Vance Joy on songwriting, album artwork and the desire for affirmation from fans

For Vance Joy, album release day kind of feels like a birthday – a lot of excitement, some anticipation and a little bit of nervousness around who’s going to come to the party.

It’s been three and a half years since the release of his debut ARIA Platinum album Dream Your Life Away, so expectations are high. The reaction to the five tracks he’s teased so far has offered the reassurance the singer-songwriter needed – but with 13 tracks on the album, Vance Joy believes there’s still plenty more for fans to discover as well.

“I just want to read the feedback [on Instagram] and see if there’s positive feedback, which you can’t help but do,” he told TMN. “I get a bit nervous but also I don’t think that ever changes. I think maybe you become more aware of your desire to get the affirmation from fans.”

“I’m excited for them to delve a bit deeper, and listen to all the tracks on the album. I guess you can’t always expect people to listen to the whole thing.

“It’s kind of rare that people would listen to a whole album. Hopefully there’ll be some little gifts in there… I hope that if people want to do some searching, and look a bit deeper, I think that there’ll be hopefully some songs that might be growers.”

Nation of Two sees Vance Joy draw inspiration from both his home in Melbourne and around the world, including influences from Australian author Peter Carey. But it was his time away that was most beneficial for the creative process.

“Being away from home, I have a bit of distance to just reflect. Even if I’m just home, you can reflect on relationships that you might’ve had, or you can reflect on things you’ve read, and it just gives you a good amount of distance and separation to just work with the things that are in your head.

“Part of moving around was because obviously that’s just necessity with touring, but… being away was a way of shaking myself out of my comfort zone, or just feeling like I was moving towards something, like heading off.”

This time around sees Vance Joy once again team up with songwriters Dan Wilson (who he’s worked with since 2015) and Grammy-nominated Dave Bassett – writing partnerships that helped the artist feel excited and proud of the results produced.

“I feel like it was always quite productive every time we worked together,” he said of his time spent with Wilson.

“We co-wrote ‘We’re Going Home’ and also ‘Like Gold’. He just brought interesting melodies. I feel like when it works well, it’s like that songwriter will just amplify your voice, and bring something special that you weren’t even going to bring to the table, but that also it feels good to sing.

“I sing the melody he might suggest, and I’m like, ‘Ah, it feels awesome.’ It’s refreshing and exciting to have that collaboration, so it’s nice to know that that’s possible. I feel like that was an important step in this album.”

And it’s the songwriting process – the delicate balance between working hard to craft the right lyrics and the enjoyment felt once a song has taken shape – from where Vance Joy draws a lot of the satisfaction.

“You can get addicted to songwriting and the challenge of it, and also the rewarding nature of just writing a song, coming to that point where it might come out effortlessly one day, or you might have been working on a song for six months, and it finally comes together, but I feel like there’s that sense of hard work to it.”

“I guess once you write a song that you feel like meets a criteria for you, of a song that makes sense and is good, it’s about trying to keep going back there and trying to make songs that work. Always trying to meet that standard, I think that’s the challenge.”

Not only did Vance Joy have a hand in writing and performing the new album, but he also created the artwork, whipping up some last-minute line sketches of couples for the art when the photos planned for the cover weren’t quite working.

“I think album artwork still matters because for me it just unites the whole thing, and I guess you just want it to look authentic.

“Obviously, you can have great songs, and you can have really shitty artwork, and it won’t necessarily matter. The artwork could just go under the radar and really what will last is the songs. I do believe that, but I think when you’re so close to the songwriting, and so close to all the creativity that’s going to making the songs, you just want the artwork to be good, as well.

“It’s kind of rounding out the whole creative output.”