On their 10th visit to Australia, Irish pop trio the Script played to their biggest-ever WA audience, performing to more than 8000 fans at the Perth Arena on Wednesday night.
The crowd at the 60th of 73 shows on their second world tour was, in part, drawn by the mega-hit Hall of Fame, their recent collaboration with R&B production wizard will.i.am, which has sold four-times platinum here.
The numbers are getting bigger for the Script, which formed in Dublin 12 years ago, but the only one that matters is three - or as they pronounce it: "tree".
Three mates touring the globe performing songs from their third album, #3. As with 2008's self-titled debut and 2010 follow-up Science and Faith, the new album has climbed into the ARIA Top 10.
The hardworking lads - rakish singer Danny O'Donoghue, guitarist Mark Sheehan and drummer Glen Power - gathered backstage at the Arena pre-show on Wednesday night to chat about #3, which has unleashed three hit singles in Australia, each carrying very different sentiments.
The first single, inspirational piano-rock ballad Hall of Fame, has more of a hip-hop influence than earlier singles, such as 2008 breakthrough Breakeven.
"There's confusion out there," Sheehan says. "People think we're trying to be some big anthemic rock band, where the music we love is soul, R&B and hip-hop.
"We're finding our feet a bit more on album number three and Hall of Fame is a perfect example."
O'Donoghue played an early demo of the hit to Black Eyed Peas leader will.i.am when they were both serving as coaches on The Voice UK.
"I played will five or six demos we had from the album because he's a super producer and it seemed getting his vibe on things was a great thing to do," he says.
"I played him Hall of Fame and he literally spent the next taping day and the day after and the day after just singing the hook to that song. He said 'Man, you should have never played me that song, I want that song. I want to put that on my album'. He kept begging and begging and we turned around and said 'Why don't you jump on and do the song with us'."
Hall of Fame became the Script's biggest hit to date and prompted the band to quickly follow with Six Degrees of Separation. The second single from #3 was inspired by O'Donoghue's split last year from girlfriend, Lithuanian model Irma Mali. The pair met five years ago when Mali appeared in the video for Breakeven.
Sheehan says that, contrary to stereotypes, "hard" Irishmen are in touch with their emotions and aren't afraid to wear their heart on their sleeve. The Script ratchet up the emotion on the third single, If You Could See Me Now, a tribute to O'Donoghue's father, who died of a stomach aneurysm in 2008, and Sheehan's parents, who died within months of each other when he was 12.
The song, which is already earning the band new fans, was one of the final songs written for #3 - the band admitting it was a difficult topic to tackle.
"Sharing it was a bit off-putting because it's incredibly personal," O'Donoghue says.
"There was a point in making the album when we said 'Have we said everything that needs to be said right now', and there was something looming over our heads to say that we hadn't.
"Mark brought a few whiskeys down to the studio that day . . . and it was time."
While O'Donoghue says a 3 1/2- minute pop song is a woefully inadequate means of expressing everything he and Sheehan feel about losing parents, he finds performing If You Could See Me Now on stage a tonic.
"Our fans, it's their song now, but it's hard for them (our parents) not to be around and see all this. My dad was a musician, he strived all his life to do this," he says."I can find solace in the fact that every time I sing it, it gets a little bit easier."
Source: The West Au
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