The Rubens Explain Why They Created the New Nation of "LO LA RU" for Their Third Album

The Rubens are back and they've created their own world on LO LA RU.

When you spend a lot of your time tucked away in an old World War Two bunker in the outskirts of Sydney's south-west with a few mates, you're bound to feel like you're in another world.

For Elliott Margin, bassist of Australian band The Rubens, this is exactly what happened to him and his bandmates (two of whom are brothers) while they were writing and recording their upcoming third album, LO LA RU.

"We recorded most of our album in [that WWII bunker] that had been converted into a studio," Elliott tells Student Edge.

"In this own little world of ours."

Because of how they all felt while in that bunker, it seemed natural to create a fake nation complete with a name and flag. The result is "LO LA RU", and the cherry on the cake was making the fake nation's flag their album cover.

"We wanted the name to sound like almost a Pacific Island or a name you think you might've heard before," Elliott admits, confessing that the syllables are, ultimately, "nonsense."

"The Ru is for Rubens, the Lo La is pretty much just because we like the sound of it, really."

Despite this, Elliott maintains that naming an album is an important part of the process.

"It's always a democratic process; ideas are thrown around and it can take a while," Elliott says.

"You work on this [album] for so long and work so hard on it and [the album’s title] going to be the first thing people see."

But sometimes it's the things that are last minute that make the most impact. Take their current single, "Never Ever", a heartbreaking debut between lead singer Sam and Grammy Award-nominated songwriter Sarah Aarons, and a new direction for the band that is, nonetheless, receiving high rotations. 

And just as their Triple J Hottest 100-topping single "Hoops" was a last-minute addition to their 2015 album, "Never Ever" almost didn't make the cut on LO LA RU.

"[Sarah] hit us up through our management saying she wanted to write with us," Elliott explains.

"We were like 'Awesome, that sounds like fun but we're gonna be finished our record so we won't be writing for 'The Rubens'; let's just write a song together and see what happens'."

After they heard the song, however, their tune had changed.

"Obviously, it turned into a duet, and we had this song at the end of it that we really loved and were like, 'Well, maybe this is a Rubens track'," Elliott says.

"We squeezed it onto the album at the last second."

After LO LA RU drops, The Rubens will embark on a tour that spans over three months and two countries with their new "RnB-infused" album.

For now, however, Elliott's just excited that the world is finally about to meet LO LA RU: "Bloody can't wait for it to be out, really."

LO LA RU will be released on Friday 29 July. You can catch The Rubens on their Australian and New Zealand tour throughout July, August and September.

Photo: Giulia McGauran (Supplied)