This Friday the fourth album from Hockey Dad is released via Farmer & The Owl/BMG. It’s almost ten years to the day since they were our first ever Farmer & The Owl signing with the release of the debut EP Dreamin. The band have been a regular precense in my life over the last decade and I’ve watched them grow for a couple of teenagers playing energetic garage rock into what we have now, the album Rebuild Repeat which is their most rounded and mature sounding record to date. I’ve also watched them grow as people and shared the journey with friends that I’ve worked with on the band from the start. There is a lot going on in release week so most of this week’s column is dedicated to the album.
First up the album itself, it was a long time in the making and there were a few false starts with it’s recording but thankfully a chance interaction with Alex Burnett from Sparkadia was the final piece of the puzzle that bought the album together. Way back when I was booking the Oxford Tavern, Sparkadia came through as a support, I can’t remember who with, but I was really blown away by their songwriting at what was then an early point in their career. The band put out a couple of great albums but probably never hit the heights they should have. Thankfully Alex stuck with songwriting and has done co-writes with a number of great artists over the years. Back when they were playing as Sparkadia a young Zach Stephenson attended his first ever live show with his parents and Sparkadia happened to be the support band, years later when Zach had started releasing music in Hockey Dad, he wrote an article about Sparkadia’s influence on him which you can see here, Alex saw it, reached out and eventually the beginning of album number four was in motion. Alex ended up co-writing on a number of songs and bought Oli Horton in to help mix it. If you haven’t listened to Sparkadia, make sure you do a deep dive on them, here is just one great example.
Back to Rebuild Repeat and with the release this week, as we’ve done with every release previously (except with Brain Candy when lock downs stopped them) the band are hitting record stores around the country to sign records and play some acoustic tunes. Record stores are such a great way to connect with local communities and they are run by music fans, they’ll be doing seven across the week taking in Brisbane, Tweed Heads, Newcastle, Melbourne, Sydney, Perth and of course here in Wollongong. This week's feature image is the first time Hockey Dad ever played at Music Farmers, it was May 2014, and in our old Cown Lane space where Kneading Ruby is now!
Local brewery Seeker Brewing has also brewed a special Hockey Dad beer for the occasion, Windang Lager, and they’ll be launching it on Friday night at Seeker HQ in Unanderra with a listening party. The Sultans Of Spin crew will be on the turntables from 7pm and at 9pm the album will be played in full, come and have a beer with the band and their mates!
Following their release week, Hockey Dad embark on their biggest tour to date, it’s crazy to think of some of the venues they are doing. Their first Sydney headline show to launch Dreamin was at the tine FBi Social on Oxford Street, that like so many other Sydney venues no longer exists. I’ve watched them grow from there, to the Metro on album one and Enmore by the time album two rolled around, now they are taking to the Hordern stage!
Aside from it being Hockey Dad week, as mentioned in last week’s column, this Sunday is the Silhouette Label’s winter showcase, it features Tropical Strength, Steve Bourke, Russell W and Penny Church and happens at Thirroul Railway Hall from 4pm.
