Vacant City on song for new EP

A polaroid snap of Masterton pop rockers Vacant City was last week pegged to the wall, next to a photo of former Paramore drummer Zac Farro, at Parachute Studios in Auckland.

MASTERTON band Vacant City will hit the ground running in the New Year after forging the final few tracks for an upcoming EP last week.

The pop rock band -- comprising Jake Schdroski, lead vocalist and rhythm guitarist, Hayden Warren on bass and synthesiser, drummer Zac Emerson and Jesse Brown on lead guitar and synthesiser -- travelled to Auckland to capitalise on their latest Smokefreerockquest prize won as national finalists.

The band, formerly known as Back to the Remedy, took out the Lowdown Best Song award in the 2014 contest with their song So Right, winning the opportunity to have the tune professionally recorded.

The members of Vacant City had battled to win the national SFRQ crown since starting college in 2009. This year was their last as eligible contestants and the band had entered as three-time previous Wairarapa regional heat winners and top 30 national place-getters.

The band topped more than 700 other entries this year to make the national finals, which were held at Q Theatre in Auckland, and had performed in a live showdown against five other group acts from across the country.

The band, as Back to the Remedy, released a debut EP in 2011 titled I Know a Place, which was recorded and produced at Warren Maxwell's Stonefeather Studios in Featherston. The four players took the name of Vacant City earlier this year and had been working on new tracks over the past several months, some of which were already available on SoundCloud.

Schdroski said the band had trekked to Parachute Studios in the City of Sails last Tuesday and the next day spent nine solid hours reworking an existing song called Stay under producer Sam de Jong.

"Parachute is one of the go-to studios in Auckland now for the big artists, so it's pretty sick to get some time working in here, and working with Sam. He's really helped with the redirection of Stay, which is quite an electronic-based song. We're still evolving our electronic sound but Sam's skills are amazing with electronica. We've learned heaps off him already."

He said de Jong was also remixing the band's prize-winning song So Right, which Schdroski had originally recorded at home, and the two pimped tunes will number among up to six tracks featuring on their as-yet-untitled EP, which is set to drop early next year.

Schdroski had recorded the balance of songs for the EP at home in Masterton and the band had also contributed their song Love Like We Do, recorded in Auckland about three months ago, for the upcoming 2014 Smokefreerockquest compilation.

He said members were scattering next year to Wellington and Christchurch but would still continue as Vacant City, and were aiming to perform in Wairarapa, Wellington and the lower North Island.