Babe Rainbow (band)

Babe Rainbow was initially conceived in 2014 by Angus Dowling and Jack Crowther in the coastal surf town of Rainbow Bay.[1] Both met each other in high school in the coastal town of Byron Bay, New South Wales. Dowling's parents are from Byron, where Crowther's mother is from a neighbouring town in the same region.[2] Both Dowling and Crowther were students of English and enjoyed permaculture and surfing.[3][1] They found interest in 1960s psychedelic music such as The Incredible String Band and Swing Mademoiselle.[1] The group was later formed in 2015 with Elliot O’Reilly alongside Venezuelan-born bass player Lu-Lu Felix Domingo,[4] who they met in the African quarter of Paris.[2] The group worked as macadamia nut farmers for John Cuts near Tropical Fruit World in Duranbah.[5][6]

Babe Rainbow wrote and recorded their first release in a second-hand bookstore in Murwillumbah.[7] The group came to the attention of Stu Mackenzie from the Australian psychedelic band King Gizzard & the Lizard Wizard, who offered to produce their debut album.[2] They collaborated with them for their self-titled debut album, The Babe Rainbow.[5] They were signed to their label, Flightless.[2] In 2017, they released their debut album produced by Mackenzie and ran support tours with King Gizzard, Allah-Las, Tomorrows Tulips, and French synth wave band La Femme internationally. Their debut album was signed to 30th Century Records, followed by Double Rainbow in 2018, which debuted at no. 18 on the ARIA Albums Chart,[8] along with Today in 2019. Wollongong surfer Miles Myjavec joined as a drummer around this time.[7] Their 2021 album, Changing Colours, featured American artist Jaden Smith,[8][9] who connected with the band on Instagram after hearing a song from their 2019 album Today.[10][11]

Babe Rainbow is characterized by their "throw-back" 1960s style of psychedelic rock along with their surf culture imagery.[12][13][14] It has also been characterized of having influences of disco, surf, funk, jazz,[15] soul,[14] garage and indie,[16] with neo-hippie and neo-psychedelia.[10][17] The band has also ventured into soft rock and latin music influences, since Domingo is from Venezuela.[8]