With their newest album Everybody Tells The Truth officially announced for release on February 5, Slowly Slowly are getting ready to enter a new chapter. For frontman Ben Stewart, it’s a chapter that feels especially good, with the band’s third Good Things Festival appearance on the horizon and a renewed confidence in the music they’re about to share.
There’s plenty happening behind the scenes for Slowly Slowly at the moment. Catching up with Stewart, he’s preparing for the album announcement, neck deep in the kind of administrative chaos that comes with getting a new record ready for the world. But beneath all the moving parts, there’s a sense of calm that hasn’t always come so easily.
“I feel like I’m uneasy when I don’t have the new music,” he tells me. “Having that next step creatively in front of me now, and having the new album and everything, I just feel really at ease. I feel really good.”
As a songwriter, he admits to being riddled with anxiety throughout the creative process, so having a record finished and ready to go is a huge relief in itself. There’s always the question of whether he’s making the right decisions, whether a song needs another change or whether something could just be better in general. Eventually, though, decisions have to be made.
“The fact that it’s all locked in – and whether I like it or not, it’s all locked in, is a nice assurance.” he says.
It helps that the band all feel particularly strongly about this one. While musicians rarely shy away from declaring their latest work to be their best yet, he admits he’s usually a little sceptical of the sentiment. When it comes to Everybody Tells The Truth, however, he’s happy to eat his words.
“I haven’t felt this way about a record since our first record,” he says. “I honestly feel just so excited about releasing this record. I haven’t felt that before, I don’t think.”
It’s a big statement from a band that has spent years discovering and refining their sound, building a loyal audience and establishing themselves as one of Australia’s most exciting alternative rock acts. But speaking with Stewart, it’s abundantly clear that the confidence in the record isn’t just about making something bigger or more polished than what came before. Instead, it’s about finally feeling comfortable enough with their own abilities to focus on what matters most.
Over the past few years, Stewart has been building his own studio and stepping further into production, working with other bands alongside his own songwriting. While the two roles seem closely connected, he found that learning more about the technical side of making music ultimately gave him the freedom to worry about it less.
“There was a bit of a trying time where I had to put my writer’s hat back on and not be a producer so much,” he explains.
But it’s an experience that has proven to be extremely valuable. With a better understanding of recording, arrangement and production, Stewart no longer feels the need to labour over every technical decision in the same way.
“I was able to focus more on the songwriting and the bones of the songs,” he says. “I’m like, ‘okay, we got that part.’- that’s science. And now I can really focus on the heart of the record.”
In the studio, Stewart admits he can be a little controlling, but explains that his approach is shaped by the way he writes. He tends to work sporadically, often finding something special in the earliest stages of a song that can be difficult to recreate later.
“I’m definitely enamoured with the romance of the demo.” he laughs. “…You write something and it just has this magic fairy dust on it and then you go to recreate it, especially with someone else’s fingers or playing and it’s just like… it’s almost like an efficiency thing. We just capture the lightning in a bottle and that’s often what makes the final cut.”
He reveals that this instinct is why he’s always played guitar on their records, rather than guitarist Albert Doan who played live until recently, when he departed the band. This departure was an understandably emotional moment in Slowly Slowly’s history, losing their first original member. While it may not have dramatically altered the recording process, Stewart says losing a close friend as a bandmate had a significant impact on the group’s morale, particularly when it came to the idea of touring.
“He’s such a cornerstone to our tour morale because he is such a beautiful, fun, exuberant personality in the tour van.”
There’s a genuine affection in the way he speaks about Doan, and no sense of wanting to dwell on the circumstances of his departure. Instead, Stewart is happy for his friend to move into a new chapter of his life, acknowledging that the timing made it possible for the band to say goodbye properly before moving on to the next album campaign.
“It wasn’t some bust-up mid-tour,” he says. “We were able to properly say goodbye at the 10-year Chamomile anniversary and have a big hug and a kiss.”
Now, they’re ramping up to play their third Good Things Festival, this time with a slot on the main stage. The first time Slowly Slowly played the festival, they were a pretty different band. With only one record out and hair way past his shoulders, Stewart admits that he was intimidated by the size of the stage and the crowd in front of him. These days, he approaches these opportunities differently.
“Back then I used to see a big stage and just be dwarfed by it. And now I see a big stage and a big crowd and I’m like, ‘Oh, look at all this room to run round on!’”
When the invitation came through for their third appearance, he says he felt nothing but excitement and gratitude, partly because this year is such a strong lineup to be a part of. Stewart is keen to catch Spiritbox for the first time, hopefully get into the pit for Speed and finally see Neck Deep live after years of wanting to catch them. He’s also looking forward to The Home Team, and enjoying the novelty of sharing a festival bill with heavyweights like Limp Bizkit and Simple Plan. For Stewart, the continued existence of a festival like Good Things is something worth celebrating in itself.
“It’s bleak out there for the Australian festival landscape and for Good Things to keep coming back every year with these heater lineups is very, very admirable.”
Between the festival, the new album and the changes happening within the band, Slowly Slowly have plenty to look forward to. The new record promises plenty of variation, with singles “Sacrosaint” and “Parallel” offering glimpses of two fairly different sides of the band. Stewart describes it as a varied collection, moving between cinematic, emotionally expansive moments and lighter, more energetic songs.
“I really tried to explore the bottomless pit of my mind on this record.” he explains.
Even the more playful tracks had to meet the same standard as the heavier material. Catchiness alone wasn’t quite enough this time around.
“If they didn’t feel like they were really meaningful to me, regardless of how catchy they were or how infectious the groove was, they just weren’t going to make it.”
While Stewart might be second-guessing himself right up until a record is finished, there’s a newfound confidence in the way he talks about this one.
Slowly Slowly will appear at Good Things Festival in Melbourne on 4 December, Sydney on 5 December and Brisbane on 6 December. Their sixth album, Everybody Tells The Truth, arrives on 5 February 2027 (pre-save HERE).
Header image credit: Marcus Coblyn
