Hanson

lost without each other

by Annie Leo

It’s hard to believe it’s been almost 10 years since the trio of brothers known as Hanson burst onto the music scene and started getting into everybody’s heads with that catchy little ditty, MmmBop. The band are now preparing for what will be their first full Australian tour and eldest brother, Isaac (now 24, followed by Taylor at 22 and the ‘baby’ of the group, Zac who is now 19-years old) gave us the rundown on the band, the tour and his passion for Cuban cigars!

The year 1997 saw the release of your first album, Middle Of Nowhere. Does it feel that long ago?

“It feels like a long time ago and yet it also feels like just yesterday,” Isaac mused. “So much has gone on, we’ve had the opportunity to do so much and we’ve had a full lifetime of experiences and yet it is as clear as yesterday as well.”

You guys were so young and were dealing with attention, according to Kyle Sandilands from 2DayFM, akin to The Beatles. Was it ever just too overwhelming?

“We definitely appreciated all the attention but we took it one day at a time,” he stated. “What we continued to revel in most, I think, was the fact that we had the opportunity to do what we loved the most, every day. This lifestyle is hard and right now I haven’t seen my home for over three months, but because of the music’s fans, we’ve been given the most amazing lives so I think we’re grateful and aware more than anything.”

How do you come up with MmmBop?

“If anyone knew, especially if record companies knew, they would manufacture and bottle it, but the beauty of it is, they can’t. You just don’t really know what’s going to make a good song. You start off with what feels right, what flows in a song, what sticks in your head. Some people can have a whole career in music and still not have that magic song that never goes away, other times you can be real lucky.”

What were the influences for songs on the new album, Underneath?

“We’re constantly looking to better ourselves, to better the last album and be able to better express ourselves in a more complete way,” Isaac reasoned. “There are songs on there that deal with finding inspiration, that elusive completeness, like Strong Enough To Break.

“Broken Angel is about daring to do the impossible and even though you might fail, it doesn’t mean you shouldn’t have tried. Then there are straight up love songs like Deeper and Lost Without Each Other. Some songs you look back on after they’re written and realise they’re almost autobiographical but there still open enough for the audience to discover the song for themselves and relate it to their own lives too.”

How would you describe this latest album to fans?

“It’s more organic, I would say. The first album, thanks to various collaborations with other people, started us using drum loops to augment rhythms of songs but now we’ve strayed away from that, it’s been too overdone in the last six to seven years. Our goal with this album was to make it more spacious. We wanted an album you could crank up in your car and feel the punch of the drums and guitars but then also make it a mellowing album that you can listen to at any moment of the day.”

There’s a great quote from The London Times that gives Hanson credit for, ‘being able to jump from teen poppers to credible rockers’. What do you attribute that to?

“I think first and foremost because we are and always have been songwriters and musicians first and everything else second. All our songs have been our own compositions, our musical direction has been completely dictated by us and unfortunately, there is a perception that younger musicians can’t do this. Now that we’re in our early 20s it’s ok for people too see that drive and direction but it’s always been there.

People don’t always get along with family members but you guys don’t really have a choice - you’re together almost 24/7. Does it make it easier or harder that you guys are brothers?

“I’ve never been in a band with anyone other than my brothers but I’ve worked with other people from bass players to other singers but nothing beats working with Taylor and Zac. It has nothing to do with being blood relatives but everything to do with our musical passion and inspiration. I don’t think the three of us would be as close as we are if we weren’t in the band together. We’re very different people and express ourselves in different ways but we’re very similar in our passion for music. I often joke that we stopped being brothers 10 years ago, it’s gone far beyond that.”

You guys have been heralded as great role models. Do you ever get sick of being role models and just want to break out the whiskey?

“I do! I have a great passion for whiskey and cigars. I had a great Cuban Number 3 cigar just the other day when Taylor turned 22 and we were celebrating. It’s funny but people think you have to do cocaine or heroin to be ‘cool’, but that’s just nuts. I have my vices like everybody else and I’ve been smoking Cuban cigars since I was 16, but I try to keep as much of my private life as private as I can. I’d rather people focus on our music than what they think we should or shouldn’t be.

Is there anything on the agenda for when you get down to Australia that you maybe didn’t have time to do the last times you guys were here?

“We’ve never played a full electric tour of Australia and that’s definitely something I’ve wanted to do ever since we had the chance to come to Australia all those years ago! We’ve played acoustic shows in Sydney and Melbourne and a spontaneous gig in an amphitheatre in Brisbane but we’ve never done a full show. And we’ve never even been to Adelaide or Perth.

“But we love Australia, it’s so easy to get around and the people are always so nice,” Isaac concluded. “So we’ll definitely be trying to get around to see as much of it as we can.”

Hanson play Thebarton Theatre on Sat Jun 4 with Zinc