Time and time again, you’ll hear a band say that they like to stick to, “their roots.” Once you actually sit down and listen to that band, you can hear some stuff that gives you that idea; here and there. Thats why The Vernons are such a treat! They stick to their roots the whole way through. With influences like Gary Clarke Jr. and The Alabama Shakes, these group of blues rockers from Queensland really know how to catch an ear in a youthful music scene that is hard to get by. Be sure to check out the bands latest EP, “Volume 1” released on September 6th. After all, we here at Highlight recommend nothing but the best!
“Shake n Roll”
This song, still every time I hear it, immediately reminds me of our live shows. We’ve had some absolutely amazing experiences playing live shows over the past few years and some of the times they can get a little crazy and that’s sort of what his song is all about. It doesn’t really have much meaning behind it all, in fact the lyrics are all about inviting people to come up and enjoy the music by dancing, but most of all its just a song that reflects the fun and energy of our live show.
“Standing in Line”
This is probably the most meaningful song on the EP. The song was written and based on a homeless man who was busking on the side of the road. His musicality was very good and he could work a crowd really well too but all the while it seemed to me at the time that he didn’t quite care about actually getting some shrapnel in his hat, but he was rather just enjoying his life playing music for others on the side of the street for almost nothing. That was really what inspired this song and I tried to relate it back to our own experiences in the band.
“White Wine”
If you hadn’t already noticed, “White Wine” is not actually about drinking white wine but rather about meeting a very memorable girl on a night out after a show, who happened to drink white wine. She clearly left quite an impression and that’s really all the song is about. I don’t want to go into too much detail of it all but I suppose one thing to note when you listen to the song is that while its all very clean and slow, there’s a lot of roughness around the edges and that definitely gives a greater perspective of who this girl is.
“Mercy”
The original lyrics to this song were actually tossed and replaced with James’ lyrics which he actually meant to write for another song, but while we were jamming to “Mercy” for the first time I instead used those lyrics and it worked really well with the vibes of the music. I’m not sure whether it is true or just a story, but he wrote it about a relationship with a girl which was basically all about the sex, and for some reason he needed to get out of it and leave but he kept going back again and again. So effectively it’s really a song about giving into temptation where you know it’s not good for you.
