Windang locals Zach Stephenson and Billy Fleming, otherwise known as Hockey Dad, are no strangers to the Gong music scene. They’ve gone from hanging out the front of Rad Bar trying to listen to gigs as teenagers, to selling out tours not only around Australia, but internationally. With new music in the pipeline, we had a chat to Zach about starting 2020 off on a high, changing up their sound, and how to support the industry in these uncertain times.

Words Matilda Jesiolowski Image Ian Laidlaw

How are you guys coping with everything going on at the moment?
It’s not too bad, we were supposed to be in Texas today, which would have been fun… Yeah, just having fun and trying to get some writing done down here and bunker down like everyone else!

You grew up in Windang. How did you find growing up in the Illawarra, and can you tell us a little bit about the beginnings of Hockey Dad?
Billy and I both grew up in Windang, about three houses down from each other, but we both had our own friends growing up. As we got older, and more into bands and playing music, we would pick up instruments and start practising. At about 14 or 15 we had a little high school band, and we kind of just kept going and playing shows as that band. We formed Hockey Dad properly just as we were leaving school, and that was where it all started.

What was it like being an up and coming band in the Wollongong music scene?
It was really fun; it was when the Gong scene was really starting to pop. Cool new venues opened up, a lot of the community started coming out, so it was a good time to be a band in the Gong, and we had a good time.

Rad Bar loved having you play there – are there any bands you saw there as a patron that were memorable? Any old regulars you remember?
Yeah, I remember once me and Billy went to see Hunting Grounds play and we were both underage, we were still in school. This is back when it was Yours & Owls, I think. We might have been about 16, so we just hung out the front door and listened to all the support bands. Then by the end, they finally let us in just to watch Hunting Grounds. It was really good, they put on an awesome show. I think that was like the first real set I saw in there and it had me hooked on the place.

At the beginning of the year, you guys created the ‘Fire Fund’ festival for bushfire relief – this was meant to be at your local Windang Bowling Club, moving to North Gong Hotel due to overcapacity. Tell us about that?
The idea really came because we felt helpless and wanted to help the community on the South Coast especially. It’s pretty important to us as we grew up down there and have a lot of friends who live that way that had been affected. We thought we may as well do a gig, it’s pretty much all we can do! We wanted to do it at the [Windang] Bowling Club, we were keen to have it really low budget and underground, grassroots style… then we sold a lot of tickets, and Windang Bowling Club weren’t really that excited to have more than 300 people. We wanted to raise as much money as we could, so we had to move the venue to North Gong. It worked out really well, the stage was awesome and the whole show was so good. Definitely a highlight of the year.

While you can’t exactly go on tour in the foreseeable future, in the past you’ve toured with some other great Aussie bands like Grinspoon – what are some of your most memorable tour moments?
That Grinspoon tour was definitely one of our more memorable tour moments – it was a tour we did with Grinspoon and Good Boys, who were our friends. We got to do a whole round trip of Australia, all the way up to Cairns, to the Northern Territory… so we got to explore a lot of the country that we hadn’t seen with three or four of our best friends. That was probably one of the most fun tours I’ve ever been on.

And what about touring overseas? You recorded an album in Seattle in the same studio where Nirvana recorded – that must have been pretty cool. What is it like recording and touring over where so many iconic bands have been?
Yeah, we did this record and the last record in that studio in Seattle, so that’s kind of like the home studio now, we love it over there. It’s a whole different scene – it’s nice to be able to stay in one city for a long time and actually enjoy it and figure it all out. With a lot of touring, you’re only in a city for maybe a day and then you have to go. Recording overseas like that is really cool, it’s like a big holiday where you get to do the most fun thing in a really cool studio. Touring overseas, especially in America, is probably one of the craziest experiences because it’s just so big and there’s so many towns, and so much driving… It’s a really intense experience. But it’s super fun. I only really ever want to do it maybe twice a year though. I wouldn’t want to do a whole big tour more than twice or three times a year, as it can be quite full-on.

You’ve got new music coming out soon. Can you tell us about your upcoming album Brain Candy and the latest single I Missed Out, what has the process been like creating that new music?
We had a bunch of songs written, so we rented out this house in the middle of nowhere and jammed a bunch of songs and got some new stuff down. The record has maybe got a little bit of a darker feel, and the songs are crafted in a different way to the last record. We had a good time recording it, we had Steve, our friend playing bass and helping us with some guitars, and it definitely sounds fresh. It’s not completely different to our old stuff, but the songs go down a few different avenues and change it up a little bit.

This is a difficult time for the music and arts industry with venue closures happening all over the world. What can people get involved in to support bands like you guys if they can’t go to a gig?
That’s a good question because a lot of bands really do rely on gigs for income, and it is the easiest way for bands to make money, especially rock bands. The best way to support a band is probably to buy merch directly from their site. Buy records, buy all that sort of stuff straight from the band. The best things you can do after that is stream their music and tell your friends about them.

Fast Five:

1. Favourite local beach?
Warilla Beach now, as it’s so close to my house and I can just walk over there. It’s so easy to get to and it’s not very crowded, so that’s gotta be my favourite.

2. Favourite cafe?
I just like cheap 7/11 coffee… it’s the worst but I’m not really a café guy.

3. Favourite local pub?
It would have been Rad Bar, but now I think it’s Windang Bowling Club. They’ve got a good $3 special on schooners on Wednesdays and Fridays, and they have pretty good food. And I can get the courtesy bus home to my house.

4. Favourite place to play music in the Illawarra?
Again, it would have been Rad Bar… the only other gig we’ve played in Wollongong since Rad Bar closed was at North Gong, so it would have to be there so far.

5. Favourite local band?
Probably Los Pintar, then The Pinheads and also Luke Spook is a favourite. They’re my top three.

The release date of Hockey Dad’s upcoming album ‘Brain Candy’ has been delayed to July 31, and the new single comes out Thursday, April 16.