Tour a Giant step for fledgling trio

A fledgling band, influenced by the likes of Florence + The Machine and Daughter, are set to rock Broome with their indie sound.

Trio Joan & the Giants will be performing at the Broome Convention Centre on June 28, launching their latest singles Cruel and Hold Me, before embarking on an extensive tour of the Kimberley.

The tour will include several stops in Broome, including Sunset Bar, Mangrove Hotel and Roebuck Bay Hotel, Kununurra, and guitarist Aaron Birch’s home town of Beagle Bay.

Frontwoman Grace Newton-Wordsworth said the band had always wanted to tour the WA coast and give Birch the opportunity to visit his family in the Kimberley.

“We also have some really great support acts in Chica, Aaron’s father Kevin Birch, and Crazy But Not because we really wanted to get as many people in the Kimberley involved as possible,” she said.

“After releasing Cruel and Hold Me we really wanted to show WA and the Kimberley what we’ve done so far before we release our third single in August.”

A new band on the scene, Ms Newton-Wordsworth said the Joan & The Giants origin story involved people from all over WA coming together and it was many years in the making.

”I’m from a farm down south of Perth, Aaron is from Beagle Bay, and we happened to go to boarding school together ,but we didn’t actually start talking until during university through a mutual friend,” she said.

“Our friend said we’d be a match made in heaven so we got together and played a rather disastrous cover of an Ed Sheeran song, but something definitely clicked there so we started writing songs together.

“Eventually we met our drummer Riley Sutton about a year later and the rest was history.”

In the midst of tour preparations, the trio found out their song Hold Me had been nominated for a WAM song of the year award in the outstanding indigenous category. Birch said it was great to have been recognised by Western Australian Music.

“We don’t just write songs for the awards, we do it because we love it,” he said.

“But to be recognised and be nominated for a Song of the Year award is pretty awesome. Must mean we’re on the right track.”

Birch said it was very exciting to come back to the Kimberley and give back to the community.

“It will be awesome to come up and show everyone that you can do whatever you want to do and go after your dreams,” he said.