Following the release of 2012’s Volume III: Hell’s Likely, Mammoth Mammoth signed with Austrian hard rock label Napalm Records. Not only did the signing greatly expand their listenership, but it led to the band’s inaugural European tour in late 2013. Drummer Frank Trobbiani reflects on what was a blessed experience.
“It was pretty amazing for our first international tour,” he says. “We had a proper tour bus, we had a tour manager, we had a full time merch guy and it was run incredibly professionally and smoothly. It was pretty amazing to go there and play to more people than we would play to here. Fans aren’t ashamed of being fans over there; they buy the merch, they wear the t-shirt, they want to meet the band. It’s just a great vibe.”
Given the mountainous praise directed at Hell’s Likely, it makes sense that Napalm wanted something similar from Mammoth Mammoth’s follow up release. Rather than trying to rebel, the band were more than happy to oblige the label’s request.
“They just loved [Hell’s Likely] and they loved that package,” says Trobbiani. “We had a really clear sense of what we wanted the band to appear like. What they liked about us was the album art, the film clip and everything tied together and made it an understandable product. They’ve been fantastic to work with, but all they said was ‘Don’t deviate from where you’re going because we really like that.’ We basically said ‘We have no intention of deviating because that’s exactly how we do things.’ If we’d gone ‘We want to develop more into a prog-rock thing’ then there might’ve been some problems. But what they wanted from us is exactly what we wanted to do anyway.”
The title Hammered Again could be seen as a metaphor for ‘more of the same’. Indeed, the album includes plenty of the hard-hitting stoner rock decadence the band are known for, but it’s not a mechanical re-run of its predecessor. For instance, tracks such as Fuel Injected and Looking Down the Barrel summon a fiercer energy, as vocalist Mikey Tucker delineates a stark worldview.
“Naturally the style developed,” says Trobbiani. “I wanted it to be darker and more menacing and probably sludgier and doomier, but our writing style is very jammy and the songs kind of write themselves. You can only steer them so far. Sometimes you’ve just got to let the song take its natural course.
“With each project you try to correct some things you may have been disappointed in before,” he adds. “With some of the previous work, we didn’t feel we’d written enough material. So we had 20 sketches of songs recorded, we tightened those down to about 15 and then we put a bunch of those aside. We didn’t want to have any filler on the album.”
Reading through a stack of Hammered Again reviews, the band’s unbridled rollick frequently invites comparisons to Motörhead, Black Sabbath and Turbonegro. While these references are generally intended as compliments, Trobbiani says they weren’t trying to resemble anyone.
“I think it’s more the physical energy that’s created that steers the music towards some of those reference points. We kind of like those bands but we never have gone ‘We want to do a song that sounds like Motörhead.’ It’s just kind of what comes out of our collective approach to the jam. It’s an interesting thing.”
During the next month, Mammoth Mammoth will stage a series of Hammered Again launch shows around Melbourne. They’ll kick things off at The Public Bar North Melbourne this Friday, before moving on to The Old Bar on May 8, The Retreat on May 15 and The Espy Basement on May 22. The decision to play a succession of small-scale shows was partly motivated by their European touring experience.
“That was a real eye-opener to us,” Trobbiani says. “We were going ‘Holy shit we’re playing every night of the week to crowds of between 200 and 500 people.’ You cannot do that in Australia. So we decided to play smaller venues just to create a better atmosphere – [it’s] four smallish shows in pretty quick succession, with good lineups.”
Mammoth Mammoth’s European visit certainly wasn’t a one-off. They’ll soon head over for the European summer festival season. If the barrage of positive reviews for Hammered Again is any sort of barometer, they’ll be met by even more punters than last time.
“We’ve been very lucky,” Trobbiani says. “I think that there’s a lot of bands in Australia who are much better than us in this genre. I think our appeal in Europe is that there’s a clearly identifiable thing and uniqueness to Mammoth Mammoth. That makes it easy for the fans to understand and grab hold of. They liked the whole image and package of the band.”
BY AUGUSTUS WELBY
