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Finding Light In The Darkness With DELLACOMA RIO · HEAVY Music Interviews

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Good name. My name is Dela Cooma Rio. I'm from
• 0:02
  Speaker 1: the band Dela Coma and we've got a brand new
• 0:05
  Speaker 1: album that just dropped today.
• 0:07
  Speaker 2: Beautiful mate, thanks for joining us today. I know you're
• 0:09
  Speaker 2: a busy man.
• 0:12
  Speaker 1: I am very busy at the moment, but thanks for
• 0:14
  Speaker 1: having me on.
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  Speaker 2: My pleasure size you say, bro, Della Cooma today release
• 0:18
  Speaker 2: your third studio album, Searching for You in the Darkness.
• 0:21
  Speaker 2: So it's been a bit of a process, mate, How
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  Speaker 2: are you feeling?
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, pretty good man. It feels really good to actually
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  Speaker 1: finally have it out. It's definitely been a process, and
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  Speaker 1: there's been In hindsight, I probably wish I wish I
• 0:39
  Speaker 1: would have given myself a few more months, but that's
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  Speaker 1: it's always the way. I think. You get down to
• 0:44
  Speaker 1: a sort of deadline day and there's always bits and
• 0:46
  Speaker 1: pieces that have to be done last minute for sure.
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  Speaker 2: Now settle for more about the album from a musical
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  Speaker 2: point of view, mate, what are you going for with it?
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  Speaker 1: Well? In writing this album, it was the first time
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  Speaker 1: I think that I really approached it from the perspective
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  Speaker 1: of I guess writing songs rather than thinking about songs
• 1:14
  Speaker 1: that I necessarily wanted to play live. Okay, not saying
• 1:17
  Speaker 1: that I won't play these songs live. I will play
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  Speaker 1: as many as I can. But the thought had occurred
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  Speaker 1: to me, you know, as I was early in the
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  Speaker 1: writing phase that with this being my third album, like
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  Speaker 1: there's now more material between all three albums plus a
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  Speaker 1: few surplus singles, you know that I'm ever going to
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  Speaker 1: be able to play in one show. And that kind
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  Speaker 1: of unlocked something I think in my head. I was like, oh,
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  Speaker 1: you know, that means I can kind of write. It
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  Speaker 1: felt like it took off some blinders almost, you know,
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  Speaker 1: which was really cool. So we've got we've got a
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  Speaker 1: couple of different tracks on here we weren't. We've got
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  Speaker 1: like more of acousticy style ballad in there. We've got
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  Speaker 1: a bit of a moodier track than maybe we have
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  Speaker 1: on the on the previous one. And we've also probably
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  Speaker 1: got one of the heavier tracks as well.
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  Speaker 3: That I've I've done on previous albums. So it feels
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  Speaker 3: really good to kind of get it out.
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  Speaker 1: In the time since the last time that I put
• 2:23
  Speaker 1: out an album, there's you know, we've had COVID, Like,
• 2:26
  Speaker 1: I've been through some personal stuff as well, so there
• 2:28
  Speaker 1: is a lot of stuff inside just kind of circulating.
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  Speaker 1: I think that needed to come out.
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  Speaker 2: I can actually explain that approach to us. To me,
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  Speaker 2: were mate, Like, it's interesting you say that, Like you
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  Speaker 2: say that you wrote it without a view to playing
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  Speaker 2: the songs live, Like, tell us how that's different to normal,
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  Speaker 2: and then what sort of effect that could have on
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  Speaker 2: the songs?
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  Speaker 1: Well, I think when for me at least, when you
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  Speaker 1: first start writing music and you start getting into playing
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  Speaker 1: your own music, you know, you write a song and
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  Speaker 1: you just can't wait to play it live. You know,
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  Speaker 1: that's the whole, the whole purpose in it. You know,
• 3:01
  Speaker 1: you play it, you want to share it. And there
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  Speaker 1: comes a point when you've got enough songs out you
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  Speaker 1: can see which ones the audience really gravitates towards, you know,
• 3:12
  Speaker 1: and there might be a song you've written and you
• 3:14
  Speaker 1: might still like it, it just doesn't quite land the same
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  Speaker 1: with the audience. Yeah, So you pull it out of
• 3:20
  Speaker 1: the set and you replace it with another track, and
• 3:22
  Speaker 1: you kind of get to a point where for me, anyway,
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  Speaker 1: you know, with this on this third album, I look
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  Speaker 1: at the set list and I'm like, it can always
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  Speaker 1: be better. You can always write a better song.
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  Speaker 3: Right.
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  Speaker 1: But I've gotten to a point where I kind of go, oh, well,
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  Speaker 1: I want to play this song, and I want to
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  Speaker 1: play that song, you know, and I want to play
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  Speaker 1: that song. And when you're looking at it from a
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  Speaker 1: live perspective, and you know, you kind of go oh,
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  Speaker 1: there's only so much room left in the set list,
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  Speaker 1: and then you start I guess you either you kind
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  Speaker 1: of go oh, well, if I write this kind of song,
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  Speaker 1: it's just gonna sound like I'm rewriting a song and
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  Speaker 1: I've already written. Yeah, it makes sense, you know, So
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  Speaker 1: I guess from my perspective, I started looking at some
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  Speaker 1: of the subject material and going, okay, well, what's a
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  Speaker 1: different way that I can approach this rather than rather
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  Speaker 1: than simply viewing it through the lens of I've got
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  Speaker 1: this story to tell or this experience to share, and
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  Speaker 1: I want to write the song so that I can
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  Speaker 1: play it live. I started thinking about it from the
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  Speaker 1: perspective of what if I don't play it live, is
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  Speaker 1: it still a story worth telling? Is it still an
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  Speaker 1: experience that I want to share, which is not really
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  Speaker 1: something that I'd ever done before. I'd always thought about
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  Speaker 1: it from the perspective of I want to be in
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  Speaker 1: front of the audience communicating this. And it wasn't until
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  Speaker 1: you know, I got sort of halfway through the album
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  Speaker 1: that I started going, oh, there's things that I want
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  Speaker 1: to communicate, but I don't know if I'll ever perform
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  Speaker 1: it live. I might, but I might not. And that
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  Speaker 1: puts a different lens on things because then you start
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  Speaker 1: going sometimes, you know, you write a lyric and you go, oh,
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  Speaker 1: if I'm not staring the punter down, you know, and
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  Speaker 1: singing this to them, does the lyric matter? And Yeah,
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  Speaker 1: It's just something different that I've never really thought about before.
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  Speaker 2: Sweet So you sort of touched on this a bit before,
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  Speaker 2: but how does this album differ to your recently be
• 5:25
  Speaker 2: Leave a Light On musically?
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  Speaker 1: So actually got one of the songs from the EP
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  Speaker 1: that was originally an acoustic track, spare Change, and on
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  Speaker 1: the last US tour, I put it in a set
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  Speaker 1: list because it was an attraction online, but worked through
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  Speaker 1: it with an acoustic guitar. So we're like, well, maybe
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  Speaker 1: we'll just kind of do it so like clean electric,
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  Speaker 1: and then we decided to go ahead and put some
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  Speaker 1: keys in and bring the drummer and the bass player
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  Speaker 1: as well, so it became a full band track, but
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  Speaker 1: we hadn't actually recorded it. And the interesting thing about it.
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  Speaker 1: When I've originally written the song, it was just as
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  Speaker 1: kind of a bedroom acoustic song, and I thought it
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  Speaker 1: was a good song, but in my head it was
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  Speaker 1: an acoustic one. As soon as we put the drums
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  Speaker 1: and bass in there, which literally just happened in the
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  Speaker 1: rehearsal room in rehearsals for the tour, it had this
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  Speaker 1: groove to it and we noticed the audience would kind
• 6:33
  Speaker 1: of start dancing to it, which again is something that
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  Speaker 1: I had never imagined for that song, you know, making
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  Speaker 1: people's hips move. So then it started becoming a part
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  Speaker 1: of the set. So we decided to go ahead and
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  Speaker 1: re record it as a full band version for the
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  Speaker 1: album We've I think on this album We've so We've
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  Speaker 1: Got More Than Survival, which was the first single that's
• 6:57
  Speaker 1: been out for a year, now We've Got Heroes, which
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  Speaker 1: was the second single we I think lyrically, I always
• 7:07
  Speaker 1: try to.
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  Speaker 3: Be as honest as I can, but I've gone pretty
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  Speaker 3: deep on a lot of these tracks.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, very nice. Now today you're releasing the single I
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  Speaker 2: Got You, so tell us me more about that song
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  Speaker 2: and why. I guess releasing on the same day as
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  Speaker 2: you release the album, it sort of represents the album
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  Speaker 2: in a way, So tell us why you chose that
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  Speaker 2: song since you do that, well.
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  Speaker 1: It's interesting because you know when you're when you're looking
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  Speaker 1: at releasing thing singles, right, you go, I feel like
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  Speaker 1: more than Survival probably that to me is the one
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  Speaker 1: that encapsulates the album most fully. But it's been out
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  Speaker 1: for a year now, so by the time we get
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  Speaker 1: to this point in the process, for me, the the
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  Speaker 1: because I've gone so deep with the lyrics, and the
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  Speaker 1: album is really about you know, we all go through
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  Speaker 1: difficult times, you know, in life. That's just part of life,
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  Speaker 1: right and and sometimes you know you're trying to find
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  Speaker 1: someone through that or you're trying to find something through
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  Speaker 1: the difficult times to give you hope. And this song
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  Speaker 1: felt hopeful to me, and it's it's a song and
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  Speaker 1: I'm gonna I actually contacted Support Act about this song
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  Speaker 1: because through COVID, Support Act supported me because I was
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  Speaker 1: a full time musician and I couldn't pay my rent,
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  Speaker 1: you know, when everything shut down, and the song is
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  Speaker 1: about just letting somebody know, hey, I got you, no
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  Speaker 1: matter what sounds super simple, but so literally I got you,
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  Speaker 1: you know, and I'd send him an email and I
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  Speaker 1: kind of told them my story and I said, look,
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  Speaker 1: you know, thank you. If you want to use this song,
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  Speaker 1: you're welcome to. I don't think they're going to use
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  Speaker 1: the song, you know, but I offered because it what
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  Speaker 1: Support Act did for me was hey, I got you,
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  Speaker 1: and that's what this song is about. And it felt
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  Speaker 1: We're in November, which is you know, it's the month
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  Speaker 1: that we do November, you know, we do Men's Men's
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  Speaker 1: Mental Health Month. You know, we've got Support Act which
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  Speaker 1: is doing the Australian Music T shirt Day, you know,
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  Speaker 1: all of that stuff. It felt to me like I
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  Speaker 1: Got You is actually more about representing where where I'm
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  Speaker 1: at on the journey of releasing this album and also
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  Speaker 1: where we're at in a larger like scheme of things,
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  Speaker 1: you know, stuff going on around the world. You know,
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  Speaker 1: it's really easy to just pick up your phone and
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  Speaker 1: look at the news or whatever and you just get overwhelmed.
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  Speaker 1: And sometimes something is as simple as just going, you
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  Speaker 1: know what, life's hard. I got you. I got you.
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  Speaker 2: It's fair sometimes simple as best, isn't it.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah?
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, So it leads me under the album titles who
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  Speaker 2: made Like searching for You in the Darkness it's what one, two, three,
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  Speaker 2: six six words, but it says so much made it.
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  Speaker 2: There's so many different meanings in that.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, and so a bit of a backstory. So I obviously,
• 10:34
  Speaker 1: you know, there's there's some tracks on there that actually
• 10:37
  Speaker 1: date all the way back to uh there's a track
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  Speaker 1: that I wrote with one of the guitarists from Sunset Riot,
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  Speaker 1: which was the band I was in before I went solo,
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  Speaker 1: all the way up to you know, songs that literally
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  Speaker 1: wrote while we were like we'd already gotten half the
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  Speaker 1: album recorded. But from me searching for You in the Darkness,
• 11:01
  Speaker 1: it's there's there's spiritual themes in there, you know, looking
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  Speaker 1: looking for God, you know when when things get really hard.
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  Speaker 1: There's also relational aspect to it. My wife and I
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  Speaker 1: unfortunately lost a child over the last few years, was stillborn,
• 11:25
  Speaker 1: and that that was really difficult. It was a couple
• 11:29
  Speaker 1: of years ago now, But it's just processing all of that,
• 11:34
  Speaker 1: you know, and the feelings and the heaviness of all that.
• 11:39
  Speaker 1: That's that's contributed, you know, to to the album. And
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  Speaker 1: when I was talking about the artwork to it's a
• 11:48
  Speaker 1: made of mind who did the artwork? The brief that
• 11:51
  Speaker 1: I gave him, I said, you know those old school
• 11:55
  Speaker 1: Star Wars posters and the really original Star Wars posters,
• 12:01
  Speaker 1: I said, I want to communicate, you know, if there's
• 12:04
  Speaker 1: kind of the hero figure, you know that you know,
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  Speaker 1: life has just throwing a lot of stuff, but he's
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  Speaker 1: he's gonna find the girl no matter what, you know,
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  Speaker 1: like that that image you know in my head. And
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  Speaker 1: then and then he set me through the artwork and
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  Speaker 1: I was like, yes, that's it, that's it, no matter
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  Speaker 1: what you know. There's I wanted. I wanted it to
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  Speaker 1: be dark, but I also wanted it to have hope
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  Speaker 1: in there, because there's actually there's a there's a line.
• 12:39
  Speaker 1: There's a couple of lines actually, and in the in
• 12:41
  Speaker 1: bon Jovi album These Days, it was the first time
• 12:46
  Speaker 1: really that bon Jovi started dealing with sort of darker themes.
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  Speaker 1: It'd always been really you know, upbeat. There's there's a song.
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  Speaker 1: There's a song in there called Hey God. And I
• 13:01
  Speaker 1: remember him talking about it because the songs about you know,
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  Speaker 1: people gone through tough times and kind of going you know,
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  Speaker 1: do you even care about me? You know, And I
• 13:11
  Speaker 1: remember an interview at the time, you know, asking him,
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  Speaker 1: you know, hey, you know you're exploring some dark themes.
• 13:17
  Speaker 1: Normally you're so upbeat, and the response that he gave
• 13:21
  Speaker 1: he said, you know, it occurred to me that it's
• 13:27
  Speaker 1: all well and good to be upbeat, but sometimes people
• 13:32
  Speaker 1: think that you've got nothing wrong happening in your life.
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  Speaker 1: It actually gives you your hope more weight and more
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  Speaker 1: purpose if they know that you've got hope even in
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  Speaker 1: a monst all the difficult times, and that really stuck
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  Speaker 1: with me. But I was like, yeah, it's like, you know,
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  Speaker 1: the more stuff you go through, the harder it is
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  Speaker 1: to see the light sometimes, but the more valuable the
• 14:00
  Speaker 1: light becomes.
• 14:02
  Speaker 2: Yeah, very well, pot, very well pot. Now, as with
• 14:06
  Speaker 2: all good albums to come out, mate, you are setting
• 14:08
  Speaker 2: off on a bit of a chur You've played Cans
• 14:11
  Speaker 2: last night. The tour continues. Tell us where else you're going.
• 14:16
  Speaker 1: So we're hitting up Melbourne for music Land for our
• 14:22
  Speaker 1: I guess, our big Southern album launch. We're also going
• 14:28
  Speaker 1: to be We've got an acoustic show in Bunderberg and
• 14:34
  Speaker 1: which will be the first time that we're I guess
• 14:36
  Speaker 1: releasing new music up there, and then we're also playing
• 14:39
  Speaker 1: in Brisbane and on the Sunny Coast and Rouchie Dore.
• 14:42
  Speaker 1: We'll be doing some more dates next year, but for
• 14:45
  Speaker 1: now we've kind of just confined it into that that week.
• 14:48
  Speaker 1: It's a bit of a hectic schedule. I've also got
• 14:53
  Speaker 1: a little acoustic show on the Sunday in Melbourne and
• 14:57
  Speaker 1: also in Darwin as well.
• 14:58
  Speaker 2: So busy, busy, and where can people go to find
• 15:01
  Speaker 2: out more information and get.
• 15:02
  Speaker 1: Tickets Dellacoma dot com, dot com.
• 15:07
  Speaker 2: Beautiful. Now, before I let you go, mate, I've we
• 15:11
  Speaker 2: got a new segment called photo Bomb. I'm not sure
• 15:13
  Speaker 2: if you've done it with you before, but basically I've
• 15:15
  Speaker 2: shoved through your social media and I found some photos
• 15:17
  Speaker 2: that want to ask you a little bit more about
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  Speaker 2: so I've come up with The first one is of
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  Speaker 2: your drummer and it's a fucking pearl of a shot
• 15:27
  Speaker 2: made like where's this and when what's he doing?
• 15:32
  Speaker 1: So on our last US tour, I our song Heroes
• 15:39
  Speaker 1: had already come out and we had a lyric video
• 15:41
  Speaker 1: for it, but we didn't have a music video. And
• 15:43
  Speaker 1: we're in the middle of doing thirteen shows in thirteen
• 15:45
  Speaker 1: days and we ended with the last two shows were
• 15:49
  Speaker 1: in LA and I still had I used to be
• 15:52
  Speaker 1: an actor in LA for a few years way back
• 15:54
  Speaker 1: in the day. I still have some filmmaking friends, so
• 15:57
  Speaker 1: reached out to one. I said, is there any way
• 16:01
  Speaker 1: that we could get a music video shots like overlooking
• 16:06
  Speaker 1: the city? And he goes, yeah, I know a place.
• 16:08
  Speaker 1: I know a place. Now, if you look carefully in
• 16:12
  Speaker 1: the music video where this photo is taken from, you'll
• 16:15
  Speaker 1: see sort of behind the drummers, I guess would his
• 16:19
  Speaker 1: left shoulder. If you look closely on some of the shots,
• 16:24
  Speaker 1: you can see a plume of smoke behind there. So
• 16:27
  Speaker 1: my Chemical Romance were actually doing their sound check while
• 16:32
  Speaker 1: we were filming a music video Dodger Stadium right behind
• 16:36
  Speaker 1: us there.
• 16:37
  Speaker 2: Awesome, that's so cool. So cool. Indeed, now the other photo, mate,
• 16:41
  Speaker 2: I'm glad you actually brought up the fact that you've
• 16:43
  Speaker 2: done a bit of acting, because not many people know
• 16:46
  Speaker 2: that you did auditions for Spider Man once.
• 16:53
  Speaker 1: Oh my goodness, I you know, I don't even know
• 16:58
  Speaker 1: where that is. Yeah, I've got no idea where that is,
• 17:04
  Speaker 1: but I'm I'm pretty sure it's in the US somewhere
• 17:08
  Speaker 1: where on tour and I'm pretty sure if you could
• 17:11
  Speaker 1: hear me think right now, I would be trying to
• 17:13
  Speaker 1: figure out how to get down because my hands are
• 17:17
  Speaker 1: really sweaty.
• 17:20
  Speaker 2: That's actually a feature of your live shows, mate, Like
• 17:22
  Speaker 2: it's your live shows are fully energetic and no one
• 17:25
  Speaker 2: knows what's going to happen from into the next is
• 17:27
  Speaker 2: a lot. That's one thing you guys pride yourself on
• 17:29
  Speaker 2: is putting on a decent live show.
• 17:32
  Speaker 1: Well, thank you, And it is something I do pride
• 17:36
  Speaker 1: myself on because I feel like in today's age, you know,
• 17:39
  Speaker 1: it's so easy to consume music, and it's so easy
• 17:42
  Speaker 1: to passively consume music. I think it's important if you're
• 17:47
  Speaker 1: going to play live. I think it's important to give
• 17:50
  Speaker 1: people something that they can look forward to, because otherwise
• 17:53
  Speaker 1: why bother.
• 17:54
  Speaker 2: Exactly exactly, But back to the photo. Has it everyone's
• 17:57
  Speaker 2: handshaped for you when you've done this, have you ever
• 17:59
  Speaker 2: fallen off, hurt yourself or not being able to get down?
• 18:04
  Speaker 1: Yeah? So I was on stage. I think it was
• 18:07
  Speaker 1: in Oklahoma, but I can't remember as a long time
• 18:10
  Speaker 1: ago now, and I was I was coming across a
• 18:15
  Speaker 1: a pipe. It was on top of the stage, and
• 18:18
  Speaker 1: I and I went to throw my legs up and
• 18:20
  Speaker 1: to wrap my legs around like I'm doing right there,
• 18:23
  Speaker 1: and I was really sweaty, and the motion of my
• 18:26
  Speaker 1: my feet coming up, I lost strip and I was
• 18:29
  Speaker 1: parallel with the floor and I fell straight down and
• 18:31
  Speaker 1: I put my hand behind myself to catch me, and
• 18:35
  Speaker 1: I hyper extended my wrists.
• 18:38
  Speaker 2: No one could, no one, no one tried to catch up,
• 18:43
  Speaker 2: but they kept playing.
• 18:45
  Speaker 1: So I mean that's good, all right.
• 18:49
  Speaker 2: Brother, Well, thanks for your tom. I know you've got
• 18:50
  Speaker 2: to get you a gig tonight for the album Searching
• 18:52
  Speaker 2: for You in the Darkness is out now through all
• 18:54
  Speaker 2: the channels. I've been fortunate enough to have a listen
• 18:56
  Speaker 2: and it's pure gold from starting to finish. Brother's so congratulations,
• 18:59
  Speaker 2: and we'll see you in Brisbane.
• 19:02
  Speaker 1: Thanks so much. We'll see you then.