Photo: Frances Carter
Australia is a "uniquely" hard market for New Zealand musicians, the guitarist and founding member of The Beths says.
In five years, Kiwi indie-rock darlings The Beths have sky-rocketed from playing Karangahape Road's Whammy Bar to international success.
Recent achievements include a NPR Tiny Desk concert, a stint touring with The National, and the acquisition of a new fan, former US President Barack Obama.
The band is also among this year's finalists in the APRA Silver Scroll Awards, for their 2022 album Expert In A Dying Field.
'You're uniquely disadvantaged as a New Zealander' - listen to the full interview with Jon Pearce here
Speaking to Kim Hill on Saturday Morning, Jon Pearce said he never attempted trying to make it in Australia - and encourages other Kiwi musicians not to either.
"Australia is a uniquely hard market for New Zealand musicians because they have such a strong domestic market, and I think, while this might sound like I'm complaining, I think the same thing is probably true in reverse and that's one of the reasons why we don't see an enormous number of Australian artists flooding our charts and venues.
"But they have a very strong local music environment, they love watching live music and they really support their small artists and small venues, and so if you're a New Zealander, you have a low profile in Australia, you go over there, you try to play the same venues but you're not a local Australian artist and you don't have that guaranteed … support base so who are you actually competing against?"
Pearce said Kiwis ended up competing against musicians from the United States and United Kingdom who are likely in Australia to end off a world tour, and are already in the album cycle.
They have a much large profile, better label support and are likely to have a more interesting story - purely because they would have more life as an artist, he said.
"Those are the people who are trying to play in the same venue that you are, you're uniquely disadvantaged as a New Zealander and I just think it's way too hard."
Back from the US for a short stint after three months touring, Pearce said having international success in the music industry meant you were doing somehing you believed in - and doing it over and over again never made it hard.
"That's my measure of whether you've struck that genius or not."
Performing the same songs over and over again on stage never bored him, saying there was always something different that could be drawn from what what going on around the music - such as the crowd.
It was about observing and getting the energy back from all the "tiny little things" happening.
"I don't really find that it exhausts my interest, my attention, no."
Pearce will be appearing at this weekend's Going Global Summit discussing exporting Kiwi music to the world.
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