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 There’s no better way to get in shape ahead of a major tour than by consuming large quantities of alcohol and enjoying way too many late nights out, explains SOMETHING WITH NUMBERS’ mountainous frontman JAKE GRIGG. NINA BERTOK listens and learns.
Something With Numbers’ latest and last single 89 Freedom Street from their third album, last year’s Engineering The Soul, will see the band take to the road for the final time in 2009 before Grigg and co. take some time off to recover from eight years of non-stop work … Sort of.
"Normally by now we’d be thinking about our next album, but I think we’re going to take six months off just to clear our heads a bit," the vocalist announces. "I don’t want to be forced into making anything and, to be honest, I don’t really feel like I’m ready for the next album. We’ve all got other projects happening which we’ll focus on for the time being and when the time is right, probably next year, I’m sure we’ll get that bug all over again."
Griggs’ own side project will see him teaming up with The Matches’ frontman Shawn Harris as the duo Maniac, and fans of both bands can expect a new album from the vocalists some time in the very near future.
"Shawn has been flying over a few times and we’re been writing an album together," Griggs states. "We are both doing the vocal parts and playing all of the instruments as kind of a duo piece. There is some computer programming, but I definitely wouldn’t call this project electro. It’s very fresh and different."
And probably just what the singer needs too after going through some tough personal issues during the making of SWN’s most recent record. While Griggs claims he is in a much better place now, he admits his life had been a mess for quite some time.
"It was a weird time, it’s hard to think about that period of my life and I actually don’t even remember a lot of it because I blocked out so much," Griggs confesses. "I was pretty depressed, there was a lot of pressure and I was doing a lot of drugs and alcohol which all ended up getting me at once. I didn’t know how to handle that and it came through in the music I was writing. The album came out with quite uplifting, upbeat pop songs but I was writing from a very dark place."
Engineering The Soul also saw Griggs truly come into his own in terms of both his songwriting skills and his confidence as a singer with a unique style.
"I am now singing with my full voice and I feel much more comfortable within myself," he says. "I think my voice has changed dramatically since our first EP [The Barnicles And Stripes EP, 2002], which was really tinged with American singing and all the pop-punk bands I was idolising. You could only see the transition beginning in Perfect Distraction [2006] and me coming into my own on the last album."
SOMETHING WITH NUMBERS play The Hi Fi on Friday Jul 3, the Coolangatta Hotel on Saturday Jul 4, and the Sands Tavern on Sunday Jul 5 – all shows with The Galvatrons and Slow Down Honey. 89 FREEDOM STREET is out now through Below Par. www.somethingwithnumbers.net
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