Track By Track: N.Y.C.K - 'Wild Streak'
Melbourne duo N.Y.C.K have just released their debut album ‘Wild Streak’, and from beginning to the end, the pair take their audience on a beautiful journey into their personal world. They took a moment to talk to us about the album - track by track.
WILD STREAK
Nick: When I was going through a particularly bitter sweet time in life I moved into an apartment on the fourth floor in St.Kilda with my best friend Jack. We were both recently single. We had this beautiful old Melbourne apartment with palm trees out the window and views out over St.Kilda rooftops. The real estate agent sold it as a two bedroom but we had these sliding Japanese doors between our rooms. And with nothing to go back to, devoid of our centre in life, Jack and I went down to our favourite local bar every night and stayed there until 4 AM. We’d often end up in the Kitchen with the girl who owned it, talking shit. The more unhappy we were the longer we stayed out. Being out drinking and taking drugs became our happy place. And real life became the opposite.
Dom: It was the most challenging song on the record, from a production standpoint. We wanted it to build to a crescendo and reflect the storyline. Ross Irwin (Cat Empire) came in and played improvised horn lines, Lawrence Greenwood played guitars, and a bunch of our friends came in and sung the big chorus lines as a choir. It was recorded and produced by Hayden Calnin.
JUNE
Nick: There comes a time in your life when you realise that you can be a fucking horrible, nasty, vindictive person. We all can. It fucking hurts when you first realise that you’ll (unconsciously) take someone you love out to the cleaners. Hurt them on purpose. Use them. Make them feel jealous or insecure. This song is about that realisation. And on the back of that realising that you’re prepared to spend the rest of your life resisting those urges because you’d do anything for her.
Dom: June is so beautifully minimal. We went through so many different versions of this song last year, playing live, but it never worked better than the most simple version we ever did, just on a piano. Nick and I recorded all of our vocals in the same big live space, looking at each other. It’s such an important part of our music and our delivery.
THREES
Nick: Every year my brothers and I drive from Melbourne up the East Coast. We stay in Motels and Hotels and play the pokies and go swimming and eat ourselves to death. Last year we ended up on the Sapphire Coast. In Merimbula, I was a little heartbroken and cold and miserable and washed out and after heaps of beers, my brothers asked me why the fuck I was still hung up on someone who so clearly didn’t like me. And I finally remembered what it was like to see someone who was acting like me from the other side. It was a giant step to dropping it all. The sample at the start is from the three of us at the Merimbula Surf Club, waiting for the meat raffle to get drawn, speaking to an old guy about how he just missed winning by one ticket. It’s called Threes cos me and my brothers - life is better in threes. The lyrics to Dom’s part is written by Olivia Gavranich.
Dom: Throughout the album, Nick and I loved recording random things when we were away on tour or separately on holidays. It adds such a personal element to our record, and so much insight into our lives. For us, upbeat and happy hadn’t been done on our records and we wanted to bring out the moments in life where we felt in the moment and joy.
LXE
Nick: A haiku during a particularly low ebb.
Dom: LXE was mostly created in Nick's bedroom. It was produced by Nick and Lawrence Greenwood.
ALIVE
Nick: Lyrically, I really wanted to juxtapose this song from the rest of the album. Most happy songs sound happy. The sad, sad. You know? But with this it was about that moment in your life when you just surrender to yourself and everything else and just say fuck this shit. Take me away. Have me. I’m all yours. It’s about having the fight you’ve had with your girlfriend 100000000 times, when you just don’t have the energy to have it again. And the peace you find when you realise it’s not worth the fight.
ALL THE BIRDS
Dom: We had so much fun recording this song. Most of it was recorded in Nick's bedroom, we just sang random things and tried different harmonies and sounds until something worked. This song is short and sweet but I feel it is a relaxing point on the record, everything sounds easy and controlled. It is definitely a favourite of mine.
SYDNEY
Nick: When we released our first song we were picked up really quickly by Triple J Unearthed and made Unearthed Feature Artists and played on national radio and interviewed. Within hours every record label and manager in the country had dropped an email into our inbox. So we organised a showcase show in Sydney and no fans showed up. It was just ten dudes from industry wearing lanyards and bullshitting onto us about how good we were. In short it’s this really nice part of growing up as a musician - where you start worrying about the things you can control.
I’LL BE THE ONE
Nick: When you’re at home two days after breaking up with the love of your life, and you’re still finding them everywhere. Notes on the bathroom door. Jumpers covered in perfume. You still have the sting from those few weeks when she was moving out, when you had logistical issues to deal with even though it was over. You go out and get drunk. You sleep with girls. You make things worse. You hope that they’ll come back.
Dom: I remember when we first wrote the song on piano together, the melody and harmonies worked so perfectly together. The bones of the song were written so quickly and easily but the production was a lot trickier than what we expected. Finding the right sounds to accompany the acoustic keys was essential in building the song and capturing the storyline. Again, we recorded these vocals together at the same time which adds to the personalised elements of the song.
BLEEDING HEARTS
It’s about the way our social media personas distort our view of the world - they are just so wildly empathic, so different from the real thing.
Lawrence Greenwood co wrote and produced this song.
FACE IT YOU’RE DONE
Nick: A realisation I had one time in a bar, watching this incredibly talented musician of 40 or so, playing to no one, that i’ll be him one day. And wondering whether he even gave a shit if anyone like his music anymore.
Dom: This was recorded live in the studio. We had one microphone set up and we both sat on the piano stool. Until that take we had never really nailed the parts to the song, it just so happened our producer was recording us as we practiced. This song is minimal and relies heavily on the warmth and contrast of our voices. For me, this track revisits the simplicity of our first EP.