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If you think you have Stand Atlantic all figured out, you’re not even close. That’s because part of the purpose of the band is to always keep you guessing. From their breakout moment back in 2017 through to now, they have undergone more transformations than some bands have hot dinners. Forever on the move and never allowing themselves to settle too comfortably, for vocalist Bonnie Fraser not knowing what direction they are going to head in next is as exciting as it is excruciating. But it’s also the thing that keeps them driven, because without it, they probably wouldn’t be here.

“I think that if I thought that any album we made was, ‘The Definitive Moment’, I think I would want to stop making music,” she admits. “Being in this band, or any artistic endeavour, you are always striving for the next thing creatively and how you can explore the next step. So, I don’t see this to be the album to define our band, it’s just another aspect of our band that we were trying to create and show another side of us, as we always fucking are.”

That album she mentions is ‘WAS HERE’, which when you consider what she has just said, it is still the furthest that the band have travelled away from where they started. It is a record that is as fiery and fierce as it is emotional and earnest. A kaleidoscopic journey through the many faces of alternative music, with plenty of home truths and hellraising putdowns about the state of things, it is as brutally honest in sentiment and sound. It is the work of a band who thrive in not being content with who they are perceived to be, pushing and pulling at every strand of creativity that they can and see how far they can run. It’s big, bold and brilliant, and represents a shedding of skin for the band in more ways than one.

“Part of me feels like we are an adult band now. We were like teenagers before, but with this new record, we have grown up, and right now is the most solid we have ever been. We’re so confident in what we are doing. And because it was written over such a long period of time, I went through so much life change. It was really helpful and made me understand myself again, so much that I felt like I was getting back to myself towards the end of the process. I feel like it will always have such a special place in my heart because of that.”

To dive deeper into this next great milestone for the band, Bonnie sat down with Rock Sound to reveal how it feels to experience real creative catharsis.

THE SOUND

The first seeds of what ‘WAS HERE’ could possibly end up blossoming into were planted back in 2022, just three months after the release of Stand’s previous full-length ‘f.e.a.r.’. Very much another example of not ever wanting to rest on the laurels of the past, Bonnie linked up with permanent producer and forever buddy Stevie Knight to do some studio debriefing. The result was two tracks, the pummelling ‘WARZONE’ and self-deprecating ‘KILL [H]ER’, both found on the album despite there being no intent behind them making the cut. Though it seems poetic that two tracks that quite clearly opened the floodgates on a new heavier angle for the band’s sound should play their part, because the cataclysmic fallout from what they sparked is massive.

“We started early so lets give ourselves the most amount of time possible to really experiment. Because it was then such a long process, we were really able to delve into so many sounds and watch it take shape in real time. We didn’t have a concrete vision of where we wanted this to go. We had ideas and things we wanted to play with, but as you are building the catalogue that’s when you start to go, ‘Ok we’re leaning into this’. Sometimes you get distracted and go into a completely different tangent, though, and I think that is why this album is quite eclectic in that way. We had all that time and that freedom to experiment and then hone in on new ideas whilst also trying our best to make it as cohesive as possible.”

The fact that they were able to make every song on ‘WAS HERE’ feel like it belongs despite them all standing up in their own right is a stroke of genius, to say the least. Having the chaotic sharpness of ‘WAKE UP, SIT DOWN, SHUT UP’ rubbing shoulders with the cutesy ‘LOVE YOU ANYWAY’, whilst the seething swag of ‘KISSIN’ KILLER COBRAS’ brings out even more wooziness in the head-mangling ‘SEX ON THE BEACH’. The band deal out as much hard rock grit and metal worship as they do hyperpop mayhem and pop-punk angst, every element perfectly tailored to feeling like Stand Atlantic and no-one else.

So much of that comes from having confidence in what feels right to the band first and foremost. Never interested in being the sort of artists who rush to chase trends that end up being outdated by the time they release anyway or even fit into a nice neat box alongside their peers, the Stand Atlantic mantra continues to be trying to create something that doesn’t yet exist. It may hit or it may miss, but having the belief to bring it to life takes precedent over both.

“You start to realise how much space and how much ground there is that you haven’t covered before. I think that it is always about trying to find sounds that you haven’t heard before. We have always tried to go against the grain and make something unique. I’m bored of so many things and so many of the same songs and sounds. We’re just trying to create things that are a cool blend of things that will allow people who haven’t checked us out or given us a chance before to come and join us.”

THE COLLABORATORS

Alongside indulging in whatever styles and sounds tickled their fancy throughout the process of making ‘WAS HERE’, Stand also set out to make sure that the people they were inviting to work with them were just as out there. And the gang they got together is something else.

First up on the empowering ‘GIRL$’, PVRIS’ Lyndsey Gunnulfsen and Mexican producer Bruses deal out their own perspective on femininity with razor sharp intensity and undeniable sass. Then pop-punk troubadour Sueco adds his own brand of melancholy to the sun-stained heartbreak of ‘NOSE BLEED’. And finally Australian metalcore royalty Polaris add delicious heaviness to ‘CRIMINAL’, allowing the harsher elements of the record to reach whole new heights.

Each guest is a master of their own craft, bringing something unique and unmatchable to the pot. Though for Bonnie, it’s much more than that. Having people that they respect, love and support actively want to be a part of something they have crafted, it allows them a moment to savour the mindset and mentality they have finely tuned. It makes all of this worth it.

“I feel like all the people on this record are people we have wanted to work with before but never had the chance. It was really cool and it is so gratifying to have people that you like and respect so much musically want to work with you in this way. It gives a different sense of us not just being a joke, I guess. You know, sometimes we are a joke. it’s a joke we have made it this far, but then there’s a part of you that goes, ‘Are people taking us seriously? Are we a respectable band?’. But seriously, having Polaris respect you enough to jump on a track and want to write their own part? That just feels good.”

THE LYRICS

Throughout the Stand Atlantic story, vulnerability has played a huge part in their lyrical output, dependent on the place and state of mind that Bonnie is in. With her experiencing so many life changes throughout the making of ‘WAS HERE’, that allowed a lot of different emotions to rear their heads and find their way in the songs being made. In some ways that vulnerability comes out in calling out bullshit, especially on the likes of the damning ‘ROCKSTAR’ and vicious ‘FRENEMIES’. But mostly it comes from making sense of the things that she has been through, being honest with how they have made her feel and choosing to exorcise whatever demons have lingered within because of them. On one hand, that’s found in the heartache of ‘G.A.G.’ and heartfelt admissions of ‘LOVE YOU ANYWAY’. But in the other it can be found in ‘17’, a song that is so raw and real that it will make your blood boil every time that you hear it.

It’s meant that this experience has been as terrifying as it has thrilling to put together. But knowing that expelling such feelings could provide solace for someone else, knowing that they aren’t alone in going through moments such as these, is all the reason she needs to at least try.

“The thing is that I don’t feel comfortable about it, at all. It’s fucking scary to say these things and the way I have dealt with them, 17 especially, is that I didn’t really want them on the album. The thing I have realised is that I had to step away from myself and stop being a selfish little brat. Just because you’ve written this song about your own life doesn’t mean that it won’t mean something else to someone else. Something positive can come out of that.”

It’s there that the true reason that Stand Atlantic have been able to continue building an empire for themselves really comes into the light. Even though they have more fun than most bands will ever have, proud to be at the centre of so many memes and jokes, they also take this incredibly seriously. That’s why they have been able to create a catalogue of songs that touch on every aspect of what it means to try and find your place in this world. By burning the candle at both ends, the effect they have on those that listen to them is all the more potent, and that’s an incredible legacy to have.

“To do something like this and to be helping other people is truly magic. As a kid I would listen to the lamest songs and still feel like I had someone there listening to my problems. The song may not have been about anything that I was going through but I felt like listening to the melodies and the voice that drew me in and made me feel a little bit lighter. It’s truly a powerful thing. It’s a scary thing when you feel like people are waiting for you to make something that is going to affect them in that way, but it’s worth me being a little bit fucking scared and a baby about talking about these things if it does help.”

THE TITLE AND ARTWORK

By putting so much of themselves into this record, there’s a real sense of how things were before and how they are now when you look at Stand Atlantic. And that’s not just an outside observation, it’s something that Bonnie feels inherently. Through the process of making ‘WAS HERE’, she realised that she had become something that she didn’t want to be. A version of herself that felt like a stranger, a version of herself she didn’t particularly like. Match that with spotting graffiti the band had left on the walls of venues across the world from previous visits whilst on tour again, it allowed her to consider even more so how different a person she had become without realising. The weight of that is a lot to take in, and the grieving process is even harder to fathom.

“We started to realise how blatantly I had really killed a certain part of myself off through this album. I felt like I was no longer the person that I was years before. It hadn’t felt like a gradual growth into this cool person that I am really proud of being. It felt like there was a huge black spot in my life where I went so inward, and I was not okay. There was a time when I felt like a shell of a person and a shell of who I was. I was grieving the person I used to be so badly because I didn’t recognise the person that I was now.”

There was only one way to really make sense of such a shift and that was to materialise it. Turn the feeling into something real that could not just adorn the cover the of the record but also show Bonnie that the version of herself that had struggled through was gone for good and she could move on from it. And that was to literally kill the band off. That’s why the artwork for ‘WAS HERE’, showing the quartet lined up on the ground with blood splattered all over them and their surroundings, is so graphic. A brutal execution that not only represents the way in which the band has shifted from who they were, but also the harsh reality that once that person is dead, then there’s no coming back.

“I went through so much shit, I just wanted to be able to hold this album in my hands, look at the person on the front and see them lying there from a completely different perspective,” Bonnie comments. “It also tied in sonically with the ‘forget everything you know about Stand Atlantic’ because we are a completely different band at this point. We’ve explored such different depths now.”

THE FUTURE

Based on the pace that Stand Atlantic have moved at over the last seven years, you just know that they are already considering what the next step is going to be. But it is important, considering the weight of what they have produced with ‘WAS HERE’ to take stock and absorb the change that has occurred. In being as bare as possible, both in their desire to explore ground they haven’t considered before and in the unravelling of heartbreak and trauma, they have taken on a completely different form. Unafraid, untethered and unpredictable, it’s an awesome place to be both as a band and as individuals. And with nothing holding them back, the next move is sure to be one that takes the world even more by storm.

The Stand Atlantic that you once knew isn’t here anymore. “We don’t know what’s next, but everything you thought you knew about us is different now,” Bonnie smiles. “I recently learned that every seven years, all the atoms in your body have been replaced. Are you the same person? No, you’re not. Think about how much life you’ve lived in those seven years. Do you relate to that person? That is how I almost see this album. You know what to expect, which is not to expect a damn thing.”