The last time Gersey made a significant impression on folks beyond their core fanbase was when they supported the Flaming Lips several years ago, and the sky seemed the limit for the group – they had just signed a deal to see their second album Storms Dressed As Stars see release in America, and they were also freshly minted with Billions, the giant worldwide touring agency.

But the Flaming Lips show ended up being a turning point for the band – after witnessing how absolutely extraordinary that band are, guitarist Matt Davis explains, there was no turning back for the group. “One thing Wayne [Coyne, Flips frontman] said is that in the studio you can be as indulgent and experimental as you like,” Matt elucidates, “but once you’re in front of people you’re there to entertain them.”

Unfortunately, due to circumstances beyond their control, just as Gersey appeared certain to take that maxim to America, the plug was un-surreptitiously pulled. “We had a good tour lined up on the last record,” he explains, “but the label who were putting it out went under so we didn’t get to go.”

Now it’s some three or so years later, and Gersey finally have a new release to call their own – third album No Satellites. It showcases a harder, rockier and more focussed Gersey, shearing some of the wool from the past, and amping up the attitude. “We felt like we’d done what we do on Hope Springs and Storms... as well as we could do it, and we wanted to do something else for ourselves – to push ourselves into different areas and different sounds,” Matt claims. “But also it doesn’t seem like the time for a shoe-gazer, mopey album; it seems like a time when you need to be a bit more dynamic, and a bit more determined.”

Matt explains that Gersey are the sort of band who revolve around the idea of writing what music with depth, while trying to be creative and progressive within their songwriting. “That’s always been our main motivation,” he agrees, “and then to take it once that’s done or the attempt is done, to take that on the road and try and play shows with the same intention. Really, that impetus hasn’t changed. It’s just that the focus has shifted slightly, and whereas we were heavily focussed on subtlety and heavily focussed on layering and dynamics, the focus shifted more to wanting to be a bit more concise and a bit more upfront about what we meant and wanting to be more direct and a bit more impactful.”

As such, it shows that Gersey have continued to evolve, as they’ve become more proficient players and more expert at crafting songs. “I think we became a bit more confident and I knew we could write songs that still had the emotional impact of “Crashing” or longer songs like “The Beautiful Look City Today” and touch on a lot of those feelings in a shorter space of time.”

As to whether it was a deliberate approach or a natural evolution, Matt is less certain, indicating that it’s a harder question to answer than you might necessarily think. “Nothing totally happens subconsciously and there’s always got to be an actuality or something that you’re cognisant of,” he avers. “We knew going in that we wanted to be more direct.”

From a personal level, he states that he wanted the guitars to have more power within the chord changes and the angles of the rhythm guitar, and that it was deliberate to make No Satellites more percussion-heavy, pushing drummer Dan Bradie to the fore. “He’s a terrific drummer and he’s been handcuffed a bit in the past because of the subtlety of the songs. You set up these little posts and know that you want to move in this sort of area, and then you start playing and start writing with that somewhere in your mind and your heart, and it doesn’t always work like you thought but it pushes you in certain areas. We’ve been playing together so long that good things start happening when you play music together. With those small ideas big things grew out of it.”

The songwriting process itself was longer, with the band pushing themselves much harder. Where before they would be satisfied with the end result, for No Satellites they were much tougher on themselves, resulting in a much more considered release than anything in the past. “It’s been more dynamic and more democratic – everyone has been heavily involved,” Matt explains. “It sounds like a cliché, but it really was a group effort.”

That comes right down to the recording process, where the band teamed with Magic Dirt’s Dean Turner. Original plans to record with Wayne Connolly were jettisoned as they weren’t ready, and then he was heavily involved with producing the Vines and then Youth Group’s new albums. “We wanted to do something before the end of last year,” he says, “and Dean came in to hear one of the songs and he helped us arrange it.”

The end result of that was the Eyes Are Wide Tonight, which began life as a project that would be fun and get the band recording again, giving them a chance to do some shows and move towards making the record. “It went really well,” he says of the experience recording with the Magic Dirt skinsman, “and it just suited everyone. So we went in and did a couple more songs, and kept pushing. It was just one of those things. It just sort of rolled on from there.”

It Sounds like he had a more ‘producer’ role than perhaps Tim Whitten had with Gersey in the past, in terms of helping with arrangements and so on and so forth. We thought we had something really interesting for us, and the chance of making a really good pop song,” Matt says of “The Girl is My Gun”, “and he really helped us with that. He was involved to a large extent with the rest of the record, but Tim Whitten who did the last two record was as involved in terms of talking about the arrangements and the songwriting. The good thing about having Dean was that he was living in Melbourne and he could come into rehearsals; you’re probably right, he probably was slightly more involved, but I think looking back on those first 2 records they wouldn’t have been as succinct and well put together if it wasn’t for Tim.”

Gersey’s No Satellites is out now, with the band touring in September. Dates:
7th September - Rubys Lounge, Belgrave
15th September - East Brunswick Club, Melbourne
September 16th - Jade Monkey, Adelaide
September 22nd - Globe Theatre, Fortitude Valley
September 29 - Hyde Park, Perth
September 30th - Wave Rock Festival, Perth
1st October - Mojos, Fremantle
6th October 6th - @Newtown, Sydney
20th October - Republic Bar, Hobart