New Music

PREMIERE: Brisbane's hardest working band Sensaii return with new song/video 'Bipolar Bears'

May 13, 2018

7 min read

Every year for the past three years that we've been writing about Sensaii, they've unleashed new music upon us and proved they are an unstoppable force that needs your time and attention. You may have caught them recently opening for bands like Saviour and Four Year Strong but these Brisbanites have certainly shown fans (and the music industry) they're not stopping until they get their way and have the world hear their music.

Following up from last year's Dig Deep EP, the boys are premiering their brand new song 'Bipolar Bears' which features frontman Rowan Herbert focusing more on his melodic side which we've only briefly caught glimpses of on their previous releases. As expected, he nailed it and can now class himself as a musical triple threat: singer, screamer, frontman goal achiever. We caught up with the man to find out more about the track and what 2018 holds for the band.

Rowan thanks for sharing 'Bipolar Bears' with us, what's the song all about?

I tried to portray the feeling of being stuck in different mindsets. Being thrown around within your own head like an uncontrollable puppet.

We all experience that from time to time, a notable change with this release is you've gone for a more melodic approach with your singing, is it daunting jumping from the heavy screams you've perfected to tackling clean vocals?

I've been trying to work on and train up the old vocal chords lately to give myself a chance to explore new ideas and elements to introduce into our new material. So far so good, but there is still a lot I have to learn.

Well you're on the right path. The video was directed by guitarist Chris' brother Ryan Burt (ex-Amity drummer), how much of a hard arse on set was he?

He is definitely a detail-oriented person, which is exactly what we need. Being the way we are, pretty chilled and can tend to get a bit silly, so we were all extremely thankful for his help.

From what we see, you're not that silly, you're one of the hardest working bands we've ever written about! Not only did you release your album Renegade in 2016 but last year you had the Dig Deep EP for us. Now you're already on new music, how do you juggle life/band/work commitments when punching out music so consecutively?

Haha thank you! In all honesty, it can be tough at times. Switzer’s a family man since he had his little girl, we’ve all got work in different fields which can mean syncing schedules can be tough. And I mean, just life in general getting in the way too. But really, I think it just shows the dedication and drive that all of the boys have and proves the level of love they/we have for the music.

You're not wrong there, we see it so keep it up. Does that mean a new album is on the way this year too?

We are in the planning stages of the next chapter, thats for sure. All I can really tell you at this stage is that it’s definitely a new path. Don’t get me wrong, the new stuff will still be Sensaii through and through, but with time our sound is developing and changing as we do personally. The ideas are flowing and sounding really solid, so I’m very keen to keep playing around with some new music for everyone.

Sounds promising, looking forward to hearing what you've been working on. You boys have played some big shows of late, opening for Amity, Four Year Strong and Saviour, next up is the Dead of Winter Festival, you've gotta be stoked on that right? Sharing the stage with bands like Frenzal, Polaris, Dad Religion and Clowns just to name a few.

I can’t describe how stupidly happy I got when we heard about the Dead of Winter show. I had the biggest, most stupid grin on my face when I saw the message come through. Dead of Winter Festival is pretty iconic here in Brisbane, and have been consistently huge with this year being even bigger. To be playing alongside such amazing artists is truly a dream come true.

And where will we catch you moshing after your set finishes?

Polaris and Ocean Grove are the first on my list, for sure. There’s no denying they are a couple of the best, and hardest working heavy bands in Australia at the moment.

Agreed. Talking about Dead of Winter, what can we expect setlist wise? Bunch of classics and some new material?

Our set will mainly be tracks off of our newest release (Dig Deep) with maybe a couple older ones thrown in for good measure. Each record we’ve released has been in a different (lower each time) tuning so it can make integrating old and new tracks into our set a bit of a pain in the ass but we’ll see how we go. Oh, and of course we will be jamming Bipolar Bears.

Good shit, it's a great song and we can't wait to see it live.

Interview by Browny @brownypaul

Sensaii play Dead of Winter on July 7th. Be there or be a triangle...