Interview with Soaked Oats

Fresh out of picturesque Dunedin, NZ, is sludge pop band Soaked Oats. With hit song titles such as ‘I’m a Peach’, ‘Apricot Jam’ and ‘Avocado Aficionado’ from their debut EP Stone Fruit Melodies, the group are much, much more than your favourite breakfast staple. The group, fronted by Oscar Mein, Henry Francis, Max Holmes and Conor Feehly, have just released a slick new EP called Sludge Pop and have signed with independent Australian record label Dot Dash.

Milk Bar was fortunate enough to catch up with Conor Feehly, drummer extraordinaire, about what the record label means and what exactly is ‘sludge pop’.

First up, congratulations on signing to Australian label Dot Dash, what will this mean for the group?

Thank you! We are stoked to have been picked up by Dot Dash, they are lovely folks. I guess this means we have more people helping us spread our music through Australia, which is kind of the next logical step if you are an NZ band. We are just really happy to incorporate people into our project who we know believe in us and can trust.

Going back to the beginning, where did Soaked Oats take its first steps so to speak? And how do you all know each other?

Soaked Oats came about when we (Oscar, Max, Henry and Conor) attempted to record some songs that Oscar had written over a previous summer. We kind of workshopped the songs as a group, made some pretty hilarious DIY demos and got invited to support some friend’s bands. Without going too deep into everybody’s friendship origin stories, Oscar and Max are old Beyblade nemeses from Kindy (preschool in Aussie?), then I met Oscar and Max at high school, then Max and I met Henry at the University of Otago.

How would you describe Soaked Oats’ vibe and music?

We have recently been describing our music as ‘Sludge-pop’. The ‘sludge’ I think pertains more to the lyrical content rather than what the actual genre is, Oscar writes lyrics that often err to the not so glamorous characteristics of people, uncertainty, anxiety, expectation. We then dress these topics up in guitar-pop songs.

The music video for ‘Coming Up’ looks fantastic. Could you tell us a little bit of how it was shot? 

Thank you! Our very close friend and collaborator Jake Munro came with us on a tour of America towards the end of last year. He was constantly shooting film as we were moving around and that video, I think, is somewhat of a homage to the trip. Its damn nice to watch and relive some of those times!

You’re going to play in Melbourne, Sydney and Brisbane in the next few weeks, but what is next for the group?

Yes, so we have some Australian shows coming up which we are very excited about, then we will come home and play around NZ. After all that we are going to take some time off from touring and start writing/demoing some new songs.

You can catch Soaked Oats at the Grace Darling Hotel this Saturday, 29 June. Grab your ticket here.

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