With Ads for Artists, The Jungle Giants share their spotlight with pandemic-stricken musicians…

It’s no secret that the past 18 months have been quite the nightmare, but the effects of the pandemic have been particularly rough for emerging musicians. The ongoing lockdowns and Footloose-style bans on live music were perhaps hardest felt by those whose livelihoods depend on regular gigs. But thankfully, not all hope is lost, with Smirnoff Seltzer and The Jungle Giants today launching a new initiative to champion Australia’s homegrown stars. 

In lieu of regular marketing and campaigning for their new Mixed Berry Seltzer, the alcohol company is giving away more than $1 million in advertising placements to spotlight twelve of the country’s most promising new acts. The Jungle Giants – who’ve undoubtedly graduated from newbie status to become industry mainstays in their own right – have been appointed as the creative directors of the Ads for Artists initiative, and their mass-curation of submissions will see a handful of entrants plastered on billboards, video on demand and other social channels from early next year. 

To get the stamp of approval from one of Australia’s biggest bands is one thing, but the widespread promotional support from Smirnoff will also allow aspiring upstarts to recoup the losses of the pandemic en route to their eventual arrival centre-stage. In the meantime, both The Jungle Giants and Smirnoff are keeping busy quenching our collective summer thirst, both for the return of live music and for the discovery of Australia’s next big act. Luckily for us, with a Mixed Berry Seltzer in-hand and the promise of emerging artists, we won’t be thirsty for long. 

We caught up with The Jungle Giants frontman Sam Hales and guitarist Cesira Aitken for a chat about their new Ads for Artists initiative, the importance of sharing the spotlight, and what they’re most keen for as mosh pits return in time for their Love Signs tour next year.  

Hey guys! Let’s start with your Smirnoff initiative. Can you give an overview of how Ads for Artists will work?

Sam Hales: We partnered with Smirnoff to find and pick out 12 emerging artists that we can divvy up from a $1 million advertising fund, to help promote their music. So essentially, all these bands were going to encourage them to send their music to Smirnoff’s DM’s, and then we’re going to sift through it, pick 12 bands, and promote the hell out of it. It’s really nice, really cool. 

Why is it important that big companies support local musicians, especially now?

Sam: The music industry has just had one of the toughest times in the last 18 months. A lot of emerging bands, they need shows to fund themselves, spread their music, meet their fans, and build their fanbase, but they haven’t had that opportunity. We really feel for them because when we were coming up, we were just playing shows and that’s what we did, non-stop. So a lot of these bands, they’ve still been making music, but they haven’t had that chance to share it, so this initiative is just about finding that music and sharing it out, promoting it, and getting it out.

Would you have been interested in an initiative like this when you were coming up?

Sam: 100%, and especially now that gigs are coming back, I feel like the idea that people could prompt their singles that they made during lockdown, it’s a good chance for young bands to get people excited for their shows, to get people buying tickets, to get people seeing that they’re about to hit stages again.

Cesira Aitken: More ears, more eyes. 

Sam: I feel like for us or for any band, that’s a really good thing. 

So you’re the creative director who’ll select the artists for the initiative. What’s some of the criteria that you’re looking for in emerging artists?

Sam Hales: We’re the cherry pickers. All music is welcome. Our ears are open, we haven’t been playing gigs in a long time so all we’ve been doing is listening to music. So my ears feel thick. It looks like they’ve got abs. 

Cesira Aitken: To be honest they just have to be on Spotify, Soundcloud or Youtube. 

Any emerging artists you’re listening to at the moment?

Sam: I get thick ears for 13 00. That’s a Melbourne band, a really cool Korean rap crew, and their beats are so insane. I’m not really sure what’s going on, but their production is wild.

Cesira: So good.

Sam: And it’s full of blips and blops and all these sounds and their real sassy, fashionable, cool dudes. I’m like obsessed with them, so yeah 13 00 for me. 

Cesira: I’ve been smashing First Beige, a really gritty band. They’re all really amazing players of their instruments, all of them. It’s like curly jazz, but also dancey. 

Sam: It’s gonna be super nice [to listen to all the submissions]. I’m going to sit by a fireplace and put on some headphones quietly, all next to each other.  

Now onto your own music. I’m a huge fan of your latest album. What made Love Signs distinct from some of your other projects?

Sam: Oh, man. It was definitely one of the biggest challenges I’ve ever set myself. This time around, you know, this was pre-pandemic life. I wanted to try and see if I could self-produce, play the instruments, engineer and just put myself in a bunker and come out with a record, and I wanted to set that challenge for myself. And over the past 18 months, I just did it.

It was really fun, it really made me feel good about myself. Now that the record’s out, to be able to see that people are responding to these things that kind of saved me, it’s something to feel good about everyday. So it’s a really special thing, really close to my heart, and it makes me feel proud of myself. I just can’t wait to play the shows, I can’t wait to see how people respond to it.  

Cesira: Let’s play this album live! Please!

Sam: We haven’t played it yet. We haven’t played it live. That doesn’t make sense to me in my brain. 

Cesira: We have to learn it, then we have to play it! 

What will be your first show back?

Sam. We’ll be playing it at some festivals over the summer, but the first Love Signs album tour show is Brisbane, Riverstage. We’re all from Brisbane, we all grew up going to shows, so the idea that we’re going to be playing those shows is really wild. 

Cesira: It’s like a dream. 

Sam: We’re also really nervous. I think we just need to play a couple of shows just to get the cobwebs out, but then it’s gonna be the tour of dreams. 

Your upcoming tour looks like it’ll be one of your biggest. What are you most looking forward to with the return of crowds and concerts?

Cesira Aitken: Singing! Definitely singing. 

Sam: See that’s the really good thing is that, you know, after releasing the music, when we play shows and sometimes people react really well, people sing every word. But sometimes people don’t react the way that you’d expect. So it’s really good for us to see how things go live. That’s the biggest teleprompter for us, a way to see what’s happening. Hearing people sing, seeing people dance, that’ll be really good. 

Cesira: It’s like a loud PA, just seeing all the normal things for a gig coming back.   

Which song from Love Signs are you most excited to perform?

Sam: ‘Heartless’, that’s our one.

Cesira: Yeah, we agree on that. 

Sam: For me, it’s in the bridge of the track, it’s got this big jam, and the whole time making it I was imagining watching a crowd during that jam in the middle of the song. I just really want that moment. 

Cesira: It’s a very Elvis Presly guitar moment for Sam [laughs].

Sam: Yeah, I’ll do the moonwalk, I’ll smash a guitar [laughs]. 

Do you guys have any pre-show rituals that you’ve developed over the years?

Cesira: Should we talk about it? [laughs]

Sam: We can talk about it. 

Cesira: We do a thing called a ‘monster truck.’ We turn all the lights down and put some songs on.

Sam: Don’t say the songs! [laughs].

Cesira: I won’t say the songs. We put some music on, and we just get rowdy for about 15 minutes, but no one sees it. It’s really quiet. 

Sam: We shut the door, we play a select, small playlist around four songs. But we trash a room in a really nice way, so like we’ll get a piece of ice and smash. We’re not actually trashing the room, we’re doing it in a really cute, funny, stupid way. It makes no sense, but it makes us feel really good. 

Cesira: Maybe we’ll release the playlist one day? When we retire, we’ll release the playlist [laughs].  

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UgaA0HfOmr8

The Jungle Giants’ new album, Love Signs, is out now. You can stream it here, and find tour event info here.