Operator Please

Nominated for the Australian Artist of the Year Award

When Operator Please won the ARIA Award for the hit single, 'Just A Song About Ping Pong' it reinforced that this five-piece Gold Coast band mean business.

They might have cut their teeth on after school rehearsals and discussed pop music during their lunch breaks, but there is more to their celebrity status than meets the eye. With the help of MySpace and a generous nod of approval by celebrity blogger Perez Hilton, the band led by the charismatic 19-year-old Amandah Wilkinson, says their success is no overnight find.

Their hotly anticipated debut album titled Yes Yes Vindictive (recorded in Gosford New South Wales earlier this year over four weeks with renowned UK producer Simon Barnicott) is a youthful tease into a world that literally swept these kids off theirs.

Barnicott (who has perfected the sounds of Artic Monkeys and Kasabian) was flown out from the UK to work with the Gold Coasters.

But before we launch into the playful energy that is Operator Please, let’s get a few facts straight about how they got to where they are today.

Operator Please formed in early 2005 by Amandah Wilkinson who wanted to start a band to enter a Battle of the Bands competition. The band won the competition hands down and was supposed to claim a box of donuts as their prize. For the record, they never claimed that prize. Two independent EPs follow titled (On the Prowl and Cement Cement).

The band signed a deal with Virgin/EMI Records in Australia last year and Brille in the UK (that’s after a showcase that happens in New York). The rest they say is history in the making.

“There was a lot of buzz surrounding us at the time of the signing,” explains keyboardist Sarah Gardiner. “Our management told us there was interest in us overseas and that these people wanted to fly us over to play for them. It was a unique situation where all these record companies came together to bid against each other and yet flew us to New York. We went over there for a week and played three shows. The showcase was at Piano’s in Lower East Side. We signed with Brille in the UK. It turned out our A& R guy was at the show. It was a vital part of the puzzle.”

Yes Yes Vindictive is a perfect debut from five musicians aged between 16 and 19. Sure they ditched schoolbooks for touring Australia, America and the UK, but what you do if you had to choose?

“My success is kind of like my getting back to those people who picked on me at school,” says front woman Amandah Wilkinson. “Half the people that I know who used to give me shit at school are either on drugs or pregnant. It’s totally true and they don’t know what they’re doing. I thank god that I never got caught up in the stupid social hierarchy that school has. I never lost sight of anything I wanted to achieve. The stuff kids carry on about at school is so irrelevant and I guess this band is a way of saying, staying true to you. Follow your own dream and don’t worry about others. There is more to life.”

The former Elanora High School kids that make up Operator Please are: Amandah Wilkinson (19), drummer Tim Commandeur (17), keyboardist Sarah Gardiner (18), bassist Ashley McConnell (18) and violinist Taylor Henderson (16). The band’s previous violinist Stephanie Joske left the group in 2006.

The youthful glow that is Operator Please can’t be bottled or bought off the shelf. What this ambitious five piece create is teasingly vibrant and well, who can’t help but notice the raging energy that tugs at Amandah Wilkinson when she curls her lips and spits her words down a microphone. She found inspiration through singers such as Annie Lennox of the Eurythmics, Lauryn Hill and Dusty Springfield.

“Annie Lennox was the first female singer that I was exposed to. I admire her and everything she did. I also listen to a lot of soul and hip-hop. I love Lauryn Hill. She was a big influence on me because before I was writing I was singing a lot of soul and jazz. Dusty Springfield is another huge influence too. I also love Karen O; she’s a total siren. But the main thing about being a female singer and being in a band is there are only so many people you can be compared to. I strive to create my own person up there. I do what comes from within.”

Yes Yes Vindictive is an artful mash of pop, electro and even a slower ballad or two. Just A Song About Ping Pong is just that – a song about playing ping-pong. It’s an idea that came to Amandah’s head while walking home one night. “Every time I hear that someone says that song is about sex I just want to piss myself laughing,” she says. “I think it’s totally hilarious. How can you get it wrong, it’s in the title? I blurted the line out when I was walking home from somewhere because I was being an idiot and it’s a song we threw together. Accuse me of not being deep but that song was impulsive and we didn’t expect it to go anywhere.”

Other songs on the record include Leave It Alone and Yes Yes, both sort of having digs at the music industry. “When you are in this industry there is so many people who have an opinion about what you do. The song Leave It Alone comes from me saying leave me alone and don’t try and change anything.”

Yes Yes was penned while the band was in writing lock down in April this year. “Someone had previously told me we needed to have more hits and I was so pissed off that we went to this writing house and decided I am not going to force any songs,” says Wilkinson. “You just can’t do that. It’s unnatural. That is a cabin fever song because we had no phone reception and no television. It was when we were in a negative frame of mind that became a positive situation in the end.”

Yes Yes Vindictive opens with the seamless energy of Zero Zero – a crescendo of rocking guitar licks that remind of the kookiness of the B52s. The violin strings interrupt casually but forcefully while the keyboards bounce back to the 1980s. Cringe is a warm and fuzzy pop number that hints of 60s retro feel.   “Cringe is about being put in awkward social situations or being new to something like a group of people,” says Wilkinson. “There is a weird shy awkwardness when you meet someone new. It’s about being thrust in a situation you have no control over.”

“The album is really a great representation of our live show,” adds keyboardist Sarah Gardiner. “It’s not over built. It’s very raw. That is important for us because our singles are different to the overall feel of the album. Hopefully it gives people a better picture of who we are. People say our band has moved really fast and things have happened quickly but how am I supposed to know what is fast? I only know what we have been through and what we have done in the past two years. When you see a new artist you never know what goes on behind the scenes. There are years of hard work. We have worked our asses off.”