The Bones of the Music.

Luke chats with Azim Zain about new EPs and old favourites before his first Not Fest adventure.

Luke: This is your first Not Fest. What are your impressions of the festival coming into it?

Azim: I’m really, really excited to be playing Not Fest. Our good friends Helena Pop have played Not Fest, I think twice now and we share a band member, Ella Hunt, and she says it is just the best time. It feels like a big, loving community playing great music together for a whole weekend. And it just sounds like something we’re just … honoured and stoked to be part of.

Luke: Yeah. It’s fantastic. It’s like a Punk Rock Christmas basically. Are there any bands you’re particularly pumped about seeing or playing with?

Azim: Definitely keen to see Self Talk, again. I’m a big fan of them and always keen to see them again and again. Same with Jacob. I’ve seen them a couple times and just been blown away every time. So, yeah, definitely keen to see them. Apart from that, I’m really interested to see Bong Mountain just because I think this is the first time a band from the states has actually come to play Not Fest. Bong Mountain and The Eradicator, if I’m not mistaken. Yeah, I’m crazy excited to check them out as well.

Luke: Yeah, the Bong Mountain record is really good. Real fast, shouty pop-punk sort of stuff. And the The Eradicator stuff is really funny.

Azim: Sounds rad, yeah.

Luke: You just put out an EP. How long were you sitting on the songs prior to recording it?

Azim: Oh, that depends. I think the oldest song on the EP in terms of how long we’ve actually been playing it live, Am I Getting Paid for This?, the opener, we started playing that maybe … end of 2015. And the most recent song on the EP, Becky Lynch, I think I wrote that at the start of the year. And we only really put it together about a month before we actually went into the studio. ‘Cause I was just pretty adamant “I want that song in here. We’ve gotta learn this.”

Luke: It’s a great track, too. It’s one of my favourites on there. Speaking of favourites, what is one of your favourites to play live off the new EP, so far?

Azim: Anticharisma, by far. It’s usually the song we tend to close our sets with nowadays and … Yeah, it’s really just the big, cathartic, emo/folk-punk song on the EP. On the EP, I sing the second verse but I get so into live that I just end up yelling it emotively like a real emo band would. And yeah, it’s just so much fun. It’s fast. It has a big, good sing-a-long part. Yeah, I don’t know. I’m going to back to … Yeah, Anticharisma. Great. Lots of fun.

Luke: Yeah, fantastic. That big sing-a-long at the end with a whole band shouting together is really cool. Are you happy with the response you’ve had from the new EP and the recent tour?

Azim: Yeah, we haven’t toured too extensively just yet, but we’ve had probably our best Melbourne show to date. It’s our third time down in Melbourne. Adelaide was pretty good. We played a house show in western Sydney during the start of the tour and the response there … that was amazing. Yeah, response to the EP so far has been pretty solid.

Luke: Yeah, it’s real belter … I’ve been blasting it a lot in the car. Tell me about the band name. Obviously, Azim Zain being your name — where do The Lovely Bones come from?

Azim: Oh, yeah. Not many people actually ask this question. I think it started years ago before the band was even a thing. One of my best friends in high school when I used to live in Adelaide, he would always joke about how I would unintentionally and subconsciously … when I started writing songs and singing myself I wasn’t very good at it. I was only really good at making “oh” sounds. So I, instinctively ended up using the word bones in pretty much every song or two. And it’s a barely-inside joke between us, so when I eventually started a band … I guess it makes sense. It’s like me and the people who make the bones of the skeleton that is my music, I guess.

Luke: That’s really cool. Do you have any more plans going up until the end of the year?

Azim: Well, because I am Malaysian, and still dealing with a visa situation, So I guess, first thing is not get deported. After that … I’m not sure what I’m going to do for the rest of the year we’ve had a pretty intensive October, I guess. November we’re gonna be playing, after Not Fest, we’re playing with Jess Locke in Canberra, which we’re like super excited about. For instance, the best show we’ve ever played was with Jess Locke in Melbourne, so it’s nice to come full circle now that we’re not terrible. After that, we’re also going to be supporting Crywank from the UK at their Canberra date. I’m really excited for that. I’ve listened to Crywank for years now and being on this line-up… it means a lot.

Luke: That’s really cool. Any new music in the pipeline in the not-so-distant future?

Azim: Even while the second EP was being worked on, we already started planning. I guess, trying to plan ahead for what I might want to release in the future. Sort of putting some songs together for maybe a third EP. Hopefully, it might come out next year. Maybe we’ll do that. Maybe we’ll see if we can do splits with someone. And my housemate, who also plays in a couple of Canberra bands, he’s the drummer in both Helena Pop and Moaning Lisa, he’s been trying to badger me. Like, “Nah, man. No. Don’t do another EP. Just go full album.” So I’ve been slowly thinking about that. And yeah …. at the very least, I’d like to get back into the studio at the end of the year or at the start of next year. And maybe record a couple of new tracks and see where we go from there.

Luke: Fantastic. Thanks for your time and I’ll see you at Not Fest.

Azim: Yeah. See you soon, Luke.

Check out Azim Zain and His Lovely Bones at this year’s Not Fest. Discounted weekend passes available for a limited time at http://bit.ly/2yLpE1d. Azim’s work is available at azimzainandhislovelybones.bandcamp.com.