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Interviews

Want to help RACKETT take over the world? Frontwoman Rebecca tells us how

Last week RACKETT dropped a live video for I Tried To Quit as part of Extra Support Act, a new competition aimed at giving some choice up-and-coming Aussie bands a leg up. They were hand-picked by The Rubens to participate in the comp, but they need your help to win.

To find out about the new track and everything else RACKETT have in the works, we took five with singer and guitarist Rebecca Callander.

Photo: Daniel Boud

After joining forces with The Rubens for Extra Support Acts, RACKETT are well on their way to total world domination. We caught up to find out how you can play your part.

HAPPY: Hey Bec, how are things? What are you up to at the moment?

REBECCA: Hi Happy. Things are moving, always making music, making connections, making mistakes, making progress. We just launched a huge campaign with The Rubens, EXTRA Gum and Youtube. It’s a competition we were asked to perform in by The Rubens to showcase Australian talent and give an independent Australian band (hopefully us) the chance to develop their career. We decided to perform an unreleased single called I Tried to Quit. Since performing it live for The Rubens, we’ve gone into the studio to record it properly and we’re looking at releasing it in September and heading out on tour again.

HAPPY: First things first, thanks for playing our last show! Did the band have a good night?

REBECCA: Thank you for having us at your Needle in the Hay showcase. It was fun to play OAF main stage, it was a great night. Thank you.

HAPPY: Could you run us through why you chose I Tried To Quit for the EXTRA Support Act comp?

REBECCA: We needed to choose a song that hadn’t been released, that was engaging and that would show off as much of what we do in under four mins. We chose this track because we felt it was the strongest from our unreleased catalogue and since then have decided to record it and officially release it in September.

HAPPY: Have you been playing the track live for a bit? How did it come together?

REBECCA: We’ve been playing it live for a few weeks before filming. Actually I wrote the chorus of the track four years ago when I was living in Melbourne. I started a little punk band there before I came back to Sydney to form RACKETT. I revisited the demo earlier this year and thought this chorus has to have a proper go. I did some co-writing with Jakob Keysell to form the rest of it, Kat put in a lead guitar solo, the girls brought the sass and people liked it.

HAPPY: Can you walk us through the comp itself, for those who don’t know?

REBECCA: Basically it’s an online voting competition, the more the watch the more you vote. The Rubens have four acts, Alison Wonderland, 360 and Five Seconds of Summer the same. Each major artist picked four up-and-coming Australian acts to perform a live version of their original work. Winner takes home some pretty sweet prizes including a performance at The ARIA Showcase.

HAPPY: How do we vote and how long do we have?

REBECCA: Just go and watch the video all the way through, share it with your network, add it to your playlist. The longer you watch the more you vote.

HAPPY: The Rubens say they caught you live recently and really dug it. Did you peep them out in the crowd one night or was that a surprise?

REBECCA: Total shock, though I did meet Will (The Rubens) at Secret Garden festival 2017, I saw him watching us play then we hung out after and we’ve talked about recording at his studio, the Bunker.

HAPPY: What else do you have coming up? You’re playing King St Crawl this year I saw.

REBECCA: Well we’re always on the move. We’ve just wrapped on a new EP and we’re releasing the first single I Tried To Quit (studio version) in late September. These are our live shows for the rest of the year (so far):

 

31st August – Chippo Hotel, Sydney
2nd September – Waywards, King Street Crawl, Sydney
14th September – Red Rattler, Bedrock Birthday Bash, Sydney
22nd September – Surry Hills Festival, Sydney.
28th September – The Cambridge Hotel w/Psychedelic Porn Crumpets, Newcastle
30th September – The Lansdowne Hotel, Festival of Doom, Sydney
5th October – Unicorn Hotel w/Moody Beach, Sydney
6th October – Crafted Festival, Gold Coast // Outside tribe Festival, Brisbane
12th October – Molo Live w/The Superjesus, Canberra
13th October – Narrabeen RSL w/The Superjesus, Sydney
13th October – Oxford Arts Factory, OAF Birthday Bash, Sydney
19th October – Manning Bar w/The Superjesus, Sydney
20th October – Tattersails hotel w/The Superjesus, Pentrith
21st October – The Cambridge Hotel w/The Superjesus, Newcastle
26th October – The Workers Club, I Tried To Quit Single Launch, Melbourne
27th October – Kyneton Music Festival, Victoria
3rd November – Festival of fisher’s ghost, Campbelltown
10th November – Ozasia festival, Adelaide
17th November – The Factory Floor, I Tried To Quit Single Launch, Sydney
1st December – Jungle Love Festival, Sunshine Coast