatever. I kind of hated it, but now I'm really excited to do it again, because I haven't really done any proper recording for Arugula in like six months. But yeah will definitely release some stuff before the end of the year cause I cant stop.
ARUGULA
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