The Getaway Plan

"It's pretty rare for a band to vanish for a couple of years and then come back and take off where they were," claims The Getaway Plan's drummer Aaron Barnett, but luckily for him, that is exactly what the band have done. If anything they have come back stronger with their most mature sounding record to date 'Requiem,' and some new found energy to back the release up with a butt load of touring. KYS caught up with the stick man to chat about the group's hectic tour schedule post-album release.

So 'Requiem' has been out for a little while now, how has it been received at this point?

Yeah great man, it's really good. Obviously it was a long time coming for us. You're a bit sceptical, you don't know how any album is going to go really but coming back from a break was a bit nerve racking. The first tour was amazing, we had a good run on the festival season and Big Day Out, now we're just doing a small regional tour because we haven't been out to some of these areas in years so we're just doing this and it has been really really cool and I think we have Groovin' The Moo after this so it's all happening again.

Considering the slightly different sound of the new record, was that one of the reasons you were nervous about coming back from the break? Worried that people might not like the new sound?

For me not really because all of our records have been a jump in a different direction, obviously because there has been a few years in between all of them, you grow up a bit and move forward. It's pretty rare for a band to vanish for a couple of years and then come back and take off where they were, you never know if your old fans are gonna be around, if any, or if new ones are gonna take to the new material of not. It was a bit daunting leading up to it, we knew we had a solid record, we think it is the best stuff we've written, you never know how the public and media re gonna take it but it's been amazing, we couldn't have asked for anything better.

So you have just released the new single from the record Move Along, which personally I thought seemed like an obvious single choice.

(Laughs) yeah.

What is it, third single of the record?

Um, second. Well kind of third, we didn't really release Flying Colours as a single but Triple J have flogged it a little bit. But this is the second official single.

What has the reaction been to that? When I say it's an obvious single choice I don’t mean it in a bad way but it does have the radio winning potential.

Yeah for sure, that's what it is. It's kind of going to take over from Where The City Meets The Sea maybe. It's that type of song on the record. We predicted that and it's gone great, I mean, it's only been out for a few weeks and we've only been able to trial it on these small shows but have heard nothing but good things so pretty sure once we get on the Groovin' The Moo run it will be out there a bit more so hopefully it's a bit more popular then.

You mentioned the festival run earlier, how did Big Day Out go?

Yeah it was awesome dude. Obviously as kids we grew up going to that stuff and we played it once before, before we broke up, but being able to do it this time with the new record and we had a couple of friends bands on the tour as well so it was just a really fun tour and for us, once again we didn't know if we were gonna get crowds or not but it was pretty incredible.

Well you guys got to be part of what was arguably the most controversial Big Day Out, what was the perspective from a band on the tour?

We heard a lot of talk saying there were no tickets being sold and that certain artists pulled out a few weeks beforehand so you never really know until you get there but for me and for us it just seemed like any other Big Day Out really. Apart from Adelaide and Perth, they were a bit quiet. Melbourne, Sydney and Gold Coast were fine, I didn't notice anything from previous years, it was awesome. We were playing the same time as a couple of big acts and we managed to fill the tent we were in every time so it was fine, the festival ran fine and we had a ball, there is nothing really bad to say about it apart from Adelaide and Perth really.

Now you have a festival coming up, the Newton something festival, what's it called?

(Laughs) Yeah some Newton thing. I just did an interview before and the girl was like "What do you think of Newtons" and I'm like "Who is Newton?"

I was told I had to ask you about it.

Well I know about it now, but we hadn't heard much info at all about it. It's in Bathurst and it's a uni festival thing. We are just trying to promote doing more regional shows and supporting events for kids that can't get out to major cities. They should do more of that stuff because there are kids out there who don’t have much to do at all so what do they do? They just create havoc really so the more stuff like this the better.

Do you find that crowds are a little more appreciative of shows like that?

For sure man, especially this run, they are smaller venues, some of them are pubs and clubs so they are only like, 200 - 300 kids there but they are very appreciative, they love it and they sing along to every word. You can tell they don't get many touring bands like us coming out and doing stuff like this.

So who are you taking out on the regional tour with you this time?

We're taking some good friends of ours called Gatherer, who are originally from New Zealand. They did our album tour with us, we're taking them out again, we've been friends with them for years and I'm pretty sure I speak for all of us that we think they are one of the best live bands we have seen to date and their record is phenomenal so just hope it takes of here but yea, we have a ball with those guys.

So what is planned for you guys once you get over this run of festivals?

Well we've got Bathurst, we've got Groovin' The Moo, we might have something small in June maybe then in July we are in the UK for Sonisphere and some media stuff and then we'll come back here and probably do another tour of our own and that will almost bring us back to festival season again. Then I think we might jump from here to the UK getting stuff out there and continuing the festival run here to bring out the year. In between that we are already getting new material together for the next one so we're pretty busy at the moment!