JB PATERSON
- Feb 25
- 7 min read
Writer: Keeley Thompson
Images: Rebecca Cunningham
Sunday is a soft bruise healing.
The lake wobbles like a glass plate in a microwave. The only motion atop the water’s epidermis are the clouds waltzing through the sky, reflected in 4k precision. The air is silent, as if waiting for our response. Our muted conversation only punctuated by the sputter of onions frying, and the occasional “tschkk” of a beer being freed from its aluminium prison.
A cluster of steely clouds graze the treetops on the horizon then swiftly take a sharp left, as if they recognise that my soft, city-dweller hands and swollen mind need this moment more than they need to ruin it.
It’s important to find moments of stillness when you can, (though the dopamine-junkie brain doth protest) lest you find yourself feeling more and more like a shoelace missing its aglet. Frayed, and increasingly incapable of returning back to equilibrium. Or maybe that’s just me.
Enter, JB Paterson.
A gentle knock on the doorway of reverie, JB Paterson is a settling reassurance that sometimes the escape from dysfunction is through the window. Quietly and gently wrecking you to put you back together like a Sunday reset, his music hands you a set of binoculars to look at the things that really matter.
Akin to a stranger remembering how you like your coffee, re-reading your favourite dog-eared book or a hug from mum after your first heartbreak, there is a human tenderness to JB Paterson’s music - a softness that’s stored only in the small, ordinary moments of life. The moments that remind you nothing is broken, even if nothing is fixed.
KEELEY: Hey Jack, how are you? You just got back from the first part of your tour - how's that all going?
JB: Yeah, good! The tour is going well. Music's pretty hard to live on but, you know. Nundle Rocks was amazing, Charlotte Le Lievre was phenomenal.
KEELEY: Any favourite spots that you've either gone or are going back to? Or any new locations you’re excited about?
JB: Not yet, we've only done two shows so far, but I think everything on this trip is pretty new for me.
KEELEY: I imagine it's quite nice to do something fresh after a while?
JB: Definitely. Going down the same highway all the time gets annoying.
KEELEY: I want to talk about your new(ish) album ‘Whole World’s Gone Mad, And So Have I.’ What was your headspace or inspiration going into creating the album?
JB: I was listening to too much Steve Miller Band, I was obsessed for about three months.
But I think it sort of just happened, it was pieced together over a year and a half. It was a mixture of learning how to write songs with a bit more depth, and then a little bit of Steve Miller on the side.
KEELEY: Was there something in particular that made you choose the album title?
JB: Oh yeah, definitely. It's just the general division of life. You go on your phone and you're like, holy shit, this is insane, everything’s insane.
But is it really? Are worse things happening now, or does it seem like they are because we’re being told so every second? If you had a newspaper, you'd read it once in the morning and then put it down, process it, and it’s done. We constantly get bombarded with largely awful information, and it does feel like the world is going mad, and so am I.
KEELEY: Was there an overall intention or message you wanted to portray in the album?
JB: There was no real intention, I just enjoy making music. I think to a degree it was solely to put another album out, 'cause it had been two years and it’s something I like to do. Sometimes it's fun, sometimes I go completely insane, sometimes it’s hard, sometimes it’s easy.
KEELEY: Was ‘The Whole World’s Gone Mad’ easy?
JB: No, that was probably one of the harder ones, if not the hardest one. ‘Springtime is Coming’ was hard as well. They’re both complex and interweaving albums, and it was hard because you have to make sure songs sound like they go together. When I listen to an album, I like it to sound connected sonically.
I think what made it difficult for ‘The Whole World's Gone Mad’ was because the full band was involved more than they previously have been. It was a lot of perspectives and ideas, and I sort of had to learn how to let go.
KEELEY: What is your favourite track to listen to, and what is your favourite song to play?
JB: It really depends on the day if I’m honest.
Some days I love playing The Waltz and other days I can’t stand it. I could list all these new songs, but nobody even knows what they are, but I like playing them.
KEELEY: A particular favourite of mine from the album is ‘All Smoked Out (All Drunk Dry).’ It’s such a fun song to listen to, and I love seeing it live.
JB: Yeah, that one's loose. Sometimes that song falls right on its ass though, so it [the song] kind of haunts me because it’s really reliant on the energy of the crowd or listener. I’ve played shows where I’ve ended up just screaming the main bit by myself and it’s a bit fucking sad.
KEELEY: You’ve picked out a couple of songs from the album to give us a bit of the back/side stories, inspiration, or history behind them. Shall we begin?
ANNAN BLUES
JB: Oh, that's a song about Conor McDonald getting blotto. He was at Wallaby Creek Festival near Cooktown and he got so drunk that his band left him behind.
It's three and a half hours through the desert to get back by car, and they'd left him because they couldn't find him and they were going to miss their flight. He woke up in a bush next to the little Annan River around 11 p.m. and was looking around thinking, “where's my band”? (There’s no reception up there either until you get closer to Cairns.)
He managed to make it back in time because the plane got delayed perfectly for eight hours or so. He’d managed to hitch a ride through the Bloomfield track, which is a four-wheel drive track through the Daintree and over a ferry. It's an incredible drive.
It’s mostly that, intertwined with a few of my own anecdotes, we’ve travelled up that way many times over the years for the brilliant BMUP festival.
ALL SMOKED OUT (ALL DRUNK DRY)
JB: This is another journey, but one of my own this time.
About 5 kilometres from here, the boys and I were having a party - indulging a lot. It got to about four in the morning and naturally, everyone's tapping out. My buddy warned me he’s a horrific snorer, and I knew I was probably not going to enjoy it.
So, with the last ounce of energy I had I walked straight out the door, into the darkness and walked home, with my broken thongs. It was winter, so it was really cold. There’s a conservation park that links between our houses, so I had to walk for ages through bushes. When I got home the dogs were barking and carrying on, Beck’s freaking out too.
The police were not there though, that bit was fake – luckily. I’d had a few epiphanies on that walk, mainly about seamless albums. This was right before releasing Springtime is Coming.
WHEN I GET OLDER
JB: That's just a generic retirement song.
RIVERBOAT BLUES
JB: This was my peak Steve Miller phase. I wrote that song ages ago, I was just hearing everybody be like “fuck my rent's expensive” over and over again.
I don't get too political I don't think. I don't really enjoy the concept of going hard on people politically. There’s so much of it already. Some people are good at it, but I hate confrontation, I have so much anxiety to begin with that that’s the last thing I want.
THE WALTZ
JB: All the characters are fictional, but they’ve all got traits of people I’ve met during touring or just in random life moments.
I kept thinking of really desolate towns, I think we were watching “Last Stop Larimer” for a bit and I just had a streak of gold writing days. I was doing heaps of writing exercises every day and it started clicking. It was during one of those exercises that The Waltz came to me.
SIGN ON THE FRONT LAWN
JB: Again, probably just lightly political about people struggling with having to move house every six months and rich landlords raising their rent. I just watch all my buddies move house like every once a year. How can you possibly get ahead when you're readjusting and your whole friendship circle keeps changing.
OLD TIMER
JB: Oh, it's my parents, Dean and Leanne. And shoutout to my sister Carly. But yeah, just a little ditty.
IN A WORLD GONE MAD
JB: I’d say this also came from my fascination with desolate or isolated towns, and the stories that come from inside them. It's like working with a blank canvas, one town in the middle of nowhere has a million stories inside of it, but it's not overwhelming.
KEELEY: What’s your favourite biscuit in the Arnott's Assorted Creams packet?
JB: The chocolate Anzac.
KEELEY: Finally, what is next for you?
JB: We’re crunching more shows on that tour, and I’ve just added a few more locations. I’m trying to book tour in Europe, possibly. Should have a new album come out soon, maybe in March.
And then, just record more music for people with Easy Machine. I think I did five or six albums last year for people, and they're yet to come out.
KEELEY: With your new album that's coming out in March, is there anything you want people to know or anything you want to say?
JB: No, I'll just leave it a surprise.
FIND JB PATERSON HERE
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