Lately when it comes to emerging pop punk all eyes seem to be on Australia. With the likes of Yours Truly, Stand Atlantic, Between you & me all gaining attention worldwide. One of the next Aussie bands we recommend looking out for is Paperweight. The band have just released their new single “lemon spiders” and are about to embark on a national tour with State champs. We caught up with the bands guitarist Luana ahead of the tour.
SCENEzine
Firstly tell us about how the band Paperweight first got together?
Luana
So Paperweight kinda formed from the ashes of Haris’ old band! When they broke up, he still had 5 recorded songs that he’d written and still wanted to put out, so he formed Paperweight. Those tracks went on to be our first 5 singles.
I joined the band in mid-2019, my childhood friend Basil jumped on drums and Tom responded to the Instagram call for a lead guitarist. The band fully came together in January 2020, we recorded our first video clip in March 2020 then were thrown straight into lockdown… but it was kind of a blessing in disguise, it worked really well for us!
SCENEzine
Congrats on the super catchy new song “Lemon Spiders”. How was the writing process for the song?
Luana
Thank you! The process for this one was different to our last EP – we went into the studio with nothing but the prerequisite that it just had to be different from the classic early 2000’s pop-punk vibe we’d already done. We co-wrote this one with our producer Stevie Knight (Stand Atlantic, Yours truly, RedHook) – once we had the riff it came together quite quickly and organically. When we were thinking of a way to kick the chorus in, I suggested that we could start it with a meme – the whole Will Smith at the Oscars situation had just happened so that’s where the “out your f*ing mouth!” lyric came from haha.
SCENEzine
Can you tell us about making the video for “Lemon Spiders”?
Luana
Absolutely – this one was special for me because I got to work with another childhood friend, Ed Reiss! We found a ‘glow in the dark mini golf’ place online (Glow Golf, Docklands) and thought it would be a rad place to shoot a film clip. I honestly thought they wouldn’t let us borrow the entire venue but they did, and they stayed open until 2am for us. Legends. It was a lot of fun to film – Ed was great to work with and my friend Jayden was taking some BTS photos for us, so it was just a bunch of mates hanging out. Those fast motion shots were actually so much harder to do than we thought – we had to play the song in super slow motion but move our bodies like normal. It took us a while to get the hang of it but we got there. I’m sad we didn’t actually get to play any mini golf so we’ll have to go back one day soon!
SCENEzine
Speaking of videos, we really like the video for “Asteroids! And where to find them” Was it as fun to make as it looked?
Luana
Oh my god, yes – it was SO much fun! I think Haris would beg to differ – he edited the entire video clip on his own and it took DAYS! He learnt how to 3D render and everything… but it was well worth it. What a legend.
We shot the clip over two days – one 9 hour day in a green screen studio and then another day doing the Happy Gilmore scene… if you watch closely, my gorgeous Grandma is in the car playing the role of Happy’s grandma. She had no idea what was going on, bless her.
We’re a very DIY band (if you couldn’t tell) – my aunty Nic owns the dance school “Dance Explosion” so she lent us all of the Wizard of Oz costumes, and we hired the rest from Centre Stage in Brunswick.
Painting Baz silver to play the Tin Man was probably my highlight – he looked so funny. I had to colour him in with a metallic silver crayon haha – it took ages!
SCENEzine
How was the experience of getting to play the Knight and Day festival?
Luana
Knight & Day was incredible. It was only our 3rd ever show! Playing alongside such huge bands was insane – we actually didn’t even get told the lineup until the night before announcing. Chris asked us if we wanted to play a festival in a castle and of course we said yes, because it was a damn festival in a castle – who’s gonna say no to that?! When we got sent the artwork the night before the announcement, we all just had this collective moment of “wait… Parkway Drive, Polaris… what the fuck!?” It was a huge 2 days and it was the first festival back after our 234705 lockdowns so it was pretty emotional! We all got Covid (except Tom) but it was kinda worth it (thankfully we didn’t cop it too badly). Bringing in 2022 with Parkway Drive and thousands of friends was something we weren’t expecting to do for a long time so I definitely shed a couple of happy tears.
SCENEzine
Very soon Paperweight are touring Australia with State Champs. What was your reaction when you found out about this tour?
Luana
I’d actually just landed in Sydney for our EP launch show and was having a nap on a mate’s couch. When our manager called me I just screamed. What else are you supposed to do when you get news like that? Haha. Haris and Tom were in the car driving to Sydney and when I called them they were like “……did you just say State Champs?!?!?!?!” “YES THE STATE CHAMPS!!!!!”. Haris loves Champs, he’s wearing their merch in our video clip for Whisper Games and used to cover their songs in his old band. Kinda surreal to have those full circle moments! We’re all so excited.
SCENEzine
Do you have a favourite State Champs song you hope they play?
Luana
Oh man, I have totally been spinning the crap out of “Everybody But You” lately – what a bop! I’d be excited for anything off The Finer Things – that was a brilliant album.
SCENEzine
Lastly, who would be your dream musician to collaborate with on a future Paperweight track?
Luana
There are so many – I’d love to have Bon from Stand Atlantic on a track, I am a little bit in love with her. But I think my number one would have to be Deryck Whibley. Sum 41 are my all time favourite band and Deryck has been my favourite human since I was a kid – it would be another one of those insane full circle moments.
(interview by Christian Ross)
