'NoLess at Brunswick Ballroom' / July 28th [Interview]
We speak to NoLess’ founder Aidan Ryan about his musical process and what to expect from their headline show this Thursday at Brunswick Ballroom.
Naarm-based band NoLess’ sound is vibrant and textural, blending raw lyrics with lively, soulful beats. While grounded in the traditions of soul, jazz and RnB, their creations are eclectic. NoLess’ sound varies from melodic tracks with evocative, unfurling vocals, to upbeat rhythms reminiscent of summer nights by the front-left speaker. Following the release of their debut EP, the 6-piece group has quietly worked behind the scenes to develop a new body of work.
NoLess is bringing these fresh, unreleased tunes to the Brunswick Ballroom on July 28th, with support from Danika, Good Luck Omen, and Yangos.
How’re you feeling about the gig?
Excited, grateful, a little bit nervy. This is our second ever headline show. The first was back in 2019, when we raised money to record our EP. It feels like a lifetime ago, and we’ve learned so much and played together a lot since then. This gig feels kind of symbolic of a new era in our sound.
t’s also been really fulfilling reaching out to artists who we admire, to get them to support us at the show. Danika and Good Luck Omen are so inspiring. They both have such a raw, vulnerable and powerful quality to their music. It’s an honour to have them play before us and I can’t wait to stand in the crowd for their sets.
How did NoLess start? How did you get to where you’re at now?
Hard to pinpoint when it all started really. I’ve been writing since I was a kid. I felt comfortable sharing guitar pieces but didn’t really share any of my singing and lyrical content until my mid to late teens. I guess NoLess started when I first brought some of these songs to the band. We eventually worked up a set and started playing gigs.
Our first ever set was one of the best feelings – singing, playing and performing with some of my closest friends. We gigged for a couple of years and then eventually recorded our EP. We took a little hiatus over those two long years of you know what. Over that time, I kept playing, writing, and absorbing new musical language and influences. Last year we picked things up again with slightly different personnel and put together this new body of work.
On your Bandcamp and event description, you emphasise the vulnerability in NoLess’s music, particularly the lyrics. Is there something specific to music as a form that helps you express this?
I’m not sure if it’s something specific about music, but music has just been the main way I have expressed myself. Music pulls things out of me that I didn’t know were there. It’s a friend. I understand it deeper than other expressive forms. I can interact with it, and converse with it. Somehow, Music and I gravitated toward each other, and that connection keeps strengthening and growing over time.
“Somehow, Music and I gravitated toward each other, and that connection keeps strengthening and growing over time”.
How does it feel to share that vulnerability - both through collaborating with your band, and performing the final product?
It’s both really daunting and absolutely cathartic. It’s huge to perform in front of a room full of people, pour your heart and soul out, and then walk off stage and mingle with the people who just experienced you doing that. Especially when you’re sharing really personal content with people you might not have ever met.
Music that I have connected most strongly to is music that I can see myself in, that describes my experience, and in that way, makes me feel less alone. Writing music is a form of therapy for me, and the more honest and vulnerable I am with myself, the more healing it is for me – and hopefully, the more helpful it is for others, too.
What’s your process like?
Most of the time, I’ll have written a fully formed song with chords, sections, and lyrics, which I play for the band by myself. We’ll then just jam it out to work out how to make it groove all together. This might mean changing the arrangement or adding and removing parts. I’m lucky to be working with some really creative and talented musicians who help lift the compositions to another level. Recently, I’ve had fun working with Indigo and Grace, who’ve helped me write our vocal arrangements.
Usually, I write the lyrics, chords and melody at the same time. Words themselves can be a source of inspiration, and sometimes act as a song’s starting point. Often, someone says something to me that sticks. People can say some really beautiful and poetic shit without noticing. When this resonates with me, I find it can make the most powerful and relatable lyrics.
I’m also heavily inspired by the lyricism of hip hop. When I first started writing lyrics in my teens, I was listening to heaps of hip hop. These are some of the true masters of poetry, story telling, wordplay, rhyme schemes and rhythm through voice. This really impacts the way I write lyrics – hearing the melody and rhythm first, and moulding words to fit inside that structure. I think this might be why my lyrics are often direct and explicit, not necessarily in terms of swearing, but in getting a message across.
How would you describe your music, in your own words? And what can we expect from the show?
I always struggle to put this into words because it’s varied and always changes. Our sound is an eclectic mix – from the serious, heartbreaking, and emo, to the fun, funky, and playful. It can be smooth, slow and soulful, it can get dirty and dance-y and hit hard at times. From the show, you can expect all of the above. We’ll be playing a set almost entirely of new, unrecorded works. I really enjoy playing these newer songs – they feel more relevant to me right now.
Anything else you’d like to add?
Just want to thank anyone and everyone who has supported us up until now. Either by being a part of the project, coming to our gigs, listening to our EP, supporting us at shows, or in other ways. We’re so lucky to have such a vibrant, diverse and supportive live music scene in Melbourne. Really keen to get out there and play and collaborate with new artists, and I’m excited to record and share our new works sometime in the not-so-distant future.
Stay up to date with NoLess on Instagram, Soundcloud and Bandcamp.
Interview by Ava Nunan (@satinangel6)
Images by Krystal Torre (@krystaltorre)
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