ARIA Award-Winner Dan Sultan Talks His New Album "Killer" and Overcoming His Struggles in School

ARIA award-winning singer-songwriter (and sometimes actor) Dan Sultan launches his fifth release this week.

Dan Sultan's one of Australia's best musical artists, but all of his achievements followed a particularly difficult period at school. 

"Being dyslexic myself, I didn't do particularly well in school," he told Student Edge. "And no one really picked up on the fact that I was dyslexic until I was about 17."

"If people had paid a little more attention in schools or whatever, then things might have been a bit different," he added.

"I wish I'd taken it a bit more serious."

Now, the 34-year-old is trying to help other kids avoid what happened to him. Besides working as a touring musician, he's an ambassador for the GO Foundation, founded by Adam Goodes and Michael O'Loughlin.

The foundation focuses on empowering Indigenous youth through education and offers academic scholarships.

"On a personal level, I’m really glad to be able to help some kids that might need a little bit more help," Dan said.

But music still remains his passion. We caught up with him ahead of the release of his new album Killer to talk about what's different this time around and his collaboration with political rap duo A.B. Original.

Dan's been on the scene for more than 11 years, but he’s both terrified and excited about the release of Killer. "We changed a lot of things up on this record, like instrumentation," Dan confessed.

"For me, personally, to stay interested and inspired, it’s good to change it up a bit."

It’s not just the music he changed; he recorded it in an entirely different continent too, making Killer in his home of Melbourne, Australia.

"Being able to sleep in our beds and having some of the guys be home [in time] for dinner was pretty good in that respect," he said.

His previous release, Blackbird, was recorded in Nashville, Tennessee, but the commute paid off; it scored him a wealth of prizes including the ARIA award for Best Rock Album in 2014.

"Blackbird’s a bit of a highlight to-date,” he reflected. "It sold more copies than my previous two records combined."

It reached fourth place on the ARIA charts and went Gold; an ARIA accreditation meaning it sold more than 35,000 units (an impressive feat in the digital age).

Dan also featured on "January 26", the first single of rap duo A.B. Original, which came out at the end of last year and landed on the 2017 Hottest 100 at #16. It's a heavy-hitting song directly aimed at the date the nation chooses to celebrate its existence; a date which coincides with the arrival of the First Fleet and the destruction of many Indigenous cultures.

"Briggs and Trials [A.B. Original] pretty much lay [the message] out; my chorus is a bit more of a softer touch," Dan admitted.

We asked if there would be any songs on his upcoming album that discuss social and political issues. He explained there will be a few, but they'll be a bit more subtle than "January 26".

"I'm certainly opinionated; I’ll let people know what I think, but with my music, it’s a little bit more of a softer touch," he said.

After the album's released, it's straight on to a national tour in September, and maybe even an international tour. "It's a hell of a lot of work, but it's good fun," he said.

None of this is new for Dan. It's been 11 years since his debut album, Homemade Biscuits, was released, and he even featured in the 2009 musical, Bran Nue Dae.

The music industry, however, is notoriously difficult to crack into, so Dan offered some simple advice outside of the common adage, keep trying and practising.

"Be serious about having fun," he laughed.

"Worst comes to worst, you can always go back to [having fun]."

Killer will be available on July 28. You can catch Dan live on tour in September.

Photo: Luke Henery (Supplied)