Experimental Australian trio The Omnific have turned heads with their dual bass player set-up – but chief songwriter Matt Fack says it’s no mere gimmick. With second album The Law Of Augmenting Returns as Exhibit A, he states the case for reinventing what bass does in prog.
The Omnific are proof that bass players needn’t be confined to the role of supporting cast. The unique power trio comprises two bassists – Matt Fack and Toby Peterson-Stewart – plus drummer Jerome Lematua. It’s something Fack calls “a happy coincidence.”
“It was never a plan to have two of us,” he says. “It was so rare to find someone that has that ability on the same instrument as you, just up the road from you. So we started jamming and that quickly snowballed into our first EP, Sonorous, in 2016. By that point it felt like we’d struck a little magic, so we just kept going.”
They released three EPs in as many years. “We weren’t 100 per cent sure on the identity of the band,” Fack recalls. “There was constant questioning of what we wanted to be, what gear to use and what our approach to songwriting should be. We’d never written for a band with two bass players before – we were just throwing all our ideas together. It felt like it took those three EPs to figure it out.”
Buoyed by those experiments, their 2021 debut LP Escapades saw the trio settling into a more refined sound. Indulgent passages were traded for slick earworms and the band’s stock went through the roof. On the recently released follow-up, The Law Of Augmenting Returns, however, Fack oversaw the majority of the writing.
“It’s a very personal album to me; I feel connected to everything,” he says. “It’s the first time I experimented with programming synths and orchestrations. I was learning how to do it on the fly, putting hours upon hours of effort into that. So that makes it very different from Escapades.”
The rest of the band were still vital components, with Lematua helping shape the feel of the songs. “In the past, the vibe of the tracks often dictated the feel of the drums,” Fack says. “Working with Jerome on the drums from the get-go really changed how I’d play a riff, or even changed the direction of whole songs.
“Double Malt Ditty is the best example – we ended up composing that from start to finish in about two or three hours. But it doesn’t necessarily have to be the drum parts either. Being told a section is too long or that a transition doesn’t seem right while I’m working on an idea really helped. I really valued his input.”
While short on writing credits, Peterson-Stewart’s role was to provide a friendly competition against his bass-playing counterpart, as they pushed one another to new heights. “The beauty of being in a band with another bassist is that if there’s a technique Toby introduces into a song, I have to learn it as well,” Fack explains. “You learn the technique and ask, ‘What could I write with it?’
“Toby got really into thumping,” he adds of a slap bass variant popularised by Tosin Abasi of Animals As Leaders. “I’d never thought about it being something that could be done on bass. That realisation inspired the opening riff of The Omnific=Bass, where I’ve given my take on it, because of Toby.”
The riff of that album opener is preceded by an a capella section á la Gentle Giant – an intentionally left-field opening gambit. “Initially I wrote that on the bass guitar,” Fack says. “I love the melody so much, but I wanted to start the record with something that would make people do a double take.
I just wrote the most meaningless words I could think of, and it seemed to work!
“We got Tim Waurick – a tenor vocalist who’s doing incredibly well on YouTube – involved to record it, as well as Luke Taylor from Heartline. I realised I’d need some lyrics, so I just wrote the most meaningless words I could think of, and it seemed to work!”
As if the album didn’t have enough bass, its title track features two more prolific players: former stand-in Kai den Hertog and YouTube sensation Charles Berthoud. The track, written as a minor-key take on the 12-bar blues, is a fine example of how The Omnific endeavour to turn traditionalism on its head.
“Kai nailed it when he stepped in for Toby in 2022,” Fack recalls. “I wanted someone to do something totally different to what I would do. Kair composed an entire orchestration of bass and it worked out phenomenally.”
He continues: “Charles was perfect for the part. Thankfully, he already knew who we were and was really keen to do it. He ripped a solo and it was good to go – simple as that. Like a lot of bass players, we idolise him; he really changed the song.”
I think the two-bass thing boosted our listenability online at first
Since day one the band has aimed to prove that their double-bass experience translates to the stage, leading to touring opportunities with Polyphia, Ne Obliviscaris, Between The Buried And Me and many more. “I think the two-bass thing boosted our listenability online at first,” Fack says.
“We wanted to reinforce that by showing we can do it live. People have told us, ‘I never would have expected that to work’ – but we’re not just a gimmick; we want to create something new.
“Compositionally, we still want to treat bass as the instrument it is. I hope we can inspire others to try and do something different on bass, or even pick up a bass and start playing for the first time.”
While they’re determined to win crowds over, there’s one late icon Fack wishes they could make contact with. “I’d love to see what Jaco Pastorius would do with our music. Bass has progressed so far since he passed. I don’t think he’d have heard bass being taken to where it is now.”
