Features Deep Sea Arcade

Ivy League Records’ new signing Deep Sea Arcade release new single ‘Lonely In Your Arms’ - their UK debut - next week (30th May). To celebrate, vocalist Nic McKenzie answers a few of our questions, before the band pop off to Primavera.

Hello Nic, what’ve you been up to today?
It’s our first day off in London, we did a photo shoot down on the banks of The Thames and got quite sludgy, the tide came in and Tim got partially submerged. After that we jumped on the tube and went east and ate salt beef bagels (below) and drank tequila.

You’ve just come over to play the Great Escape, and a few other shows too - how’s your trip been so far? Is it your first visit?
It has been our first trip as a band to the UK. We loved The Great Escape and Brighton itself is a great city. We played two venues there - Komedia and Digital and both were really nice venues and surprisingly well attended. London has been loads of fun too we really enjoyed playing at the Old Queens head and The Social we have been very appreciative of the warm welcome shown to us so far. We did have some really strange accommodation in London though. It was this massive place that was very reminiscent of the set of Red Dwarf. Four of our band members had very similar nightmares involving dark figures and decomposing bodies. Other than that the place was fine. We’re of to Manchester tomorrow to play a show with Ghost Outfit who we’ve heard a lot about. We’re having a blast.

So, your debut UK single will be released later this month: can you tell us a bit about it?
Yes the single is called ‘Lonely In Your Arms’ it was mixed by Dan Grech-Marguerat (The Vaccines, Sound of Arrows). It will be released here as a 7’ Indie Label
New Music Club on the 30th of May. The song is about a longterm relationship coming to an end and a string of destructive one night stands that followed in its wake. Most of the time we are a happy bunch we promise! We threw in some 60’s surf guitar and 80’s synth for good measure too.

Have you already been releasing material in your native Australia?
Yes we have a National radio station called Triple J who have been very good to us. We have released two singles and now getting ready to release a mini album.

Are there any Australian bands you particularly look up to, or do you look for inspiration elsewhere?
We look for inspiration everywhere. There are some great bands in Australia worth checking out both new and old. We love Russell Morris, INXS, Midnight Juggernauts, Cloud Control. We also love lots of UK bands like The Stone Roses, Beta Band and more recently the Vaccines. Also we saw a cool band called Real Fur play at a laundrette in Brighton.

It says in your bio that you spent a long time working in a ‘bedroom DIY studio’ - what’s your set up like now? Do you still record in that way?
Yes we are still tracking and recording music in our own makeshift studio but since I was recently kicked out of my sharehouse the studio has been relocated to my mum’s bedroom.

Finally: we know roughly your plans for the next month or so in terms of records and shows, but what’s on your schedule after that?
We have our booking agent organising a world wide tour of people’s baths. We hear Hackney has nice bath tubs so if any readers would like to volunteer theirs for an exclusive show, please get in contact.



Deep Sea Arcade by DeepSeaArcade