It Was Worth It For Polish Club's David Novak To Move Back In With His Parents

Chaotic live shows around the globe, a run of releases that have been loved and lauded, and soulful rock that inspires hoarse singing from sweaty mosh pits: that's Polish Club. Their 2018 hit Clarity even scored a slot in last year’s triple j Hottest 100. By all appearances, the Sydney duo are living the high life. But the reality for any modern band is not quite the heady lifestyle of old. 

The newfound joys of contract work are keeping singer David Novak busy after wrapping up the recording of their forthcoming second album Iguana. It’s the same for drummer John-Henry Pajak, who has worked at his full-time day job throughout Polish Club’s existence. Novak says it is what it is – a way to allow this hard-working, fun-loving band to keep at it.

“My job isn’t super glamorous but it’s got free booze,” he laughs. “It’s minimum investment for long-term gain. I just dive in and put out fires and then I’m out. It just allows us to reinvest anything we make into the band for touring and albums, which is a necessity.

“John has worked full-time most of the time we’ve been in the band. I don’t know how. He’s a graphic designer and works stupid hours and goes straight from work to a photo shoot and [to] do a bunch of ads and stuff for the band. Being what it is, it’s not a sustainable machine for mental health and not conducive to creativity. It’s really hard to monetise a creative passion. But we all make it work.

“I also broke up with a long-term girlfriend last year and found myself going, ‘I don’t want to pay $350 a week for a place that I’m gonna be away from with shows and touring.’ So I bit the bullet, and fortunately my mum is a musician and my dad is a wannabe musician, and were totally understanding and open to me coming back home and eating all their food and using their washing machine.”

Despite living without the cliched rockstar charms in their everyday lives, Polish Club have kept themselves close to the good times since their self-titled debut EP dropped in 2015. A soulful slant amid basic but boisterous drums and guitar was all that was needed to prick the ears of listeners who welcomed some cheeky rock among the indie onslaught. In 2017, their first LP Alright Already garnered critical esteem with an ARIA nomination for Best Rock Album.

With the band's fanbase growing, thanks in part to their face-melting live shows, it seems like it might be difficult to maintain a skyward trajectory. When it came time to notch up their second record with touring band member and long-time producer, Wade Keighran, Novak admits he and Pajak had to push past the inevitable internal pressures of second album syndrome.

“We hit a few roadblocks, and a lot of it was to do with trying to find the next single or writing songs that fit a specific purpose,” Novak explains. “As soon as we stopped doing that and went back to writing songs as if it was fun or they were what we wanted to do, it became easier. 

“John was talking about it the other day and he said, ‘Dude, I think we wrote over 100 songs for the album.’ We tried writing pop songs, punk songs, R&B songs, electronic songs – all this stuff. I think it’s what we had to do to find what made sense and what we could pull off when added to the context of this band and what people expect from us, but also what we can get away with, how far away from expectations can we go without it being totally disingenuous and having change for the sake of it. 

“It was a nightmare, to be completely honest. Because after spending so long trying to come up with new ideas and rehash old ideas with the perspective of what is actually valuable and what makes sense, it was like, ‘These are all the songs and I don’t know what I like anymore because I just hate everything.’ The process became not fun anymore, and so to that end you just kind of have to go into the studio, and it was only towards the end we had two big sessions where the bulk of the album was done. 

“It made us realise that no matter what we do or how crazy and experimental we get, it’s got my voice and guitar on it and John’s drums and our songwriting, and it still sounds like our band. So we were a lot less precious about trying to find one thing that we could latch onto, and the result is that it sounds more free and fluid.”

It would be completely reasonable after such an intense process for some cracks to appear in the band, let alone one made up of two longtime friends. Bands with more members can bounce frustrations off each other, and solo artists often go to war with themselves. A duo has the danger of becoming make or break, but Novak said he and Pajak rarely cracked the shits with each other.

“And if we do, it never comes from an emotional thing – it’s always something logical or a difference of opinion, so it’s very easy to talk that out,” he says. “There’s usually a consensus that forms and we’re all going for the same end result, and our tastes are not that disparate from each other. We don’t really come to disagreements where it stops us from progressing – the only thing that stops both of us is not feeling productive as a unit. It’s just us against ourselves.

“Otherwise it’s true love, what can I say? We do it because it’s fun – I mean, why else would you do it? We’re not rich, we’re not famous, we’re doing it because it’s fun for us, and fortunately it’s fun for other people. 

“We’re incredibly lucky, because every time we’re vibing or being stupid on stage or with a cover, it’s always elicited a positive reaction from people on the outside. Long may that continue – rather than having to think about what this is and why we’re doing it.”