Teenage Joans: The Juice-Box Punk-Pop Duo

Photos courtesy of Hailey Feller

This article is part of SCAD Radio’s SXSW collection, in which some of our radio members visited the music portion of the SXSW Festival and Showcase in Austin, TX.

Tahlia and Cahli met nearly five years ago in Adelaide, Australia at a music communitythat hosts a lot of workshops. Cahli explains that it is “a place where kids can go and learn howto write and produce music.” They were doing different thingsin the program until Nick, theperson in charge of the community, mentioned to Cahli that she would be a good match withTahlia. Shortly after, Tahlia and Cahli created “Teenage Joans”.

Vocalist and guitarist, Cahli Blakers, and vocalist and drummer, Tahlia Borg, as Teenage Joans. Teenage Joans self identifies as “Juice-box punk-pop.” After asking what they mean by that, particularly the “juice box” portion, it all started to make sense. Firstly, Cahli clarifies that the punk-pop label is simply, “playing pop music that is punk.” Secondly, the “juice box” element is what they describe as juice box lyrics, in a sense that their “lyrics always have an element of silliness, and almost childishness to them. Like nostalgia. We’re always trying to have fun with our music,” Cahli reveals. When listening to their music, it takes me back to high school grounds and the chaos that that environment brings.

As the duo is still quite young, just in their early twenties, a lot of their music has to do with their teenage years. In their EP “Taste of Me” both of their favorite song was hands down “Something About Being Sixteen” as it sums up the band pretty well, in addition to it being “a really good singalong song that shows itself; everyone loves it,” Cahli acknowledges.

Teenage Joans has a Spotify playlist called “Taste Of: Taste of Me” that includes songs that inspired their EP. In the playlist is a wide range of artists from Five Seconds of Summer to Lana Del Rey, to Taylor Swift, and so on. I asked the girls how they combine all those musicians into their music. Cahli starts off by saying, “Five Seconds of Summer is definitely our main influence; our joint influence. Then we both kind of stray a little bit. I have a definitely more pop influence. I love Taylor Swift and her songwriting. I think she influences my lyricism and stuff a lot.” Cahli continues by saying how she actually “started playing guitar because of Ed Sheeran.”Tahlia joins into the conversation by commenting how her taste in music is heavier and more pop-punk and emo. Some of her favorite bands are “Mom Jeans, Hot Mulligan, Movements, and definitely Five Seconds of Summer.” Cahli finishes off by saying “it’s like a mosaic. Just adding little pieces together,” in context to how the all their influences meld into the music they create.

This has been the first time the girls made it to the States but they’ve been touring around Australia before then. One of Tahlia’s favorite memories of their career so far is playing at a music festival inWollongong, Australia. The stage had a huge lazy susan spinning them around as they performed. Cahli’s favorite memory is when they played their first ever headline tour in Australia at the end of last year. She mentions, “We pretty much sold out every show and it was really wholesome. Such a beautiful, respectful crowd.

Their favorite place to travel has been Brisbane, Australia, until now. Cahli thinks their new favorite might be Austin, TX. She exclaims, “I love it here. We’ve been spending a lot of time downtown; it’s been really cool.” Tahlia adds, “Everyone’s super nice as well. And the weather, besides today, is really nice. And the air is fresh.” Additionally, the girls have been loving all the vintage shops around town and going to all that they can find, so much so that Cahli exclaims, “we’re just a vintage store now.” And their favorite thing to eat in town: TacoBell. They clarify, “we have it in Australia but just not in Adelaide where we live, so we love having it when we go to different cities.

Teenage Joans’ main bucket list item is to play with Five Seconds of Summer, but other than that they really just want to play music until they can’t anymore.