Album Feature | Vague Rituals
The urge to make music again, regional living & how a record store is a great meeting place
Noah chats to Leo Coyte from Vague Rituals all about this brand-new band, recent ventures and the self-titled album that has just landed today on Solor/Sonar.
Firstly, congratulations on the self-titled debut album for Vague Rituals. It’s a bold statement of melodic and noise-laden indie-rock. How does it feel to have it out?
Thanks! It feels pretty wild, it’s come together super quick, so I doubt any of us have even had the time to reflect on it at all. We were, and still are kind of flying by the seat of our pants.
Let’s get into the nitty gritty of this project - How did Vague Rituals emerge? It seems like a wild concept with your members hailing from all over the shop originally - Melbourne, Sydney and Portland Oregon and now find yourselves all situated in Bendigo, Victoria. I’d also like to know the attraction to that area.
I was chasing stable employment and a more affordable lifestyle. My partner and I found jobs in the visual arts community in the large regional city of Bendigo and made the move from Sydney.
I was missing playing in my band Further and I felt the urge to make some music again and this was also coincidentally timed with the opening of Trash Cult a record store and venue in Eaglehawk Bendigo where I met a few like-minded peeps.
I posted a rhythm section wanted ad and found drummer Matthew Mero from Portland US now also living in regional Vic, he was taken by the list of mostly US 90’s post hardcore bands I’d listed as references.
We started jamming at our local rehearsal space YeeHaa Studios where we met the owner Craig Brown a guitarist that had spent a decade or more living and playing music in and around Melbourne. We needed a bass player; Craig had been enjoying the noise through the walls and picked up the bass to round out the trio.
There is some deep history within your group that includes Australian bands Further, Gentlenemy, Alarms & Motel Love, and US bands Drunk Ladies & Stray Heat. The common thread is underground punk and I’m imagining the shared vision you have and all the years of experience make it a comfortable fit?
All three of us share a very similar background. Skateboarding, visual arts, punk rock, indie rock etc... I think we can recognise that we are lucky to have found each other out here. After playing in other bands for so many years we are pretty comfortable in our musical skins now. We’ve learnt from past mistakes too, I hope.
Speaking of the rich musical history you have can you tell us a bit about your journey and any cool rock and roll stories you might recall?
We are essentially a brand-new band so our cool stories would be very limited right now. I wouldn’t want to go into detailed stories from previous bands as that was such a long time ago for some of us.
We’ve all definitely played some really great shows and some really bad shows before. We’ve been kicked and spat at, been praised and humiliated by people we respect but mostly we’ve had some good times with great people we’d never have connected with otherwise.
Being Bendigo based, what is your connection to the Melbourne music scene these days and are there some cool venues where you live?
Vague Rituals have only played twice in Naarm in our short existence so far, but we hope to get down there more often once the album is out. Craig spends a lot of time in Melbourne playing with his other band, so he knows the scene pretty well. Matthew has been in a few Melbourne bands recently too and worked at venues and music shops around town and is still very close to lots of the community there, so he knows what’s good. Me being from Sydney I know a few of the people left over from the shows we did with Melbourne bands in the early 2000’s and the bars that still exist from then.
We have some really great venues around central Victoria I’ve seen awesome bands at Trash Cult in Eaglehawk, The Red Hill in Chewton and Oni skate shop and at the Theatre Royal in Castlemaine.
Solar/Sonar has released the album on vinyl with a super cool print and bonus poster for the first 50 orders on Bandcamp. Can you tell us about the connection you have with the label and what it’s like to have them back what you are doing?
Tom Lyngcoln of Solar/Sonar and I met a long time ago when Further and The Nation Blue toured and played together in the 2000’s, I sent Tom our Vague Rituals recordings because I knew he was still active in the Melbourne music scene and I think we just got lucky timing wise as he was looking at ramping up his record label. We are really excited to be working with Tom given his incredible musical output and the awesome catalog of bands at Solar/Sonar.
Do you have plans for launching the album?
We will definitely be wanting to do launch shows in Melbourne and Bendigo. I’d love to get back to Sydney, and we are absolutely open to other destinations as well of course. We’re going to get the album out in the world for a little bit first.
Finally, who are your favourite local Melb/Naarm bands at the moment and who would you like to see interviewed for Tempo?
Names of Naarm bands that I hear being talked about from our camp on occasion are Frons, Stepmother, Voice Imitator, Sweatshop, Armour, Metho, the Misanthropes and Chris Smith. Local bands for us in Central Vic that we see pretty often and who get to Melbourne regularly are Harold Holt Search Party, Dead, Astrofuzz, No Hope, Abreact and Alarms to name a few. I’d like to see any of these bands interviewed for tempo.
Listen & Purchase Vague Rituals by Vague Rituals at Solor/Sonar