The world is a bit nuts right now. As a musician – a member of Forest Falls and freelance session violinist – it can be hard to make sense of everything all of the time. For some people, sensory overload is the perfect catalyst for creativity. Not for me. With all that’s going on, I’ve found it very useful to nut out these three tenets of creativity. Exposing myself to these conditions is what fuels my best work, so it’s useful to know what to fall back on when chaos gets the better of me. Tenet 1 – Diversity Like so many musicians, I’ve worked with a great many bands over the years. I’m classically trained as a violinist, but I’m just as home improvising as I am with sheet music. That skill set, thankfully, has lead me into a variety of music-making situations: into the studio with The Smith Street Band, at Sing Sing for an entire weekend with the wonderful Ali E, two weeks of recording with TANTRUMS in Pablo Clements and James Griffith’s (UNKLE) studio in Brighton (UK), and most recently to fiddle up a country noir storm touring high priestess Jemma Nicole’s debut album, My Darkest Hour. It’s a blessing, really, because I’ve had the chance to play in contexts as diverse as they are exhilarating. Being exposed to a variety of creative contexts does wonders for my inspiration. It also makes a lot of sense: I’m a Gemini! When I’m feeling a bit creatively starved, I savor the chance to try something completely different. I might put on an old favorite Against Me! record that I haven’t listed to for years, note down any ideas that spring to mind, then record a new work into the computer. My sound...

Which images, ideas, or emotions do the two words forest and falls conjure up for you? Let your mind go a little AWOL for a second; there’s no correct answer to that question, by the way. For the six of us in this band, the name Forest Falls epitomizes in a single statement why it is we make music. It’s the embodiment of a journey: from how we met to where we want to go. It’s equal parts history book and travel guide. It’s what inspires us every day, as six equals and six best friends, to write and perform our music. Why did we want to write this blog? Because we’d love to offer you a taste of it too; what it feels like to be following the creative path you were always meant to take. Our music is honest. No facades, lies or cover-ups. We want to share that feeling! Forest Falls is a band born out of a love for collaboration. It’s such a cool idea really, that a whole can be greater than the sum of its parts. Think about what that actually means! We can do in a group what we can’t do on our own. It was this idea that started everything: the imperative for our lead singer, Jon, to create music with others. When he left Perth a few years ago, he piled his life into a Tarago and headed off to Melbourne in a bid to meet other like-minded musicians. Jon met Jamie, who knew Jez, who knew Gabe, who met Shaun, who knew Lucy from Uni. It was almost as if it was meant to happen this way. The evolution of the band which you now see is the evolution which finally feels as if...