Written by: Rod Whitfield - Independent Professional Writer | Tuesday 14th June 2022

The Acoustic Interlude

There is always major risk involved when an artist releases something that is markedly different to what he or she has become known for. Having built a solid global profile as a purveyor of loud, electrified prog rock instrumentals, Melbourne guitar player Rohan Stevenson, AKA I BUILT THE SKY, has taken a very sharp turn to the left with his latest release, a chilled-out, all-acoustic full-lengther appropriately titled The Quiet Place Away, and while admitting to a little anxiety about the unveiling of something so different from what his fans expect, Stevenson is optimistic and philosophical about the album’s prospects.

The Interview

“I feel good about it,” he begins, “but starting the process of talking about it and advertising the release date and stuff like that, you start to question yourself a little bit, doing a bit of a turnaway from what I generally do. But I have definitely released acoustic stuff along the way, and it’s different but it’s still me, it’s still got my flavour to it. I’ve shown a lot of friends and they’ve said it’s really good. I have some confidence, but you never know.

“It's one of those albums where, it’s either going to be really good for me, and really help me and expand my audience, or the opposite, because it’ll annoy people who want a follow-up to (previous album) The Zenith Rise. I guess we’ll see.”

And it’s not like an all-acoustic release is something completely out of the blue for Stevenson, it is something he has thought about and talked about for quite some time. In addition, it is something he gets a real kick out of and forces him to think about his music in a profoundly different way. “I’ve been a big acoustic music fan for a long time,” he states, “and I enjoy making it (this type of music), because it’s a whole different headspace you’re not thinking about production techniques, all those things that you know so well in the metal stuff, all the distortion and stuff, typically. It’s fun to try and make music that’s a bit more organic in sound and moreso focuses on the chords and the notes and less on the production values and stuff, although when you look at the album there’s still a lot of production stuff (laughs).

“So it sort of started there and just evolved and evolved and evolved.”

So it’s been coming for quite some time? “For sure. Some of the songs are more than two years old, so it’s definitely been on my mind for quite a while.”

While the Covid period was highly traumatic for millions of people across the globe, a few rays of sunshine can be drawn from it, including the fact that the development of this record benefited from the extra time Stevenson had to put into it. “I always sit down on the couch with the acoustic and noodle away,” he says, “and you get to a point where you say, ‘right, I’ve got to commit to it, I’ve got to do it’. That’s what happened during Covid times, I ended up fleshing out the songs during that period and then booking an Airbnb to track, a really nice Airbnb down near the Otways, it’s a really cool location. We had a break during the lockdowns, we headed down there and smashed it out.”

Supporting and counterpointing the resonant acoustic guitars on the album is an almost constant wash of sweet string arrangements. While it would be tempting to create the strings in the studio, given the cost and the logistics of it all, Stevenson tells us they are all 100% real, played by real musicians in real time.

“I was playing around with programmed strings in my home studio,” he recalls, “but then I thought to myself, I should do this for real, and get someone in who knows about arranging strings and things like that. I’ve got a friend, Jake Wilson from the UK. He’s an amazing guitarist, but he also knows all about string arrangements and stuff, so I got him involved. I also had conversations with Forrester (Savell, famous Australian record producer) about how to move forward with it, and we decided to try adding different instruments like mandolin and banjo and percussion to just flesh it all out and add more colours.

“So Jake was very involved in taking my general ideas and evolving them so they would make sense for a trio of strings, or adding different things. He’s a really switched-on guy, and he generally sent me back something where I was like, ‘yeah, that’s great’. So then we just went about getting players in and smashing it all out, and we got it done.”

The finished product comes across as very much like an ambitious acoustic prog rock album, although this wasn’t necessarily always his intention. “Not really!” Stevenson admits. “In the beginning I just wanted it to be full chill and just an acoustic guitar. A lot of the acoustic music I enjoy, often there’s just one guitar and it’s just a great song. But I think it’s just how my brain works, I love to layer, and add more guitars and do double-tracking and stuff, and it starts to have that progressive vibe about it. I sort of can’t escape it, that’s just how I create.

“It (the album) is definitely quite progressive, I’d say.”

The original vision for the album was that it would be far shorter, simpler, more stripped back, and far less expensive to make. “I get a bit stressed out about it, because I’m spending so much money. Initially going in, I had all these acoustic riffs and I was like, ‘it’s cool, I’ll be able to put out an EP, it won’t cost me anything, I’ll just do it at home, it’ll be cool, it’ll be chill, people can enjoy that and I’ll work on the next metal shit’. But as we’re going, I’m writing more songs and fleshing out pianos and different layers and I had this realisation that these songs deserve more, I can’t just use my shitty Midi strings and stuff. So I fell down the rabbit hole of getting Forrester involved, booking studios and players and all that, so that idea was completely lost again!

“It’s okay though, I don’t regret anything.”

Fans of I BUILT THE SKY’s louder, more electrified sounds need not worry. This foray into the chilled acoustic side of things is not a permanent new direction, Stevenson has plenty of heavy riffs, licks and blistering solos left in him, and his next output will be a return to the raucous instrumental prog rock and metal he is known around the world for. “Yes, it’s all in my head. I haven’t started getting it all down yet though. I’m just letting it build up at the moment, and once I’ve got the album launch show done, because there’s a lot riding on that, and I feel a bit more at ease to spend time on something new, I’m going to lock myself away for a few weeks and starting ripping something out.”

The Quiet Place Away will be launched in Melbourne at the Northcote Social Club on June 24th. Stevenson and his fabulous band will perform two separate sets on the night, and he has some very special things planned, musically and visually. “I’m having three string players on stage with me, cello, viola and violin, along with a piano, I’m going to have my drummer playing percussion, plus two acoustic guitars. It’s going to be a real production, I’m super keen.”

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