The first song Julia Stone ever learned to play on the guitar was a Ben Harper song.
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This week, the singer, along with her brother Angus, will kick off the Summersalt tour in Canberra, headlining the bill alongside Harper.
"When we got sent the offer for the show, it was a huge drawcard for us," Stone says.
"Because we are both working on some new stuff, we're not doing that many Angus and Julia shows anymore - Angus is busy with Dope Lemon and I'm working on a new solo record.
"But seeing Ben Harper on the line-up, it was just kind of one of those life goals to play with him. And there's been a few of those moments - we got to play with Fleetwood Mac and recently got to play with Crowded House - and this is up there with those guys. Ben Harper, we just listened to him so much when we were teenagers."
But the chance to perform alongside Harper is not the only first Summersalt is offering the siblings. The festival is also the first time they've brought their 2021 album, Life is Strange, on tour.
It's a long time coming, considering the duo started working on it following the release of their fourth studio album Snow, in 2017. But in a way, the album was always meant to be presented in two ways outside of its recording. The first is to be performed live, and the second was as the soundtrack to the episodic video game, Life is Strange.
The Life is Strange game franchise has won more than 20 awards since its debut in 2015, and the franchise boasts more than 20 million unique players across its lifetime.
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As composers, Angus and Julia Stone's score guides the players through the game, with tracks such as Love Song exploring the richness and complexity of relationships between siblings, families, and communities.
"For both of us, even though it was a computer game soundtrack, it was probably one of the records were most proud of," Stone says.
"We worked on it for years. It was great that it got to go into the game, but it was an anticlimax in the sense that normally we go out and tour when we put out an album. But we love playing Love Song, which is probably our favourite from that record."
On paper, Life is Strange took four years from start to release. But in between writing and recording - in multiple locations, including in Boulder, Colorado, where the video game is created - both siblings were working on their solo work. While Angus Stone was working on his Dope Lemon project, Julia Stone was working on her third studio solo album, Sixty Summers.
But Life is Strange provided this touch stone, particularly during its later stages when COVID had already hit. With Angus Stone on his farm in New South Wales and Julia at home in Melbourne during that time, the project gave them something to keep in contact - "Angus and I, we're not naturally big phone people. So having a project to work on and finish kept us connected during that time."
But Julia had something else to keep herself busy during the pandemic, and it had nothing to do with her music. In fact, that's what attracted the singer to it.
"I had this feeling of maybe it's worthwhile thinking about doing something else entirely," she says.
"I had started university when I finished school, but I was a year into doing a degree when Angus and I started getting too busy for me to stay at school. So I thought I'd go back and finish. I wanted to do psychology and I was talking to my sister, who does psychology, and she was saying to me that before I committed to a six-year degree, I maybe should try out just what it's like to work with people in crisis and how it feels."
It was then that she decided to volunteer for a crisis helpline and use the time that she would have usually spent touring, training to work for a crisis helpline - at first - and then taking phone calls.
"It's been 15 years since I've studied - and I had to study and do interviews and made sure I qualified to be a helpline volunteer. I learned a lot and then started taking calls," she says.
"I've continued but it's becoming more challenging now that we're back working. But I'm just going to see if I can make it work.
"Certainly I had a lot of time at home [during COVID] so it was a lot easier. But I find it satisfying and challenging, and it's not just being there for people but also the community of volunteers. It's such a nice group of people. It just opened up my world. I've been so deeply in music for so long, it was nice to meet a whole new range of people."
Summersalt is at Stage 88 on Friday. Tickets from summersaltmusic.com.au.
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