WITH seven members bringing in sounds from banjo to mandolin and pedal steel, Brisbane band Halfway are known for the rich textures in their music.
Two of the members, singer-songwriter John Busby and Elwin Hawtin joined forces after playing in bands in Rockhampton. After moving to Brisbane and recruiting Ben Johnson on bass, Halfway was formed in 2000.
Joining shortly after were Dublin born brothers Noel Fitzpatrick on pedal steel and Liam Fitzpatrick on banjo, mandolin and tenor guitar. The finishing touches to the lineup were added with the inclusion of ex-Go-Betweens member John Willsteed on lead guitar and Luke Peacock on keyboard.
The result is a rich tapestry of sound, almost cinematic in its scope.
Getting it all together though is something singer-songwritwer John Busby admits can be a mission.
“Yeah, there’s a lot of us. At one stage there was me, Chris (who left the band in 2018) and Willsteed all on guitar. For a while I dropped back to acoustic guitar to open the sound up a bit. There are tricks like that you can do to pull away a bit, make it a bit more percussive, less filling,” Busby said.
The downside is working out who fits where in the mix.
“Oh everyone’s always competing,” Busby said with a laugh.
“We’ve had the band up to 10 members. We had two keyboard players at one stage. We had a Fender Rhodes and a Hammond player. I’d rather have more and move stuff away than be sitting there with three people wondering ‘I wonder what fits the theme, oh no we can’t do that’.
“Usually at rehearsal we try and work out who is doing what and what is going where, if it is cluttered and if someone has to sit out and make space. We’ve done a lot of that, to have people come in at certain parts. But with this new record everyone is just playing any part they can hear or find and then we are going to sort it out in the mix and then go back through the mix and find out what’s where and who is where and try and rework whatever songs we want to play live and make them make sense.
“When you make a record you soon work out what parts are working and what parts aren’t. There is nowhere to hide. In a rehearsal space it is a bit easier to just be part of the general roar of the band, but once you make a record, you really know whose parts are where.”
The big sound and rich texture the players bring to the arrangements is a key ingredient to accompany the songwriting which paints a picture of Queensland life.
“Rehearsals are a bit different now but when we started out it was more about fun and drinking, like a music club and less about rehearsing; more about sharing music,” Busby said.
“Now, everyone’s a little bit older, a little bit more serious, we’re all still friends because all the music we share. It’s more, OK what’s the set, let’s start, let’s do it.
“We always used to take the music seriously, but it’s a bit more regimented. It has to be in a way.”
The band is currently recording what will be their ninth studio album and if co-ordinating seven people wasn’t hard enough, Busby is living between his new home in Darwin and Brisbane.
“We’ve been writing over the last winter. We’ve got a bunch of new songs, so we’re just tracking away. I’ve been recording in between Darwin and Brisbane, I live in both cities. So I’ve been up there recording, just demoing and we do the heavier recording down here. We’ve got new songs we are working on them and hopefully get them out this year.
“This one’s a little bit different to the others in that we’ve recorded it all ourselves. Our process is generally to work out the record as a band, rehearse it hard and work it out and go then into a studio for a week to track it and a week to mix it.
“With this one, we just track it bit by bit and made it from the ground up, just from one acoustic guitar, one voice, add bass, add drums. So the process is quite different. It’s like demos turned into full blown songs. And then once we’re finished, we’re finished, which should be fairly soon. “
From their first album Farewell to the Fainthearted, released in 2003, Halfway gained strong reviews and a loyal fanbase.
The band toured nationally and the lead single Patience Back was picked up by Triple J.
International and national supports with The Black Keys, Gomez, You Am I, J Mascis (Dinosaur Jnr), Josh Pyke, Band of Horses, Gary Louris and Mark Olsen (The Jayhawks) and Richard Hawley followed.
In 2008 Halfway songwriting duo, John Busby and Chris Dale won Queensland’s most prestigious songwriting award – The Grant McLennan Fellowship.
In 2009 Go-Betweens frontman Robert Forster was recruited to produce their new album An Outpost of Promise and their fourth album, the breakthrough LP Any Old Love which won the Independent Music Award for Best Country Album. The lead single Dulcify also won Song of the Year at the Queensland Music Awards with the band receiving a plaque on the Brisbane Valley Mall and an APRA Award nomination for Best Blues and Roots Single.
The band’s rising popularity continued with the albums The Golden Halfway Record, Rain Lover and Restless Dream, a collaboration with Indigenous elder Bobby Weatherall and On the Ghostline, with Hands of Lightning.
· Halfway play at the Old Museum in Brisbane on March 2 on a double bill with The Wreckery.