INTERVIEW: San Cisco's Scarlett Stevens on touring and covering The Wiggles

Interview: Jett Tattersall
Image: Duncan Wright

Three piece band San Cisco have been bringing their adorable mix of synthpop, indie and rock into our lives since 2009. Comprised of Jordi Davieson, Josh Biondillo and Scarlett Stevens on vocals and drums, the band have scored four top 20 albums on the Australian charts, including two top 3s, as well as six ARIA Award nominations. To date, their music has been streamed over 300 million times.

Their most recent album Between You and Me was released in 2020 which peaked at number 3 in Australia and this year they have been a part of one of the most talked about releases of the year, ReWiggled which sees some of Australia’s top musical acts cover classic tracks from The Wiggles. San Cisco reworked 2018’s ‘H.O.L.I.D.A.Y.’, converting it into a glorious synthpop number. The band are currently touring the east coast of Australia and we recently caught up with Scarlett to chat more about touring, the band and covering The Wiggles.

Hi Scarlett, thank you for your time today, I really appreciate your time. How are things in your predominantly primary coloured world?
Thanks for having me. Well, things are a bit topsy turvy at the moment. Josh and I have left the rest of the band over east and we've come home because they've all got COVID, and we have tested negative. So we've had to put our tour on hold for about a week while they recover. So strange times.

I love how you just dropped them and run!
We were like 'does this mean we can come home?' I'm actually loving being at home.

I want to talk to you about ‘H.O.L.I.D.A.Y.’ Obviously Madonna had a huge success singing about her desire for one and The Wiggles killed it. And now you've gone and covered it, and it's so much fun. Talk to me about this whole thing.
Oh thank you! The Wiggles actually reached out a while ago, I remember we were in the studio so it must have been like July last year. We were recording our own music at the time, and we kind of just kept putting it off. All the hits like ‘Mashed Potato’, ‘Big Red Car’ and ‘D.O.R.O.T.H.Y.’ had been taken, so we were like, ‘what are we gonna do?’. I remember going through the list of songs on Spotify, and thinking ‘this ‘H.O.L.I.D.A.Y.’ song is a banger!’ Emma Wiggle featured on it heavily, and I really like her backstory that she wasn't a naturally gifted singer which I really relate to because I just kind of got pushed into it and I don't really identify as a vocalist. I just really liked that song and I put it to the guys, we put it on hold for a bit longer and then in December last year, Josh got in the studio and came up with a keys part, we changed the timing of it a little bit and made it into a slow disco jam. Then all was left to do was for me and Jordi to sing on it. We had heaps of fun making it

Slow disco jam - that's how you make kids music for adults. You just gotta wind down the red cordial!
Yeah, that’s it. We just pop-ified it and made a little bit more slinky and a bit more adult contemporary disco.

You said that you're not a vocalist and and you don't feel comfortable identifying as one. Can you talk to me a little bit about your background in music? What was it about the drums and how did your transition to behind the microphone happen?
I started drumming when I was 10, but I did enter a singing competition at my local school fair when I was about four or five and I won the competition. I sung ‘Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star’ and I won a boombox. With drumming, it was the movie Josie and the Pussycats that was my earliest memory of seeing a girl behind the drums. Seeing a woman doing it that made me want to do it. I was learning piano at the time and I asked my parents if I could get drum lessons and the rest is kind of history. With singing, it was when me made the song ‘Awkward’ that I jumped on and sung on, the boys pretty much bullied me into it! As the years have gone on, I've graced more [songs] and now I actually really like singing, but it's not something that comes naturally to me like drumming, the moment I started drumming out and i had a knack for it. But singing I have to really work at it.

I love that, and it is all about seeing a hero that you can identify with. So thank you Josie & The Pussycats, and thank you Meg White as well.
Yeah, exactly. I was such a big fan of Meg White. It’s that whole thing you can't be what you can't see. I don't think that is the be all and end all, but it is very important.

You said you didn’t start singing until ‘Awkward’, but really that was when everyone heard you, when everyone was like, ‘who is this band?’ So that's amazing.
Yeah, that kind of kick started the band really. It’s what gave us international success and allowed us to tour overseas. At the time, I didn't really know happening and now I look back and I'm really proud.

It’s one of those things that when you're in the thick of it, you don't stop to go ‘this is cool’. You just keep running.
Yeah, it was all kind of uncharted territory. Now you look back and it's so hard to get those lucky breaks, or to make a video clip that gets heaps of coverage. It's really hard now, so every little success we have now we really take stock and we're so grateful for. When you’re young, it’s all happening, I don't think you can really process it until you're much older.

So you watched Josie and the Pussycats you won a boombox which is an incredible thing to win when you're a kid, it really is, and you played the piano Where did your passion to create music originate?
I don't know…I grew up in a household where my parents were huge music lovers and they owned a live music venue, so I guess I was just really exposed to lots of creatives and lots of live music. They have cooler music tastes than me, so they definitely influenced me and there was never any pressure to go and get a degree or to have a ‘normal’ job, creativity was valued and nurtured and fostered in my household. And when I was 10, we moved to New York, my dad is a music manager so he manages John Butler Trio and a few other bands, and we moved to America so he could set up a record deal for John. Mum and I would just explore the city and go to art galleries and met so many interesting, colourful people. We were staying in the East Village and this was the early 2000s so it still kind of rough and interesting and lots of old school New Yorkers still could afford to live there, so that was also a real eye opener for me.

That's incredible. San Cisco make such great pop music, and if we're talking genres, it's always that alt-pop-indie area, but because we're then talking alternative radio, it's just predominantly been a very heavily saturated environment of a lot of dudes and guitars, in Australia particularly. You're the sole female in a band of men, how have you found navigating the industry as a woman in that very male saturated alt-music community in Australia?
Within the genre, and creatively, I haven't felt limitations, but definitely on the practical side and the touring side and the day to day being in venues, being in recording studios, I've come up against so much sexism and misogyny, overt and more subtle. It was really hard as a young person, in my early 20s and those issues were not being spoken about like they are now. There’s definitely a bit of trauma from that time, dealing with some really tricky stuff and feeling really isolated, being on the road as a 19 year old and being away for months at a time. But it's made me stronger and I definitely think there's a lot of good change that's happening, a lot of positive change. And it's happened in such a short space of time, it's a really amazing time to be the woman in the music industry.

Do you think that was also that element of, gender aside, there's always going to be advantage taken of young artists, because there's money to be made, and there’s exploitation to be made as well, on people that are made to feel that they should just be grateful to have a spot on the bill.
Yeah, definitely. I hear so many stories like that from other other bands starting out. I mean, I still get asked to do things for free. I got asked to be in a video clip for quite a well known male musician - I won't say who - but he wanted a female drummer for his video clip and asked me and I was like, ‘okay, cool what are they paying?’ And they were paying nothing at all. Why don't you just ask anyone? Why do you want me? That’s just ridiculous.

Because you should just be grateful to be asked!
Yes! I’m like no, thanks, I'm not a fan anyway! But we're so lucky that my dad managed us from the beginning and he's a really great manager and not just from a financial point of view. He really wants to help create careers for artists, and it's not just overnight success and then you’re washed up. He's into goal setting and has really nurtured us from a young age so we're very lucky. But it's definitely had its challenges having dad as your manager!

San Cisco have been around and experiencing so much and you seem to just grow stronger and more confident with your sound while still experimenting with your curiosities. How do you feel San Cisco has grown since since you got behind the microphone with ‘Awkward’?
I think we've just gotten more confident in the studio, and I think we're doing some of our best songwriting now. We're also more comfortable with each other in the studio, we're actually just closer than ever as a band and that is coming through in the songs. There's definitely a level of maturity that I feel we really got to on the last album. We're just really excited for the new stuff that we're creating at the moment. The sound has evolved so much, which we're super proud of. We're not afraid to experiment and look at different genres, we're all into such different music so it all feeds back into the San Cisco sound.

Obviously, you've just run back to Western Australia to escape the apocalypse, what else is coming up for you guys this year?
We've got an album’s worth of songs that we just need to finish. So they'll definitely be more studio time, a little bit more touring, hoping to do some theatre shows within Australia. We still haven't taken the Between You and Me tour to like Melbourne and a few capital cities, so we just want to finish off that cycle for that album because it didn't really get the touring that it deserved. And then hopefully we can look at going overseas and playing some shows over there because in 2020 we were meant to do a big Europe and US tour. So just trying to get back out there and also finish off these new songs.

San Cisco are touring along the east coast of Australia now.

March 31 - Hoey Moey, Coffs Harbour NSW
April 1 - Drifters Wharf, Gosford NSW
April 2 - Yours & Owls Festivsal, Wollongong NSW
April 3 - UC Refectory, Canberra ACT
April 24 - The Fortitude Music Hall, Brisbane QLD 
April 30 - NightQuarter, Birtinya QLD
May 1 - Golden Shores Festival, Surfers Paradise Beach QLD

‘H.O.L.I.D.A.Y.’ is out now. You can buy and stream here.

To keep up with all things San Cisco you can follow them on Instagram, Facebook and Twitter.