By Justin Flynn
Raised by Eagles is heading to Ocean Grove for the annual Tranquility Fair on Saturday 6 January, and band frontman Luke Sinclair has fond memories of the bustling coastal town.
“I look forward to coming to Ocean Grove even when it’s got nothing to do with music,” Sinclair says.
“Friends used to have a holiday house there, and we’d stay for a week or two. I have great memories of Ocean Grove. A bunch of us still go there to lay on the beach and surf.
“Those gigs where there’s families, kids and dogs running around – they’re great.”
Raised by Eagles has formed a reputation as one of Melbourne’s most sought-after independent bands.
The quartet’s 2015 album Diamonds in the Bloodstream won Best Country Album and Best Emerging Artist at The Age Music Victoria Awards.
But ask Sinclair about what made the band delve into country music and he pauses.
“They’re still calling us country for some reason,” he says.
“I really struggle with that question. I like to call it country rock ‘n roll. I can’t articulate the type of music we play because it involves so many influences from all of us. There are connotations attached to labels.
“If you get labelled as country, people who don’t like country have already decided they don’t like it and pass it by just because of the label attached to it.”
The band’s journey took them to Nashville for the prestigious Americana Music Festival and when prompted to recall the experience, Sinclair’s reaction is immediate.
“It was just an amazing place to be in,” he says.
“It was always a place that was almost mythical growing up. We were wide eyed and astounded at the level of musicianship. That will stay with me forever.”
Raised by Eagles was an interesting choice for a band name, and Sinclair recalls the day it all started.
“I wish it was a more interesting story,” he says.
“It was a nickname given to me by an eccentric buddy. He reckons I walk around with a furrowed brow like an eagle, like I’d been raised by eagles.”
After the Tranquility Fair, Sinclair plans to get back into songwriting, but says he needs “silence and an empty” to do it properly.
The band is still going strong since forming in 2013, and the members are all good mates.
“We all have issues like brothers and families do, but at the end of the day we are a very tight unit that relies on all four of us for the band to be what it is,” Sinclair says.
“When we get into a room and start playing, it all comes together.”
