If you had told his fans three years ago that Kirin J Callinan would one day release a glittery, oversaturated EDM record… well, they probably would have believed you, actually. And not because the one-time Mercy Arms guitarist is predictable – in fact, rather the opposite.
Callinan is the kind of artist who clearly does whatever the bloody hell he wants, and his output is defined by its volatility. The Sydneysider could announce tomorrow that his next record is a series of K-pop songs covered in Mariachi band style and no-one would really be that surprised.
Indeed, that Callinan has hopped from the brooding guitar work that defined his first solo record Embracism to the MDMA-infused, joyous electropop of his new album Bravado isn’t some kind of about-face – it’s just him leaning into the ecstatic oddness that makes his songs what they are. And anyway, as different as the two records might seem on the surface, Callinan argues they are both reaching for the same thing anyway.
“With Bravado I was trying to explore a lot of the same ideas that I did on Embracism, just in a little more of an ambitious sense,” Callinan says over the phone from the States, where he is drumming up anticipation for the new record. “I was moving towards the same end goal, but just taking leaps and bounds instead of little baby steps.
“Where the Embracism songs were dark electronica and moody ballads, I wanted this record to be full of inclusive, joyous electronica and open-hearted, sentimental ballads. It was about exploring my own identity and my own sense of humour.”
That inclusivity is particularly evident on lead single ‘S.A.D.’, a giddy ballad dedicated to chemical dependence on which Callinan rhymes the words ‘plastic’ and ‘fantastic’ and generally sounds like he is having the time of his life. And there’s a reason for that joy, too – Callinan describes the album’s production period as one of the most creatively fruitful periods of his life.
“Aaron [Cupples, producer] and I were working on Bravado seven days a week, and living together as well, so we would get up, have some breakfast, and then we’d ride over to the studio, spend the day there, ride back to his place when we were done and then do it all again together the very next day. Not once did we argue. It was a very happy time. And I think it has brought us that much closer.”
The bulk of the record was already written before Callinan took it to the studio, but that’s not to say the recording process was simply about laying the record down to tape. Some of the songs transformed completely with Cupples’ help, and the longer the pair worked on it, the more Bravado began to reveal itself to them.
“Being in the studio totally changes the songs,” Callinan explains. “Particularly on this record – Aaron was as committed to the songs as I was. He would help me tweak songs in a whole bunch of different ways, so the songs really evolved. So with something like ‘S.A.D.’, the finished version is barely recognisable when compared to what it started off as. It was initially this abstract kind of modulated guitar piece that somehow became this EDM-indebted hip hop thing.” He laughs. “I don’t really know how that happened.”
Of course, by their very nature, such brutal rewriting processes require musicians to almost totally disengage their egos. You can’t be too precious about a song that you know will be gutted during a recording session, and often you have to actively tear your baby apart yourself – completely restructuring something that you might have once thought was a done deal.
“You have to let go completely,” Callinan agrees. “There has to be no judgement at all in the studio. If something is bad or I don’t like it, that’s normal. The only way to deal with that is just to keep going down the rabbit hole. And that’s how it works – the bad stuff just falls away and the good stuff will stick. Especially if there was a disagreement – if Aaron and I disagreed on something, or even if I was conflicted within myself, I’d really have to learn not to try to control it all. If an idea was shit, it would eventually not make the cut.”
Bravado also boasts a stunning roll call of guest vocalists. Everyone from ‘Contort Yourself’ singer James Chance to Jimmy Barnes (yeah, that Jimmy Barnes) makes an appearance, and at times the record feels like a sweaty, angel-dust-coated karaoke session at a dive bar. Everyone just sounds like they’re having so much bloody fun; as though they all left their inhibitions by the door in a nice little pile next to most of their clothes.
“There are so many other characters involved, which makes it such a richer world,” says Callinan. “It wasn’t so much that we made it up as we went along, but we made sure that it was never forced. [The guests] were my friends – people that I was hanging out with, or was on tour with, or even in some cases living with. So because they were in my world, it felt very natural that they should be on the record.
“Much of the core of the record is to me the community feeling. Everyone on the record knows each other – everyone was playing the same festivals, and touring constantly, hanging out in the same places. It just made it feel like all these people from Australia and Europe and the States all kind of coexisted in this pretty small international community. So having all these people on the one record – all these people both old and new – that became a cool part of the statement.”
Of course, the nature of such a guest-heavy record will undoubtedly present interesting problems when Callinan tours it around Australia – unless he brings Barnes for a ride around the country with him, he’s going to have to find a fill-in. But that’s not the only problem. Simply put, Bravado is generally becoming a bit of a pain in the arse now it’s time for its creator to mash it up into a manageable, tourable shape.
“These new songs are really hard to play, especially with a three-piece band, let alone solo. At the same time, I remember it being really challenging learning how to do the Embracism songs as well. Both records were intentionally made with me not thinking about how I was going to perform them live. I didn’t want that to restrict or inhibit what I was making. I was like, ‘Well, I’ll cross that bridge when I come to it.’
“The structure of the songs also makes them very hard for someone else to learn them. For me, when I’m writing the songs they just feel right. Those songs are the way they are because that seems like the obvious thing to do.”
Callinan laughs, perhaps struck by sudden self-awareness. “To be honest, getting the songs ready to play live always makes it clear what a weird decision it was to write them that way.”
Bravado is out Friday June 9 through Siberia/EMI. Kirin J Callinan plays Oxford Art Factory on Saturday June 10, and tickets are on sale now.
