STACK NZ Jan-Feb #59

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Jeff Boyle is guitarist with sonic
titans Jakob, who released their
fourth album Sines last October.
Formed in Napier in 1998 with
Jason Johnston and Maurice
Beckett, the instrumental three
piece released their debut album
Subsets Of Sets in 2002, and
followed that with Cale: Drew
(2005) and Solace (2006), which
received international acclaim.
Unfortunately, a freakish run of
debilitating hand injuries suffered
by all three members of the band
meant a frustrating eight year
wait for their latest LP. However,
now they are back firing on all
cylinders and looking forward
to playing this year’s Laneway
Festival in Auckland.
12 SUMMER EDITION 2015 JB Hi-Fi
EXTRAS
mountain only to keep on falling back down.
On this album you had contributions from
former Isis drummer Aaron Harris and
Wellington-based composer Rhian Sheehan.
How did these collaborations come about?
Aaron’s been a very good friend and a big fan
of ours for a long time. He’s been producing
and engineering ever since Isis broke up and
we found his input essential. Because of all
the hiccups we had along the way we ran out
of money and I ended up having to mix most
of the album myself but [Harris] was a huge
help. And I’ve been working with Rhian for
quite a few years now on a few of his albums.
Musically, him and I think in a very similar way.
After working with him on his stuff I really
wanted to introduce the way he thinks about
string arrangements into Jakob just like how he
wanted to introduce my way of doing guitar into
his music.
Do you think that being an instrumental
group is freeing or limiting creatively, as
opposed to having a vocalist?
I feel as though we have exponentially more
freedom not being confined to a standard
way of doing things. We have so much more
freedom it isn’t even funny and that was the
whole plan behind Jakob in the first place.
How does it feel to be a part of this
year’s Laneway Festival?
It’s really good, a great opportunity
and the line-up is amazing! I’ve been blown
away by many of the acts over
recent years like Little Dragon
and Jon Hopkins, and so
many more. We were
surprised to be asked to join
in, to be honest.
But we’re stoked.
much time we can commit to the band.
But we’re still just as passionate about the band
and our music as we ever were, it’s just our
approach that’s changed. On top of that we all
have full time jobs so it’s definitely a juggling act.
Considering that it’s been eight years
between albums, was is it gratifying to
see how well Sines was received?
Extremely. It was a long and arduous process,
much harder than any of the others had been
by a long way. After you’ve been working on
something for so long, you can lose perspective
on whether it’s any good or not. All you can do
is release it to the world and see what happens.
It’s always a scary thing to do but the reviews
have been amazing.
Has the long gap between albums
yielded any unexpected benefits or
has it all been negative?
It was a bit of both really. It was very, very
frustrating a lot of the time but there were some
positives that came out of it. These seven songs
were written over a span of eight years so they
ended up coming out very eclectic, which is a
big positive for me. But it was a struggle to hang
in there with all the injuries we’ve had. I was
off for a year and a half which was really hard
to deal with since I’ve been playing guitar since
I was six. And then the other guys both had
hand-related injuries, which kept putting us back
further and further. But the positive results that
came out of it were definitely worth it.
Was there ever a time when you didn’t think
that Sines was going to see
the light of day?
If I was to be brutally honest, there was.
It does get to a point when you have one
cataclysmic injury after another you start
thinking really, is this how it’s going to be from
now on? It just seems like you’ve climbed this
visit
It’s been eight years since the release
of your last album, Solace.What has
changed for the band in that time?
It’s all changed so dramatically. To start with
I’ve had two children and your life changes after
you have kids, particularly with the career side
of things. Your children and your family have to
become your top priority and music takes a bit
of a back seat but it’s still a close second. Jason
[Johnston, drummer] has four kids as well so
we’ve all had to make some changes in how
Jeff Boyle