Silent Republic

Fri 24th Sep, 2010 in Features

I’m sitting in a dirty pub and three artfully dishevelled guys walk in. That’ll be them. Mark Crow, Matt Sullivan, and Julian Millership, three parts of the five-piece band Silent Republic, have just come from the studio, where they’ve been working all day on their debut EP, We Seek The Light.

And by studio, I mean wardrobe. What is it with bands recording in wardrobes? “It’s about as close as you can get to a proper vocal studio at home,” deadpans Matt. “The clothes are like an acoustic dampener, so you can get pretty decent quality vocals. We recorded the whole thing ourselves, and the mastering is all being done at Abbey Road in London.” Ah, we come to the London connection.

Mark, Julian and Dean all grew up in Essex and jammed together for years before moving to Australia. Mark explains, “How we came together was I’d been auditioning for other bands, and Julian is friends with my brother …. So I’m auditioning around the place and these guys weren’t happy unless Robert Plant walked in the door. And I’m like ‘oh yes, you’re going to get Robert Plant in some shit-pit f-ing rehearsal room, no worries.’ So I phoned my brother and we went for a beer … and long story short Jules and I met, we had a bit of an evening.”

After a couple of years of just “spinning our wheels for a bit,” Mark got the travel bug and headed Down Under. A trip around Australia ended at Fremantle, and Mark decided to stay. “I got to Freo and just loved it. There’s such an open vibe, the people are so welcoming ….” Mark talked Freo up good and proper, and within a few months the boys came and joined him, and they started the hunt for band members.

That’s where Matt comes in. “I spotted their ad on a notice board so I went down to audition on a whim, and we just clicked straight away.” They found Glen soon after, and the deal was done. Flash forward to now and they’re a tight group with a message they want to get across. “Where we come from, everyone’s really into what each other’s wearing, whatever, it’s like – a cultural void. If your hair’s different, everyone’s got something to say about it,” Mark explains. “So with our band name, it’s a comment on how people have freedom and rights but they don’t use them. People are too busy concentrating on keeping up with the Joneses.” With We Seek The Light, the guys continue this line of thought. “It’s about who we are as a band,” says Matt, “we’re seeking out the good and the light, and finding ways to break out of urban traps that a lot of people fall into.”

Sat night 2nd October, FasterLouder presents the launch of Silent Republic’s We Seek The Light at the Norfolk Hotel in Freo. Good tunes, pommy accents and general feed good vibes… Sounds like a stomping-good Saturday night.