CityMag met Swapmeet to discuss their beginnings and success under a different name, why they swapped it, and releasing a debut EP.

As a young teen, Maxwell Elphick went to a Murray Bridge swap meet and bought a guitar, sparking an idea: Swapmeet would be a cool band name.

It took a few years and a legal threat, but Swapmeet was at last realised.

The band, made up of Maxwell and Jack Medlyn on guitar and drums, Venus O’Broin on guitar and vocals and Joshua Doherty on bass, formed about three years ago.

But they were originally called Sour Sob, playing a first gig at the Metro as a spontaneous one-off to fill a gap in the lineup.

“There’s videos of it,” Venus says.

“They’re awesome, Venus is barefoot, all the lights are on as well,” Maxwell tells CityMag. 

Although they say it was “super awkward” they pushed through and decided to give the band a proper crack.

They had been gigging around Adelaide and making a start on their debut EP when a local artist with a similar name began legal proceedings against them. 

Eventually, they made the tough decision to move on from Sour Sob and change the name to avoid an “unnecessarily lengthy court battle” which would prohibit them from releasing music as it unfolded.

This image: Louis Campbell.

They say the community response to their name change was overwhelmingly supportive, but fans weren’t happy about the circumstances.

“People were angrier than we were,” Maxwell says.

While they felt lucky for the support, there was hesitation about the band’s recognition under a new name.

“Sour Sob was always on like the big gigs that we played with interstate bands and we were scared that getting gig offers was kind of going to diminish,” Maxwell says.

“But when we did the name change and everyone got around it, I feel like everyone from Adelaide especially knew we were Sour Sob before but I find like, a lot of fans and friends interstate have kind of found us as Swapmeet which is really cool.”

Having gotten her current guitar via a swap meet, Venus was very on board with the new name, saying the change gave them “the freedom of having a fresh start”.

Their debut EP, Oxalis, sounds like dreamy pop meets indie folk-rock, and marks a meeting place between what began as Sour Sob and ended as Swapmeet.

“We kind of had to release those songs that we’ve played since the start,” Venus says about the track list.

“We feel bad letting songs die,” Maxwell says.

The EP’s name is a cheeky nod to the band’s roots, being the genus name of the plant Australians affectionately know as a soursob. Venus says the EP’s name goes way back.

“A song we uploaded to Soundcloud early on was called ‘How to remove Oxalis from your backyard’, so the plant was seeded,” she says.

‘How to remove Oxalis’ didn’t make it on the EP, but the bands pull to nature is still seen clearly in the album art, designed by Venus.

“I’m just an iPad baby, I’m always on my iPad,” she says.

Debut EP Oxalis, artwork by Venus O’Broin.

Venus, who also plays guitar for The Empty Threats, says she uses her free time while touring to create mixed media designs for Swapmeet and other mates’ bands. For Oxalis, there were hundreds of variations.

“Deciding on the artwork took longer than doing the EP,” Maxwell laughs.

Oxalis, along with the art of other Swapmeet singles, has an Ovine theme, adapted from pictures taken from Maxwell’s family farm.

Venus says she enjoys using animal imagery because it captures the emotion of the music and “also, they’re really cute”.

“I find that my favourite music, it doesn’t feature heavily on the people themselves,” Venus says.

“I feel like the animals is good way to like, almost separate the music from us a little bit… like the songs seem very much something themselves,” Maxwell adds.