Polish Club frontman David Novak on reclaiming Sydney’s nightlife

David Novak is the charismatic frontman of Sydney duo Polish Club.

Polish Club

David Novak is the charismatic frontman of Sydney duo Polish Club.

Sydney-based guitarist and singer David Novak is about ten years older than most up-and-coming Australian musicians. “I’m half-Asian and John’s beautiful, so we’re fine,” jokes the 31-year-old, referring to bandmate and drummer John-Henry Pajak. “At least, until we hit 40 and we look 100.”

Together, the pair formed Polish Club in 2014. They’ve become known for their distinctive rock songs that Triple J Unearthed has described as being “pop songs [written] fifty years late and twice the speed”. Their talent is undeniable, and Novak certainly looks like a rockstar when he arrives for this interview in Surry Hills with a perfect quiff, mirrored Ray Bans, a distinctive moustache and a black leather jacket.

Polish Club has a following of dedicated super-fans in Sydney, each of whom Novak says has been steadily won one at a time. It’s not for want of trying, he says, but because of the genre they picked.

“We got lucky and we got on the radio,” he says. “In the beginning there was no-one at our shows. I was talking to my mum today, because our next Sydney show is on her birthday. She’s like, ‘I’ve got a birthday party, all my friends are coming to your show’. I said, ‘You’re going to hate it, but that’s fine’. My mum’s a musician, she gets it.”

While Sydney is undoubtedly his favourite place to perform, he says it’s like night and day compared to Melbourne - or, in fact, any other city he’s played. As a headline band, usually Polish Club takes to the stage at 10pm at the absolute earliest, but in Sydney he says they typically start at about 9pm.

However, the crowds make it worthwhile, and he largely credits that to winning over Triple J early in the piece. All of a sudden, industry people found out about them and wanted to see them. Novak laughs when he says the band’s early shows had about 30 or 40 industry people but no actual fans.

“It was really weird. I don’t think that’s the norm. It’s usually like, people want to see some connection with a demographic before they go in [and sign someone], but I think with us it was pretty easy to understand what we were and that eventually people would like it,” he says.

“People come to our shows and within 30 seconds of a song they’ll know what it is and if they like it or not. It’s the best part of it, trying to win people over - or at least make sure they’re paying attention.”

One thing startlingly evident about Novak is his self-awareness. He tells the Daily Telegraph he was always a bit musical, but never seriously considered a career as a musician until the past few years. He laughs when he says he played in the same high school band for years before pursuing an arts degree at university, majoring in music, while working as a music promoter in Sydney.

One day, after a disagreement with a composition class tutor about the meaning of a Marvin Gaye song simply got too much. He walked out and never went back.

“It’s music, it’s open to interpretation,” he says with a smile.

Even now, that’s undoubtedly the case. He writes most of the lyrics, but always with Pajak’s influence and approval. Although they’ve been successfully working together for more than four years - and they’re about to do a nine show, ten day tour in Germany - they still have creative differences.

“He’ll just say stupid [things] like, ‘Put a swear word in this one, people love swear words’,” he says. “I’ll say, ‘That’s the dumbest thing I’ve ever heard’, but the one time I did it, it became one of our most popular songs. It’s called Don’t F*ck Me Over, it’s the one everyone remembers.

“He’s got a very different approach, but there’s a genius in there. There’s genius in everyone. We’ve both worked out how to find the genius within each other but also get rid of the bad stuff we come up with.”

Their songs are generally upbeat and catchy, designed to get people on their feet and cutting loose on the dance floor, but Novak says Polish Club’s lyrics have a balance of light, dark and levity.

“There’s no filter. You don’t want anything to be a dirge. We write sad stuff. I just went through a break-up, so a lot of our new stuff, there’s some sad stuff in there. But the music around it can still be fun. We still want people to dance,” he muses.

“I don’t think happy and sad music are mutually exclusive concepts; it’s all a spectrum.”

He’s very pragmatic about the band’s success. He laughs when he recounts a story about the time his voice blew out before a gig in Wollongong, says the time the band lost a lot of money buying their way out of a terrible deal they signed in the United States is a “classic rock-n-roll story”, and admits being chosen as a recipient of an American Express Music Backers Grant was “not a small deal”.

“Everything is a positive when you have no expectations. Everything is a pleasant surprise,” he says.

“It helps if you pick the right people. And then your next show is 50 people, the next show is 100 people, the next show is 200 people, 500 people and then you’re selling out a crowd of 1200 people.”

He’s been cool and charismatic the whole interview, saying he has no endgame other than to keep making music, but when the conversation turns to the upcoming European tour his excitement becomes obvious.

“I get to go to Germany, for a reason, with a visa,” he laughs.

“I travel like a businessman, just with better hair and an emptier wallet.”

Originally published as Polish Club frontman David Novak on reclaiming Sydney’s nightlife