Tom Snowdon performed three stunning tracks from his debut album for the latest Rolling Stone AU/NZ ‘In My Room’ session.
Following the demise of his previous project No Mono, Snowdon courageously decided to become a reluctant solo artist, and with a voice like his, it was lucky he did.
Filled with renewed energy and purpose, Snowdon captured his musical rebuild on his debut album, Lonely Tree, which arrived earlier this year.
“I wrote songs about that process of starting over; of reimagining and reconnecting, and stepping into the unknown to find new life and new special things,” he says. “Lonely Tree is a story about that process. It’s about hope and peace and for me is a celebration of being brave, of friendship and discovery, and of the persistent love of making music and of expressing stories with my voice.”
Where in the past Snowdon created music in an impressionistic way, focusing on dreaming up hazy atmospheres and exploring elemental forces with powerful metaphors, he took a much more direct approach on his debut album, giving his listeners more personal storytelling as a result.
It was a decision that paid off handsomely: “Tom Snowdon’s Lonely Tree is vast, spectacular, isolated and stark,” praised Beat Magazine in a glowing review, comparing the Australian musician to Icelandic singer-songwriter Ásgeir.
“Men at Work was a defining band of my childhood. They were before my time but I became a fan through my parents’ great love for their music. Their songs were a feature of our family road trips and their sound and its energy has had a big impact on me,” Snowdon wrote.
“I grew up in Mparntwe/Alice Springs in Central Australia and our family holidays meant driving for days to reach the beach. Men at Work’s music was a feature of these trips and I’d sit gazing out the window and watching the landscape change slowly from red to green, daydreaming to the great imagery in their songs and to Colin Hay’s effortless and special voice.”
Snowdon even covered Men at Work’s “Who Can It Be Now?” for his 2021 covers EP, Channel, which also featured the musician reworking tracks by Britney Spears, Björk, and Selena Gomez, showcasing his expansive range.
Watch Tom Snowdon’s full ‘In My Room’ session above. Lonely Tree is out now via Pieater Records.
