![]() ![]() I must have watched that film two or three years before I wrote that lyric and don’t even know how that came into my head. The first line in the second verse is, “There’s this movie that I think you like/ This guy decides to quit his job and heads to New York City/ This cowboy’s running from himself.” Are you referring to an actual movie? So you’d say, “Be careful of the rip.” But a lot of pop music is like that it’s not about making sense it’s about the sounds of the word with the melody and getting that balance right. In Australia we refer to it as a “rip,” because a rip is the undercurrent that could drag you out into the ocean and it’s dangerous. The phenomena that the word is referring to is “rip current,” but I guess that doesn’t have the same ring to it. The funny thing is that I was talking to a lifeguard about the word “riptide” not long ago, and he was saying that the word in itself is a misnomer. ![]() And for that reason, the word has a special significance and a special memory for me. That’s why it was in my head since it’s not the most commonly used expression. In my mind it’s the ocean, but my whole awareness of that word existing is staying at a motel called Riptide. I think at first you write these words without really thinking if they make sense or not. ![]() ![]() I heard that you got the title for “Riptide” from a motel you used to stay at when you were younger and in the chorus you sing, “Oh, lady running down to the riptide.” So are you referring to the motel or are you referring to the ocean? The “pretty girls” line is me for sure, I was a shy kid. Plus, it’s also true in my childhood as well. “Dentists in the dark” sounded right, especially because of the alliteration. When writing, you just spurt things out without being too conscious of it. The first lines of the song are, “I was scared of dentists and the dark/ I was scared of pretty girls and starting conversations.” Does that come from your own life? I have the lyrics in front of me, so let’s talk about the words. All the words I needed were at my fingertips, and from that point I put the song together in a couple of days. Once I had that charted out, the words came easily, kind of like a stream of consciousness. That melody wound up becoming the instrumental bridge, and that led me to write the melody for the chorus. One day, I tried working on it, then stepped away we went to the shops to buy some stuff for dinner, and when I came back I started playing this melody on the ukulele. Four years later in 2012, I was living with a friend and I would spend a lot of the afternoons writing while he went to work. At that point I only uncovered a small portion of the song, so it wasn’t clear to me where it was going to go. I had the first two lines but really didn’t think much about it. One day I just picked up the guitar and started playing the chords for the verse. What’s the origin of the song? Where did it all begin? “Riptide” is an amazing song the heights that it’s risen to are just incredible. I liked the sound of the words and I thought it was quite a memorable name, and it stuck. I was playing a few small gigs at a cafe on Sunday afternoons and I started using that alias because I picked it out of a book I was reading at the time. When did you start going by Vance Joy? It’s a catchy name. No, I’d get a few raised eyebrows if I did that. So when you go back home, do you say to your friends, “Hey, listen… call me VANCE.” ![]()
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