Words by Ash Kissane

Ballarat’s Yacht Club DJs are without doubt the biggest mashup duo in the country. Known for their high-energy live sets, outlandish stage props and ability to turn audiences into sweaty messes, they’ve performed at some of the country’s biggest festivals and are about to head on another huge national tour. Both talented musicians in their own right, the pair have been working hard at creating their own music, which they are set to begin releasing this year. I had a chat to Yacht Club’s Gaz about the EP in the works, their influences and what audiences can expect from their upcoming (dubbed) ‘Mayhem’ tour.

MM: How did you guys come to make Yacht Club?
YC: Shit, I cant remember. I know it was at a pub. Guy had a band with a friend of mine, Shaun. And I stole Shaun and made my own band. He put me as a member of this band I’d never even rehearsed with; I think I’d only seen them play once and there I was, a member of this band. Yeah, so we were just stealing band mates off each other for a while and eventually we worked out that we were into the same stuff. He wanted to learn how to DJ, which I’d been doing for years, so I taught him. That’s how we started Yacht Club, we didn’t want to just play dance music, we didn’t want to play dance music at all. We just wanted to play random shit.

So, what was your first gig together like?
(laughs) We supported Grant Smillie. It was meant to be just me because really early on when I first started DJing, I was writing Deep House and Break Beats, when that was big in the nineties. I toured the UK a bit, but I started hating it and didn’t want to do it anymore. I would still randomly get these gigs though. So I got this gig in Ballarat, I cant remember, but it was billed as me and Guy, and I turned up and played what was going to be our first Yacht Club mixtape . We just ran around acting like idiots and you have never seen a more polarized room. I think most people were standing at the back of the room shaking their heads. Grant came on and was really pissed off and thought it was the most ridiculous thing he’d ever seen. We’re friends now though, he remembers it as the stupidest thing he’s ever seen in his life. So that was our first gig.

Were you a bit nervous then, doing more shows as Yacht Club after that?
No, because from the start we just assumed that everyone would hate it. It was a surprise when we started having people coming to see us. If you had told us then where we would be now, we would have told you you were being ridiculous.

You’re about to start your national tour; a huge tour. Where are you looking forward to going?
The shows that end up being really good are never the ones you expect. I approach each one like it’s going to be the best.

Melbourne just sold out, right? That should be good.
Yeah we had to add another show. It’s a hometown crowd though, essentially. Even though we’re not from there.

So, you’ve played a bunch of festivals, do you prefer playing the big festival shows or these more intimate shows?
They’re so different. At festivals, we get to do really big jestery-type stuff. Like Splendor last year, we had a fifty foot marshmallow man from Ghost Busters and all of our friends dressed up as Ghost Busters, firing shit at the crowd out of an air canon. You can’t really do that at a club; probably wouldn’t work. The club shows are just like a house party and it’s more about the music and not so much about putting on a really big show.

What’s been your favourite gig so far?
It would have to be the first Meredith we played. It’s always been a special weekend for me and all of my friends from Ballarat. I’ve been going there for years and years and years. One day I got a call saying, “You’re playing at it,” and I was like, “Holy Shit.” I never thought that would happen. It was a running joke that if I ever got the chance to play at it, I’d take a shovel and bury myself out the back so I’d never have to leave. It was the weirdest feeling ever. I had all of these friends who were travelling overseas and didn’t tell us they were coming back, and I saw them for the first time when I was standing on stage. That was really surreal. It also kind of kick started our career. It is probably the most addictive drug that’s ever existed, playing at Meredith. I think once you’ve had your go, you just want to do it all the time, but you can’t.

Are you still writing your own stuff?
Yeah, we’ve just written about forty songs that I think we’re going to dribble out over the next year. There will be some kind of album coming out, there definitely will be an EP pretty soon. Guy’s the songwriter from Twinsy and I’m in a blues band called Them 9s, and a Punk called Rick Moranis Overdrive. I’m actually getting ready to go and do a gig in Melbourne with Them 9s. So, we were musicians before we were DJs, it’s what we’ve always done. DJ is just one of those funny things that happened.

Can you tell us a little bit about the new stuff you’re going to be putting out?
It’s kind of quirky dance music, you could probably call it. It’s got bits and pieces of literally everything we like. If I was to play you two of the songs and say they were by us you’d be like, “What, that’s not the case.” I think that’s something we wanted to do as well, being Yacht Club is a lucky thing because we don’t have to stick to a genre and we can write the most idiotic thing we could possibly write, and if it’s got a sense of humour or fun, we can get away with it.

Who would you say are some musical influences for you?
The people we like aren’t really relevant to anything that we’re writing. Guy’s a massive metalhead, or he was. He spent most of his teenage years learning to shred at a million miles an hour, now he makes tropical disco. It makes no sense at all. My influences have always been punk, like Black Flag, Circle Jerks and Bad Religion, but then I make Hip-hop. I think we’re weird like that; we like everything. I get more inspiration from people like my dad; he’s just always happy. I find that more inspiring than anything, really.

What else is coming up this year for Yacht Club?
We’ve worked really hard for the last 10 years to do nothing but music, so pretty much just that. We’re going to tour overseas, but I’m not really allowed to talk about that. There’s a big band that asked us to do it. That’s going to be exciting so we’ll be over there for a while. Hopefully a few months in the studio, a few months touring then that’ll be our year.

Yacht Club Djs Mayhem tour details below.
http://youtu.be/7j6zErkbJrQOriginally posted on Moustache Magazine.