Track of the Day: The Buckleys “Breathe” (2020)

Byron Bay sibling trio The Buckleys have just put out their debut album Daydream, an identity-forming project spanning country, pop, Americana and indie, all wrapped up in what is one of the most summer-appropriate sounds from a young Aussie band right now. It’s hard to choose a highlight from the piece, given no less than four of the tracks have cracked the top 10 Australian Country Airplay charts, but we’ve been finding ourselves spinning “Breathe” the most.

Why? It’s got that sense of season we could all use right now, bringing summer up a few months and planting us firmly in the flitting sunshine with a pop-indebted sound largely drawing on contemporary, road-trip worthy Americana. If it’s giving you classic Taylor Swift vibes, that’s by design – it was produced and engineered by multi Grammy Award winner Chad Carlson who worked on Fearless with Swift back in the late 00’s and has helped channel The Buckley’s sound with the same kind of sparkling country-flecked soul that takes a hard-right from pop and lands on something more penetrative and tangible.

It’s no wonder that the young band is drawing a heap of international attention too, signing with INXS manager Chris Murphy’s Petrol Records locally and inking with Universal in the US, baked by 3 million streams and a huge virtual tour that drew over 4 million viewers. The hype got our attention in the first place, and after a hypnotic number of “Breathe” replays we can definitely see what the fuss is about.

After you’re done basking in the song’s sunshine, head to The Buckley’s Facebook here.

Feature photo by Francisco Tavoni.

Chris Singh

Chris Singh is an Editor-At-Large at the AU review, loves writing about travel and hospitality, and is partial to a perfectly textured octopus. You can reach him on Instagram: @chrisdsingh.