Campbell Burns has been in a reflective mood over the past two years. Milestones have been flowing thick and fast.
He turned 30 (he's since reached 31) and his Newcastle indie band Vacations have celebrated a decade since their formation out of Burns' Hamilton South bedroom and into a fully-fledged unit also featuring Nate Delizzotti (lead guitar), Jake Johnson (bass) and Joseph Van Lier (drums).
"It took a moment for me to pause and think back," Campbell tells Weekender over Zoom. "Especially because we had the 10th anniversary of Days, the very first EP that we put out as a band.
"I did some anniversary shows in Brooklyn to celebrate and also to sort of celebrate that I had moved there.
"It did make me sort of pause and reflect on where I started in Newcastle and playing shows at the Lass O'Gowrie or the Hamo [Hamilton Station Hotel] and playing those songs to a handful of friends, and then, slowly, things started to develop and take shape, and now it is where it is now."
That "now" Burns is referring to is Vacations' remarkable overseas success, particularly in the USA.
Despite never fully cracking the Australian market, the four-piece's dreamy-pop brand of indie has garnered an audience of 8.7 million monthly listeners on Spotify and seen the band perform on USA talk show Jimmy Kimmel Live! in 2024.
Vacations' third album, No Place Like Home, released in January 2024, dealt with Burns' move from his native Newcastle to Los Angeles and his diagnosis with pure obsessive-compulsive disorder.
In October Vacations will release album No.4, Pursuit Of Anything, which covers Burns' move to New York and the band members' divergent paths that remain linked by friendship and passion for music.
We're all kind of pursuing our own paths in life, but we're still coming together over something that we've done since we were essentially like teenagers or young adults.
"The record is essentially a coming-of-age album for us, especially for me, and more so reflecting on a decade past as a band and all of the collective experiences that we've shared, navigating the music industry but also individually as people," Burns says.
Since the release of No Place Like Home, Van Lier has become a father, Johnson got married and Delizzotti has moved to Melbourne.
Meanwhile, Burns is living in the Brooklyn neighbourhood of Greenpoint, working as a songwriter and producer.
"We're all kind of pursuing our own paths in life, but we're still coming together over something that we've done since we were essentially like teenagers or young adults," he says. "It's really beautiful.
"There's been a lot of self-reflection and looking inward, thinking about your inner child or where you started and thinking about my family, my parents, and how those relationships have changed over time."
When Weekender spoke with Burns, he was back in Los Angeles, going over final rehearsals with his bandmates for Vacations' US tour to promote Holy Grail, the first single from Pursuit Of Anything.
The tour features 13 predominantly sold-out shows across North America before gigs in the Philippines, Malaysia, Singapore and Indonesia.
The subsequent six-date Australian tour ends with a hometown return at Earp Distilling for The Act. The intimate performance will be filmed and recorded by The Act's Bailey Watts and Clint Topic for a future release.
"I'm really glad that they approached us," Burns says. "I wasn't sure if we were going to do a Newcastle show on this run, but what they presented to us is really exciting.
"So, I'm glad to be working with people within the music scene and the community of Newcastle to put on something special rather than just playing a traditional kind of pub show."
Burns, who speaks with a slight American accent, says he's always fascinated by how Newcastle continues to evolve as a city in his absence. He was last home at Christmas.
"Because I don't live there anymore, every time I come back, and every time I come back to Australia, honestly, I get a sort of reverse cultural whiplash, or things aren't the same as when I left, which is to be expected," he says.
"That's how life goes, that's how it progresses. Things change all the time, whether you're there or not."
