WORDS BY
Jacqui James
ANY NEW PARENT can understand why Aussie singer/songwriter Skotty Fairclough aka Hey Skotty wants to spread pure happiness with his debut single Wonderful Morning. Listening to it or watching its video makes you smile, even if you are having a crappy day!
Wonderful Morning (which is out now on all digital platforms) is a poppy tune filled with absolute bliss. You can dance around naked in your house because the tune is so infectious! As a new Dad, Skotty found himself watching repetitive cartoons to please his then nine month-old daughter with the chorus of Wonderful Morning inspired by her singing ‘Dada’ over and over.
Skotty Fairclough is a music magician! He’s previously written songs featured in the hit TV series Underbelly, Triple J and Stellar Entertainment’s inflight programming.
In 2017’s Hey Skotty’s aim is simple. Spread happiness as far he can! He says, “Happiness is the ultimate state of being. It can make light of a bad situation, breed immunity to adversity, and organically bring forth opportunity whilst requiring no investment. It’s also transmittable; happiness breeds happiness. It snowballs, and the more of it you can generate, the greater amount you will find and receive.”
Thank you very much Hey Skotty for your time. Good luck with the release of Wonderful Morning and enjoy fatherhood!
G’day Skotty! Congratulations on making such a joyful song. Your debut single Wonderful Morning is so power packed of full pure happiness. Can you explain the story behind it?
Why thank you. I’m really glad you like it. {smiles} Sure. What you are hearing IS pure infectious happiness. It is the music of a first-time father singing about finding the joy in newly discovered domestic bliss. That’s really the feeling I tapped into when I wrote the foundations of the song. I let go of any notion that this had to be cool, written for a certain audience or genre-specific and just wrote about a loving the moments between my wife, daughter and I in our morning ritual of waking up to coffee, cartoons and dancing to vinyl records. Originally the song was a personal little lullaby I wrote for the girls, but in bringing it to life I tapped into the energetic nature of the music we were dancing to in our early morning routine. Once I had that intention, in many ways the song took on a life of its own and I felt I was merely recording what had already written itself in my imagination.
New fathers take every chance to try to get their babies to say “Dada”, but you used the chorus in Wonderful Morning with the hope of teaching your nine month-old daughter to say it. Was it a deliberate attempt to win with the “she said my name first” battle with Alva’s Mother?
Well actually it was Alva who unintentionally wrote the catchy chorus for me forming the basis of the song. It was at the time she began saying her first words that she would wake up and start repeating my name over and over. Her first word was ‘duck’ so ‘Dada’ wasn’t too far behind. Once she got the hang of it she was like my own little personal rooster repeating my name over and over and over at first light until I stirred enough to pick her up and play with her. The first time she did it, I noticed it had a little rhythmic phrase (da-da-da dadada da-da) with a melody attached in the middle that sounded like she was saying ‘Dunca-kiora’ (which later become Wonderful Morning). I started repeating it back as a little game in that moment, but I was quite surprised when she woke the next day repeating the exact same little phrase and melody. I continued repeating it back to her and together we came to sing it as our morning wake up song long before she was even able to talk. That is the true story of where the chorus was born. I myself love a good musical challenge so the kid in me wanted to test myself seeing if I could take the words of my baby girl and turn it into a fully fledged song. It took a while for her to master the word ‘Mum’ but boy when she did, she more than made up for lost time.
When I read you have written material for Underbelly and other productions, my head spun! You must be one of those great songwriters who can write about anything?
Oh yes, I love to write. It’s something that comes very naturally to me and I will write about any topic thrown at me. I love it all. I am happy writing pop, classical, death metal and everything between. I just see genres as different mediums to explore and experiment the way any visual artist might work in oils, film or sculpture. It’s the good ideas that are important and the medium is merely the materials I use to make the art. The variety keeps me excited.
Which is more challenging…raising a little human or writing for Underbelly?
{Laughs} Underbelly was fairly easy. In fact the song Youngblood was an accident; a repetitive riff jam made up whilst waiting for a band to show up for rehearsals. It was really just a throwaway idea, one of the least complex I’d come up with up late one night whilst listening to Grateful Dead records. It was just one of those things; effortlessly written in a non-eventful moment that unexpectedly caught people’s ear. Raising two little humans by comparison is a non-stop challenge requiring ongoing planning, time, attention and unlimited patience.
Play Nice, your upcoming debut EP is due out in 2018. What can we expect from it?
You can expect the musical equivalent of a sugar rush. Everything about Play Nice is big, bright, colourful and infectious. Five earworms; all-age easy access, infectious, addictive, light-hearted, kooky, packed with positivity and heavy on the FUN factor! There is a delicious blend of modern and retro sunshine sounds, all wrapped in high-end productions to make the music really POP! The visuals all match the celebratory nature of the music and it’s my hope that together this will all make you sing and dance unashamedly.
Thanks very much Skotty! I hope everyone catches your infectious happiness!
English
Nice one Jac! Good to hear about Skotty and his music.
Thanks Jono! Skotty is a very lovely guy! ☺