THE FOLK BITCH TRIO TRAIN IS COMING

 

We caught Naarm based band, Folk Bitch Trio on a rare day off from touring. They’ve been on the tour train pretty much all year with a mix of headline and support shows, sharing the stage with the likes of Alex G, M.Ward and so many more. Making stops from Europe and the UK straight to the States and now they’re back in Australia to finish things off and they ‘Aint hopping off yet’, due to complete their almost three month tour on the first day of Folk Bitch Summer which is the first of December. I had a lot of fun chatting to the whole trio, Gracie Sinclair, Jeanie Pilkington and Heide Peverelle they are the sweetest of people and that carries fourth onto their angelic music, filled with beautiful harmonies and accoustic goodness. I’m due to see them tomorrow at the Servo… I’m very excited to say the least.

Image by Bridgette Winten

WANDERER: So it seems like you've been nonstop touring this whole year and you've played headline shows around the world as well as sharing the stage with some incredible artists. I saw that you guys supported Alex G, like that's insane are you guys tired yet?

Jeanie Pilkington: Depends. Who's asking? If its Alex. No, we're ready to go again.

Do you guys have anything planned for the rest of the year?

JP: We'll be on tour until the end of the month. And then December 1st, the first day of summer. It’s Summer of Folk Bitch, First day of summer Folk Bitch relax. Gracie got acupuncture for the first time the other day and I reckon I'm gonna do it as well because that shit sounds really good.

Gracie Sinclair: Yeah really good

What's it done for you?

GS: Well, touring turns you into an old lady really fast. We've all got problems, I had a lot of chi blockage, so I got that unblocked. And also, I got acupuncture on my tummy for all my digestive problems and I feel really good.


Yeah. I've heard so much about it.

GS: Yeah, this is the Chinese medicine vibe, unblock your energies. They even checked out my tongue.

JP: Your joking, they needled your tongue.

GS: No, but it was actually a student clinic and there were two women and they were both studying and they were really nice and they were like, okay, tongue now. And I was like, [...] [Then they said] flip it up. And they were both just like with their little notepads standing, looking at my tongue and they're like, we know this is funny, we check each other's tongues every day.

JP: That's beautiful.

GS: Yeah, it was really good.

Heide Peverelle: That's what, this summer holds for us after the year it has been


Holistic journeys.

JP: A lot of rest and rejuvenation because this train ain't slowing down and I ain't hopping off.



Has there been a favourite show for you guys throughout the whole year? Could you pick one?

GS: There's been so many amazing shows that we've done.

JP: Standouts. Definitely London headline. Hamburg was really special too, we got booked last minute to play at Reeperbahn in Hamburg when we were in Europe. We kind of made amends with the possibility of not playing to too many people, we'd never played in Germany before. And we were thinking No one really knows we're here, it might be a really quiet room and that's okay. We were like, okay guys, you gotta still gotta pop it for like five people. And then it was a completely full room of such a warm crowd. And I think we were all just very caught off guard and it was such a beautiful room. There were like these renaissance style sculptures, built into the walls.

Heide Peverelle: And chandeliers and light projections that I think they were kind of AI vibes, so they were picking up on the room.

JP: It was all very sexy. Also, we played a farewell show in Melbourne before we left at Merri Creek Tavern, which is like a 50 person room. And all of our friends and family were there and we were all so nervous. It was where we played our first show like five years ago, so that was really special.

That's incredible. The show that you were talking about in Hamburg, it seems like it was so special when you least expect it, that's when the magic kind of all goes into and makes something really beautiful.

JP: Yeah. There's been so many amazing shows, but in such different capacities of what's enjoyable for us… If the crowd is funny, the shows that we put on the best performance, the shows that we are the funniest they can all be the shows that mean the most.

GS: Also the shows where they laugh the most at our jokes. Not necessarily where we're the funniest.

JP: Shows like Alex G where we're like, wow, this feels like an amazing position to be in. We're so grateful.

I was gonna say like with that, is there a most memorable show, good or bad?

HP: I mean I feel like there have been some memorably bad ones for sure, but I feel like I can't think of them.

You're trying to escape them
HP: Yeah. You know the bad shows are the learning experiences, but those ones are very like telling of what you do and you don't like. But I think Alex G was maybe one of the most kind of, Wow shows 'cause it was like our biggest venue at that point that we'd ever played in. And the crowd was amazing. The crowd were really, really engaged and I've just never experienced such a loud crowd.

GS: We were down downstairs at the forum, the green room is under the stage, and when the doors opened we heard everyone like a stampede. Usually, if you're an opener for a venue that big, like cool, you're playing the big venue, but it's probably not full and people probably don't, these fans were right up the front at the barricade, screaming and so ready.


I'm very excited to see you guys play at the Servo on Saturday. I've never seen you play before, so is there anything that I can expect, you mentioned there may be some jokes?

JP: We try not to talk that up though because sometimes it's a tender folk bitch trio set and if we're a little bit tired or a bit emotional, we just wanna sing and we actually, literally might be non-verbal. But other times like Wednesday night in Sydney we revealed too much about ourselves and we'll be pretty funny and unhinged, but you never know what you're gonna get.

Do you guys play more of an intimate set?

FBT: I dunno…

GS: Hey, we were talking about this last night. We've never seen ourselves perform live before, and we're like, I wonder what we would think of our show.

JP: Funny that.

GS: If you think about it too much it's actually pretty weird.

JP: It will result in ego death because it's a really confusing concept with this thing that takes up your whole life. And it would probably feel really weird to watch a Folk Bitch Trio set, but not being up there. Like, if I saw me, what would I think? But that doesn't really answer your question. Do we play an intimate set? I think if we play in the country, say a smaller venue you might get a tender Folk Bitch Trio.

GS: Yeah. And then like if we're in the city, maybe you get raunch, rock Folk Bitch Trio, but it's always the same music and it's always tender.

HP: I think it is always intimate. I mean the music is intimate and it's vulnerable mostly and well, yeah, I mean it's all kind of very, earnest.

JP: Even when we think we're rocking, we're not actually rocking.

GS: That's what I'm thinking, we're like, Yeah. We're rocking. Haha And then you see us playing acoustic guitars and singing.

I love that you can think that it's rocky. 'cause I feel like the word rocky can be put into a place of like, you're just really getting into it maybe.

JP: Exactly. Rock and roll is just a mindset

GS: It's an attitude man. 

 
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