Enola Fall

Amongst other things we were lucky enough to have a chat with Enola Fall frontman Joe Nuttall about their recent release, I am an Aerial.

Perhaps it takes a dark night, a shot of something strong and certain stillness to contemplate the overwhelming entirety of our universe. Otherwise, you could listen to Enola Fall’s I am an Aerial.

Listening to Joe describe what became the catalyst for the record, the Hubble Deep Field, it is immediately apparent that this was an image he found immensely inspiring.

The telescope, directed into what was assumed a vacant patch of sky revealed hundreds and hundreds of unknown galaxies. Joe goes further, “there’s a radio telescope down the road in Hobart and we tied the two things together and it worked pretty well.”

This can be said of the entire record, as the aerial is pervasive in Enola Fall’s album art, lyrics and sound.

“There seems something slightly arrogant about using the depth and breadth of the universe as a metaphor for your own relationship problems seems a bit strange… It's not so much a metaphor as it is comparing and contrasting the two things.”

In terms of sound the band was inspired by the almost static, white noise of the telescope’s control center. As Joe relates, "we decided to tie the record together with loops of guitar noise that sounds like static… It’s just an echo and you make a load of feedback and guitar stuff with it.”

Like their hometown of Hobart, Tasmania, it’s evident that there’s something decidedly unique about Enola Fall’s sound. A certain edge possessed by bands like Battles. As frontman Joe Nuttall relates, “it’s to completely confounds expectation but in a way that is still accessible.”

This then is something only achieved after what I would imagine, felt like a period of hibernation, “when you write you go very much on gut instinct it’s not a conscious thing, you’ll be playing and improving and it goes on for hours…you go for this chord but your gut says no.”

“You have to try quite hard to get out of these traps that the music sets for you.”

 
It goes without saying that Enola Fall has been successful at evasion. The EP marks the first of three releases the band will have with Creative Vibes, each having a decidedly unique concept and sound. I had always been intrigued as to why the band chose this approach over a full-length album. As Joe explains,

“Partly pragmatic – it’s a lot cheaper to make an EP so you don’t blow all your money on one release but also artistic because we wanted to make three slightly distinct things.”

Whilst pragmatics always prove tough for independent bands like Enola Fall they managed to see their way through an extensive tour earlier this year. As Joe confesses, “It nearly killed us, we ran out of money about half way along and so we all lost masses of weight and kind of just ate toast for a week. Kind of doing a tour beyond our means, fuck it that’s part of being in a band.”

On the other hand there’s something rewarding about playing a gig to six hundred people, half of whom are shouting along the chorus to your songs. “Some of the gigs we’re amazing, we played a gig at the Roundhouse and that was just incredible.”

Amidst efforts to establish a strong grassroots following at home in Australia Nuttal admits that branching into an International market would be something to set their sights on,

“It’s always a good idea, especially the states – there’s such a huge market over there, getting over there is hard but you know if you can get over there and play and support and do festivals. But we’re already being spun on a lot of radio in the US, so it’s only a matter of time.”

Grab I am an Aerial from any reliable music store/ on Itunes (previews too!)