Stonefield: 70s Rock in the 21st Century

by Helen Henry on March 3, 2011

The Findlay sisters grew up on a diet of Zeppelin, Zappa & Hendrix and in 2006 picked up the instruments needed to create 70s rock in the 21st century as Stonefield. Starting out as iOTAH, the band won Triple J’s Unearthed High in 2010 and have since been thrust into the limelight and onto stages everywhere.

They’ve released debut EP ‘Through the Clover’, supported some of Australia’s favourite acts like Ash Grunwald, The Cat Empire, the Spazzys and British India, and placed #120 in the lasted Triple J Hottest 100. There’s no slowing down for the girls in 2011 - they’re bound for the stage at Glastonbury and are keen to keep writing and releasing new music.

I caught up with lead vocalist and drummer Amy ahead of Stonefield’s performance at Newcastle’s Disc-O Ball on 11 March…

You and your sisters picked up your instruments in 2006 & after only a month started playing as a band. How was it starting out when you all had so little experience?

We practiced a lot, we’re perfectionists. We wanted to make sure that before we did a gig in public it was together enough. Practiced & practiced, it was a little bit scary but fun! Being sisters, it’s easy to practice as much as you want and we can read each other pretty well so it was easier to connect a bit faster.

What is it like playing in a band with your sisters? Are there ups & downs?

I think there’s probably more positives than negatives in our case – we’re pretty close. We do fight a little bit, but generally we’re just like friends. The advantage is that if there’s anything that needs to be said you can say it and not worry too much about hurting their feelings because you’re sisters and you get over it straight away – there’s no beating round the bush in rehearsals. We have very similar tastes, so that makes it easier.

Congratulations on making the 2011 Glastonbury bill. What are your other plans for 2011?

We’re doing another release. Not 100% sure if it’ll another EP, an album or both. We’re thinking probably another EP to buy ourselves some more time to make sure that we’re really happy with the album. We’ll be writing a lot more songs & playing gigs & other festivals.

Led Zeppelin, Frank Zappa and Hendrix are listed as your influences. How did you come across this music? What are your favourite tracks by each artist?

We grew up listening to that sort of music – it’s always been playing in the house. Dad especially is a massive massive Frank Zappa fan! As far as favourite tracks go, it’s a hard choice because there’s so many…

Zappa – Inca Roads
Led Zeppelin – Whole Lotta Love
Hendrix – Purple Haze

Coldplay and Beyonce have been announced for Glastonbury in June. How does it feel to know you’re on the bill with some of the biggest acts around at the moment? (Ed’s note: I caught Amy by surprise with this one - she wasn’t sure that they’d been confirmed yet…)

It feels pretty good – very exciting!

I’m sure you’ve been asked a lot about the name change… but can I ask where Stonefield came from?

So we had to change our name because there’s another Australian artist called IOTA. I called him and he didn’t have a problem with it but his manager did, he called me later and started talking about legal documents and stuff so we thought that’s no problem, we’ll change it because it was early days back then. We did a lot of thinking about the name change. Because we were under pressure to change it, it was really really hard to come up with something but eventually Stonefield came from the fact that we live on a farm. When we first moved here there was no trees or anything, there was just rocks everywhere and then Dad built our house out of the rocks that were on the land, so that’s where Stonefield came from.

You got lessons from a neighbour from about 2006. Do you and your sisters continue to get music lessons?

Holly, Sarah and Hannah all still get lessons next door. I haven’t had any for ages, and I really should start again – I haven’t had a singing lesson since I finished my degree last year.

What advice would you give other young bands?

I think that the most important thing is to practice a lot, and there’s no point in doing it if you don’t have a passion for it. You also need to be yourself & do what you want to do or you’re not going to like it for long. Get as much experience as you can, talk to as many people as you can to get advice. We played as many gigs as we could, even if they were outside in the snow, we took every opportunity and I think that’s helped us get to where we are now.

Stonefield will perform with The Bag Raiders + Muscles + more as part of the 2011 Disc-O Ball at The Bar on the Hill - get your tickets now!

We’ve got a double pass to give away as well - to enter…
…on Facebook: “Like” the Urban Insider page and post “I want to get back to my rock roots with Stonefield at O’Ball” on our Facebook wall.
…on Twitter: tweet “I just entered to win free tix to Disc-O Ball with Stonefield @Urban_Insider”
The winner will be announced on Monday, 7 March.