BEN KWELLER Brings COVER THE MIRRORS Down Under

Words by Ali WilliamsBen Kweller is excited to be heading back to Australia in July with his Cover The Mirrors tour. It has been a while between visits. Kweller says he has not toured Australia since before the pandemic, making this run something of a proper return after the world decided to collectively lose the plot for a few years. “I’m so excited,” he says. “I love Australia. I haven’t been there since the pandemic, so this is my big return since the world shut down.” That excitement is not the polished, copy-and-paste version artists sometimes pull out when talking about every country on an itinerary. Kweller speaks about Australia with real affection. His fans are keen, he is keen, and the timing feels right. Cover The Mirrors has now had time to live out in the world, and Australia gets to be part of the international stretch of the album cycle. Released in 2025, Cover The Mirrors is the latest chapter in a career that started ridiculously early. Kweller began writing songs when he was eight and formed his first band around the age of 12 or 13. By his teens, he was fronting Radish, the Texas band that first put him on the map and gave him one of those music memories that still lights him up. He remembers being 14 when a Radish song, Dear Antarctica, was played on Q102 FM in Dallas by the gloriously named DJ Redbeard. Kweller and his bandmates piled into a car, because only one of them was old enough to drive, and circled the block until the song came on.  It is the kind of story that sounds small until you remember how massive it would have felt at the time. Three young musicians, one working car, a local radio station, and proof that something they made had escaped into the world. That is the sort of thing that keeps people writing songs long after common sense has suggested a more stable hobby.Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/heavy-music-interviews--2687660/support.