GRETA Stanley spent the majority of the pandemic tucked away in the relative sanctuary of her adopted hometown of Cairns.
But in the past week as she's kicked off her first national tour in two and a half years the indie-pop songstress has quickly come up to speed with the problematic nature of touring in the COVID-era.
Stanley almost didn't make her first show in Brisbane last Thursday after a raft of flight cancellations from north Queensland.
"We got a message the night before we were meant to leave Cairns, saying that all of our flights had been cancelled," Stanley says.
"It said we cannot offer you anything from Virgin. I was on the phone for a few hours and they couldn't give us anything and there were absolutely no flights from Cairns to get us there.
"So we had to drive to Townsville and fly out of there, which is like a four-hour drive. There were all these delays once we got to Townsville, so we were so stressed by the time we got there."
However, the shows went ahead and proved a triumph.
In April Stanley released her second album Real Love In Real Life and the tracks haven't been performed live outside of Cairns.
Real Love In Real Life marks a turning point for Stanley, who grew up in the tiny town of Mena Creek near Innisfail, before moving to Cairns.
Soon after she caught national attention as a indie-folk artist when she released her debut EP Bedroom City at 18 in 2015. Stanley's debut album Full Grown was released in 2017.
The origins of Real Love In Real Life began in 2019 when Stanley met up with German producer Tobias Kuhn (The Living End, Kate Miller-Heidke, Milky Chance) for a writing session after BigSound festival.
"We had four hours together, I didn't think I would come up with anything but thought it would be nice to meet him and see how we go," she says.
However, in that four hours Stanley and Kuhn wrote infectious single Soak Into This and a second meeting delivered New Feeling. The tracks were released in 2020 and were included on Real Love In Real Life.
For the rest of the album, Stanley collaborated with Middle East's Mark Myers and fellow Cairns musician and drummer Tristan Barton. The result was a truly eclectic record, featuring electro-pop, atmospheric folk-rock and even country, all capped off with Stanley's hauntingly beautiful vocals.
"That's just me, I'm a very indecisive person and I can't concentrate on what I'm creating," Stanley says.
"I just get over one thing and move to the next and go back to it again."
