Good Morning and Delivery Have A Lot of Fun

Liam Parsons is one-half of the Melbourne-based indie rock duo Good Morning; James Lynch and Bec Allan play guitar and bass, respectively, in the also-Melbourne-based garage rock band Delivery. Delivery’s new record, Force Majeure, is out this Friday on Heavenly, so to celebrate, the three friends got together to catch up about it, and much more. 
— Annie Fell, Editor-in-chief, Talkhouse Music 

Liam Parsons: So, what’s the deal with your new record? Because I haven’t actually heard it. I should have asked for it. 

James Lynch: [Laughs.] We were just saying, we should have sent you the record. 

Bec Allan: I was like, I don’t want to force you…

Liam: No, I was thinking about it today and I was like, is that weird? Like, “Hey, send me the link.”

Bec: I was thinking that it would be like, “Hey, here’s our new record to do your homework.” [Laughs.] 

Liam: [Laughs.] I mean, I’ve got the “Digging The Hole” 7-inch. I’ve got the number one probably.

James: Really?

Liam: It should be on my Discogs, what my number is.

Bec: No one’s bought it yet. [Laughs.] 

James: I actually looked it up on Discogs the other day and someone is selling a copy of it. 

Liam: And you know who lovingly put all that information about the record into Discogs? Me. 

James: Really? Woah!

Liam: Yeah.

James: So you’re a Discogs guy?

Liam: This is a tangent, but me and [my partner] merged our record collection maybe four years into dating. So now we have a joint Discogs account where we keep track of what we have. But it’s accidentally become kind of nerdy, to catalog all our records. But when we get something that’s not in the system already, you gotta go through this really annoyingly elaborate process of adding it in. 

Bec: I’ve never added anything to Discogs. 

Liam: Yeah, it’s kind of a chore. So, you’re welcome. [Laughs.] 

James: Was it an emotional experience joining your record collection? 

Liam: Yeah, it was a big move. It was a COVID decision, because when we first moved in together, I was homeless because I was on tour and I was just like, “I’m not gonna live anywhere.” Because the whole 2020 was meant to be on the road, and then obviously that didn’t happen. I came home with nowhere to live, so I moved in with him, and then a few months later, I was like, “Should we join our records?” It kind of escalated very quickly.

Bec: We kind of had a similar thing when we started living together. It was an awkward thing of, “Should we both buy this record?”

Liam: Yeah, we were doing that for a while!

Bec: It seems dumb. But then it was like, “Well, how committed are we…?” [Laughs.] Because it’s a big deal, if you really want a record but then you’re like, “We’re only going to buy one.” You have to hope that the relationship really lasts. 

Liam: I do think — well, first and foremost, I believe my relationship will last. [Laughs.] I’ll put that on the record. But secondly, I think I would remember which ones are mine.

James: Yeah. It’s more when you’re owning it together, when you get to the point where you’re like, “Let’s buy that record” —  if something was to go sour, you would have to negotiate. 

Liam: Right. Anyway, I’d like to go back to your record. What was the gap like [in between finishing it and its release]? When did you finish it? 

James: Officially maybe…

Bec: March? Or April?

Liam: OK, so less than a year. That’s kind of quick. 

James: Yeah. But actually, we’ve never had to wait this long [to put out an album]. 

Liam: Yeah. But it could be worse, considering especially now that you also have an international label.

James: But, yeah, I’m pumped for people to hear it.

Liam: What are both of your favorite Delivery songs? 

Bec: Of songs only I’ve written?

James: Yeah, I’m more curious about that.

Bec: Because sometimes it is interesting to me, thinking about songs James has written. I think when we started playing in Delivery, I was almost the harshest critic of James’s songs, because I was coming from a punk background so if a song wasn’t fast and furious or whatever, I’d be like, “Meh, I don’t get it.” Like, I remember there was one time when James was trying to bring in this song on the first album, called “Picture This” — it was just one note the whole entire time, almost, and I was like, “What is this? It sounds so boring.”

James: It was literally our second rehearsal — “Oh, I’ve got this idea, and it’s like this one note thing.” And Bec’s like, “Why? That sounds stupid.” And I was like, “Oh, OK, don’t worry about it.” [Laughs.]

Bec: [Laughs.] I feel really bad now, because it ended up being a song that I actually really liked. Then I had to learn to just trust James. Even if it sounds like it’s not really my style, I know that if I just let him go, it’ll end up being good and I’ll like it. I was also going to say, there’s a song on the first album called “Born Second” that’s slower, almost like slacker rock or something. I wouldn’t expect to love a song like that so much. So that’s why I’m always like, some of these songs, James has a vision that I can’t see and I just have to let it ride and trust the process.

James: But I don’t think that’s specific to me — I would imagine if I said, “What’s your favorite Good Morning song?” You might pick a Stefan [Blair] song. 

Liam: I mean, they’re better songs. [Laughs.]

James: Because your perception of those songs is so different. 

Liam: Yeah. It’s like what you were saying, you’ve just got to trust the other person, and then every time they do something cool, you’re like, “Fuck yeah!”

James: Sometimes it is good as well — maybe this is a good creative partnership, or not a good creative partnership move — but in those early Delivery rehearsals, if you weren’t like, “What the fuck is this,” I might have been like, “What if we play one note and the song’s done?” Whereas after Bec was like, “what are you talking about?” I was like, “Alright, I’m gonna figure out what this is.”

Liam: Add a second note. [Laughs.]

James: [Laughs.] Well, yeah, we added a couple more! 

Bec: I think maybe my favorite song is from Force Majeure, “Stuck in the Game,” because I like that it’s like a punk song, but the chorus has a melody in it. And I’m not really one to do melodies. 

James: It’s like a classic progression where it’s going E-D-A — those three chords sound good in a row. So it’s kind of brutal, and then it’s got the moment of…

Bec: A little bit of a hook, dare I say. So I kind of surprised myself. Because also, I would not really think this now, but maybe a year ago I would have thought, I can’t sing this. So it’s nice to surprise yourself sometimes and be like, “Oh, I don’t have to just yell.” I remember with first Delivery album, me and Sam Harding were just in a room alone together, recording some vocals for a song, and I was like, “I can’t sing, so yelling is better. If it’s yelling and it’s got attitude, that’s gonna sound good.” And we’re just in the room just screaming, then James comes in and he’s like, “Oh, my god. What is happening here?”

James: Bec started having a crack at the vocals for a song, and Sam was being an enthusiastic person behind the computer, and he’s like, “Oh, yeah, we’ll try it again and try it again.” And every next go at it, instead of being like, “Alright, let’s try and find the note and home in on it,” it was like, “Why don’t you try again?” And Bec was like, “Alright, I’ll go harder.” Then I came back in 20 minutes later and it was at the top of Bec’s screaming voice. [Laughs.] I was like, “I’ve heard you sing this song as a human…”

Liam: Yeah, that’s classic, mixing a record or doing overdubs, and you get way too far down some path and it’s like, “Wait, what the fuck have I done?”

Bec: But there’s moments on the first Delivery record where I listen back to myself and I’m like, Oh, my god. I was really trying too hard to just be yelling, instead of actually sounding good. But then this record, I’m quite proud of myself for being a bit more restrained.

James: We’ve talked a lot about how you can have more power in not yelling. If you start going louder and louder, then there’s no melody at all or.

Liam: And then when you do yell, it’s like the payoff.

Bec: I’ve always very attitude-over-melody, and James is always melody. Or, not always anymore — you yell sometimes. But I like now, having worked together for long enough to kind of understand the back and forth, and not being so scared of singing. And even now, we’re doing demos for the next album, and I’m singing even more. And the singing’s not bad. I’m still not that good at it, but I can do it.

Liam: I’m excited. I can’t wait to hear it. 

James: So, we said we’d ask a few questions each. Bec’s being pretty quiet about her questions.

Bec: Well, my first question is: what do you believe constitutes a demo?

Liam: Oh, that’s interesting. I feel like when I demo, unless it’s literally just one instrument and vocals — which is maybe 10% of the time — then it’s generally the whole song kind of mapped out. I go pretty micro with it. Because that’s the thing that I like doing — I like arrangement and I like sitting around and overdubbing and making little countermelodies and harmonies and stuff.

Bec: Me and James have had this conversation a few times lately, and like I said before, I’m all about the attitude and the vibe. So I’ll be like, “These are the song categories. Isn’t that good enough?” But even when I’ve got an idea, and me and James will work on it together, he’ll start getting more ideas and he’ll be like, “What if we add this or that?” Or, “Let’s do this and let’s add that.” And I’m like, “Nah, I think it’s fine. It’s just a demo.”

Liam: And you’re like, “No, it’s not.” [Laughs.] 

James: Yeah, I’m the same, like throwing all the shit at the canvas to see what is going to be good or not. And if it’s going to be a demo, I might as well see everything that doesn’t work or that works. I don’t want to leave it up to myself in the future to figure out. 

Liam: Yeah, exactly. 

Bec: I mean, I really respect that, because I don’t play the guitar or the keys. I can only play the bass and just about sing. So I’m like, “Eh, it’s got the vibe, drum machine and vocals.” And then James will come and add all this flair to it, and I’m like, “Well, now it sounds awesome, but the song’s done.” I’m like, “That’s the song now.” Which I like.

James: Yeah, there’s not heaps of experimentation later. 

Liam: Yeah. But you also don’t want to close up shop too early, and then when you get to actually recording it properly, you’re like, “No, I know exactly how it goes and there’s no room for any change or editing.”

Bec: We’ve talked sometimes about getting a producer, and I’ve been like, “Well, why would we?” Because it’s done already. James is the producer of Delivery — you know how every part goes.

James: On the last record, I guess. But we’ve never had a producer do anything. We’ve never had that kind of person in the mix. 

Liam: Would you do it? 

James: I’d like to, but more for where my gaps are, and the things that I’m interested in doing that [I don’t know how to do]. I mean, it’s cool doing it when you don’t know how to do it, because that leads to other ways. But sometimes I’m like, “If I had someone who knew exactly how to do these handful of things…” Have you?

Liam: Not really. When we first started…

James: Avicii got in touch.

Liam: Yeah, we flew out to Stockholm. [Laughs.] No, we made our first record with my childhood friend Hamish [Mitchell]. But we made it together. It was just because we didn’t know how to record. So all the songs were written and we knew how they went, and it was just like, “Here’s how you do this,” and, “you can run this through tape,” and all this other shit.

James: We’ve never had anyone really do that except members of the band. And it is cool if someone’s like, “My purpose here is I know how to make this sound good.” 

Liam: But you already kind of knew how to record before you started the band. 

James: Yeah, yeah. 

Liam: If you listen to our back catalogue in order, it’s like the most heinous sounding recordings of all time, and we were like, “Yeah, put it out!” [Laughs.]

Bec: When you’re recording an album — there’s that saying, “the first take is always the take” — how many takes is too many when you’re just like, “I’m sure there’s a version that’s fine, but we’ve gone too deep into the rabbit hole.”

Liam: We really fuck ourselves up, because until the newest record, everything was on tape. So if you do it again, you’ve lost the one before. So we were constantly going over the one where you’re like, “I had it,” but it’s gone and there’s no going back. So you kind of have to go through the rabbit hole. 

James: Would you have really intense moments where you’re like, “I nailed it,” but someone else is like, “Nah, it’s not the one”?

Liam: Generally the thing is — which is more me than Stefan — Stefan will be doing a vocal and he’ll be like, “I think that was pretty good.” And I’m like, “Yeah, it was really good, but actually, I just recorded over the synth…” [Laughs.] “So we have the vocal! But we’re gonna have to do that synth again.”

Bec: I get really stressed about that thing you said, when you think someone else might have the perfect take. I feel like I almost stop breathing when we’re recording, because I’m like, Everyone else is playing well, don’t fuck it up. But I think maybe once you’re hitting five-plus [people playing], it’s too many.

Liam: Yeah. We also used to do that thing where it’d be like, “You know what? I think I’m gonna have to drink a little whiskey to do this one.” And then it’s an hour later and you’re fucked up, and you’re like, “I can’t really do this anymore, let’s come back tomorrow.” [Laughs.]

James: I reckon there’s a bit of magic in — I remember we did a when we recorded “No Homes” and I had to do the vocals, we were like, “Let’s go in and have, like, six beers.” And it is better than what I could have done if I just rolled straight in.

Liam: You get a little comfortable. 

Bec: Yeah, with vocals you’ve got to have a beer or something. It’s too daunting. You want to be relaxed. 

James: Alright, in the spirit of ending this conversation, I’ll ask one last question. Why do you like being in a band? 

Bec: Oh, that is a good question.

Liam: I really like not having a job. Or, I like having this as a job. I’ve had a million jobs in my life, and it’s fine, I can do it, and it’s nice to earn a real wage. I’m, like, super poor. But, you know, I’m my own boss, which is great. I love doing that. I don’t want to shade anyone who has a real job, but I just know that for me — like today, I was trying to write songs, and I was just sitting on the couch watching Monk all day. I was like, This is so cool. I’m technically working. [Laughs.] I don’t really have any other, employable skills so maybe I’ve backed myself into a corner of being in a band, being a musician. But I’m fine with it. 

James: It’s this or podcasting. [Laughs.] 

Bec: I like being in a band. I’ve always loved music, but I never played it, and then when I started playing it — I don’t want to sound really lame, but when you’re on stage playing music, I feel almost like that Disney movie Soul, where you kind of go to another place. I don’t really know how to describe what it is, but I’m just in the moment fully. I’m always stressed about something, or thinking about the next thing or what to do, and I like playing music because all you’re thinking about is doing that. It’s probably the most enjoyable thing I could think of doing. When I go to work, it’s to make money, and then when I’m playing or writing or thinking about music, it’s just Zen time. And you? 

James: It’s fun. 

Bec: [Laughs.] It is so fun.

Liam: [Laughs.] It doesn’t need to be more serious than that.