The Jezabels chat about music in the internet era & their new album Synthia

“There’s lots of dualism; there are contradictions,” Hayley Mary says of Synthia, the third album from Australian four-piece The Jezabels. The singer and frontwoman, along with her bandmates — Heather Shannon, Sam Lockwood, and Nik Kaloper — have long walked this line of polarity, having become known for their songs that drift between vibrancy and illness, youth and adulthood, or even just distorted guitar wailings and graceful vocals.

But perhaps inadvertently, one of the greatest dualities to impact the alt rock band is the mere existence of the internet.

On the one hand, it has allowed The Jezabels to play out their careers from wherever they want, whether that’s in Sydney where it all began or halfway across the world. In the past, it was essential for Australian acts to move abroad because, in Mary’s words, “the markets were so different and you had to go somewhere else to ‘make it’ because [Australia] is such a small market.” But now, she continues, “you’ve got the internet and you don’t need to do that.”

It’s not as if the band hasn’t ever uprooted itself for farther shores, though. Their 2014 release, The Brink, took the troupe to London, but as Mary points out, this wasn’t because of any commercial imperative. “We weren’t compelled as a band [to leave Sydney]; we just did it because we wanted to be with our loved ones, which was nice,” she explains. “We had relationships that a few of us were in that led us to London, and also, we were just wanting to try something new.”

In the case of Synthia, the band returned to Sydney to write and record their music, which allowed long-time collaborator Lachlan Mitchell to step back into the producer role. “He’s like another member of the band,” Mary says of Mitchell, who also produced The Jezabels’ first three EPs and their debut album, Prisoner. “He’s good at getting the best out of us, he’s good at supporting our strengths, and knowing where the song goes.”

But as duality’s other shoe must inevitably drop, the internet is also the source of a new stress for every artist. Mary describes two years as “a pretty normal-length cycle” most artists have traditionally placed between their albums, noting that it’s “about as long as you’d want to go” before you risk the public forgetting about you. But in the era of social media, two years is unthinkably long — “people just want content all the time! All the time!” she laughs. “They want tweets every day, posts every day, and eventually you run out of stuff to say unless you release some new music.” And so begins the never-ending cycle of dropping tunes, not for the sake of creating, but for the sake of staying relevant.

But whether or not it’s in their best commercial interest, The Jezabels have resisted giving in to that demand. “One thing I’ve learnt is that with this whole culture of ‘likes,’ you can’t put something out there just for likes because you’ll never be satisfied,” Mary explains. “You can’t get a record out there just because it’ll keep your career going. You have to have something you really want to express from within and a reason for creating something.”

“It’ll react better,” she continues. “Even if it’s with a smaller audience or if some press won’t acknowledge it because you’ve been in the shadows for too long, I think it’ll be met by the right people if you release music when you want to.” She likens it to a painter churning out artworks: “Putting art out all the time will never be as satisfying as painting a portrait that takes years and years and is good.”

And at least so far, it’s an approach that’s working for the band. Already, two of album’s tracks have spread quickly online — late 2015’s ‘Come Alive,’ which Mary says “people reacted really well to,” and the recently released ‘Pleasure Drive.’ The singer adds that the latter tune was somewhat overshadowed by the sad news of keyboardist Shannon’s ovarian cancer progressing to an “aggressive state” (get well soon, Heather!). Nonetheless, she describes Synthia as “celebratory,” saying the record has an emphasis on “pleasure, hope, optimism, and living in the moment.” “Coming through hardships is an inspiring theme,” she says.

More than anything, keeping to a strict schedule of making music is something that probably wouldn’t work for Mary. “I’m more of a vibe and people and timing person — I like the serendipity,” she says about her attitude towards making music with other people. In fact, it’s exactly how Synthia came together in the first place: “We just said, ‘we’re all here, so why don’t we see if Lachlan’s free, put some demos together, and see how we go.’ We didn’t actually plan on finishing anything, and then six months later it was done.”

First published on Pagesdigital.