Feature: Groove Vultures Decodes “What Happened to Lucy”
What inspired you to write the lyrics/music for "What Happened to Lucy?"
I’m Shawn- the lead singer of the Groove Vultures. Lucy is inspired by my experience as an Emergency doctor- though the character is fictional, it’s my reflection on the experiences of so many people who have fallen on hard times after years of drug and alcohol abuse. I found myself wondering what their lives were like before and what they could have become, and from that the idea of Lucy was born. Then the song really took on a life of its own.
Can you talk about the recording and production process for this song?
We are really lucky as a band. To have an audio engineer like Harry Marsh in the band has allowed us to surmount so many of the challenged bands normally face in self-production. The main challenge from our perspective has been trying to find what sound works for each individual, as we all have such a wide range of influences. It's been a learning experience to see where everyone's strengths are, and how to capitalise on those strengths for our future work. It’s been a learning process during EP recording and despite that have had an unbelievable reception so far. But you can be certain our next couple of songs are going to take everything we have learnt and turn it up to 11.
What did you enjoy most about making "What Happened to Lucy?"
It might be hard to believe but the song was initially a solo singer song writer style before I met the rest of the band. I remember playing the recording from my phone to friends years ago like- hey do you like my idea!? When we put that concept song to the whole band it took on a whole new rhythm and beat and morphed into this energetic rock beast you see today. I love what it has ended up as but I could never have predicted the direction it would take from its inception. To see how far it has come from a crappy phone recording to today has been a mind bending but amazingly cool experience.
Can you tell us more about you as a band?
We are 4 mates from Melbourne- 3 Australian’s and a kiwi all from pretty different backgrounds, musically and geographically. Because of that we didn’t want to be defined by a specific label or fill another band’s template. We wanted to create something unique that reflects our unique weirdness.
Our Guitarist and bass player love metal they bring that style heavily to our writing process. Our drummer and audio engineer Harry has a wide range of skills and influences but loves heavy rock and punk he brings elements of that to his song writing. I myself loved Sublime growing up and carry that funky rhythm into my guitar playing and story driven lyrics. Somehow in between all of that we mixed it all into a really energetic, groovy, heavy sound that blends a whole heap of genres and makes us a band that’s hard to define and hard to put in a box! Just like we like.
Can you share an instance where you felt a strong connection with the crowd during a show?
At our last show which was our EP release, we packed out the Workers Club in Melbourne. It was booked as the last show before our current writing/ recording hiatus. In the crowd was all the people that have been with us from the start of this journey- our friends, our loved ones, our fans from day 1. The sound was epic and the crowd really vibed with every song we played. We got to do a huge encore and at the end took a photo with the crowd which you can see on our profile- everyone was thriving! We were absolutely fizzing. It felt so heartfelt and connected to celebrate with everyone after what was absolutely our best show yet, we were ecstatic to show everyone how far we had come and what their support had allowed us to do. There was a real sense of completeness like we closed the chapter on that set list with an absolute bang- and gave our fans a show to remember. We definitely won’t forget it!