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Interview: The Belair Lip Bombs
- Olive McCagh
- 1 day ago
- 12 min read
Interviewed by Olive McCagh
'Again', the sophomore album from Melbourne's The Belair Lip Bombs, was a highly anticipated release in 2025. The four-piece alternative rock group had already solidified a cult following with 'Lush Life' in 2021, and their most recent release saw them soar as one of Australia's fastest-rising bands. We got to sit down with Maisie, Mike, Jimmy and Dev during their Australian album tour and chat all about their past shows, the release, and their touring habits. Our conversation was accompanied by Queensland's signature afternoon heat and cans of Guinness, revealing how the album was written between soundchecks on international tours, and an insight into the early days of the band. They played a massive sold-out show at Brisbane's Crowbar that night, and are heading back to Magandjin in June to play the 'Against The Grain' festival.
Olive: You guys have been in a band for over eight years now. What were the early days like when you first formed the band?
Maisie: Well, in the earliest days, we were a three-piece. And it was just me, Mike, and Liam, our old drummer. And we actually found a video recently of our first show at Cherry Bar. Mike's dad found a video of our very first show, which was in 2017.
Jimmy: Playing to the parents and bar staff.
Ma: So, Mike and I would have been 17.
Mike: Yeah, we were underage, and we got kicked out after we played.
Maisie: And it was really bad. I was watching the video, and there was no bass, so we just stopped the song halfway through. And like, what the fuck actually happened? I don't know. Anyway, so we were bad at the start, basically.
Jimmy: Then I joined. And we got really good from there. [laughs]
Maisie: Early days. There’s this place in Melbourne called Yah Yah’s. It's a club. I feel like we cut our teeth there. Because they used to do, I don't know if they still do, it's more like a club now. But they used to have bands play upstairs, and every weekend they had the 3 am slot. Oh my God. And if you could get that slot
Mike: Yeah, that was the thing to strive for.
Maisie: It was really good. Because you actually got paid quite well. So, we did that a few times.
Jimmy: It was just shows in clubs around Melbourne. Like that's literally it. Stu, our manager at the time, booked one big Aus tour. That's when we first came up here and played Ric’s Bar. Actually, for the first time, but not the last. We were privileged to play there a second time for BIGSOUND.
Maisie: Oh yeah
Jimmy: It feels like a bit of a blur. Even though it was three years. Then COVID happened. And then I really feel like there's a shift in that 2023, doing Lush Life. It was like the mood had changed; we’re focused. But the early days do seem like a blur. But fun, very fun.
Olive: I wanted to talk about ‘Again’. Because that would have been such a large and fulfilling project. How has the response felt now since it's been out for a little while? How's it been sitting with the album?
Jimmy: Yeah. I remember when it came out and...
Maisie: You say that as if it were like 10 years?
Jimmy: No, the specific time of when you release an album, you get a feel for how well things are going with the singles. And everyone can walk up after a show and just be like, “Oh, that was really great.”
And maybe you read some early write-ups and get a good appreciation of how well it's gone. But I always said, I'm not going to be able to understand the impact of the album until it's like six months past. Then we can really look back.
Dev: It's a hindsight thing.
Jimmy: I'm saying the same things. It's completely exceeded our expectations.
Dev: So grateful.
Olive: Have you got a sense of it since touring it?
Maisie: Yeah, we were in America when the singles were coming out. But we were playing with Spacey Jane, we were opening for them. The crowds that we were playing for, no one really knew who we were. So, it was hard to gauge the reception to the album at that point. And then we did a European tour a few weeks after the album came out. Which was great. And the response was really good. But I feel like, as Jimmy was saying, it was still quite early. The whole rollout was still playing out.
But I think this Australian tour has been the biggest indicator of it.
Jimmy: Because we’ve played here so much, and we know what gigs feel like here. In terms of mood and scale.
Maisie: Yeah, exactly. What’s the science thing?
Jimmy: It’s a litmus test.
Maisie: A litmus test, yeah, to be able to compare it to. And even in Sydney last night, we played the album show in Sydney last night and the last time we played in Sydney was almost a year ago.
Dev: Yeah, the last Sydney headline was probably before I was in the band. So, it's been ages.
Maisie: Playing last night and watching the crowd and the response and stuff was quite special.
Dev: It was pretty special. We haven't seen a crowd sing a song like that before. Even in Melbourne.
Mike: Yeah, better than Melbourne last night. A bit too cool for Melbourne.
Dev: Yeah, fuck Melbourne. [laughs]
Olive: That's cool. I feel like it would be nice to be able to compare it to other shows. You'd feel the difference. Whereas I guess international crowds are all new.
Maisie: That's still new territory.
Jimmy: Brisbane turns up.
Mike: Yeah. Always.
Jimmy: Brisbane, even if it's a slightly smaller show, the energy is always higher. So, we're very keen for tonight.
Olive: Throughout the making of the album, did you have any favourite memories or favourite parts of the process?
Dev: I think a big thing that I reflect on is working with Joe White, who produced the record. I think it was a cool thing for all of us because we'd never worked with a producer before. He was probably the best person to do it with, as a first try.
Mike: It was his first try.
Dev: He's a really accomplished musician in his own right. So, it was a really nice thing for us to have a sparring partner. And someone who could help us with getting songs over the line. The whole experience was really rewarding. It was really fun.
Maisie: Yeah, it was just so much fun. I remember saying to you when we were recording, “I wish we could just do this”.
Mike: It's the funnest part of it all.
Dev: Obviously, we love touring, and we're all really close friends and love being together. The whole reason we're doing this is to make music. So being in the studio is very fun. But it's obviously not feasible to do that year-round. The whole experience was memorable.
Olive: That's awesome. I feel like collaboration, when it stops in the band, can restrict it.
And when you get to work with producers and people who have other ideas, it can definitely bring out even more. It sounds great on the album.
I'd love to know what you find inspiring and maybe what you look to trigger your creativity, if there's anything like that.
Jimmy: I reckon we're all over the place for this one. We didn't have an objective. We had maybe rough ideas, bands and styles and what we've done in the past that we like. We feel like we had an identity for each song, but it wasn't via Blueprint. We were just making songs we loved.
Dev: There was no one big influence. But we had a lot of references for specific songs.
Jimmy: Very individualised pieces. Which is cool because it allows you to channel a band you found last week or your biggest love.
Dev: And we all listen to different music; there's a bit of crossover. Bands like Kings of Leon, like early Kings of Leon. Alabama Shakes. What else?
Jimmy: Geese, LCD Soundsystem. A lot of mid-2000s indie, I think, is the key. Which is sort of what comes out.
Dev: But then, Maisie's lyrics might be inspired by something completely different. Mike's guitar parts are definitely inspired by probably none of those bands. It's all a bit hodgepodge. Which is funny.
Mike: Who I get compared to the most when I’m playing is The Strokes.
Jimmy: We'll have it on record that comparing any band to The Strokes is a weak comment. It's a lazy comment.
Please, someone, write this down. We love The Strokes, though.
They're a great band. If anyone says that any band sounds like The Strokes, unless they actually do, Jesus Christ.
Olive: Where did you write the songs on the album. Because I find environment can influence songwriting. Could you paint me a picture of any setting you were in when you were writing?
Dev: It was a bit stressful for us because we were touring a lot. So, I don't want to speak for everyone, but I think we were kind of just doing it wherever we could and whenever we had time.
Maisie: We wrote a lot during soundchecks. That was cool.
Jimmy: Also, Joe was helping us just tie off songs or write whole halves of songs in the studio.
Maisie: The whole lyric-writing journey was a major stress. For most of the songs, I wrote the lyrics after we'd already written the song. And I didn't really have that much time to do it. Because we had a deadline for the album, which we pushed back.
We had to get pushed back like two times until we actually couldn't anymore.
Dev: Our dream is to go to a beautiful place and record for two or three weeks and really indulge. But I think during that period we were just rehearsing anywhere, whether it was Frankston, where we grew up, or in the city, around where we all live.
And then sending demos and stuff. So, it was a lot of patchwork and trying to make time to write between touring. Then, when we got to actually record, we had blocks of time in the studio to do that.
It was really hot when we recorded the album. It was 40 degrees every day.
Maisie: It was like the middle of February.
Mike: Fucking stinking hot.
Olive: It's cool that the songs came from soundcheck and then into the studio.
Mike: Yeah, I think ‘Price of A Man’ was completely written in soundcheck.
Maisie: ‘Price Of A Man’ we wrote in Glasgow.
Olive: I feel like that's the price of being an up-and-coming band. You don't get the pleasure of sitting down, and you've got to do it all at once.
I wanted to ask each of you what your favourite lyric is from the album. This is a test for the others.
Dev: I like the one in Cinema. The alliteration,” The rubber band ball that bounces back”. That one. That's a great line, great lyrics. I can't remember the rest of the lyrics. But all the lyrics are good.
Mike: Price of a Man lyrics are my favourite.
Dev: I think we all really like that. No, the lyrics are great. And for us, like, it was really fun for me, Mike, and Jimmy hearing Maisie's lyrics when they were all done because we had the bed tracks recorded for so long that we were waiting to hear them.
It was great. When it was all done, it was really fun for us to hear it because it gives the songs a whole new life and a whole new energy.
Jimmy: “A piano falling out of the sky.”
Maisie: I hate that lyric.
Dev: Oh, “motherfucker just say what you mean”.
Jimmy: Yeah, “motherfucker just say what you mean.” Good call. I love that one.
Maisie: I have so many because they're all just really good. Nah, kidding.
‘Don't Let Them Tell You It's Fair’. That's my favourite song. The lyrics from that. The whole song.
Olive: You guys have been touring pretty non-stop over the last couple of years, and you headed to the US with Spacey, as you said, and are heading back in two days. Have you figured out a harmonious tour and how to keep the dynamics?
Maisie: I think being super in tune with each other's personalities and boundaries and all that is the most important thing.
Dev: Yeah, we're all good communicating, and we all obviously know each other very well now from touring so much that it's pretty easy, and we're all pretty chill people. There's never been any huge blowups or anything, which is good because you hear a lot of horror stories. But I think touring's hard, like it is hard.
Maisie: Yeah, that's not to say we don't bicker and stuff. We definitely do
Dev: Yeah, it's normal. If you're sitting in a van with people for 10 hours a day, you're going to have arguments.
Maisie: You just have to communicate. It's literally almost like being in a relationship. Communication is key; you have to compromise on stuff. But we've gotten pretty good at it. We all have our own individual routines.
Jimmy: On tour as well. We’ll get in the van, we all put our own headphones on, do our own thing, be in like a bubble for a bit, chat for a bit, and then go back to doing our own thing.
Dev: There are lots of things you can do, but I think having your own little things really helps. Mike was doing a lot of drawing on the last tour, and Maisie and I were journaling.
Jimmy: I was just drinking a lot of black coffee
Dev: Jimmy was doing EDM. Jimmy was doing weird science experiments.
Jimmy: Nah, I was re-learning calculus. [laughs]
Olive: I feel like it's hard to pick up hobbies that are compatible with the road. Have any artists or songs been soundtracking this current Australian tour?
Maisie: I think, honestly, Cool Sounds, who we're touring with, are from Melbourne as well. I just feel super lucky to be able to have them on the tour because I love them. They're a really great band.
Mike: Great people.
Jimmy: We were listening to Counting Crows today as well. Vanessa... What's her name? Vanessa Carlton. Carlton, yeah.
Dev: Just lots of that era of early 2000s pop, band pop music.
Jimmy: Stuff that easily could be on, like the Shrek 2 soundtrack.
Maisie: This is just from today. I don't know. I wouldn't say this is the whole tour. This is from the last two hours, I think.
Dev: It's a big hodgepodge but a lot of cool sounds, a lot of way dynamic. A lot of Alice in Chains. That's about it.
Olive: I was curious about your experience performing overseas and if you noticed any differences between international crowds and Australian crowds, or maybe if there were any memorable audiences?
Maisie: I mean, the demographic definitely at this point in our career is quite different. In the UK, the demographics that are coming to our shows are a bit older. I think that's probably got a lot to do with the outlets in which our music has been broadcast overseas. A lot of like radios overseas.
Dev: I feel like the tastemakers in America and Australia are younger. Whereas in the UK it's still quite old-fashioned, where the people who are really calling the shots on what's cool, you know, in quotes, or what you should be looking out for. There are still a lot of older crews. Which is great. If their platforms are sort of targeted towards older audiences, then they tend to come to our shows.
Maisie: And in Australia, for instance, I feel like one of our biggest supporters has been Triple J. And obviously, the demographic for Triple J is a younger group of people. And also, the gig scene is just different in Australia.
Olive: I find it super interesting how different places work and that's cool that all the tastemakers are making the difference, and how much that can shift who is listening to you and who's coming. So that's really cool.
Dev: I think it just shows how strong the music industry is in the UK still. It hasn't yielded. It's still the cultural centre for a lot of stuff. And that's not to say that young people aren't coming to our shows there. It's just something that we've noticed playing there, that there are older audiences.
Olive: I feel like the young people are still trying to grow Australia’s scene, you know. It's trying to get bigger, whereas in the UK, it's so inbred in them and their culture.
If you could describe the perfect listening experience to ‘Again’ front to back, what would that be for a listener?
Maisie: Maybe…
Jimmy: Getting ready for a night out.
Maisie: …Getting dumped.
Olive: Getting ready for a night out?
Jimmy: Yeah, why not? I've got a few albums that I'll listen to if I'm getting ready to go out. You know the mood shift is like everything's fucking done. And now we're having fun, and I'm going to start the fun from getting ready.
Mike: We’ve got a few comments on YouTube or something, and it says, “perfect music to drive to”.
Maisie: It kind of feels like a backhanded compliment. But actually, no. I mean I listen to music the most when I'm driving. If there is an album that I want to listen to in full, that’s when I’ll do it.
Dev: I agree with Maisie. I think it's a good commuting record. But I think that's just because we probably all listen to it so much.
Jimmy: Demos in the car.
Dev: I think it's an eclectic record that you can find different moods for, which is cool. I think it’s nice, we wanted to do an album like that. That wasn't just one whole vibe, kind of change it up a bit.
The Belair Lip Bombs are performing at Against The Grain Festival on June 20th.
