Little Red keyboarder Tom Hartney has returned to his singing and psychadelic bluesy roots with his new ‘creative baby’ – Major Tom and The Atoms.
Hartney and bandmates Sean Vaag, Simon Lawrie, Simon Tait, and Adam Swoboda are gearing up for a series of shows in hotels and clubs around Melbourne in the next few months. The band are also planning to record and release their debut EP later this year.
Hartney said the group was primarily an outlet for him to express his massive love of 1960’s rock.
“This is the main thing I’m putting my energy into at the moment,” he said. “My personal influence has always been the 60s – like The Doors, Dr. John and stuff like that – just classic American rhythm and blues stuff. It’s great to be playing the stuff which you love listening to.”
Forming the group has presented Hartney with a chance to take on vocals again after he moved away from being one of the three vocalists in Little Red during the making of their second album, Midnight Remember.
“On the first Little Red album we had three singers and shared it, then over time we tended to favour the songs towards Dom, so it just happened that way and now I’m just a keyboarder,” he said.
“But my real passion is signing, and this is what I’ve always wanted to do. I love getting out the front and showing off without hiding behind the keys.”
And although he’s thoroughly enjoying his new project, Hartney said he will be working on a new album with Little Red later this year.
“Little Red are working towards our next album, and we’re not touring at the moment so we’ve got heaps of free time,” he said.
“It’s made it easy to put some time aside and dedicate it to this outlet.”
“It’s going to be great to do some recording because the demos we’ve got online are very much tailored to our sound in a live setting, and people can’t be bothered sitting down and listening to a 10-minute pyschodelica freakout.”
To listen to music from Major Tom and The Atoms and view their tour dates, visit their Facebook page.
