February 2010

Dreams take flight

Following a year of blinding success, we talk to Empire of the Sun’s Australian frontman Luke Steele about making music and chasing dreams

WORDS ADAM BAIDAWI

It’s always difficult to measure success and the perilously subjective waters of the music industry are especially murky. But, when the monolithic U2 strutted on stage in Paris to “Walking on a Dream” in late 2009, Australia’s pop superforce Empire of the Sun received an undeniably golden nod. A wordless invitation into the inner circle.

In hindsight, that recognition proves little more than a bookend for a project that has pursued everything on the grandest of scales. The bold, the brash, the ecstatic. Yet, for all of the fantastical video clips, genre-bending soundscapes and unabashedly eccentric couture, the beginnings of Empire of the Sun were decidedly more low key.

Two of Australia’s up-and-coming songwriters, Luke Steele (then of Sleepy Jackson fame) and Pnau’s Nick Littlemore were introduced at a bar by a mutual contact and instantly bonded. Writing together whenever they could find themselves on the same side of the country (Steele was based in Perth, while Littlemore worked out of Sydney), Empire of the Sun was a labour of love and collaboration.

In the 18 months since the release of their debut album, Walking on a Dream, frontman Luke Steele has transformed from a promising local songwriting talent into an enigmatic, globetrotting, larger-than-life curator of electro-pop aesthetic. Littlemore’s story is much the same: he’s busy recording a new Pnau studio album — with Elton John’s help It’s a late Tuesday morning in Perth when we sit down, the kind of predictably picturesque day when the city smiles like the relaxed, bronzed beauty she is. When we spoke a few months earlier, Steele and his musical partner in crime were riding a high: “Walking on a Dream” the single was charting in innumerable countries, including Japan and New Zealand, while shoring itself as a multi-platinum cult hit in their homeland. More notably, the duo were about to make their long-awaited live debut at the 2009 Parklife festival in Brisbane. The landscape has shifted dramatically since.

It’s been two months since they cleaned up at the ARIA Awards (taking out four categories, including the coveted Album of the Year). In rather affable (though not wholly unsurprising) fashion, I find that Steele has retained his authentically Perth-tinged down-to-earth charisma. “What happened there?” he grins wryly. “It’s funny: you go to the shops and like, middle-aged mums and truckies are coming up just going, ‘Good on ya!’”

Modesty aside (did I mention that Steele was also named GQ’s Man of the Year?), it’s clear that the ARIAs rubber-stamped the duo’s domination of the Australian music scene. They had scaled the mountain and that night, they reached the summit. Yet, infamously, it was Steele alone who was there to take it in.

Rumours of a tiff between Steele and Littlemore began circulating after the latter inexplicably disappeared just before their debut tour. Steele readily admitted that he was missing for months, and that he was somewhere overseas. The whispers reached fever pitch at the ARIAs, with Littlemore still nowhere to be seen, and Steele noticeably lost for words when asked about it at his press conference. “We never had a fight,” he shrugs as I ask again, “but we had different plans on touring. Nick didn’t want to tour for three or four years. I’m more rapid — the show needs to stay on the road. You want to play these songs that everyone was singing all summer, you know?”

So what of the future of the band? Who are Empire of the Sun? “It’s still me and Nick,” he assures. “It’s part of the journey. But, I guess, only the future knows.”

So, for the time being, Steele is steering the ship himself, performing and promoting. Littlemore is accredited with producing. They’ve just released the deluxe edition vinyl box set of Walking on a Dream and the single“Half Mast”, yet another pop song destined to become an anthem. Indeed, terms like “anthemic” and “iconic” have all too often been cited when it comes to this group.

So what was different about Empire of the Sun for Steele who boasts an impressive musical CV — he grew up in a musical family (sister Katy fronts indie rockers Little Birdy); he’s been signed to a major record label for the better part of a decade; and he’s contributed to numerous bands and collectives?

He pauses, pensive: “Chemistry. I think Nick and I have always had this pretty rare chemistry. Empire of the Sun didn’t have any timeframe. It just happened when it was meant to happen. I’ve never really done that. With an album, you usually strangle the life out of it, and tie it up in the corner and go, ‘You’re finished, alright?!’” he grins waving a stern finger.

When he’s not keeping impossibly busy — current projects: a “highly mechanical” heavy blues solo album, a closing song for an upcoming Australian film and Sleepy Jackson’s new album — Steele’s focus lies firmly on his family.

He met his wife Jodi, a former glossy magazine editor, after commenting on her “rather eccentric” cocktail at a Perth nightspot. His pet name for her is “Snappy Dolphin”. “She’s so efficient and professional — snappy — she gets things done pretty quick. And being such a beautiful woman — she’s kind of like a dolphin.” The couple had their first child in 2008, a daughter named Sunny Tiger.

“It’s amazing how much it [parenthood] makes you become an adventurer. You can’t pull out the same trick each day. You have to invent. I’ve invented so many things: the flying dummy, the tiger that comes out of the kitchen… it’s the greatest thing to happen to a guy and a girl.”

2010, he tells me, will finally see the family move overseas, a plan which fell through two years ago, “when Snaps fell pregnant”. In March, they’ll likely find themselves in New York. “I’ve always felt very at home there. I feel it’s the right time to work with people that are a lot better than me, who have been to a lot more places and seen a lot more things than me.”

And so, Steele finds himself once more on the verge of big things, only on a scale infinitely more grand. He’s just striving to keep up with his own mind.

“All of the visions and the imagination have turned into this ocean. It’s great when you’re months and months behind your mind, but when it turns into years — you’ve got a lot of work to do each day, you know?” He sits up straight suddenly, eyes bright. “You wake up thankful to talk and walk and you’re ready to go.”

FAVOURITE DESTINATION LUKE STEELE’S

Coromandel, New Zealand:
“It’s where all of my cousins live. Skiing, fishing, surfing, writing songs, drinking nice New Zealand wines and teas — all of the good things.”

TOUR DATES: FUTURE MUSIC FESTIVAL

SAT 27 FEB: CITY PACIFIC DOOMBEN RACECOURSE, BRISBANE
SAT 28 FEB: WELLINGTON SQUARE, PERTH
SAT 6 MAR: RANDWICK RACECOURSE, SYDNEY
SUN 7 MAR: FLEMINGTON RACECOURSE, MELBOURNE
MON 8 MAR: RUNDLE & RYMILL PARKS, ADELAIDE