Touring is hard work. It’s a lot of travel, a lot of killing time, a lot of not sleeping, but if you’re an Australian musician, it can be that much harder. Just ask Jarryd James, who recently discussed the travails of being an Aussie touring musician with triple j.
Speaking to Breakfast hosts Matt & Alex, the Brisbane songwriter, who achieved huge success this year with the singles ‘Give Me Something’ and ‘Do You Remember’, revealed that before those songs took off, he’d actually given up on music as a career.
As he revealed, it was a summer tour with Angus & Julia Stone that restored his confidence. “I was just working [before that],” he said. “I’d given up on any sort of life in music. I thought if I wasn’t going to do it properly then I wasn’t going to do it at all.”
“I’d just have a normal job and I’ll get superannuation, retire, buy a [house] and get a stupid mortgage.” When asked why he packed it in, James touched on the sad truth that all up-and-coming Aussie musicians face when trying to crack their homeland.
“It’s really hard in this country, to be honest. It’s a logistical thing: it’s really expensive to tour in this country and everything is so spread out, there is not enough people.” In other words, it’s hard to play to a small population spread over a large landmass.
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“You only get one go at doing it the first time and by the time you’re balls deep in that you’re like ‘I’ve spent all my money and I’ve committed to this; I’ve put the rest of my life on hold’…”
“I can only speak for myself, it was really hard and I ran out of energy for it and I ran out of resources.” James’ turning point came when he released that his “full-on… high-stress job” was a waste of his musical talents.
“I just thought I’ve been given this gift of music and I’m not using it.” Readers can check out the Brisbane hit-maker’s full chat with triple j embedded below.
