Louisa Nicklin Talks About The Big Sulk: 13th Floor Interview

Louisa Nicklin has just released her new album, The Big Sulk, produced by none other than Shayne P Carter. Louisa played with Shayne in the most recent Dimmer reunion and you may have seen her on stage with The Mermaidens as well.

The 13th Floor’s Marty Duda thought it was about time we talked to Louisa about her own music…

MD: So tell me about how The Big Sulk came together. When did you start thinking about making a record and it turning into what it is?

Louisa: I feel like we were making demos for some of these songs like the beginning of 2022 s it’s almost 18 months, two years in the making. And I would have asked Shayne (Carter) to be producer, probably, like mid 2022. And then we recorded in, like March 2023, then finished recording end of 2023 and here we are. So it’s kind of been kind of a long process…long for me. I can be pretty impatient.

MD: What kind of producer is Shayne? What does he add to the mix?

Louisa: I feel like his biggest value was in the pre-production. I would bring him the songs, and he would help me sort of shape them so they worked a bit better and helped me get out of some of my, I guess, my songwriting habits. That can be good, but if you’re doing it the whole time, it’s nice to have someone that notices them and can sort of bring you out of them a bit. And his arrangements and things were really great. So yeah, it was really great working with Shayne.

MD: Because you’ve played with him with Dimmer, right? So how far back do you go?

Louisa: We don’t go back very far. He reached out when he heard one of my songs from my EP, so quite a long time ago…maybe not that long, 2018 or something. And we had a bit of email contact. I didn’t really know him, and had sent him a few other songs, and, you know, that sort of dynamic. And then he asked if I wanted to play in Dimmer for the reunion tour, which was kind of out of the blue and really cool. I was stoked. And it was great fun. And so yeah, got to know him and have a friendship with him through that, got to know him more as a person, rather than as, like this random musician that I would email sometimes, you know? And yeah, I really liked, liked working with him, and liked how he talked about and thought about music and how he… I don’t know…kind of…how we worked. And so I asked if he wanted to produce my next record. And he was keen, so I was stoked. I think he’s really helped me make this record significantly, significantly better.

We recorded the first part…we went over to the Coromandel…we were there maybe two weeks. And then we recorded the final songs in September or October of last year with Emily Wheatcroft-Snape in a studio Auckland. So it was kind of a mix, but it was cool to like have that time in between where we recorded a majority of the songs and the arrangements, and could have some time away from them and come back to it and and some other perspectives. So it was recorded over, many sessions.

MD: And what were the sessions like? What did they feel like to you? Was it celebratory? Was it stressful? Was it intense?

Louisa: Oh, I don’t find it too tense or anything like that. I don’t find them stressful. I find recording, mostly enjoyable. I sometimes find it hard when I’m doing my own bits, like playing my guitar or something like that. Sometimes I get a bit in my head and can find that, you know, a little bit stressful. But I do love the process of…particularly the overdubs process, or else, if you’re doing live tracking. I really enjoy that. So we did a little bit of live tracking for some of the tracks. I think we live tracked Feel On Me and live tracked Sleep It Off. And I like, when you can kind of just, like, get into the swirl of the music and not be thinking so much about it. Whereas sometimes, when I’m just tracking a guitar thing by myself, you can get, you know, you can get in your head a bit and feel…yeah, I enjoy the process.

MD: You mentioned Feel On Me, that’s the opening track on the record. Why have you set it up there? Did you give a lot of thought to the track listing?

Louisa: Yeah, I definitely think about the track listing in particular with, like, with vinyl. So I think about the end of side A, beginning of side B, and that kind of stuff. I really do think about that stuff. And Feel On Me felt like a good opening track. I guess it’s not like a big attention grabber. It’s not like it’s, you know, comes in real hot and whatever. But I like it’s sort of got this very delicate unfolding. And it’s kind of a very simple song, pretty repetitive. But I think it just kind of sets the scene for the record, or, like, sets this environment. It just kind of felt right. I don’t know it felt like it worked as an opening tune.

MD: And I see you got a video that’s supposedly inspired by the Porter Wagner Show, for Can’t See. Tell me about that.

Louisa: Um, kind of got into watching, like, old Dolly Parton videos, on that show. And I just loved the kind of, like, he was kind of cheesy with his like, really bad fake tan and there’s like, sparkly outfits, and then there’ll be these, like, just odd backdrops that they would be singing…that Dolly Parton would be singing against. I don’t know, there’s something really charming about it, and I wanted to create something kind of like that with our own take on it. Not just totally copying that, but yeah, I thought it was cool to do this sort of…it’s almost like a live TV performance for, like, a show that doesn’t have heaps of money and is kind of like a little bit janky, but it’s…yeah, yeah.

MD: I think there was a part near the end where you were kind of playing in a red room, and it kind of reminded me of a David Lynch scene.

Louisa: Oh yeah. Where I’m just kind of singing by myself, and then comes back to the live performance. yeah, It was fun to record that one as well, to film it, because it was very…we tried to film it all in o ne shot on film with like two cameras, and was all very like practiced out and things, but then one of the cameras didn’t work when we went to record the whole thing. So that was a real shame.

MD: There you go. There’s always technical glitches,

Louisa: Yeah, but I think all came together and still has that feeling of like a live TV performance.

MD: And rather than sounding like Dolly Parton, which nobody does other than Dolly, I don’t know if anybody’s ever compared you to Nico? Has that come up in conversation at all?

Louisa: Yeah, I think maybe, I think I once did a cover of a Nico tune, that someone suggested. So maybe it came from that of them thinking our voices had some similarity. But yeah, I mean, that’s a great…I love that similarity. Yeah, she’s cool.

MD: And you have another video for Thick in which there is lots of Jello salad involved.

Louisa: That was good fun. It was fun to make all that jelly. Particularly I like making it when you’re just being inspired by how it looks rather than worrying about how it’s going to taste.

MD: Now, I think I’ve seen you in a number of different settings and with different people. You mentioned Dimmer thing, but with Mermaidens, I think I saw you played at the Wine Cellar a few times. Plus, I think I saw you open for Bright Eyes at Powerstation. And I think you did Sea Of Love during that show. Is that, right?

Louisa
Oh yeah, I did. I did a cover of Sea Of Love. I did a cover of a cover, I guess.

MD
I was wondering which version you were familiar with, because it goes back to the 50s.

Louisa
Yeah, I was listening to the Cat Power version.

MD
I thought, so,

Louisa
But the original was really awesome as well.

MD
And then was it? Robert Plant did it somewhere along the line as well.

Louisa
Yeah, yeah, quite a covered song. But, I mean, it’s a beautiful song.

MD
I saw you at the Wine Cellar, have you seen the new Double Whammy place that’s kind of replaced it?

Louisa
Yeah, I went to the opening. It looks great. Yeah, I’m excited to play there. Yeah, it’s roomy and I think it’ll be fun. Yeah, it’ll be good. Big room!

MD
A big stage too, it looked like.

Louisa
Yeah, a big stage, so hopefully there’ll be some people. And, yeah, it’ll be good.

MD
So you’ve got shows coming up.

Louisa: Yes, yes. So starting the tour in Nelson, and then down to Christchurch and Dunedin. And then I’m going to be playing in Wellington on the 13th of September at Moon bar, and then finish the tour in Auckland at Double Whammy.

MD: And who’s playing with you on these shows?

Louisa: In Nelson, I have Team Scary opening, and then Christchurch, I have TG Shand. And in Dunedin, we’ve got Death And The Maiden… I saw them for the first time, probably, like, 10 years ago, and like, totally fell in love with that sound. So it’s really quite exciting. I’ve got Linen opening in Wellington, so that’s really cool. And then for Auckland, I’ve got Groopchat, a kind of young, cool three piece, who I saw play at BFM, fancy new band, and I thought they were just sick. That was so great. So asked them to play and then Green Grove, who’s Durham Fenwick, and he actually played on the album. So it’d be cool to have him opening.

MD: Nice and who’s in your band?

Louisa: My band is Mason Fairey, who plays in everyone’s band. And Eamon Edmundson- Wells and Ali Burns will be playing. So that’s the band for Auckland and Wellington, and it kind of like is my core band. But then when we play the South Island, Eamon has a young baby, so he won’t be able to come with us. So Kat Tomacruz will be filling in on bass for the South Island League of the tour.

MD: Ah, sounds pretty exciting. Very cool, very cool. And we look forward to seeing youat the Double Whammy. See how the room sounds with you.

Louisa: It’ll be fun, I’m looking forward to that.

MD: Alrighty, anything else we need to know about the album? Do you have a favorite track that you want to talk about or point anything out about before we go?

Louisa: Ohhh, it’s hard to choose a favorite track. I feel like some of my favorites would be Want Your Mother and Can’t See, I think.

MD: What can you tell us about those tracks?

Louisa: Yeah, Want Your Mother, I wrote it…this is probably one of the first songs I wrote for the album. I remember demoing it almost two years ago, and it’s more about someone I knew around that time who really, really didn’t like being an adult, I guess. And she really battled with that, and battled with the kind of responsibilities of not being a child anymore. And I guess she just found life pretty stressful, and was pretty sad, but um, yeah, wrote that song about her. She doesn’t know….I don’t think she needs to know it’s about her. I don’t know her anymore.

MD: Excellent. All right. Well, thank you very much for taking time to talk to me.

Louisa: Thank you. Thanks for talking to me.

Tickets for Louisa Nicklin’s tour at undertheradar.co.nz