Art vs. Science: Aussie Dance-Rockers Credit Band's Birth to a Relative's Death

The chemist and the painter would probably disagree on most things in life. But merging art and science for the sake of music can sometimes create the best of both worlds. Especially if you ask Jim Finn, keyboardist and vocalist of the Australian dance-rock act Art vs. Science.

"We like the idea that the duality of art and science exists in all of us," Finn tells Spinner. "When you're creating something as an artist or a musician you're drawing on influences from the past. There's also the scientific part of writing with grammar and song structure, but there's always the unknown that comes out of nowhere, which is the combination."

The band, made up of Finn, Dan McNamee and Dan Williams, met at an all-boys school in Sydney. It wasn't so much art or science as it was death and circumstance that helped the band discover their signature jangly sound via an old keyboard that a band member's uncle left after his passing.

"Dan [McNamee]'s uncle died right when we started the band and left us his keyboard," says Finn. "We'd all played in other bands, so we plugged the keyboard into a guitar amp and that in itself was different. It gave it a really live and crunchy guitar tone. One of our inspirations was just finding new toys to play around with and building on them."

It was silly, manic songs like "Parlez Vous Français" (an unwitting play on the cheesy French hit "Tomber La Chemise" by Zebda), the inclusion of the song "Hollywood" on the NBA 2K11 video game soundtrack, and the shredding experimentation of "Bumblebee" -- which earned the band airplay on Australia's Triple J national youth radio station -- that caused the catalytic reaction that launched Art vs. Science's careers. The attention led to an ARIA award (the Australia Grammys) in 2011 for their album The Experiment and, arguably, the opportunity to play Spinner's upcoming massive 11-hour free concert headlined by the Flaming Lips at Yonge and Dundas Square in Toronto for NXNE on June 16.

"Australia only has one national youth radio station and the whole country hears the whole thing," says Finn. "It's same songs, in the same order, with only a few hours delay depending on time zones. If you get picked up by Triple J, it's not hard to get other stations to play you, or even book an entire tour based on one song."

Art vs. Science's music pays tribute to a childhood weened on Hollywood action movies, '80s metal, Beastie Boys and Rage Against the Machine, all married with current obsessions like Justice and Daft Punk. Songs like "Magic Fountain" channel the naïve wonder of Talking Heads, and it's impossible not to hear Europe's "The Final Countdown"-style riffs in the opening of "Friend in the Field."

"It was a natural progression to take all the influences and add all the best of everything we've ever heard," says Finn. "But the thing that separates us from other bands is that we make dance music, but without backing track, samples or computers -- its just keyboards, drums and vocoders. It's all live, and the crowed really notices that."

Art vs. Science play Spinner AOL's free concert at Yonge-Dundas Square in Toronto at 4 p.m. on June. 16.


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