The morning after a sold-out show at London’s Signature Brew, Skeggs’ Benny Reed (and briefly, Jonny Lani) chats with Nick under the glass roof in East London’s Mama Shelter about how Australian road trips and freezing nights stuck in Cheyenne fed into their forthcoming album Pacific Highway Music.
“I’ve driven that stretch so many times… I don’t know how many times, but a lot more than, like, the average person, I reckon. From Foster to Byron or Sydney.” His connection to these roads may have begun somewhat practically, as a cheaper alternative to flying, but it has evolved into more, shaping a new album full of floaty, sun-drenched pop-rock songs punctuated by subtle experimentation, dreamed into existence as a soundtrack to long coastal drives.
“When I’m on the highway, I actually love it ‘cause I’ve got a bit of a route, and I stop at a few spots to mix it up. I’ve done it since I was like 16. Even my mates used to take me surfing on that same route, but now I have to do it, playing gigs or work,” Benny continues, “and I don’t know if [the songs] will work or not, but it’s like if you’re on your own driving, you can be in the world of the songs. It’s a place you can kind of visit in your own imagination.”
While earlier works evoked a rebellious teen spirit wet from surf, and loose in production, Skeggs in 2024 is more reflective, offering a polished album of tight, grungy soul-searching, full of sunburnt energy, perfectly tuned for a road trip, and offering appreciation not just of the album’s namesake highway but of the journey the band has taken over the last decade.
“I feel like I’m sort of doing things later than I wanted to do when I was, like, 19 or 20. But the band kind of got busy. And it would be stupid if I spent coin going to travel when I knew we might do a gig there one day. So this last month of my life has been like the best month of my life, ‘cause we’re finally going to places I’ve dreamt of going.”
Gratitude is a theme throughout our conversation, as Benny reflects on how Skegss has allowed him to meet people and see parts of the world he’d only imagined. Whether touring Asia or reminiscing about early gigs at Byron’s Great Northern, the band’s journey has fuelled Pacific Highway Music. “I thrive off meeting people, whether they’re young or old,” he tells me, happily looking around the East London hotel where we’re chatting. “And I love them telling me things, and I love being real honest with them,” adding that these interactions and his experiences on the road, go hand in hand with his songwriting.
A recent trip to Hossegor, France, included a few days of surfing, but as he told me: “We went to this little café, Café de Paris, and every time I sat down, I’d talk to the people at the table next to me, and we’d have like a convo for half an hour, and by the third day, I sat there for like, eight hours… by the end of it, we had a crowd of 15 of us all chatting.” He goes onto muse on the evolution of his lyrical output “I was always singing about what I wanted to do. And now I’m actually doing it… I’m pretty fortunate and grateful that I just trusted that it might actually come to fruition.”
Moving beyond their earlier surf-rock anthems, Pacific Highway Music shows a clear evolution, embracing a broader stylistic and thematic range, and displaying a renewed openness to a broader sound palette (including subtle use of synthesizers). This is apparent in opener Tradewinds, whose intro textures, soaked in lush layers of chorus sound somewhere between Slowdive and The Cure. I Think I Can Fly evokes a playful rolling melody, with a tight vocal delivery that quickly gives way to the brooding gentility of Brain on the Highway. Meanwhile, Aeroplane Heart has the poppiest lyric Benny has ever sung: “My aeroplane heart keeps trying to fly away,” and feels like it could easily break the band out to a new audience.
Out of My Head lands with an energy reminiscent of The Strokes but with some hints of classic punk’s unvarnished core. At last night’s gig, it made me think of mid-2000s northern English indie, the crowd dissolving into pure chaos as the chorus dropped. And it’s just a bit heavier and more energetic in the live environment — a soundtrack for a night of pure drunken, youthful euphoria.
Meanwhile, Spaceman drifts in a different direction with its slow, grungy undertones, deep bass, and muted vocals offering one of the slickest moments on the album. The song’s seeds germinated when Benny was “getting a bit antsy” during COVID and wanted to put some new music out, releasing an acoustic version through his side project Mughead. Eventually, Jonny added the drums, and the song became a new Skeggs anthem with a comedic video seeing the duo meet an alien who quickly becomes a new friend… I can’t help but feel that this is either a case of life imitating art or a purposeful exploration of the serendipity of finding a new bassist after Toby’s exit (more on this later).
At its heart, Pacific Highway Music is a collection of stories, but none hit quite as sharply as Stuck in Cheyenne. Its momentum pulls from when the band were stranded in North America in the middle of a tour. “We were stuck for over three days,” Benny recalls, with Jonny adding, “It was a huge snowstorm.” Opening with the line, “It’s so hard to follow your dreams,” Stuck in Cheyenne is a solid rock song with an evocative dusting of Americana. Yet, despite the challenging inspiration, the song’s tone remains upbeat—optimistic, almost buoyant—pushing against the bleakness with a sense of hope. And that’s what stands out. Pacific Highway Music is an album that does battle with moments of sadness and introspection, obstacles, and doubt but resolves each of them with positivity and warmth.
On High Beaming, Benny repeats, “no, life is never easy,” yet the song floats effortlessly through verse and chorus, before blurring to a close on the lyric “putting my wild mind at ease.” Album closer Kelly Heroes is something of a departure from the central Skeggs sound, drawing on 90’s alt-rock and fellow Australians Silverchair, with a cushion of guitar hooks coated in a warm fuzz, and the repetition of the album’s title bringing everything to a close along with Jonny’s rolling beats. There’s a narrative cohesion here that I think was missing from previous works, a newfound storytelling that Benny tells me he developed during Covid when he did sit-down gigs at local venues.
We briefly chat about Toby’s exit, which could have caused a bend in the road to become a U-turn, but the band appears to view it as another chapter to explore. As he sips a Bloody Mary beneath the glass roof of the garden bar, a slither of blue battling the grey skies above us, Benny appears nothing short of optimistic. Especially when I ask about new bassist Kelton Lee who “slotted in perfectly” after reaching out straight after Toby’s departure, and brought a fresh dynamic to their live shows. The guys confirmed he’ll be joining them on the road for the next year, and potentially in the studio after that.
Pacific Highway Music feels like Skeggs adrift, no longer tethered to their surf rock roots, but embracing the pull of the world. That said, all the ingredients of a classic Skeggs release are here: a touch of angst, solid riffs, and Benny’s trademark gravelly vocals supplying the singalong hooks. But there’s a renewed energy. With subtle textural layers and a warmer sonic palette, this is Skegss at their most refined and expansive,
I ask if there’s a track that stands out, something they hope will resonate with fans, but there isn’t one. Instead, Benny offers a positive reflection on the new material: “I just hope the people that need to hear it, like it. And if they’re on their own and they need something to zone out to, they can escape their world a little bit.”
Pacific Highway Music is out on 18th October, and Skeggs will be back in the UK in May 2025 because as the guys tell me, “the sun’s usually out for us in May.”
