Durand Jones & The Indications on their upcoming album ‘Flowers’, homecomings and touring with Lenny Kravitz

Durand Jones & The Indications. Photo credit: Kalie Pontes (@kalie_pontes)

Durand Jones & The Indications visited Australia for the very first time earlier this year, bringing their true blue soul music to many adoring fans across the country and to festivals like Golden Plains and Womadelaide. We were lucky enough to catch up with Durand, Blake and Aaron to discuss the incredible upcoming album ‘Flowers’, homecomings, each member’s musical upbringing as well as memories from their recent tour with Lenny Kravitz.

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Rei: Thanks for taking the time to chat, I appreciate it. Where are you all at the moment? What are you up to today? 

Durand: I live in New Orleans, Louisiana. It still kind of feels like the weekend to me. I recently did the very last show for my solo project, ‘Wait Till I Get Over’ out here in New Orleans. So it's a bit of a lazy day. The weekend is going to be incredibly wild though. It's jazz fest out here in New Orleans right now.

Blake: Good, I'm at my girlfriend's place in Wisconsin. She lives on a farm raising lambs. And one of the sheep had twins today. So that's exciting. And then just a couple other little chores. And yeah, hopped on the computer for this.

Aaron: I'm out here in sunny Los Angeles, California. I had a pretty late couple nights doing a DJ set and catching up with a comedy show, actually, weirdly. I sat in with a comedian. So I'm still sort of readjusting to regular hours.

Rei: Were you a part of the comedy show as well, performing?

Aaron: I was. I'm not a comedian at all. But there's a comedian named Craig Robinson who plays keyboard, sings and makes up songs, so I sat in with him on drums.

Rei: So you are all located in different places and come together for tours, rehearsals, recording and writing?

Aaron: For many years, we were never more than like two weeks from a show anyway. So it didn't matter what city we were in.

Rei: I’d love to talk about the upcoming album, Flowers. I saw that it was described as Durand Jones & The Indications embracing your roots and influences. I listened to it and I can hear the Isley Brothers influence on Paradise. Lovers Holiday feels like it could be an evolution of what Sam Cooke was doing. I'd love to take it all the way back to the start and hear about the kind of music that you grew up around. Was it quite similar to the project?

Durand: For me, it's quite similar. I can remember Saturdays being with my dad. That was like his cleaning day. You know what I'm saying? Like that was his day to like vacuum and scrub the toilet and shit. You know, all that stuff.

He had this sound system in our little raggedy trailer. That man had this big old sound system and would blast soul music while he cleaned. You know, he would play stuff like Isley Brothers, Living For The Love of You. He would play Devotion, Earth, Wind and Fire, Luther Vandross, stuff like that.

I feel so proud, I really feel like the Indications are really hitting a stride. We have really established a fan base and a community that embraces us all around the world. I can't, there were several times, it wasn't just once or twice. There were several times where I was out in Australia and I would hear our music, you know? And that just, yeah, that made me feel, you know, like I'm doing a little something. We're doing something great.

Blake: Unfortunately, no. I mean, this is not the type of music my parents put me on to. I had this compilation CD called Pure Disco, which had a bunch of disco hits on it. I remember loving that. But, you know, pre-Spotify, pre-YouTube, it's like, where do you get this stuff? I remember being like, regrettably, really into the Red Hot Chili Peppers, but they did a cover of Sly and the Family Stone, If You Want Me to Stay. And I was like, OK, what's this original all about? That shit blew my mind. I remember listening to it. I would steal my brother's iPod and put that on there and like, listen to that song over and over and over.
And just like always kind of stumbling across the stuff that eventually I would, you know, find my way into it. But it took a long time. I did not have a mentor or anybody to show me soul music when I was young.

Aaron: I have a really like early memory of dancing with my mom to Beat It, Michael Jackson, in our living room. She used to play a lot of Carole King, too. And like Tapestry was constantly on the turntable. And that record is definitely like a blueprint to me on how to write a good song, just like the nuts and bolts of songwriting. 

My dad, he liked some soul music for sure. Like the Jackson 5, he liked the Jackson 5 stuff more than like the older Michael stuff and the Motown stuff. But for me, like a lot of my early education and like this kind of music that we make came filtered through hip hop.The first CD I ever owned was Big Willie style, Will Smith. And on that record, there's a Sister Sledge sample with Getting Jiggy With It. There's a Bill Withers interpolation on Just The Two of Us. There's the Patrice Rushion, Forget Me Not interpolation on Minute Black and George Benson on like Miami. So it's like I was learning about these things kind of filtered through the sampling and the re-sequencing and the looping. And so my pocket as a drummer was being influenced by rap. But I think harmonically, I was getting that soul music.

Rei: On a similar note, the single Been So Long and the creation of this album I read was centered around the idea of a homecoming of sorts. Where in each of your individual homes are your favorite places to hang out, see friends and eat. Is there a special place that comes to mind? 

Durand: Honestly, I don't know if this is like stupid or cliche, but I would say my grandma's porch. Over the past few years, that's just like it's just been a place to convene with so many friends to find in the community. It's a very normal thing to be sitting on that porch and it's like closed off and there's a door like there's like a little entrance thing. And it's so normal for someone not even to knock, but just to open it up and just be like, “where's your brother or where's who?” It might be a grown person. It might be some little kids, you know. I don't know. It's just a beautiful thing.

Blake: I mean, a place I go back to, like sometimes even if I'm driving back home, I'll stop there even before I go to my parents' houses. My hometown thrift store, which is now under new management, was forever called Bibles For Mexico. Thrifting was just I don't know, it's definitely something that's kind of shaped a lot of my personality. You know, it's kind of starting with digging for records and then clothes and stuff. Just that sense of openness to discovery and trying new things and resourcefulness, I think, has been a really fun thing to kind of always explore. And most of my friends from home are always down to check out Bibles and see what they got going on. 

Aaron: Back in Brooklyn, my musical community were mostly like folkies, country music, folk music. And a lot of that scene was situated around, still is situated around a really awesome venue called the Jalopy Theater.

It's a bar and a small music venue that has church pews as seats. And the kind of theater part, it can get really, really quiet. I think it's my favorite stage in the world to play on because you can get loud, but it also like there are lots of venues where you can get loud, but there are very few where you can get that small. It's really special. And the next door, it's just like, you know, it's singalongs and it's pass the guitar and it's whoever walks in with their instrument hops on. And you don't really have to make plans to go to the Jalopy. You can just show up and know that you're going to run into somebody that you love.

Rei: You all just finished touring with Lenny Kravitz. I was wondering about memories from that tour. Are there some moments that kind of stand out to each one of you?

Durand: For me, a standout moment. We were doing Can't Keep My Cool. I think it was the first time we did Can't Keep My Cool on that tour. I think Aaron brought it up that we should bring it alone or do it in our set.

And it was going really well. Then when we ended it, I saw a bunch of broken glass all around me. And I was like, “did I break Lenny Kravitz’s stage? Oh, my God, what did I do?” But I broke my watch and I put a fucking hole in my pants by the knees on that song! Yes, I did. But it was just like the soul power, the yearning. You know, I just really wanted to bring it. And I broke my goddamn watch.

Rei: Haha oh no, were you able to get it repaired or was it gone?

Durand: I still have it here, but I think it's a goner. It's like, damn…

Blake: Yeah, it's funny. Durand said Can't Keep My Cool because we did, I think, six shows with Lenny. And the first three were tough. It was sometimes almost like a bad dream, kind of like up there playing our hearts out and just like a sea of blank faces just standing there motionless. We'd come off stage and Durand would be like, what do we got to do? Like, we got to switch out a song to break. You know, like, how are we going to get these people? And I don't want to be a negative Nancy, but there's part of me that was just like, I think that's just the gig sometimes. I think the opening band, you know, they're not there to see you.

But we changed some stuff up, moved the country over and shit started really popping. People started getting really excited for our set. And it was just fun to see that, you know, the, you know, like just tinkering with the set and working on it and seeing it kind of pay off. It was really fun.

Aaron: I guess maybe for me, another one was like an off stage to on stage moment. We were like doing a vocal warm up. We were just singing together in the hallway right by the stage entrance. It was right outside like Lenny's dressing room. We were singing Don't You Know. And we finished, you know, the “yes, I will”. And the door opens and he pops out and he's like, “YES, you will”. And we're like, “Lenny?! Wow”. And he's on the phone with somebody. And he was like to his phone. He's like, man, you want to say hi? You got to say hi to these guys, man. You love them. They play soul music so good, man. And then he turns the phone around and he's FaceTiming with Denzel Washington.

First of all, just objectively a baller thing to do. And on a personal level, like Denzel and Jay-Z for me growing up were like, it's the definition of cool. Like they were like Sinatra. You know what I'm saying? They just embody what cool meant for me as a 10 year old. And they still do, actually. And, you know, we had like 30 seconds of small talk where Durand is just like, you should come on the road with us. My wife would make you guys turn my mic off.
And it was just like, and then, you know, our tour manager's like, yo, we got to go. So then we were like, all right, see you. And we walk on stage and start the set. And I like just lock eyes with Steve, our keyboard player. We just look at each other like, dude, what is life, man?

To sort of go from that moment to hitting the stage in an arena and just like, you know, at the end of the day, you're still those same kids who grew up like, you know, playing music in our basements and our sheds with our friends. And to be in that moment was really cool, just like zooming out, taking a look and appreciating where you're at.

Rei: I think we got to wrap it there. But thanks again. And, you know, congratulations on an incredible album. Looking forward to having you guys back in Australia, hopefully sometime soon.

Aaron: Thanks for having us. We'll see you over there. Thank you.

Durand: Thank you, Rei. 

Listen to their latest release ‘Lovers’ Holiday’ out today.