A Band You Should Know: Radium Dolls

Interview by Milo Cullen-Blakey. Photos by @jerri.attric

Radium Dolls already know what it is to band.

They’ve somehow snuck an early leg-up over other acts, making good music through making music they like. The boys have been playing out of Brisbane and dropped their debut album, Legal Speed, earlier in the year with the live version released last Friday on YouTube and available on Spotify real soon. These are the kind of guys who write what they want, sing what they want, and they’ve got music spilling out of them for whenever you're ready to give them some love.

Let’s begin with the origin story of the Radium Dolls.

Will: Yeah well, Tom and I are brothers, so we’ve played together over the years a fair bit. I moved up to Brisbane seven or eight years ago, and I started playing in a band with Ewan and Bryce. Somehow, I managed to rope Tom into moving up here with us. I was like, “I swear it’ll be worth it, just move your whole life from Sydney to Brisbane”, which he did. We all just started playing together after that.

Bryce: Correct.

You guys were initially the Stippers.

Will: Yeah we played one show as the Strippers, that’s right.

You didn’t like that name?

Will: I mean, the Strippers was a very impulsive decision in the first place. We got a show before we had a name and everyone thought it was kinda funny. I foresaw it being a little problematic for us though and we changed it.

Where’d Radium Dolls come from?

Will: I was fascinated by the story of the radium girl factory workers. You’d have to look it up. It was on my mind but I didn’t wanna take the name from them. My partner at the time was like, ‘what about Radium Dolls’, and I said, ‘oh that’s got a ring to it, let’s go with that!’ We voted and everyone was relieved to have it sorted.

Tom: It was at the time that we were gonna put out that first EP, so we were in a little bit of a rush for something.

Will: (Laughs) Yeah, then we just posted on Facebook ‘we are this now. Don’t ask.’ We did it early enough that it was pretty smooth. No one really knew who we were at the time.

If you guys had to describe the kind of music you make to someone who’s never heard it before, how would you go about doing that?

Bryce: I guess rock music.

Will: I always just say rock n’ roll but I really don’t know. It’s a tough question. I’d say just come see if you like it. It’s rocking. We got lot’s of energy but there’s also softer ones in there.

Ewan: We don’t really go for one thing when we write songs. It’s sort of a mix of whatever we’re each inspired by at the time.

Will: Yeah, to keep it interesting we like to change it often. One day you’re super into funk so you wanna make a funky song. Sometimes you want something rocky and fast. Sometimes you’re feeling sad so you write something totally different. If you’re willing to stick around to listen to all that rubbish, that’s what I would describe our music as.

Sort of better, not letting yourself get boxed in.

Will: Yeah. Just feeling free to explore whatever anyone's feeling at the time. Not trying to write the same song over and over. Keep ourselves interested and inspired. We’ve actually started to write more as a unit. In the early days, I wrote a lot of the songs and felt I had to have a solid idea of how it all went. Now we just get together on the weekend and get into a groove. I’ll search through my notes and we’ll write a song that way. Just shove it in.

Has that method given you more of a sound?

Will: Definitely. The band’s gotten a lot more exciting for everybody since we started to write that way. It’s really fun to write on the go cause you got this thing that’s nearly there and you get to rephrase it and add new ideas. It’s nice to leave it to the last minute and see what happens. Sometimes it’s good and sometimes not but it’s definitely fun.

You guys put out your first album this year. What was that like?

Will: It was a lot of hard work. Stuff like that’s expensive so we were trying to get as much done as quickly as possible. I think we did the whole thing in two days. It was about six songs a day essentially. It felt a lot like exam day at school. We’re a bit of a live band so sometimes it’s hard to capture that. There’s a beauty to when you’re recording though, cause it’s always gonna be slightly different to what you get at the show. 

It was a really smooth process though. We worked with Cody, one of our mates who’s a gun sound engineer. We all felt very comfortable and just got down to it. We had rehearsed a bunch so the boys were locked in. 

Bryce: Yeah, I also don’t think we were trying to do anything too wild. We did it in two batches. Went in with what? Six songs? Got it all done in two days and sort of went back and did six totally different songs. It’s the same reason it’s hard to put a genre on us cause we didn’t really write with any big picture in mind.

Will: That’s true! Half the album wasn’t even written yet. We just booked more studio time three months away, would go to Ewan’s house on the weekend and write on the go. Those songs are some of my favourites.

Tom: I swear we did Fast and Loose just a week out of recording. It took shape in one of the last sessions we had. 

Will: I like leaving it up to pressure a bit. Sometimes you’re about to go into the booth and at the last minute you finally get something better. If you put down a few takes there’s usually something you can use.

Tom: Cut-and-paste it together.

Are there any artists you guys are coming up with?

Will: Full Flower Moon comes to mind. They’re killing it at the moment and they’re great friends of ours. There’s actually a bunch of cool bands coming up that are cool.

Tom: Magazine are sick.

Will: Yeah, Magazine. The Brisbane music scene has been so good to us. We’ve all been playing here for years now and it’s so committed. Even with all the venues shutting down people will still make an effort to go. It’s been overwhelming, we even sold out the Zoo. Not in my wildest dreams would I have thought that would be happening. It’s a bit of a tough time at the moment but I’ve got full faith in it. Brisbane rocks!

Is there anywhere you guys are really excited to play?

Ewan: Well, I think we wanna go to Europe sometime soon.

Tom: Yeah, that’s in the works.

Will: Maybe another run up and down the east coast of Australia before that. That’s probably the plan. We haven’t done much touring and the album tour was so good.

Touring was really fun for you guys?

Will: It was crazy, man!

Tom: It was unreal.

Will: We did two Melbourne shows on the first weekend and it was packed. Everywhere we went we were blown away. It was so cool to go into all these cities which we hadn’t spent that much time in and see all these people singing our songs. 

Anything big coming up soon that you can tease?

Will: We actually have been up to some stuff. We just recorded a live album at my parents' property which was unreal. Cody came with all his gear and we set up a studio in this barn. Got our mate to come down and film it. It’s our final kiss goodbye to the album and it’s gonna be really sick. There’s also gonna be some new music coming pretty soon. 

Yeah, wow. You guys are on a roll.

Will: Gotta keep it going. Strike while the flames hot, you know.