Interview: The Monster That Is Liquid Face

Thrills besties, and everyone’s soon-to-be new favourite band, Liquid Face, are flying the coupe and playing their first shows outside of the Northern Rivers/Gold Coast region this weekend.

The talent pool of bands in the Byron Shire is as deep as the ocean, but after a string of live shows ranging between Brisbane to Byron Bay, everybody who has managed to catch them is in agreeance that Liquid Face are the real deal.

Formed on the Gold Coast a year and a half ago, the band, now based in Byron Bay, took early inspiration from fellow dual-percussionists Thee Oh Sees and the San Fran Garage scene, but as with all things garage and gritty, Liquid Face became a whole new monster. The end result sounding like something birthed of that early Thee Oh Sees inspiration mixed with proto punk, a healthy interest in DEVO and an even healthier dose of working class rage.

With barely an online presence to speak of, rumours of a killer live show and a blossoming cult-following were the only signs of the band's existence, until this week when they released their first track into the cyber realm.

If you’re lucky enough to be in (or anywhere near) Melbourne this weekend (21st, 22nd or 23rd of September), drop whatever plans you have and make your way to one of their shows.

Cop the first digital taste, venues, dates, and a couple of words from the brain behind LF below.

You’re welcome.

Tell us about Liquid Face. Who’s in the band, and how did you start out?

Apart from a way to piss off the neighbours, Liquid Face was born out of necessity. It’s an outlet. In the beginning, Liquid Face was just a couple of demos I’d recorded as voice memos on my phones. From that, it evolved into a three-piece band which began playing live under a different name. As time progressed and the band's demos developed, the physical line-up of the band grew to reflect the sound. My name’s Cal and I’m the singer/songwriter/guitarist. I’m fortunate enough to be joined by 2 drummers, Anthony and Chris, synth player Sarah and bassist Jack.

I know your early inspiration for Liquid Face was Thee Oh Sees, but you’ve been a band for a while now, how would you describe your sound now?

Yeah Thee Oh Sees are sick, and apart from their song writing and live presence, I’ve always been super into the idea of experimenting with two drummers. The sound became more about that. Mixing that percussive dynamic with other influences like DEVO, Hawkwind, The Spits, Total Control, Goggs and I guess most working-class punk and garage music.

You’re getting a bit of hype up here in the Northern Rivers, describe the local music scene in Byron Bay.

The local music scene ay? SHOUT OUT TO MINISKIRT, ISRAELI CHICKS, DOG FIGHT AND FLYING MACHINE! But seriously there are a lot of talented musicians doing cool, interesting shit out here.

So, you’re heading south to play a couple of shows in Melbourne. How did that come about?

We are! We were asked to come down to play Angst Fest 2.0 and managed to get a couple more dates, including a headline show at The Tote on the 23rd with a sick line up!