He keeps the beat for indie rockers Boy & Bear. Now drummer-come-singer-songwriter Tim Hart is going solo.

With brooding lyrics and inherently folk undertones, Hart confesses his debut album, ‘Milling The Wind’, is both a chronicle of his whirlwind career and a glimpse into the isolating life of a travelling musician. “The Boy & Bear stuff has been incredible… but being constantly on the road things happen; stuff back home relationship-wise is tough and so these songs tend to be a reaction to that,” Hart reflects. “It’s an album that I wrote from personal experience and I guess my lyrics are a way of dealing with what I’m going through in life.”

It’s already been described as a dark collection of tunes, but Hart is comfortable wearing his heart on his sleeve. “Some people talk about what they write is in no way relating to what they go through in their lives, but I guess I’m one person who’s always had to write from personal experience and the juicy stuff to write about tends to be the darker end of what happens.

To my close friends, it’s pretty confronting but for me I feel that’s the tradition of singer-songwriters.” Recorded in Cairns last year with The Middle East producer, Mark Myers, at the helm, Hart says ‘Milling The Wind’ encapsulates his love for traditional folk music. “I grew up listening to folk music and I really wanted to do an album that was unashamedly folk, not sort of under the guise of indie folk and I guess we’re pretty stoked with the result.”

Following the tradition of folk icons Simon & Garfunkel, Bob Dylan and Neil Young, Hart’s vision for the album was straightforward. “I think the common denominator with those guys is they sat down and played their songs into a microphone and I feel like I wanted my record to sound like me sitting down and playing my songs into a microphone and hitting record.”

While Hart’s pursuit for a solo music career has been evolving for some time, his roots are still firmly with Boy & Bear, with members of the indie collective lending guest vocals and instrumentals to ‘Milling The Wind.’ “For me, music is about community. I like the idea that whoever is around plays on the record.” ‘Milling The Wind’ is released August 17.

Tim Hart plays Black Bear Lodge September 27 and The Loft, Gold Coast, September 28.