On Tour With Trophy Eyes…
Some bands have turbulent times in the career and it stops them in their tracks, others, like Trophy Eyes somehow dig deep inside and push through. From a near spilt post plague to a soon to be headline tour of Australia, the last few years have certainly given them the greatest of highs, and the lowest of lows in one fell swoop. To be clear right now, one of those will respectfully not be spoken off. We discuss the comeback, touring and John Floreani’s necessary evil hate/hate relationship with social media. Let’s start with that, and the age old Australian ‘no Perth’ comment.
‘Oh man, I gotta remember in the internet everything can be taken outta context. How everything is received, how that person is receiving it at that point in their day, like context of that person in that point of their life. They might have a shitty day at work in Perth and they read that stupid comment that, ‘No Perth’ with the rude finger emoji, they’ve seen that and they’re like, fuck this guy! But honestly, I’d love to play Perth. I’d love to play it a lot more. I don’t wanna bore fans in Perth about explaining all the bullshit to them, you know? Because at the end of the day, they don’t care. They’re just ‘why no show?’ I’d love to play there, but just too far. One day when we’re Justin Bieber big, I’ll do a residency in Perth, three hundred and sixty five days of the year for one year. I’ll play there every day.’
The tour in question is the upcoming Australian headline tour featuring Trophy Eye’s best mates from the UK Boston Manor, as well as Towns, before going over to ol’ blighty to reciprocate.
‘We’ve known them for a long time, probably like 2016, I think. We met for the first time on a tour in the US with Moose Blood and another band that was opening called A Will Away, which is probably one of my favourite rock bands. They were fucking incredible. I remember every night we’d be like – all of the bands – would be watching that opening band, and it would be like me, Eddy Brewerton, the singer, and Henry Cox, the singer of Boston Manor watching this band play like, fuck, I can’t believe I have to go on after them! They were so good. It was crazy. They had like every band being like, ah, shit!’
‘We met on that tour, and we kind of ended up on the same circuits for the best part of a year, and back then touring wasn’t as easy as we have it now, so it’s like a shared trauma bonding experience! We just became best mates! We did WARPED tour together and we just stayed in touch and stayed really, really good friends for a very long time. It was a no-brainer for us. It was like, let’s get the boys! I think that was reciprocated. They were let’s do the same thing in the UK and we’re all way too happy to oblige’
The band post Covid nearly spilt however ended up releasing Suicide And Sunshine which many felt was the bands goodbye, including themselves. However, the comeback has been phenomenal.
‘During that time, it was pretty dark and there was that one call, we got together and evaluated everything. We looked at it and we were ‘this really isn’t bringing us any joy anymore’. Every day we wake up, our accountant gives us a call and he is like, ‘it’s not looking good boys.’ You start your day like that and you’re like, ‘fuck!’ Then you use social media and you see all of your mates back to it and touring the US and whatever, and you kind of just go ‘fuck, we’re ruined, man!’ There was so much time between sips that we kind of started our own lives again There was a lot of learning who you are without music and living without the guys in your fucking back pocket for one.’
‘We’re gonna climb this fucking hill again. We were like, let’s call it, say goodbye to the fans. Go in there, leave no stone unturned, like fulfil our own wants and lay it all out there and just say thanks. It means so much to people. It meant so much to us. So we got in there, we did the album, doing well writing together in sessions and playing live and it sparked that, ‘I forgot, this is like magic.’ This is something incredible. That feeling just kind of carried through. I’m reinvigorated, I have different expectations and different wants out of what music is giving me now. It’s totally rearranged my mind and my outlook on everything. It’s lit a fire under us and I don’t think the end is as close as we once thought at all. In fact, I don’t think it’s an option for us at the moment.’
Which brings us to how is the band setting themselves up for the tour.
‘I want to focus on what we are good at, what has kept us a band for so long and why it means so much to people. Breaking down what the fundamentals of Trophy Eyes is, if you took everything away, what would be left that could keep it moving? What is the skeleton? What is the bare bones of what it is? It’s raw energy and honest emotion. We wanna focus on that. In a way you can’t really polish a turd, you know what I mean? We’re a punk band! How do we kind of look ourselves out here and really deliver something that’s heartfelt and honest and new and fresh? So we’ve been working on moments and finding what moments mean the most to us in songs and accenting them, focusing on them and putting a little bit more energy into that and relaying that with our production person who’s doing the lights. We are really gonna make moments and just create this space of emotional catharsis. Make it a lot more about the music than pretty sparkles.’
We started with social media, lets finish there and John’s hate/hate relationship with the world’s necessary evil.
‘I do believe inherently that social media is bad. It’s bad through and through. It’s made people into goblins, dude and Twitter is just a fucking cesspool. It is disgusting on there. Like the type of people, the things they say, the casual racism, just the pure hatred that you find on there just by scrolling, man. I do hate social media, but then again, I do love the chaos. There is a part of me that goes, wow, look at this spectacle. Mostly I think it’s not for me, I feel I’m much more interested in just living life and subtle beauty of – this is gonna sound fucking ridiculous – I just like to sit in the park and watch the leaves blow.
‘I do use Instagram as another outlet for creativity, and that’s kind of how I view it. It’s easy to kind of look at that yourself and be like, oh my God, I’ve created a shrine to myself! This is fucking ridiculous! It’s a necessary evil to exist nowadays as a business, as a band, you need to do it. Labels are the first kind of people to be ‘make some tiktoks, call your friend in another band and talk about your song.’ You’re like ‘they’re gonna love to do that, bro, that’s a great idea, ha.’ So it’s a necessary evil, but one that I’m yet to delve into a hundred percent.’
Interview By Iain McCallum
Catch Trophy Eyes on the following dates with Boston Manor and TOWNS, tickets from Live Nation…
