INTERVIEW: Split The Ticket

Releasing their second EP quickly after their debut, and juggling university studies in-between, local indie rockers Split The Ticket are nothing if not focused. And, as it happens, the term ‘focus’ might not only apply to their behaviours. Tight, controlled, and with some killer guitar lines, their new EP Cornerstone is immediately heavier than their debut, and sees the band exploring more mature ideas and musical textures. Cornerstone is both musically and lyrically more mature than its predecessor. This is a focused EP.“We were on a bit of a good roll before we had to stop the band for a while and go to uni,” Oisin confirms, “but we knew we had good songs and more material that we wanted to get straight back to.”

“I think we also started to listen to heavier influences,” adds Finn, “and those influences started to impact how we were writing and what we wanted the sound to be when we got in the recording studio.”

Released as a four song EP, the band have already released two of the tracks (Unreadable and Let Me In) with both showing different styles of indie rock, though maintaining a common thread of emotional maturity throughout. “There’s definitely a theme to the EP,” confirms Oisin, “the sounds may be slightly different, but the songs work together as they’re all focused on growing up, working through different relationships, in some ways moving on.” Both of the two unreleased songs, Months Have Passed and Losing It, maintain that feeling; there may be a heavier, rockier element to the band, but perhaps that’s driven by the weight of the lyrics.

“The sequencing of the EP was also important to how we wanted to present the band,” confirms third and final member Lachlan. “We wanted to put the track listing together in the way that the songs were written and recorded, meaning that in some way the songs and the content get heavier as the EP grows. Although it’s only a small detail that was really important to us and how we wanted to explain ourselves.”

Braced for a headlining EP launch at The Cluny on Sunday 13th April, the immediate next step for Split The Ticket is to let others hear the new material and then get straight back to thinking about new songs, as Finn confirms. “We can’t wait to play what we have, to get the new EP out, to do some gigs, but we’re already thinking about new songs and new ideas.” Oisin agrees: “That is where we want to be. We’re really happy with the new sound and the new heavier influence, but we think we can go even further. And that’s exciting.”

Split The Ticket launch Cornerstone EP on Sunday 13th April at The Cluny, Newcastle.