Formula Indie Sessions – Interview with 51st Avenue
We are 51st Avenue – a 4 piece band from Sydney Australia. We make hyper modern pop rock music which is pretty much emo music with lots of pop influence, electronic synths and crazy riffs!
What is your earliest memory connected to music?
This one’s a tough one as it feels as though music has been a part of my life since I was born but of course, I can’t remember that far. The earliest age I can recall is 4 years old and I was singing and dancing to Disney movies and my parents’ boombox playing cassettes of Whitney, Mariah and Celine. Also having a Filipino dad means lots of karaoke parties! – Aly
How did your passion for creating music begin?
Both my parents love music, so growing up there was always music playing. My cousins also played drums and piano so it was only a matter of time before I started venturing down the path of learning more deeply about music which many years later turned into wanting to create original music. – Scott
What’s the story behind your current music project?
51st Avenue has a ‘mascot’ called Lantern Girl. This is from our first EP artwork ‘ Breathe Again’. The concept was that no matter how dark life gets, we should always look for the light, no matter how big or small that light may be. It is to focus on the positive, when sometimes all we can think about is the negative. 51st Avenue hopes to provide some light to those who find comfort in our music and to remind them we are all in this together. Lantern Girl is a recurring theme for our artworks to this day. – Scott
How would you describe your sound to someone who has never heard your music before?
Imagine if your favourite nostalgic emo music mixed with nu metal decided to go hard on electronic synths, trap beats and had huge pop music influences then add an R&B vocalist and you’ve got our sound. – Aly
What is one thing you’ve learned that completely changed the way you make music?
I think a lot of people in creative spaces would agree that it is important to accept that something is finished. You could spend hours continuing to refine and enhance a track but at the end of the day it needs to be finished and released. In saying this, it is hard sometimes when you want to keep trying to create a better riff, melody or drum beat and you ask yourself, ‘’is this good enough?’’. If we all went with this mentality, nothing would get finished and this motto has helped us when we make music. – Scott
What tools, instruments, or software are essential in your creative process?
Our creative process is very much a collaborative effort. We utilise everyone’s knowledge of their instruments and production skills to help us when we write songs. – Scott
Which indie artist or song are you loving right now?
Our newest single ‘Self Sabotage’ features RinRin, so how could we not mention her. Absolutely loving everything she does and very much looking forward to seeing what she does next! – Scott
How have your personal experiences influenced your music and artistic vision?
We use our personal experiences to write our music and lyrics whether they be drawing inspiration from our favourite bands to write riffs or using themes of loss, love and even mental health to write our lyrics. For many of our songs, though they may feel heavy in themes, our vision is there is always a light at the end of the tunnel. – Aly
What emotions or messages do you hope listeners take from your work?
We explore a range of emotions/messages in our songs that we hope listeners can connect with. We hope that other people can relate to experiences we have been through or emotions we have felt. Our core message is that despite how dark it is, there is always a light to follow – we hope that listeners while connecting to some heavier themes are able to see that it is important to push on and just focus on the next steps. – Scott
What’s the most important lesson music has taught you so far?
For me personally, music has taught me that there’s no right or wrong. It’s all about feeling. If music is speaking to you in any way, it’s doing its job. Being in a band, we are different people who feel differently and we try hard to make music that makes us all feel so it in turn makes listeners feel. Whether it’s happy, sad, confused or just plain relatable, we hope our music speaks to people the way the music we each and all enjoy speaks to us. – Aly
What is a dream venue or festival you would love to perform at?
If we are really dreaming then Qudos Bank Arena in Sydney. You know you have made it when you are headlining this venue. For a festival we would love to play Rock Am Ring, what a great atmosphere that would be. – Scott
If you could collaborate with any artist, past or present, who would it be and why?
I think currently we would say Bring Me The Horizon, we’ve taken a lot of inspiration from them. – Scott
Where can our listeners follow and support your music? (Website,Spotify, IG, links)
https://linktr.ee/51stavenueaus
Looking toward the future, what’s your dream for the next chapter of your musical journey?
We plan to release an EP this year, Self Sabotage was the first single, we will have another single before the EP drops. From that we hope to continue playing gigs and tour a bit more frequently. Overall, we hope to continue to grow the awesome community we have and keep having fun doing what we love. – Scott
What do you hope listeners will discover about you along the way?
We hope that they discover that at the end of the day we are a bunch of friends doing what we love. We have fun and hope that conveys to our audience. There is an inside joke with our Twitch community where 51st brings the ‘chaos’. This chaos usually refers to all of the humorous things that happen when we are all together doing what we love. Come join us for the ride! you never know what is going to happen next. – Scott
