What better way to celebrate your 10th studio album than by making it a double LP? Alternatively, what better time is there to make a double LP than for your 10th studio album? Such is the case for Pond, the Australian psych-rockers who check off both of those boxes with Stung!.
Despite being recorded in founding member Jay Watson’s (AKA Gum) backyard studio with members coming and going to lay down parts, Stung! overflows with a band-in-a-room feel. From start to finish, it feels like the ultimate Pond album: flanger-soaked guitars, propulsive drumming, and enveloping sonic details culminate in a stirring accomplishment of a record.
Following the record’s release in June, guitarist and multi-instrumentalist “Shiny Joe” Ryan sat down with Uproxx to talk about Shania Twain, cheese, and buying too many guitars in our latest Q&A.
What are four words you would use to describe your music?
Eat more cheese now.
It’s 2050 and the world hasn’t ended and people are still listening to your music. How would you like it to be remembered?
Well I suppose I’d like our music to be remembered as an example of a kind of egoless, joyful, creative freedom between friends? But even saying that makes me feel weird because as I think about it, all I want is that when you listen to our music your mind can drift off. Like when you’re washing dishes whilst listening to music. When you wash dishes or vacuum or knit or do something with your hands your mind can wonder and it’s a special time. So take that and apply it to 2050. If we even have dishes to wash or vacuuming to be done in 2050. Maybe we’re all in hyperspace on our way to the mars and the dishes have been sent ahead for us as a form of meditation to help us deal with a new planet??
What’s your favorite city in the world to perform?
Favourite city to perform in is Barcelona!!!! But I’m desperate to perform in Ireland, so all ye Irish promoters, hit us up please!
Who’s the person who has most inspired your work, and why?
I’m playing with them now tbh. My band mates/best friends have always inspired me. But I get inspiration from new artists all the time and not just musical artists. Nice to be inspired by a whole different medium and what you’ve drawn from that you can apply to your music
Where did you eat the best meal of your life?
There have been a few unreal meals and they all hold a special place in my mind. It’s hard to pick one, so I won’t think about it too much. I’ll see which one floats to the top…. I’m going with eating NZ Green lipped mussels that we picked from the underside of Jamie’s dad’s jetty and ate immediately with a white wine sauce and some fresh fish that we caught that day out in the straight between the north and south islands of Aotearoa (Māori name for New Zealand)
Tell us about the best concert you’ve ever attended
Hard to say…. so, what jumps out at me now is Nick Cave and The Bad Seeds at Primavera Porto in Portugal. It was my first time seeing them, I had just started to get into Nick and it was unreal!! I was floored and hugely moved by that performance. Still feeling the effects today from that gig.
What song never fails to make you emotional?
There’s a song called “An Buachaill Caol Dubh” and it’s a lament played on the uilleann pipes by Liam O’Flynn. Uilleann pipes are the Irish bagpipe played basically by sitting down and strapping woodfire bellows to your arm while the drones lay over your lap and the chanter is on your knee. Liam is one of Ireland’s greatest uilleann pipers in my opinion and watching him play this song on DVD is how I learned to play the pipes myself. “An Buachaill Caol Dubh” translates to “The Dark Slender Boy” from Gaelic, so, when you type “The Dark Slender Boy by Liam O’Flynn” into YouTube, get ready for an emotional rollercoaster.
Who’s your favorite person to follow on social media?
@Blindboyboatclub on Instagram! Also check out his podcast!!!
What’s the last thing you Googled?
Fuel Watch. It shows where the cheap fuel is so I can fill up my car. It’s a 97 Ford Explorer.
Where’s the weirdest place you’ve ever crashed while on tour?
I once crashed in a lovely wooden, very open, lovely lit house in Wellington, NZ wayback when Pond were playing a festival there called “Camp A Low Hum”. Crashed there when it was dark and when the sun came up we were surrounded by arcade machines in various states of repair and a lovely cup of tea.
What’s the story behind your first or favorite tattoo?
I was pretty young, just out of high school, and I had a big row with my parents. I went over to my friend’s house. They played in a doom band called ‘Cease’ and they were good friends with this other band and friends of ours called ‘Sex Panther’. They used to give people panther paw tattoos (only to the most deserving, of course). Their drummer, Jess, offered me a tattoo of one of these panther paws and I said yes and as I was getting it, still quite emotional from the fight I had just had with my folks, all my friends gathered around me and started chanting “one of us one of us” and I’ll never forget it. That was so beautiful and my first tattoo.
What’s one piece of advice you’d go back in time to give to your 18-year-old self?
You don’t need all those guitars. Oh, and buy as many Rhodes and Wirlitzers as possible and flog ’em now for a stupid amount of money haha.
What’s one of your hidden talents?
I can draw pretty well, but I don’t do it so often, which is something I’m trying to change at the moment.
If you had a million dollars to donate to charity, what cause would you support and why?
When I was younger, I would’ve said I’d give it all to their kidney foundation, because I only have one kidney. Worst pain of my life – kidney failure – apart from heartbreak, but now I’m getting older and my last one doesn’t show any signs of quitting, so I guess I’d honestly have to talk to some local community figures and see where the money is needed. It could do a lot of good around here in Perth and there’s heaps of causes, heaps of people in need, so I’d have to research and see where it’s actually needed before I can answer that.
What are your thoughts about AI and the future of music?
Bring it on haha. I’m not worried.
What is your pre-show ritual?
Usually, start listening to a bit of AC/DC or Midnight Oil on the speaker in the green room. But, on the last tour I rediscovered that ‘I see you baby’ song by Groove Armada/ Gramma Funk and that was pretty fun. Basically just trying to get a bit of movement in, stretch out the legs, move the arms, sort of fire up without getting too fired up.
You have a month off and the resources to take a dream vacation. Where are you going and who is coming with you?
Taking my partner to Ireland finally!
Who was your first celebrity crush?
What is your biggest fear?
The fear of not trying something because I might fail. And getting taken by a crocodile.
Stung! is available now via Spinning Top Records. Find more information here.
