Mariah is My Jam: A Chat with Yeo who’s Busy, Taking Things Slow

The Melbourne-based multi-instrumentalist is bringing an exciting change of pace to his music, by slowing things right down.

There are funny Australianisms that make our most everyday of tasks well, ironically kind of dangerous. For example, there was once a Melbourne woman who fell into a 3 meter deep sinkhole in her backyard while she was putting up the washing. On this grey Melbourne day, musician and producer Yeo is hanging his wet laundry up in his yard, aware of the risks that his chore is fraught with. He chuckles, with equal parts whimsy and dread, “I get real nervous because there’s always spiderwebs on my clothesline and hanging out in my pegs. You never see the spiders but you only see the spider webs…” he tails off, as we both shudder to think where the actual spiders might be lurking, and watching, and waiting.

Yeo’s just returned home from an epic November of producing, touring and international festivals. Running through his chaotic call sheet of the past month, Yeo vividly recounts that he’s had an absolute blast playing with Mojo Juju’s national tour, he did his thing and got the whole room moving in his shows at Iceland’s Airwaves Festival, and he saw the electronic-infused release of Charlie Lim’s album CHECK-HOOK, a year-long work-in-progress with Yeo working in both Singapore and Australia as a producer. On top of all that, he’s released a new single and music video, “The Comments”, with a solid schedule to release an EP in the coming new year.

As he bounces between events, there’s at once a brash confidence and pride to his achievements and a humble reverence and admiration for those that are close to him. The singer/songwriter is quick to thank his manager Vivan Vo for her scheduling talents, he joyously sings the praises of the musicians he’s worked closely with and he’s warmly appreciative of his mum. She began his foray into music by forcing him to practice the piano that a 7-year-old Yeo had convinced her to buy. Underpinning his openness and optimism is his acerbic sense of humour, inherited in part from growing older, and in part from his 11-year career as a DIY independent musician. When asked whether he sees himself as a cynical person, he hoots “Yeah, I know I am! When it comes to my own music, I think I’m cynical and realistic. I’ve learnt not to get my hopes up for anything.” He elaborates, “I know that sounds kinda dark, but it’s also freeing because it means I can make whatever the hell I want. I enjoy that freedom.”

Yeo’s latest single “The Comments” is a slow burning Rn’B track, a palpable contrast from the upbeat snaps of 2016’s much loved LP Ganbaru, or the deep danceable grooves of previous album Desire Path. Through a gentle yet urgent beat, “The Comments” speaks of the futility of online discussion; the hurtful words that we ambivalently and anonymously hurl at each other around divisive Australian social issues like marriage equality and indigenous rights. “People get hurt and there’s noone there to take responsibility for that. I think it’s unfair, but that’s what the anonymity of the Internet provides,” reflects Yeo.

The melancholic change of pace in his songwriting could be seen as an artist viewing the world through a darker lens, but mainly says Yeo, the slower tempo takes him back to his teenage obsession of Rn’B music. “I just feel like slowing things down a lot. It might be me getting older, but I’m really connecting with ballads again – slow music where there’s lots of space to feel, and the feelings aren’t rushed out the door by some ridiculous beat that people want to dance to.” Yeo explains, “I’ve always made beats, stuff that’s “let’s get this room going”, but on the next EP there’s two real slow burners on it. Not necessarily darker, but there’s more space.”

The rest of our conversation quickly digresses as we begin to gush over our favourite 90’s and 00’s Rn’B artists like Boys II Men and Aaliyah. “And Mariah! Mariah is my jam,” Yeo grins unabashedly. “It’s pretty cheesy I’m not going to deny that, but fuck, those people can sing. They can sing for days. It’s beautiful, it’s so heartfelt, and I want to be able to do that. That’s why I’m going into ballad zone.”

You have an EP coming out next year, next year’s not very far away!
Y: Oh crap, thanks for reminding me!

How’s it all coming along?
Y: The schedule’s tight! [My manager] Vivan’s put the schedule in place, now I just have to work towards it. I feel it needs to happen that way, because if it was the other way around it would never happen at all. I’m really glad there’s some deadlines in place. There’s a bunch of songs, they’re all kind of 75-80% there. There’s some decisions to be made of how to finish the songs off. They need to be made by me, nobody else, just me (laughs). So yeah, we’re on our way!

What are your artistic goals for the upcoming tracks?
Y: I want my next EP to sound like me, so kind of all dirty, weird with lots of low frequency mess, and DIY, to take the listeners on a journey. I want to leave a story even though it’s a short one with an EP. It’s definitely going to be on the R’nB side of things, because I haven’t been listening to anything else for the last 2-3 years.

I kind of fell in love with this video again, it’s this rendition of the Brady Bunch theme song that Jamie Foxx does. It’s amazing, he just ‘R’nBs’ it. It’s funny at the beginning, but it stops being funny because it’s so good. I want to learn it, I’m gonna learn what he does, I’m going to learn all his vocal runs. I want to be Rn’B singer basically.

There seems to be a trend of pop music getting slower, more intimate and darker. Do you think this is true?

Y: We had to get over the “let’s get wasted thing”, didn’t we? There was definitely a time when it was like Kesha, being loose as. Now you’ve got Lorde making really dark pop tracks but still pop as all hell. There’s definitely an edge to it that wasn’t there before.

I feel like the definition of love has changed in music as well – in a great way. What Ariana Grande has done the last 4-5 years, is amazing. She released that track with Troye Sivan (“Dance To This”), it’s a bit of a quieter song but to me it’s still a party. Maybe it’s just that I’m getting old and I don’t like people as much and big crowds, but it’s like, you can still have a party but it might just be the two of us.

“The Comments” is about the futility of online discussion. What’s your relationship with the internet?

Y: It’s a love/hate thing. I love what online has done for music. It’s allowed DIY, independent artists like myself to have a career, but at the same time I see some fucking awful shit on there. I see people being awful to each other. I want to use it as a platform for supporting and sharing, and there are people who use it, maybe they don’t know that they’re doing it, but they’re hurting other people and it’s disgusting. It makes me so sad, and that’s what that song is about.

Central to that conversation, are all the issues I talk about which is very current and still very much in the conversation now in Australian politics and the social issues that we have here in our country. I feel like that landscape, when we’re talking about aboriginal rights, when we’re talking about the [marriage equality] plebiscite, that’s when we saw the worst of humanity in Australia. Like that landscape, that’s when all the awful shit on the Internet comes out and people start wielding their opinions as weapons. It’s really awful.

You’ve released 5 albums so far, what are some lessons you’ve learnt along the way?

Y: I don’t want this to be a cop out for not being hugely successful or anything…it might sound that way (laughs), but I feel like what people think doesn’t really matter.

You can try and play to what you think your audience wants to hear, and they’ll ignore it. Or you can do whatever the fuck you want, and they still might ignore it. Or you might do whatever you want, and they might love it. It’s just not predictable and it’s not representative of the quality of your work. You’ve gotta just realise that the time you spend into stuff, the money and the effort and all the care, it doesn’t go to waste because you’ve made something good. Just because no one else thinks it’s good, doesn’t mean it’s not good. Following that is really hard sometimes, especially when you’re $10k down in the financial year and you’re like, “OK that’s where I spent everything and didn’t make anything back” (laughs). But it’s real, and it’s not like you don’t recover from it.

Has the music industry made you a cynical person?

Y: For a while there, I thought “maybe I should have taken that record deal”. Then I realise regardless of all that, I’ve spent a decade making the stuff I want to make. Some people don’t get to do that until a decade into their career. So in a way, I feel blessed – despite the hardships and the way I’ve turned out! I feel like I’m very encouraging when I’m talking to other people, because I want everyone else to do well. I’m supportive and I still have a lot of love and loyalty to give to people. It’s just that these days, I’m picky about who I’m giving it to. You know what I mean?

Yeo’s single “The Comments” is out now and you can throw him some love by buying the digital track on iTunes or Bandcamp. Keep your eyes peeled for his new EP in 2019!