Welcome to a brand new feature where we sit down and talk to bands and artists about their latest albums to find out all about it. Today we speak to the Alex of the project Talkradio to find out about the new album Choose.

Hello nice to meet you, tell us about yourself!

Hi, my name is Alex and I’ve been in music for most of my life, starting on the drums at the age of 3. I had drumming lessons in my teens and started singing lessons when I was around 20. This project Talkradio started in the late 90’s. If we go back to the very beginning, there were two of us. I started it with a bandmate from the cover band I was gigging with at the time. I didn’t play guitar back then, so he would play all the guitar parts. I then recruited other friends for the other instruments when we were ready to do studio recordings.

Sadly, he left the project only a few years later, right after we received a letter in the mail from a Sony executive wanting to come to Melbourne to meet us. When I told that exec that my guitarist had quit, he moved on. I still have that letter. I then decided I was going to continue alone. I began learning the other instruments I needed so I wouldn’t have to rely on anyone anymore.

Tell us about the new album

This was the second album on which I played all the instruments (except bass). The previous one was a little “safe” in a way. I had never done anything like that alone before so I was conscious of making sure I wasn’t trying to write something I might not have been able to pull off in a studio. The way that album turned out gave me more confidence, so the new one was a little more adventurous.

Strangely, though, I think my drumming was more outgoing in the previous album. I may have done more colourful guitar work on this one, but for some reason it does sound like I was a little more conservative on the kit. Don’t know why. It just turned out that way.

Favourite track in new album and why?

I think “No Replay” is my favourite. It has the kind of vibe that would sound great live.

Tell us a bit about the recording process, was it fun to do?

The first thing I do is record a proper demo in my home studio. Once I’ve finished, I call my studio contact and upload all the finished songs so they can have a listen. I’ve always given the studio the songs ahead of time because I think it allows the producer to fully understand what we’re going to be recording, so we both know exactly what we need to do before we even start.

When I get in there and start recording, everything is played as it was on my demo. I don’t hand my demo in until I am 100% confident that it’s what I will be recording. The only things that may vary are drum fills and guitar solos. Sometimes, in the moment, what I improvise can turn out better than what I had previously.

I’ve been told by every studio I’ve recorded with that they haven’t seen anyone record the way I do or in such a short amount of time. I finish an album in 9 days. I’m sure it’s not that big an achievement. It’s just about preparation. As exhausting as the whole process is to do by myself, it’s also the most rewarding. It’s the best part of the entire creative process. You end up seeing what you’ve written come into existence. It’s an awesome feeling.

What inspired the album name?

As I was finishing the last couple of songs, I noticed that all the songs had become about choices I’d made throughout my life and where I’d ended up as a result. It wasn’t intentional. I originally thought it would be “Choices” but that somehow sounded a little cheesy. “Choose” sounded more like something that life keeps screaming at us, so that’s what stuck in my head.

Tell us the idea behind the album cover?

It’s just a visual concept of the album name. I went through a few ideas for the cover, including one with 3 different masks, but that didn’t really represent a real choice as such. I started scouring the “license free” photo sites to see if anything would trigger an idea. After a while I realised I was seeing all kinds of photos of different landscapes (desert, forest, mountains etc). I then saw some overhead photos of traffic. That’s when I wondered what I would pick at a crossroad. Would it be somewhere hot, somewhere cold or somewhere like a rainforest? Once I saw the image in my head, I started collecting a bunch of photos that had some bit that I needed and created the final product in Photoshop.

The CD booklet is an interesting one. Each lyric page is made of an image that’s related to either rock, paper or scissors. It’s fun asking people to flick through it and see if they can tell me what the theme is. It seems to be more cryptic than I had imagined, lol.

What one of your songs on the new album do you think will the most difficult to rehearse for a live audience?

Well I can’t play live by myself, so… all of them? LOL! To be serious though, if I had a bunch of good musicians to play live with me, I don’t think any of the songs would be a problem.

Why should people listen to the album?

For the last 20 years, everything has sounded so electronic. Even stuff that’s released as “rock” music is auto-tuned like crazy and sounds like something done by AI. I still get my inspiration from groups like Foo Fighters, Queens of the Stone Age (I’m so hooked on their new album), Pearl Jam, Soundgarden and Radiohead. If you are also completely sick of how music has been sounding for some time now, I’m hoping you will find something you like on this album, as well as my previous albums.