What do you do when the thing that has defined your life and identity for over a decade suddenly stops bringing you joy?
It’s a very real crisis that many artists quietly grapple with – when music is no longer something they love or feel passionate about, but feel burdened by. Few speak about it openly, but the Jungle Giants’ frontman Sam Hales is candid as we catch up to talk about the band’s fifth album, Experiencing Feelings of Joy, out today.
Hales says that feeling became impossible to escape following the end of his long-term relationship with Confidence Man’s Janet Planet (aka Grace Stephenson). While he has previously shared online that the pair remain great friends after calling off their engagement, a breakup of that magnitude – especially one where your personal and professional lives (as Confidence Man bandmates) are so deeply intertwined – inevitably left its mark on the singer-songwriter.
“I was so messed up by not being able to write music,” he tells Rolling Stone AU/NZ. “I was so messed up by having a relationship breakup with someone I was making music with. That was crazy. It messed deeply with my brain.”
For years, music had been Hales’ escape, he says. It was the thing that made sense when little else did. Long before the Jungle Giants became one of Australia’s most beloved indie acts, songwriting was already deeply tied to his sense of self. “I grew up in a single mother [household]. Music was my private time, my special time. So when music started to be troublesome, I couldn’t make any sense of what life was.”
The emotional spiral he found himself in eventually pushed him to Bali, where he hoped a change of scenery would force him back into a creative mindset. Instead, the trip ended in disaster when he crashed a moped and landed himself in hospital – which only pushed him to near-breaking point.
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“I remember being in the shower at the gym one time being like, ‘Just do that,’” he says of imagining buying a one-way ticket to Mexico and “running away” into the jungle. “And then it felt wrong, the thought. I’d be like, ‘Well that’s not going to solve anything.”
A self-described “solution-based” person, he points to a lyric in one of the new record’s songs “Where Can I Put All My Love” – “Giving in ain’t giving up” – to explain how he eventually pulled himself out of that dark period. “Running away to the jungle, that’s giving up. Giving in is actually facing all these feelings and trying to figure out a solution and being patient enough to survive through a negative thought process. I’m glad to have not given up. I gave in.”
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So, instead of disappearing to Mexico, Hales stumbled upon The Artist’s Way, a book by Julia Cameron centred on artistic healing, designed to help change inner dialogue and encourage creative recovery.
“It really helped me because I was at a very troubled point,” Hales says solemnly. “I’d been engaged to someone that I was in a band with, then when we split with the band, it just tumbled a lot. So I went back and started again.”
The Artist’s Way, he tells me, teaches techniques and exercises to regain self-confidence and harness creative talents. And over a 12-week period, he fully committed – studying himself, his situation, and his connection to music. It was then that he had a breakthrough moment.
“I started to learn that music wasn’t the issue, it was myself. I’d basically set myself up for failure – music was there, but I had closed the door to it. What I learnt was to change my outlook, stop looking for the outcome and start enjoying the process again,” he smiles. “Where I’m at now is leaps and bounds away from when I started. And by week 12, I had finished the record.”
Experiencing Feelings of Joy, the Jungle Giants’ fifth studio album, perfectly captures the journeys. Careening from crushing personal loss to hopeful exuberance, each track is specific – chronicling the breakup and feelings of depression, hopefulness, delusion, and more. That’s what makes the album such a compelling listen. Beneath the band’s signature shimmering hooks and euphoric choruses is a sombre record about losing yourself and learning to find your way back.
“It’s 10 steps on a ladder to joy. I had to get up and then open the door to joy, finally. That’s what it feels like now because now I’m having a really great time. I’m not scared if music bites me again or if life bites me again. I know that I can find joy again.”
Given it’s been five years since their last album – 2021’s ARIA chart-topping Love Signs – I ask Hales how, if at all, Experiencing Feelings of Joy differs from its predecessors. He doesn’t hesitate to answer: “To me, it’s a full unique take. I feel like I had to go through my life’s biggest change to get to this record.”
While previous releases from the Brisbane-formed four-piece band, like Love Signs, thrived on dense indie-pop maximalism and glossy production, Experiencing Feelings of Joy is more simple and emotionally exposed. Taking a more stripped-back approach to writing and producing, he says, gave him room to focus on something he admits he historically avoided: lyrics.
“The lyrics were always the hardest. I would always leave them last, I hated doing them,” he laughs. “The lyrics on this record are so imprinted in my mind because I go back to the day I wrote them, what I was thinking about, and it feels really natural. The meaning of it is right there.”
Plus, he adds, there’s a certain level of catharsis that comes with no longer hiding behind metaphors and finally allowing himself to write more openly and honestly about his experiences. “I used to love being cryptic because it was safer and easier,” he says. “But now I love the idea of having my heart on my sleeve, truly for maybe the first time in my life.”
Hales’ emotional openness has resonated deeply with fans, many of whom have praised him for candidly discussing heartbreak, therapy, creative burnout, and falling out of love with music; conversations artists still rarely have publicly.
“What’s weird is the more honest I am about things, people didn’t go, ‘Oh my God, I can’t believe you’re saying that,’” he says. “People went, ‘Thank you for saying that.’” It’s also transformed the way he experiences performing these songs. For the first time in years, Hales says he feels fully connected to what he’s singing. “When I sing these new songs live, I really love meaning what I’m singing about. That feels really new for me.”
That honesty hasn’t just deepened Hales’ connection with fans. It’s also strengthened the one he has with the people closest to him, especially his bandmates Cesira Aitken, Andrew Dooris, and Keelan Bijker, who helped guide him through some of his hardest moments. “Everyone is so supportive and has been so supportive.”
He singles out Aitken in particular, recalling one moment where he found himself spiralling over whether a song “made sense” lyrically while rebuilding his confidence as a songwriter. “I remember being like, ‘I just don’t know if I like it. I don’t know if it makes sense,’” Hales says. “And then Cesira gave me some great advice. She was like, ‘How often have you loved a song from an artist that you didn’t understand?’”
The comment stuck with him. “She was like, ‘I think it needs to make sense to you before we keep going,’” he continues. “And she was so right. I just needed to slow down for a second.”
That trust and emotional openness eventually led to a first for the band (impressive considering their almost decade-and-a-half of existence) while finishing the album in Dublin. Hales had been wrestling with the lyrics for “Tell Me How It Feels” – the first single off the album, released in February – when Aitken stepped in to help shape the words alongside him.
“We’d never written lyrics together before,” he beams. “And it was so fun. For the first time ever, we wrote lyrics to a song together. She gave me strength.”
According to Hales, the bond between the band feels stronger than ever heading into this new era – something that will undoubtedly radiate off the stage with their upcoming album launch shows and national tour.
To celebrate Experiencing Feelings of Joy, the band are embracing a far more theatrical approach to their live production, with Hales revealing they’ve brought in co-producer Michael Belsar as musical director to help elevate the performances.
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“For the first time ever, we’re doing this really plotted-out musical directed show. There’s a lot of theatre in it now.” Fans can expect elaborate staging, backstage live-stream feeds projected onto screens, and a carefully connected setlist designed to mirror the emotional arc of the album itself, he teases.
“Compared to the old shows, it’s leaps and bounds,” Hales says. “I think it reflects what happened to me songwriter-wise. There’s been a lot of growth.”
Even the setlist has been reimagined. Rather than simply running through their biggest hits night after night, the band plan on rotating deep cuts depending on the city – something Hales says was important given the sheer size of their catalogue now five albums in. “Each city is going to get a different song somewhere in the set. Brisbane will get one, Melbourne will get another. It keeps it fresh and special.”
The excitement in Hales’ voice now is striking – there’s joy and happiness radiating off him as he talks about the upcoming shows. “It’s been long enough that I almost forgot what it felt like to be excited about releasing a record,” he reflects. “To actually be here and be in a happy place and loving the record… I almost feel like I have to pinch myself sometimes.”
The Jungle Giants’ Experiencing Feelings of Joy is out now. For complete tour and ticket information, see here.
THE JUNGLE GIANTS TOUR 2026
Thursday, June 5th
Theatre Royal, Castlemaine VIC
Friday, June 6th
Forum, Melbourne VIC
Friday, June 12th (Licensed All Ages)
Enmore Theatre, Sydney NSW
Saturday, June 13th (Licensed All Ages)
Fortitude Music Hall, Brisbane QLD
Friday, June 19th
UC Refectory, Canberra ACT
Saturday, June 20th (Licensed All Ages)
Hindley Street Music Hall, Adelaide SA
Friday, July 3rd
Forth Pub, Forth TAS
Saturday, July 4th (Licensed All Ages)
Odeon Theatre, Hobart TAS
Friday, July 10th
Meow Nui, Wellington NZ
Saturday, July 11th
Powerstation, Auckland NZ
Sunday, July 12th (Licensed All Ages)
James Hay Theatre, Christchurch NZ
Saturday, July 18th (Licensed All Ages)
Astor Theatre, Perth WA
