THE VIOLET STONES // Crystal Energy

Meet The Violet Stones, Sydney’s grunge rock wunderkids. Since forming in late 2016, the band have been on a steady touring schedule.

MORE: THE HYST LIST: The Top Ten Musical Bamboozles That Scramble Your Brain REVIEWS: I PREVAIL: Trauma // TOTALLY UNICORN: Sorry // THE VIOLET STONES: Intensify

Now, they’ve finally released their first official single Intensify and trust us when we say it’s a choon and a half. Hysteria caught up with the up and comers to chat about the track, their history and their plans for 2019.

Hysteria: Let’s get the band introduced.

Sarah: I’m Sarah and I sing and play the guitar

Jarrod: I’m Jarrod and I’m the lead guitarist of the band

Mate: I’m Mate and I play the drums

Neil: I’m Neil and I play bass and I sing a bit too

I’d love to hear about the band’s history and how you all got started

Sarah: We basically formed in high school. Our music teacher put us together, it was me, Mate and Jarrod at first with another guitarist. When high school ended, we didn’t really do anything else. I tried to start other bands but they didn’t work out so I decided to get us back together. We jammed and it worked out well. Then through a mutual friend, we found Neil.

Jarrod/Mate/Neil: Who was the mutual friend?

Sarah: [Laughs] It was actually Neil’s music teacher, he was still in school. The teacher’s also my dads’ friend.

Did you work with anyone to get Intensify recorded?

Sarah: We worked with a bunch of different people. My dad has been helping us with the whole thing, he’s an engineer

Neil: He’s an engineer, producer and creative mind! He helped us out with recording it mainly starting out with drums and then we had some help recording guitars.

Sarah: One of my dad’s friends is a really good guitarist and he has a lot of good gear so we recorded guitar at his house, and then we just recorded vocals at my house in my dad’s home studio.  There’s been a couple of people involved, but it’s mainly been my dad.

I tried to start other bands but they didn’t work out so I decided to get us back together. We jammed and it worked out well.
[ Sarah ]

How did you find the recording process went?

Sarah: We recorded drums in September 2017 and we didn’t have a way to record guitars because we were doing it DIY.  We don’t have a lot of money [laughs] so it wasn’t until we contacted my dads’ friend and asked if we could record it at his house that we got it done.

Mate: The drums were pretty difficult, I got told to record with no metronome and it wasn’t until halfway through that we started using it. It was easier but by then I was kind of dead [laughs].

You’ve been playing heaps of gigs since you formed, what have been some standout moments from those shows.

Jarrod: I just really liked Queensland because we were getting out of Sydney

All: [Laughs]

Jarrod: There was this one show where we finished our second song and had two guys dancing. We ended up giving them the thankyous and stuff but by the time we finished out next song and looked up the room was packed. We didn’t know where anyone had come from.

Mate: I really liked Brighton Up Bar when we played with Kiko Smokes… They’re a Birds of Tokyo’s side project. It was packed there and the vibe and sound were good.

Sarah: I liked the Chippendale Hotel show we recently played. People just got really into it and Jarrod was lowkey drunk so he got into the audience [laughs].

What’s planned for 2019 for the band?

Sarah: Well basically we’re planning on releasing the whole album, hopefully, it’ll be out by September. Just that and playing more shows.