Yeah. This is the one you’ve been waiting for. Today, Psychedelic Porn Crumpets drop their sophomore LP High Visceral {Part 2}, a sprawling lucid dream of reality-altering riff work, acid-founded lyricism and more psychedelic juice than ever.
We asked frontman Jack McEwan for a track-by-track rundown of the new LP. Where did each track come from? Which issues does High Visceral {Part 2} tackle? Find out, and take your first listen to the record, below.
How differently have Psychedelic Porn Crumpets played the game on High Visceral {Part 2}? Pick the mind of Jack McEwan while you take your first listen.
Nek
The opening track is a fast paced, heavy hitter to get your head nodding and fix you up for whats to come. It’s about all of sorts of things really; the whales have left Earth due to global warming and taken all other sea creatures with them.
It was a bit of a homage to Douglas Adams’ Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy where the probability machine turned the missiles into a bowl of petunias and a whale. I like that nonsensical tomfoolery.
Gurzle
It’s themed around our generation who have been given a broken planet to fix but we’re too immersed in virtual realities and force fed entertainment that no one really cares, or chooses not to at least, it’s easier to escape into a world of colour and imagination than come to terms with having no money while searching for a job you don’t really want to attend.
I did have a part where I shouted “what happened to my $7 footlong” because I practically lived on them, I think it’s just a mega release of youth-interpreted life being launched aimlessly at a very high speed.
First Light in the Garden at Chipping
First light is me sitting up in the early hours of the morning watching the sun come through my bedroom window at mine and Luke’s old house. I think it had been quite a big night so I wanted to fall asleep but my brain was off dancing around in all sorts of places. I remember just watching the garden transcend from darkness into full colour over an hour or so and it was really beautiful.
Ergophobia
Me and Luke used to work with my old man, my brother and our good friend Josh doing piling in the middle of the city, we built anchors and were in this giant hole for a good six months working on the foundations for a 30 storey building.
We both hated it but needed to pay for rent, tours that were coming up and to afford the production of the second album. I’ve been on building sites a lot but that one took the cake, it was mind numbing, Ergophobia is the fear of working so it’s a summing up of the time spent pouring concrete.
Move
Move is a track about sitting up at night pondering our place in the universe, if there’s any another planets teeming with life or that might be home to old abandoned satellites from previous intelligent beings. I wanted the music to accompany that thought and build into this giant opening that sounds like a grand discovery.
Buzz
This track came pretty late into the mix and was one of the last tracks we worked on before finalising the album. It’s fairly self explanatory, I watched the trailer to Christopher Nolan’s Dunkirk and had previously just finished watching Band of Brothers for the first time, soooooo epic!
I was in one of them ‘how terrible are humans’ frame of minds and thought – what would an outside perspective think if they saw everything unfold? So it’s a mix of modern politics and not learning from the past, augmented with peaceful aliens tutting at us. Bad humans.
Coffee
This little gem is about all the times me and my girlfriend would head off on little day trips and drive out of Perth getting lost venturing round the many magical National Parks WA has to offer.
Dependent On Mary
Mary was one of the first songs we wrote as a band. It’s about my first couple of weeks living in the barn In Southport contemplating the mess I’d got myself in. My car broke down in the same week I quit my job, the roof was missing panels, I shared my bed with a jubilant group of opportunist mosquitoes, we had no hot water, my phone smashed and in those days there wasn’t Internet around so I was uncontactable.
It was beautifully peaceful, but then I ran out of weed and couldn’t afford anymore so reality kind of struck all at once.
It’s Not Safe To Leave This House
This is the lollipop song of the album, I love how warm it feels even though the chord progression is kind of wonky. This was written at Chipping, again gazing out of my bedroom window when I was looking for work (I think the majority of songs I wrote at Chipping were about looking for work) and every day that passed without finding something, I started to feel more useless until I didn’t even want to go outside.
I became a prisoner of my room and just played guitar not caring about much, then the government saved me, good ol’ dole. I got a job in a bar a couple of months later but it seemed the safe option of getting a degree before pursuing music was just as unsafe.
November
I spent over a year tinkering with November, the music I wrote in one day which I was pretty chuffed about but I couldn’t find any lyrics that felt strong enough to accompany the progressive themes of the track. I had put the song down for about a year and went up the farm to work on some lyrics.
Being surrounding by trees and streams, green and blue, it sets you into the most tranquil of states, so it’s about me and my girlfriend’s trips to Swan Valley, heading down south, sharing a love for the universe and always looking out for each other in the lucky little spot we have in it. Remembering to live in the moment.
Psychedelic Porn Crumpets are taking High Visceral {Part 2} on tour all over Australia. Find all the dates and info below.
Thu 20 Apr – The Crown & Anchor, Adelaide – Event – Tickets
Fri 21 Apr – Yah Yah’s, Melbourne – Event
Sat 22 Apr – Fresh Hop Beer Festival, Launceston – Event – Tickets
Sun 23 Apr – The Brisbane, Hobart – Event – Tickets
Wed 26 Apr – Rad Bar, Wollongong – Event – Tickets
Thu 27 Apr – Oxford Art Gallery, Sydney – Event – Tickets on sale soon!
Fri 28 Apr – The Northern, Byron Bay (Free Entry) – Event
Sat 29 Apr – Miami Shark Bar, Gold Coast – Event – Tickets
Sun 30 Apr – The Bearded Lady, Brisbane – Event – Tickets
Fri 5 May – The Prince Of Wales, Bunbury (Free Entry) – Event
Sat 6 May – Settlers Tavern, Margaret River (Free Entry) – Event
Sat 27 May – Rosemount Hotel, Perth – Event – Tickets
