I Am Giant
/
I Am Giant recently released their latest single 'Dead Flower', performed at Wellington's Homegrown Festival and played what will have been their last ever show at Auckland's iconic Kings Arms.
We had a quick chat with Shelton Woolwright about it all...
You’ve had a few different vocalists since the formation of I Am Giant. What led to the decision for Aja to front the band?
Aja was a natural fit to front the band as he was our original guitarist. In a way it almost didn't feel like a change with in the band as Aja had always played a big part vocally live. Its been great to see a positive reaction to him taking centre stage.
Even though there is now only 3 of you, you’re still living in different countries. How much of a challenge is this?
Live theres still 4 of us on stage. Its a welcoming change having a front man play a guitar but yea Aja lives in Sydney, Paul London and I live between London and Auckland. It's pretty straight forward to be fair, we just need to be in a room together for about a week before a tour for rehearsals. When i comes to writing Paul and i start most of the ideas in Paul's studio in London and flick stuff to Aja via the Internet until we're all happy with it then we hit the studio. In the case of the latest album we started recording in Berlin mid last year and are just finishing off vocals in Devonport as we speak.
Your latest song ‘Dead Flower’ is a solid release. How did this track come about?
To be honest that track was a b side off our first album the Horrifying Truth it also almost made the cut on Science And Survival but got changed out for Standing On The Sun last minute. We new it was a good track but we hadn't quite got it right. When we were thinking about the new album we pulled it our again and Paul and i re-wrote the verse, wrote a new bridge and finally got it to a place where we felt it was a good fit for the new album and represented the new direction.
What plans do you have for a third album release?
Well we're about 90% finished the album so hopefully we'll look to drop in near the end of the year. We just filmed a video for our second single 'Playing With Fire' at Homegrown so where gonna keep dropping new music right up until the release to ease the wait on our fans as its been a few years since our latest release.
How was the Homegrown Festival over the weekend?
Homegrown is always great its kind of like a school reunion. Its definitely something we look forward to playing each year.
You’re also going to be performing a show at the Kings Arms this week. What can we expect from this shows?
Its a great chance of our fans to come and hear some new music and get up close and personal with our new singer Aja he's a beast on stage!
Could this be your last show at the venue with the announcement the venue will shortly be closing their doors?
Unfortunately this is absolutely our last show at the Kings Arms. Its also our last NZ show for awhile but we'll new back with a new album.
What external projects do you guys have in the works?
Paul and i have recently been working on another project called Kinetic with Laughton Kora from Kora. Its a pretty big departure from I Am Giant but feels refreshing to be creating something different.
What else does I Am Giant have in store for 2017?
Ya can't get much bigger than dropping a new album so were just gonna focus on making a bunch of noise around that. We've poured our heart and souls into this album. Its possibly the most honest and personal album we've ever done and we can't fucking wait to get it out!