The past 12 months have been a blur for Fremantle band Spacey Jane.
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They performed at Splendour in the Grass and the Laneway Festival, made their debut at number 80 in triple j's Hottest 100 with Good For You and hit the 10 million mark in Spotify streams.
They also released single Straightfaced from their debut album Sunlight, which was recorded with Dave Parkin at Blackbird Studios and has a June 12 release date.
Then the coronavirus pandemic hit and the band had no choice but to cancel their national tour, which had included a sold-out Newcastle gig at The Small Ballroom. Drummer Kieran Lama is taking it all in his stride.
"We're be frothing at the mouth to play a show again - it's been a while," he said.
"We're sort of expecting that the entertainment sectors will be the last to open."
Lama and vocalist Caleb Harper formed a band at school in Geraldton and moved to Perth after graduation. There they met guitarist Ashton Le Cornu and bass player Amelia Murray, and soon the four were jamming on Violent Soho covers and playing backyard gigs.
In 2016 all Spacey Jane members except Le Cornu travelled to Byron Bay for Splendour in the Grass. The story goes that the trio were standing in a drinks line, dreaming out loud about playing the festival one day, and Lama bought all his drum gear online by his phone while in the queue.
Inspired, they returned to Perth and began to book gigs.
"At no point was it like 'We're going to do this as a career', it was always just for fun on the weekends then it slowly ticked over to become a viable thing and here we are," Lama explained.
"Then we started selling out shows in Perth and we started to think that maybe we had something. It became more important to us to put on a good show. Get out there and get our name out there a bit more."
Like so many young, up-and-coming Australian bands, Spacey Jane received a helping hand from triple j in the form of radio play.
"We've had huge support from them and triple j unearthed. They have nurtured a good part of our career so far," he said.
"You can get pigeon-holed a bit, but we're totally OK with being known as a triple j band."
The band gigged for 12 months before releasing music. Their debut EP, No Way To Treat An Animal, featured tracks Thrills and Feeding The Family. It was followed by 2018's In The Slight.
In May, 2019, bass player Murray left Spacey Jane to pursue a career in medicine and was replaced by Peppa Lane.
Her second-ever show with Spacey Jane was at Splendour in the Grass.
By this time the single Good Grief had been picked up by triple j. The band also won a West Australian Music, or WAM, award. They took out the Most Popular Live Act category.
"It's all happened very fast, kind of a whirlwind, and it still is," Lama said.
"Caleb is looking to have the bulk of the next album written by the time this pandemic is all finished and we are hoping to be back in the studio in a couple of weeks, actually.
"I haven't played a lot of drums for the past couple of months, so it'll be like trying to re-learn how to ride a bike - I think I've spent too many nights watching Netflix and playing Mario Kart."
