Hey Tord. I expected you to sound Norwegian not Scouse… Yeah, I’ve been in Liverpool for about seven years. I came to study and just ended up staying. I’m a Scouser through and through now!
Cool. How’s the new album? It’s quite different to the first. You will definitely recognise the writing and lyrics and the way we use our words, but it’s a lot more keyboards and a bit heavier. Maybe it sounds a little bit more mature, but still a lot of fun.
Was that a conscious decision? It’s just a natural reaction when you’ve toured the first album so much. You kind of rebel against what you used to do. Some of the first songs we wrote were just completely weird!
So were you fed up of your hits? Not really because the crowd’s reaction is always different. That’s what keeps it interesting. But it’s not like as soon as we come off a tour we go straight into the back and start playing them again.
You’re playing Parklife here. Will they be your first gigs with the new tunes? Yeah we’re really excited about that. We’re basically going straight from recording in LA to Parklife. We haven’t had much time to practice them so its gunna be a trial run.
You guys seem to love Australia… The first time we came down, our name was starting to spread out a bit and shows started to sell out and we were like “oh Jesus this is really kicking off down here”. Maybe it’s because of the Australian name.
I heard you were on Neighbours? Yeah, we were the entertainent in the bar, Charlie’s. They were having a really serious argument and we’re just playing in the background and at the end of it they just focus on the song for a few seconds.
Did you ever watch the show? I didn’t no. I think it’s more of a British phenomenon. I think it was more special for the other two!
Do you hang out with wombats? Yeah we do actually. In Adelaide the local paper took us to a zoo. We got to hold a baby wombat. It was like massive!
So, we need to know exactly how much of a wombat you are and what attributes you share with them… Are you short-legged and muscular? Ha, definitely yeah!
Have rodent-like teeth? Er, probably not that one.
Relatively large brains? Definitely!
Okay. Do you get home much? I try. I don’t get to go back as much as I wish I could. I go home for Christmas.
What’s Elverum like? Very small? Yeah I think its only like 20,000 people. But it’s actually classified as a city though!
The Wombats play Parklife on the Gold Coast (Sept 25), Perth (Sept 26), Melbourne (2 Oct), Sydney (3 Oct) and Adelaide (4 Oct). Details and tickets at www.parklife.com.au
