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“Reinvent the wheel. Send a signal somehow. You gotta take the life you have now and throw it all away…” – Signals
Open your eyes. Take a look around. The world is offering plenty of signals about where you could be going.
As a songwriter, Travis Caudle has tuned into those signals and they’ve led him to a new album of songs.
“I pretty much constantly take in everything that’s going on around me and then at some stage it all processes itself and the songs come out,” the Perth-born singer, songwriter and guitarist says.
The latest collection of ideas has coalesced into a dozen spacious rock/pop songs tied together as an album called Signals.
Following in the footsteps of some of his favourite artists like Colin Hay, Lloyd Cole and The Church, Travis’ lyrics are powerful instruments for reflection and hopefully change – just as life offers up a myriad of possibilities, some good – others not so good, Travis says his writing tries to see the best of it.
The first single, In Your Presence, laments the loss of a friend to suicide and is a reminder to appreciate our friends and family members.
“When someone passes, we constantly wish they would walk through the door,” he says. “And you just wish they’d known that they were enough, exactly as they were.”
Ever conscious of the human condition and the state of the human soul, other songs on the album include one which yearns to transcend the trappings of the mind (the atmospheric closer Rise), another inspired by a sporting hero’s fall from grace (Change Your Mind) and a third about reinvention.
“The title track, Signals, is all about getting to a point where you get rid of all the things which don’t work in your life, understanding that by giving away some of your security you actually gain freedom.”
Throughout, Travis’ guitar-based pop songs push his voice out front and have been said to echo artists like England’s David Gray and Scottish band The Blue Nile.
As a member of awarded Perth band, The Woodenelves, Signals marks another step in Travis’ solo adventures which began in 2002 with his solo acoustic project, Bareboy.
Signals was recorded in Sydney with musician and producer Tim Powles (Spacejunk Production House). The drummer and sometimes-producer for The Church is also a former member of 80s band The Venetians and has played with the Divinyls and Rose Tattoo amongst others. He was also at the helm of The Woodenelves’ 2007 debut album, Trips Between Worlds.
“The Church’s Hologram of Baal album was very lush and atmospheric and it’s all guitars and no keyboards,” says Travis. “That was the album which made me want to work with Tim.”
Signals was completed in about five weeks, in and around Travis touring the east coast.
“The intention was to keep the songs as close as possible to how they’re presented live even though it’s a band album and I’m touring in solo acoustic mode. For example, a track like In Your Presence, it’s just bass, drums and guitar so that when I do it live with just my voice and guitar, it’s still quite like that version.”
Tim is known for his work of allowing incident and accident to work together in the studio and Travis says it was very much that way with his album too.
“Recording is about being creative and making other albums gave me the confidence to be able to just sit back and see what happened in the studio – I love that a lot of stuff we did totally on the fly.
“I really enjoyed the process; sometimes I would pick up a guitar and play and didn’t even know Tim was recording and that was where some of the results we liked most came from.”
The singer/songwriter has notched up several hundred shows in the past two years, which includes two trips to Canadian Music Week to perform and, showing his artistic versatility, support slots for acts like Jimmy Barnes, Kasey Chambers, Hinder, The Black Crowes, Tim Rogers, Taxiride and James Reyne. He and The Woodenelves have also been invited to international festivals SXSW and CMJ.
Following an Australian tour to support the release of Signals, Travis heads to the US for a series of shows.
Signals is released into stores and on iTUNES on July 1.
A selection of tracks off the album is at Travis Caudle on MySpace
