The Little Lord Street Band Interviews Each Other About New Album 'Time and Place'

Image credit: Bridget Turner

There’s a time and a place for everything, or so the saying goes… well, for long time fave local Americana alt-country rockers The Little Lord Street Band the time is now to release their sophomore album and the place is all around W.A. with the band gearing up for a run of regional shows.

It’s been four years since their debut album, A Minute of Another Day, but the wait for Time and Place was more than worth it, with the result an eleven-track collection of sweet, warm, at times melancholic, often uplifting and always melodic sounds.

Showcasing the band’s signature intricate guitar work alongside tender, honest vocals, electric guitarist and singer Jimmy Rogers explains “I guess it's a ‘looking back’ album. It's about when you get to that point in your life and you look back on what's happened or what's been going on. It's that sort of longing for something that you can't have back. It's quite glass half empty, but at the same time, it’s about enjoying your memories.”

Time and Place is the latest feather in The Little Lord Street Band's well adorned cap, that includes winning Best Country Act at the WAM Awards a whopping three times in a row (fingers crossed fourth times a charm this year!) and have been a constant fixture on the air, including spins and features across ABC Country, Double J and community radio all around the country, having stayed on the community radio charts (Amrap) for weeks.

To celebrate the release of Time and Place, The Little Lord Street Band have just wrapped up a couple of Victorian shows, with a stack of regional W.A. dates coming up in June (all dates below). To get even more nostalgic and emotional, bandmates and life partners Tash Shanks (guitar/vocals) and Jimmy Rogers sat down and had a career spanning chat, focusing on the new album:

Tash: So 10 years in the band with moi - how's it going a decade on? Verses when we first started?

Jimmy: It’s. Great. Could. Not. Be. Better. Babe. In all seriousness, in ten years I think we have somewhat evolved yet kept ourselves grounded (thanks to parenthood, full time work and modest streaming numbers) which people tell us, is all part of the charm and appeal of The Little Lord Street Band. Remember when we hadn’t landed on the right band name and we were calling ourselves Rogers and Shanks and someone called us a pub meal? Ooof!

Tash: 3 EP and 2 LP's how does this stack up with the desire to write and record all the time, are you content with the process or do you need/ want more releases to your name?

Jimmy: As much I sometimes manifest this idea that I am some kind of ‘prolific artist’ and that I can just write and release ‘amazing’ music, the reality is something other. I believe, that we act as each others sounding board and filtration system which works to our advantage and only lets the good stuff through. In saying that, maybe I should put out a collection of instrumental numbers? Call it ‘Jimmy’s Nuggets’? Yeah?

Tash: There are a few more songs on this album with real mature adult content. Are you growing, getting comfortable and vulnerable with songwriting or is there something else you are processing?

Jimmy: I could quite possibly be maturing at this undisclosed age (39). It is good to keep growing and changing as an artist which is something that we both do. Since we’re parents now babe,  maybe let’s do a kids album? Yeah babe?

Tash: We were lucky enough to record our second EP 'Walk with Me' in Nashville back in 2016, If you could record another album overseas where and why?

Jimmy: I’m not sure if I would to be honest. Sure if someone was begging for us to come and record on their reel to reel tape machine with this distinct sound and if it was in some village in an exotic part of the world then sure but the thought really hasn’t crossed my mind. I suppose my man-cave/home studio can resemble a war zone from overseas I suppose?

Tash: If you could have your time again with the sophomore album what would you carve from the batch and have a do over and why?

Jimmy: More you babe! More you on everything! Hey babe, like the album? Come on, be honest!

Tash: Yes I do like the album, it’s grown on me like a little bit of mould on a chunk of cheese in the back of the fridge. It’s had all that flavour added after some time. I can say that after 4 years in the making and falling in and out of love with the album and the process in amongst all the life stuff we’ve had to go with it. Plus bonus i’ve learnt to let go of my ego (rad applause) and appreicate the work that went in as a team member in the band, and as a songwriter who contributed less than I would have liked at the time. It’s interesting to reflect on where the energy and passion lie in amongst the body of work in the album, in how it was written, rehearsed, demoed and recorded. I’m proud of the work babe, really I am.

Jimmy: What’s the most cringe/interesting lyric or musical note of mine on the album?

Tash: From Don’t wait too Long ‘come lately come undone, is the academy’s favourite son, fell away with a sun kissed gypsy girl’! Oh my lord that’s the cheese right there. I roll my eyes inwardly everytime I sing that line. But hey it works with the song you’ve written so just keep practising babe you’ll get there.

Jimmy: What’s the cheesiest moment on the album?

Tash: Hey are you trying to flip the ‘meat and potatoes’ mould and portray us a more of a cheese platter band? Cos there are so many references to cheese in this interview. When did it become about Cheese? And what has cheese got to do with it? Got to do with it?

What's cheese but a second-hand emotion?

What's cheese got to do, got to do with it?

Who needs cheese when a cheese can be broken?

Ok cheese moment on the album would have to be the song about my dad ‘ Could have been someone’ if you were a dog it’ll be the same as trying to sniff his butt. Sounds like this song is a legacy song about my Dad but you used a bunch of corny words and chord progressions. There!

Jimmy: What’s your favourite moment?

Tash: Oh I have a few. My hairs on my neck go crazy for ‘Burning all Night’ when I remember how we wrote it during the NSW 2019 Bush Fires in Katoomba and how bloody close it all was. ‘I am enough’ in the second verse when the band changes the vibes from a sad sounding woe is me to a boom chicka wah wah 1970 porn set. Or ‘Time and Place’ every time this gets me in the feels. Harmonies in the ‘The Mess’.

Jimmy: Keen to do it all again? Third times a charm!

Tash: You’re on BABE - are you talking about albums or babies - hahaha!

The Little Lord Street Band's new album Time and Place is out now

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