Two weeks ago TheVine flew to L.A. You know this because you've been reading our tour diary of the experience. Well, the reason we were in the City of Angels/Cars, was to watch Melbourne pop-punk band Cruel To Be Kind record an EP.

The young five-piece (Mike, Tim, Nick, Dene and John) were 2011 winners of the Red Bull Bedroom Jam, an annual, nationwide competition searching for new bands aged between 14 and 19. The competition is initially based around "buzz", something the competing bands earn after uploading a video of an original track to the Red Bull Bedroom Jam site. They tell their friends, generate word-of-mouth and get voted up and down accordingly. The Top 8 bands then have a live set filmed in their actual bedroom/jam space, before a winner is handpicked by those infernal "industry supremos". From there, the victor is sent on their way to record at the rather fancy Red Bull studios in either L.A or London; after which they either nab a spot at the Download Festival in Donnington U.K or tour Australia with an established headliner. Not long after, their blood is scientifically replaced with pure taurine. Something 14-19 year old's run on anyway, right?

The competition has been running for three years. As such, Cruel To Be Kind are the third round of high-school kids to shun real life for a week and up and see the world. (Note: In several instances elsewhere, the band's name has been reported as being CruelToBeKind. No spacing. That's a typo the band told me, albeit one that they made themselves. "We stuffed up our online application the first time around," guitarist Nick told me in the studio. "We couldn't enter it again with the same name, so we took out the spaces.")

So three days into the recording process, and with a multi-million dollar studio and big-shot engineer, James Musshorn (Calling All Cars, In Flames and, uh, Guns N' Roses) at their disposal — not to mention camera crews and photo shoots galore — Cruel To Be Kind bassist Tim and vocalist Mike tell me over a bowl of Pop Tarts what the hell's going on here.


Cruel To Be Kind -- L-R: Nick, Mike, Tim, Dene, John

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So it's three days in. How much Red Bull have you drank so far?

Mike: Two, three.
Tim: Today anyway.

Tell me how you guys met?

Mike: Everyone but Dene [rhythm guitar] goes to our school. Whitefriars College in Donvale [Melbourne, Victoria].

And how did you meet Dene?

Mike: Friends of friends. Parties and stuff.

How did you get to the point where you thought you could write songs together?

Tim: Nick [lead guitar] and I had been in a band the year before [last] that was writing original material. But that sort of stopped. That was in 2010. Nick's always constantly writing I guess, so to get a new band together to get these songs out, we just needed a singer. And a guitarist and a drummer. We knew Michael could sing. John wasn't the first drummer to join us.

Mike: It was Nick on drums, originally.

Tim: Yeah he played drums for a while.

Mike: The guitarist we had had a drummer background, and the drummer [Nick] had a guitar background. For some reason. They were on opposite instruments. So we swopped them around but then the drummer wasn't that committed. So he moved on and John came in.

Nick seems like he has a lot of ideas in the studio. Is he the guy who shapes a lot of the songs?

Mike: He comes up with the guitars and then we go from there. He'll just come up with a couple of chords and a melody and then we'll just...

Tim: He's the guy who gets the ball rolling.

Mike: Yeah. And if he doesn't write a whole song then he'll try and get me and Tim to help write lyrics.

Does that mean that you're singing his lyrics, Mike?

Mike: Yeah. I mean, parts of them. But I don't write that much.

Is that weird?

Mike: I definitely change a few things. If I think something's wrong or could be said in a better way.



With the kind of music that you play, it's not usually telling stories from the point of view of a character or narrative, it's very individual. A lot of people who see you guys would think that they're your feelings and emotions you're singing about.

Mike: Yeah it's a bit weird. Most people assume that the singer writes the lyrics. It's not always the case. I guess it's cool if they want to think that.

Do you want to do more writing?

Mike: Well, I would write the songs if Nick said 'OK you write all the lyrics', but it's better to have three heads instead of one.

Tim: Michael's also done some other stuff as well.

[To Mike] Do you play guitar as well?

Mike: Yeah. But I write more acoustic -- like there's one song that I have acoustic guitar and everyone else comes in [on it].

What's the reference point for Cruel To Be Kind? Who inspires you?

Mike: For me I just wanted to be in a band and play music. I wanted to be doing that, and I don't know why it's this way. I don't know, music's cool.

But you could have been in a math-rock band or something?

Mike: I don't know, I listen to everything. [The sound of the band is] what you like and listen to. And if you have the talent to play that -- I'm not going to go and be in a metal band and start screaming. It would be cool, but I just can't. So...

Tim: We all love the sort of music that we play but by no means is it the only music that we listen to. It just happens to be what comes out with us. We listen to all sorts.



Those three songs you've recorded, there's a surprising amount of diversity amongst them.

Mike: I'm starting to get into more chill stuff. I don't know, everyone brings their own kind of thing. Like for example, I know Dene listens to metal and hardcore but he still likes this kind of music. And Tim's more into classic rock: Zeppelin, Beatles. And this [band] is Nick's area, this stuff. And John likes punk stuff. Everyone brings their own little talents together and it comes into one mix.

Can you see where it might go next? Are these three songs your newest songs?

Mike: Yeah. I think we want to play as many shows as we can and get the name out to as many people as to hear it. It's not about money or anything, we'll probably just give [the recording] out to anyone that wants it. And even if they don't we'll just give it to them [laughs]. So they have to listen to it.

Will you put it up for a free download when it's done?

Mike: I suppose. If people are willing to pay, that's cool, but I would just be happy to have someone listen to it and enjoy those songs. I think that's the key, to have people listening and enjoying the songs while we're having fun making the songs.

It's also an ad to play shows. How many have you played so far?

Tim: We played...18 gigs in 2011.

And you've only been going since April 2011?

Tim: Yep. That includes full band and acoustic shows.

You were telling me in the car the other day, that the other bands who have won this competition, also come from the same area of Melbourne as you?

Mike: The last winners were Welcome Wednesday, who live five minutes down the road. And then our friends Way With Words, who won the first one, all of them went to our school except for one. So they're a bit older but one of them we went to school with.

Tim: I went to high school with Joey [from Way With Words], primary school with Joey.

So did you hear of this competition because those guys won it?

Mike: Yeah that's pretty much it.

And maybe the guys before and vice versa?

Mike: Exactly. The thing is, you've got to get people to go on the site and vote for you and stuff. [Post up] whatever tracks you have. And seeing Joey and all them telling us to vote for them it's like, "What's this?" It seems simple enough so we thought we'd enter it.

Were you surprised when you won?

Mike: Oh we were pretty pumped. We were that excited. In the second one we got pretty close, but we got beaten at the end. And then the next one we did it.



Does the experience of recording with James make you think about your music differently, previous to coming here?

Mike: Not really, he's pretty much let us do our own thing. And if we've had a suggestion or an idea we'll ask him and he'll just tell us yes or no. I guess it's more...essentially it's our say, but if he doesn't think it's a good idea then obviously it's not a good idea.

We have been to a studio once before and that guy knew what he was doing. So that really helped. Like if we came here with no studio experience we'd probably be pretty clueless.

I presume you guys do recordings at home as well?

Mike: Oh yeah at home we'll be like, doing something in Pro Tools to send to ourselves.

So are you happy with the way the recording is turning out so far?

Mike: Oh, it's great. It's...I dunno [laughs]. Like you listen to songs through your headphones and it sounds pretty good and then you hear them through crazy big speakers and it's like, 'This is great! That's our song!' It's really weird. Strange.

It must be nice having someone like James — who's worked with all these famous artists — be taking your music seriously.

Mike: He's done heaps of bands that we listen to, some of our favourite stuff. And he's working with us and it's a bit...surreal.

Is it all downhill from here?

[Laughs] I'm not sure what we're going to do after this. We'll have it mixed, pressed and then try and get it out there. I don't know what we'll do after that. We've got Year 12 this year, which will make it a bit difficult to be doing shows and stuff. But we're definitely not going to stop. Especially not now.

It must make you feel like you're doing something right. Not just to win it but to get here and not be fazed -- to have James believe in you.

Yeah. It's definitely reassuring. I forget at times that I'm actually in Los Angeles. In a studio. It's definitely very cool.

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Marcus Teague

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