Nick Ward announces his debut album, House With The Blue Door

Nick Ward initially envisioned his debut album, House With The Blue Door, completed just before his 22nd birthday, as a kind of blurred time capsule for his youth. After spending an afternoon at a Sydney exhibition of Hilma af Klint’s The Ten Largest (1907) paintings, Nick Ward had the idea to create an album about childhood and the lingering emotions of the past.

"It’s about family, childhood, and the difficult relationship we have with the past," he explains. "I think your early-twenties is about coming to terms with your childhood, especially after finishing high school and experiencing more of the world. Starting therapy really made me realise how much emotional baggage I was holding onto, and this record was made while I was unpacking all of that. I finished this album right before my 22nd birthday, so it felt nice to encapsulate my adolescence in one statement. For a while it was hard for me to listen to, just because of the headspace I was in while making it, but now it brings me a lot of joy and it gives me closure to finally release it.”

Nick co-directed and edited the "All Your Life" video with his twin brother Tom Ward, using super 8 footage from the 1950s and 60s, filmed by their grandparents in Malaysia and Perth, Australia.

“When I was 10, I made my first film using family photographs on iPhoto with a Foo Fighters song, which sparked my interest in filmmaking. Ten years later, after our grandma passed away, we found a suitcase of unseen photographs and super 8 footage filmed by our grandfather during their journey from Malaysia to Australia, which we used in the ‘All Your Life’ music video and album cover,” explains Nick. “‘I really hope you’re happy all your life’ reminded me of scenes in movies where characters said farewell – never to meet again – but still wished the other person a happy rest of their life. As someone who struggles with their mental health, those words felt like an impossible idea to live up to, but something to chase anyway. I’ve never consciously made ‘sad’ or ‘happy’ music, but I’m proud to call this my most life-affirming song.”