Pomomofo - A Band Is Not An Island
Local indie rockers Pomomofo are back with their second EP, In Super VGA. 3D’s Matt Unicomb finds out all about Facebook posers and maturing lyricism.
In a city saturated with, trendy, Cheap Monday-toting musos brandishing the ‘indie dance’ slogan, none represent the cause better than local three-piece Pomomofo. After having recorded their sophomore EP In Super VGA earlier this year, the five-track is in place for its widely anticipated release later this week. After signing to indie getup Bandroom Records in the wake of their prior label’s bankruptcy, the trio have seen the Pomomofo outreach envelope more fans than most young, EP-only outfits could only hope for.
It was this initial self-titled EP that garnered them so much attention. Rising from the cracks of Sydney’s live music scene with the electrifying, ‘are they being serious-’ attitude, Pomomofo gathered something of cult following in Sydney’s own judgemental, somewhat too serious, indie scene. “The feedback was amazing,” Nikos Andronicos exclaims. “We started out as a band who had absolutely no idea. You see a lot of bands who have barely started, and suddenly are releasing stuff – we definitely weren’t like that.”
Pomomofo had catapulted the young band to heights that they couldn’t have achieved without its release. Their tongue-in-cheek lyricism, coupled with frantic instrumentation, made them out to be a band that did not take themselves too seriously, and were proven to be a breath of fresh air for those growing tired of the ‘doom and gloom’ musicianship taking over Sydney’s musical underground. Things stepped a notch in the aftermath of Pomomofo. “When you’re live, no one really knows where to place you, but the minute you have something on tape a lot of things happen,” he explains. “Having something on the shelf is a major deal.”
However getting something on a shop shelf is not as easy as it may seem. Recording, pressing, promotions and artwork pressures all combine to result in headaches for all those involved in its conception. In Super VGA has been no exception. “We recorded it months and months ago,” Andronicos says.
“Dude, I don’t even have one!” he exclaims when told 3D hadn’t received a physical copy of their EP. “I’ve only seen a PDF of the cover and some mp3s. Everything takes so fucking long.”
Fans of the band would note the departure of much of the token, in your face, Pomomofo comedy that has made them so recognisable over the last two years, replaced with a metaphoric slant on the occurrences the trio see everyday. The lead single Island holds perhaps their most profound and most confronting lyricism. Compared to 2007’s EP, it’s like aligning Andrew G with Shakespeare.
“It’s not a joke song, at all,” he says about Island. “It was written around the time you couldn’t have a proper conversation with someone unless it was on MySpace or Facebook. Everyone I knew was involved in promoting something of there’s. I just remember all my friends became fakers on Facebook with all their interests listed next to the picture of their face. It started to remind me of the advertising exercise, where you turned yourself into this product on Facebook to try and be cool. The ironic thing is now we have to promote the song, even though the song is about self-promotion.”
Underlying In Super VGA’s cryptic lyricism is a, perhaps, contempt for the scene they have risen from. Not so, according to Andronicos. “I love the scene, but it’s flawed as fuck – that’s why I love it.”
WHO: Pomomofo
WHAT: In Super VGA through Bandroom Records / Play Beach Rd Hotel / Play La Campagna
WHEN: Saturday 18 October / Sunday 19 / Friday 24
MORE: myspace.com/pomomofomusic