For some of you, you’ve been waiting since 1998 for this day. For others it may have only been a couple of years; even just a couple of months. Either way, a lot of us have been waiting. And with good reason.

When Neutral Milk Hotel dissolved in 1999, they were one of the last true cult bands. They’d released two albums, only one of which gained minor traction. The Internet wasn’t yet in full flight, so unless Triple J played it (they didn’t) or your local Sanity stocked it (they didn’t) it was unlikely you would have heard of them. Not only that, but they played a style of music that had not yet been mimicked or popularised by the next generation of artists — so much of whom pointed us in the NMH direction — so we may not have even loved them, if we had heard them.

But whenever we did finally track down a copy of In The Aeroplane Over The Sea sometime in the last 15 years, from the opening buzzy guitar chords of King Of Carrot Flowers Pt 1, that beautiful piece of art instantly pitched a quaint, slightly off-kilter tent in the middle of our hearts, where it’s remained, unmoved, ever since.

When whispers started a few years ago that Jeff Mangum had finally come to terms with his legacy and was out performing NMH songs again, it was kind of like finding out Santa Claus was real, after years of dismissing it as bullshit. But those whispers turned into conversations and those conversations turned into excited celebrations, until finally, we find ourselves here today, about to experience Neutral Milk Hotel in Sydney for the very first time.

It’s unnerving to imagine what Mangum’s warbling, awkward notes will sound like weaving their way through the rafters of the Enmore Theatre tonight, after all we’re so used to years of hearing it via speakers or headphones. What is thrilling, however, is the thought that those notes will collide mid-air with a thousand mirrored responses, as a theatre full of Sydney-siders, like in theatres and festivals around the world, will sing those stunningly strange words back at Mangum uncontrollably, with joyous tears burning their eyes and smiles torn across their faces.

So, in celebration of Neutral Milk Day in Sydney, we take a moment to remember and reflect on why this band means so much to us and our collective, music-loving being. See/hug you tonight.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=21exnGWN-uI&w=500&h=375]

Originally published on Polaroids of Androids

Aussie hip-hop has an incredibly defined sound.

The okka accent, the bouncy production – a lot of it falls into a very specific mould. And that’s fine – it’s what Aussie hip-hop fans love. But it’s also something that fans of hip-hop in general, particularly fans of American hip-hop, often have trouble swallowing.

Melbourne emcee Remi doesn’t fit that mould. His unique, laconic delivery paired with the soulful production of his collaborators Sensible J and Dutch gives him a truly unique flow in the context of Aussie hip-hop and that individuality is starting to garner him some serious attention.

As well as gaining traction and impressive support slots in Oz with the likes of Joey Bada$$, his song ‘Sangria’ was recently played on the highly influential US music podcast All Songs Considered.

Channel [V]’s Nathan Wood caught up with Remi on the phone recently to discuss getting played on All Songs, his alt hip-hop influences, not fitting into a specific scene, staying independent, and what he hopes his future holds.

[V]: Okay so first I heard of you was on All Songs Considered, which is a fairly massive deal. Has that given you a bit more exposure O.S.? Have you got many other journos contacting you in the aftermath?

Remi: Yeah, like a few. I had actually no idea what the impact of getting played on that podcast would be. The guy that had talked it up hit me up and he was like, “Yo, we’ve considered your song for this podcast and we really like it and we’re going to put it up.” And I was like, “Okay cool,” and I got tagged in these tweets and theytve got like 295,000 Twitter followers, and itts like, “What the fuck is going on?!” [laughs]

And from that, obviously you hit me up and I’ve had a bunch of new fans and people just checking out our stuff so it’s been really cool. Obviously we sound a little different to most other Aussie hip-hop so sometimes it’s hard to find your place here. To get recognition on a global level at any [point] kind of shows you that you’re doing the right thing.

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YNUD19rgB6g?rel=0]

You have a distinctive flow and production style that is fairly unique in the climate of Aussie hip-hop. When I looked at your Unearthed page and saw you cited Phonte and Black Thought as influences – that clicked with me straight away, just based off of listening to you and your flow. But they’re both artists that I’d be surprised there’d be many more emcees in Australia saying they were influenced by. What would you say it was about those artists that you were drawn to and who are some of the other artists you look up to?

I should say that Sensible J and Dutch do all our production, when you’re saying our production sounds quite different as well. When I actually linked up with Sensible J about three years ago, I didn’t have much of an idea about hip-hop in its rawest sense. So, he kind of ran me through all that and I went from liking like pop artists like Cudi and Kanye – even though Kanye’s early stuff is amazing, all those kind of guys from the world I was familiar with, but working with J he went through and [showed me] like you said before Phonte, Black Thought, especially, Mos Def, Common – Like Water For Chocolate album – Outkast’s earlier stuff as well – Andre specifically – all those kind of guys really speak to me because they’re doing something that is very different. Whereas, like Black Thought, Mos – those guys are some of the few rappers that just appear to keep getting better. They don’t get stagnant and fall off, they just keep getting better and better and better. The same with Andre. These guys are just like artists as opposed to hip-hop dudes.

They’re also really intellectual and literal rappers and they’re guys that invest a lot in their craft as much as the phrasing and the shaping of their words and their delivery as emcees. I feel that you’ve already done that with some of your songs that I’ve heard. Is that something you aspire to be? I know they’re called alternate rappers but they’re really “thinking emcees,” I suppose.

Definitely. Especially the next project we’re working on, I’ve started to realise if you make music, you may not blow up in your lifetime but it’s kind of like your imprint’s here. You’ll die, but your music lives on. J Dilla is the perfect example of a person who continues to grow after they’ve passed away. The key for me is to try to make music that will do that. Hopefully that will shine through on our next record. I really want to try and say something that’s relevant.

One of the main reasons is, when we dropped ‘Sangria’ I had no idea what it was going to do, like in Australia or on NPR or any of that stuff. And then some guy hit up my Tumblr and said that he was suicidal but then he heard the song and it made him feel that it was okay to keep living. And I was like, “Damn, that’s some real shit!” That song is about getting high and hanging out with my homies. You know what I mean? It wasn’t meant to do that. But if you can make a song like that, you can have an impact and you can actually say something. What else can it do? It’s the power of music.

I’ll go back to the very start and ask when did you first start rhyming and when did you start thinking about yourself as an emcee?

I’m gonna say 2010, because one of my friends at uni dared me to write a rap and I did and it was real shit. [laughs] But he was like, “Yo man that was real good.” And I really enjoyed it and so I kept writing and it was still very terrible, like I’m sure some stuff will surface in the future of how bad I used to be. [laughs] And I met Sensible J and he was like, “Yo, this is all my beats,” and I was like, “Wow, this doesn’t really sound like anything that I’ve ever heard before,” and he was like, in a matter of words, “If you wanna hang out, we could do something,” and that’s where we’re at now.

And how did you guys initially come together?

Luckily. [laughs]

I worked with his girlfriend at General Pants, who’s also one of my very good friends – I worked with her and she played an album that he’d done with N’Fa Jones from 1200 Techniques. I heard it and I remember going, “Damn, this stuff is crazy.” So I hustled him by inviting his girlfriend over to dinner, with him. [laughs] He was like, “Yeah, cool. Let’s do some stuff.” That’s kind of how it happened.

Have you deliberately crafted your style to be different from other local emcees or has this all come naturally?

I think it honestly just happened. I definitely didn’t want to sound like anything else and now, especially if you try and make trend music, like anything that’s already happened, by the time you hear it and record it, mix it and get all the stuff done and release it, it’s already a month to a year old. You’ve already lost. So, if you make your own style of music, you can’t really lose because it hasn’t really been done.

We are just strongly influenced by stuff that we like and the stuff that we like may not have been on a huge platform yet or never reached a huge platform. I am from a different country to all the dudes I listen to and so it sounds different anyway. I’m not trying to sound over-Aussie, I’m just trying to sound like me.

That being said, Aussie hip-hop fans – they like what they like. It’s a fairly generic style at times. Have you found it hard to connect with audiences here because your style is so much different to other local hip-hop?

I think some people are very “Aussie hip-hop – there’s a way to do it and there’s a way that it should be and if you don’t sound like that, then you can fuck off.” But I’ve found that most of the time we go down with musical audiences. I supported Nai Palm from Hiatus Kaiyote at Northcote Social Club maybe three weeks ago and that crowd was amazing. Like, appreciative of us for what we were. And when we play a festival it will be the same thing – people who love music will tend to like our stuff more. We’re not trying to fit in to an Aussie hip-hop scene. I think a “scene” is bullshit. Music is music and if you like it, you like it. If you don’t, whatever. You can have your own genre.

It can be a bit difficult at times, but we will always do our thing, no matter what. If people like it – if we turn five people out of a 1000 people, they like your stuff, so that’s a positive.

You put out a mixtape earlier this year. What’s your current label status? Are you signed with anyone or are you operating independently?

We’re actually just self-managed and independent as possible. We want to keep it as independent as possible at home. We just want to try and go as far as we can by ourselves and we feel like we’ve done a pretty good job so far. We’re happy with ourselves when it comes to management, but when it comes to labels, unless you’ve got a huge fanbase and it’s totally out of your control – I think it’s just money that you’re losing.

After having a song featured on All Songs Considered, do you think there could potentially be a chance you might move to America in the future and have a crack at the market over there?

I think at the end of the day it makes everything so much easier being on the internet – you can make a footprint. I don’t know if America is the place for us because, again, hip-hop is a very gated community over in the states. They like American hip-hop. They can understand their struggle and I can comfortably say I haven’t been to a ghetto. I went to a private school and shit growing up.

If I were to make it over there I’d be amazed and honoured because people over there would be inspired by and feel our shit. I would say Europe is where we want to head off to because it’s just another place that appreciates music for what it is. That’s where Dilla was getting his first stuff played and Japan and places that were outside of the States. He’d do a European tour and people would just love him. You see videos of the J. Dilla nights over there and it’s just wild. I fell like Europe is the best bet. If we can make it in the hometown – that would be amazing. But we’ll just have to see.

Originally published on vmusic.com.au

Continued on from Part 1…

In this part of our conversation with the legendary Sex Pistols and Public Image Ltd front man about his difficult relationship with the media (“It’s like a very bad marriage”), his memories of PiL’s last Australian tour (“just staring up at how many stars you have in your sky”), and the state of modern music (“Green Day are a real problem to me”).

MAX:  The new album, This Is PiL,  has been critically and fan lauded around the world  – has that been validating?

JL: [laughs] It makes a pleasant change from when we first started, where it was almost catastrophic negativity from the press and a very, very deep resentment. But then again, you know, that’s what the Pistols had to endure, that’s exactly what the early PiL had to endure and I suppose if you had the staying power and the stamina to survive all of the problems that are put in front of you and all of the hindrances and stumbling blocks, well, then it is genuine and it really doesn’t matter what anyone has to say negatively speaking because they’re just wasting their breath. They might as well just stop that nonsense and start really listening. Maybe that’s what’s happening now. People are actually beginning to listen.

MAX:  You’ve had a difficult relationship with the media at times…

JL: Thrilling though! It’s like a very bad marriage one you don’t want to leave because it’s so entertainingly exciting and you’re never quite prepared for the next ugly comment. Sometimes in life we are attracted to the insulting side of things and a relationship with the media is definitely doing that.

MAX:  Do you think you get more respect from the media these days than in the past? Do you feel they show more respect for your contribution to music?

JL: I don’t know. Do you remember that old comedian Rodney Dangerfield?

MAX:  I do, yes.

JL: [In a Rodney Dangerfield voice] “I can’t get no respect!” [laughs]. I thought that was one of the best lines ever! The thing is you’ve got to go beyond that. It really isn’t all abouit getting respect from pen pushers. It’s “Have your audience left the building happy?” And invariably, with PiL now, that is the case. They leave well content.

MAX:  What was the process for building the band’s live performance before the tour? Was there a lot of rehearsing?

JL: Mostly live. Once I got down to the basic, bare bones of the song we were then fully prepared to go risk it on stage and we did that for nearly two years – to the point now where the songs take on lives of their own on stage. But the interplay and understanding between us is very, very close. Very well attuned. No-one will let anyone else down. It’s a very warm band. There’s no egos. There’s no-one deliberately playing a bum chord so the singer sounds out of key.

MAX:  Have you noticed the music evolve through the last couple of years?

JL: Yeah and it’s a great, fun thing when you can mix the old with the new and explain it as a story. It’s almost like theatre, really – the way a PiL set evolves. One song definitely leads to another and into another and they’re all pieces of the jigsaw puzzle. The more you see PiL the more you will understand that.

MAX:  The last PiL tour to Australia was 20 years ago. Do you have any memories of that tour?

JL: Oddly enough little scenarios and vinegarettes. Vignettes, sorry – I was talking salad there for a second [laughs]. Just what a beautiful country Australia was and is and will hopefully always be. My fondest memory of Australia was going out into the desert one night and just staring up at how many stars you have in your sky – and how polluted the west is and what a tragedy we live in here, compared to what you have there. You actually can see nature as people did thousands of years ago – a sky full of stars at night. You look at that and you pay attention to that and that’s of course why the Egyptians built the pyramids – that was the worship of nature and nothing to do with UFOs.

MAX:  I’ve read a few interviews where you talk about your appreciation of nature – is that something that’s grown in you in the last few years and is that something that is becoming something that influences you more creatively?

JL: It all seems to have spring boarded for me really well ever since I did that I’m A Celebrity, Get Me Out Of Here! Thing, which by the way I did for charity only and I raised a considerable amount of money for charities doing it. But I loved being in that little jungle! Wondering around and just sorting things out and not seeing that life is a problem. It was exciting and thrilling for me. It was camping at Christmas. I took it from there and went into doing a whole bunch of nature programs and some of them were TV series, which ended up in the British school curriculum, so that school kids would not be afraid of spiders and creepy crawlies if they new the full content of them. Explaining all of this – not with huge Latin words but, “That’s a Violin Spider. That’s a Huntsman.” You know, just being logical. Not talking down, talking with. I loved it! Loved it! I did a thing on gorillas in Africa and I got my diving license in South Africa, so that I could go out and swim with great white sharks and found it absolutely thrilling.

MAX:  Do you think you’ll have time in Australia to get involved in some of those endeavours?

JL: No, I don’t know. The time is so short and money dictates. I arrive the day before and I’ve got three gigs in a row – Brisbane, Sydney, Melbourne. That involves travel, so time off doesn’t really happen for fellas like me. I’ve never been afforded the luxury of large festivals with millions of pounds floating around in my back pocket. You know, where you can do one gig a week and then go off jet skiing somewhere. I’d love that but that hasn’t happened. I live in Los Angeles – I’ve got an ocean outside my front door and when I want I go diving. I used to like all of the sports that were on top of the water but I think as my life’s  progressed and of course my work experience led to it, I now appreciate it much better deep under the water.

MAX:  I wanted to ask you about punk music, obviously. You’re one of the few artists that is an icon in the sense that your image and your very first band heavily influenced an entire musical genre. Has that been a difficult weight to carry throughout your career – having things that you said and things that you did in your late teens in the Sex Pistols still being applied to your music today and your career and identity today?

JL: I was kind of lucky that I landed fully loaded in the Pistols and I already and the ability to write. So,  I transferred what I was writing and my story lines into songs, and my targets then were always political institutions or defending the disenfranchised. These were things that mattered to me. Because I come from the slums and I’m always on the lookout for my working class folk. That’s my roots. It’s still in me. It’s why I write the way I write.

But I progressed with PiL and I could explore my own problems as well. I could internalise and put that out in a song and hopefully find that that was helping other people think about themselves.

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Ah1JM9mf60]

MAX:  When you talk to fans do you find that they relate to PiL’s music and to you as an artist in PiL completely differently to the Sex Pistols?

JL: There are some that are there all the way through but there are others that only like this section of PiL or that section. But for me they’re the best part of a gig. The gig is exceptional when afterwards I go outside and say hello to people. The autograph signing moment. It’s much more so than signing those little bits of paper, it’s those little conversations that are really, really remarkable and you take them with you and it makes you a better person. There’s no two ways about it. It’s also a risky thing to do because, you know, for every 100 people that turn up with good intentions there’s always the one “Mr Jealousy” there. And you have to watch yourself and watch your back while doing it, while trying to be as open and natural as possible – you have to assume a defensive posture, and that’s unfortunate about life all over. But for me that’s also song writing material because it’s part of the nature of what we are as a species. We come from the Garden of Eden and we’re fully loaded with the Seven Deadly Sins.

MAX:  Do you think that is part of your artisitic process as well – almost like the final stage whe you actually engage with fans and they give you direct feedback?

JL: That happens now a lot in the gigs. I can sense the moods and motives of an audience. It will drive me into different tangents, different areas, different angles and the superb intuition that goes on between all of us on stage. It was remarkable that we found Scott (Firth – PiL bassist) for this too because he fitted in so quickly, so what would have been a nightmare, I suppose, to tour other musicians out there – but that intuition, that ability to shape shift the song according to the pulse, the immediate feedback of an audience to a song – it really what this is and should be all about with PiL. I don’t see much of that happening with any of it out there at the moment. There’s no elaborate light show or dancing or any of that – and who needs that?! I’m really kind of repulsed by the “Las Vegas productions” that are travelling the world at the moment. Unfortunately most of the from an American origin.

MAX:  You’ve also said that punk music has lost its way and a lot of the time it’s just imitating itself…

JL: No. A lot of what now call themselves “punk” have lost their way. They weren’t paying proper attention to the original message of, “Get up and do it for yourself!” That meant being true and honest. That did not mean absorbing a uniform and joining what became a cult.

A lot of it morphed into a kind of negative violence and a resentment of anything different. The whole idea for us right from the start, was to absolutely be open minded to difference – to change.

MAX:  Do you see that ideal of punk in any other form of music that’s around today or any other artists?

JL: I’m not particularly looking for it but I know for me, from the very first onset of writing in the Pistols onwards, I’ve carried that sense of ethics, that sense of values and I’ve never swayed from them. I don’t do nothing just for the money.

MAX:  Is there any modern music that you enjoy or that excites you?

JL: I’m the kind of fella that can enjoy anybody’s work but when I hear something that sounds so completely taken from something else without any understanding, of course that’s going to raise the hackles at the back of my neck. Green Day are a real problem to me. They grab the huge audience and they’re promoting this punk ethos that they do not understand! It’s terrible. To me it’s like coat hangers with studded leather jackets hanging on them.

MAX:  You’ve done tours with various different acts over a long period of time – how does this current “This Is PiL” tour rate in comparison?

JL: It’s been harder because of the money constraints and trying to start again after a nearly two decade interval. I mean that’s an uphill climb anyway you look at it.

MAX:  Do you think this is a learning curve for what PiL will have to deal with in the next few years if you’re going to continue like you’ve planned?

JL: Oh, I hope so and that is no bad thing at all. Every now and again you deserve your knock backs and you’ve got to be able to get up and dust yourself off and start all over again!

MAX:  What can Australian fans expect for these upcoming PiL shows?

JL: Full on enjoyment. You will be pleasantly surprised and you will be full on entertained and you’ll feel responsible about the world, hopefully with a bit of luck when you leave the theatre. You’ll see that it can be done, that you can take on the system –  the shitstem as we know it – and you can actually win! If you’re looking for a flash lifestyle, don’t be bothering with us.

Originally published on MAXTV.com.au

When you speak to John Lydon, it’s impossible to imagine that he was silenced for almost two decades.

The former Sex Pistols front man and current Public Image Ltd (PiL) leader is famous for his ability to wax lyrical about almost every and any topic. The only time that springs to mind that he’s been actively audibly hushed was during a particularly hilarious appearance on US reality court room show, Judge Judy – and even that didn’t last for more than a few seconds.

But for almost two decades Lydon was kept quiet – forced to sit on the creative sidelines as financial woes and restrictive record deals prevented him from releasing new music. The punk and post-punk icon forged ahead, however, using gigs in radio, TV and as the face of a succesful UK butter commercial to raise the funds necessary to break his record label chains, reform PiL, release a new album (2012’s This Is PiL) and tour the world again as a free musician.

We had a lengthy phone conversation (the only kind we think you could or would ever want to have with the infinitely clever and charming Lydon) about that forced hiatus from releasing music (“a terrible period”), hating the word “experimental” (“it implies assholes that can’t quite fix their car”), the state of the modern music industry (“the internet is a bit vacuous really and it hasn’t answered all of the problems”) and why this current PiL line-up is the best band he’s ever worked with.

The following is part one of our chat, with part two set to be released tomorrow.

MAX: You’ve said that you were kept from releasing new music with PiL because of financial constraints and record deals that were in place. I wanted to start off by asking how did you get into those contracts and deals to begin with?

JL: It was an off shoot of the Pistols, where the label took up the option for anything I went into, there in after, and I started PiL. It was great at the time because I had a record deal but as the music from PiL started to evolve, there were some raised eyebrows in the offices of the record labels. One thing led to another and it just all piled up into one huge animosity and no financial backing and they wouldn’t release me from the label. They used the term, “recoupment,” [laughs]. You know, you can’t raise the money if they’re not going to release the records. So it was a Catch 22 really. That was a puzzlement to me because for nearly two decades they kept me under that kind of pressure, so I had to make career moves outside of music in order to raise the money. So, what I did was I went into radio work first and then TV and slowly but surely, one thing led to another and along came a wonderful advertising campaign for butter in Britain and with that money I was able to put some against the outstanding debt and reform PiL.

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7mSE-Iy_tFY]

MAX:  Seeing as you were successful in funding this record independently, do you think that in the future you may pursue something like a Kickstarter, crowd-sourcing campaign in order to fund a record?

JL: No, I don’t like those kind of amalgamations. I don’t trust who’s running it, I don’t know who’s running it, and I don’t really know what it’s all about. The last place I want to find myself is under the heavy manners of unions, and that’s what those things become. It’s like joining a tenants association. You’re under the guise and rules of the greater body and the “greater good” and that can be very disruptive if you’re creative.

MAX: You’ve promised, now that your less burdened by financial obligations you were forced to adhere to in the past, that PiL will be releasing records, “at a far quicker pace.” Do you have a strategy in place for when those records will come out?

JL: Yeah, live performance. We need the audiences to maintain this even keel. I can’t guarantee audiences – audiences have to supply themselves. But if the demand is out there for honest music done from the heart and soul, well PiL’s here, ready and waiting! From my point of view, I’ve often been copied, imitated but never surpassed. I’ve never done anything musically in my entire life that’s ever been a copy or a version of anyone else. So there’s the deal folks! You get what you ask for with John.

MAX:  PiL is a band that’s constantly reinterpreting their sound, from record to record. Are you constantly looking for new artitistic inspiration?

JL: Yeah, to me a band is a joint effort. And the same goes for the other members. The reason I wanted so much to work with Lu (Edmonds – PiL guitarist) and Bruce (Smith – PiL drummer) – who have been in PiL before, was because they were personality wise much easier to get on with and understand in any situation. You have to be able to run a smooth bus and it’s no good hiring the best musicians because you won’t get the best results. What you’ll get then is a clash of egos and assumptions and I’m really not in the industry for that.

MAX:  Is this then the best line-up you’ve worked with as PiL?

JL: I think ever! In any band that I’ve ever been in – yes. You must bare in mind that when I first started and all the way through the early days of PiL, I just natuirally assumed that bands don’t get on and don’t like each other because that’s just the way it seemed to be. So this has been a learning process, where I’m actually trying it from the reverse angle, where we actually do really respect and like each other and we’re finding that the workload is therefore infinitely more preferable.

MAX:  So you find you share much more of a camaraderie with the band now?

JL: Oh yeah, total. Completely. We’ve toured for almost two solid years. Traveling on tour busses you have to be able to get on with the people and them with you and that really all about the right blend of personalities. I’ve always said that, mostly out of wish. But now the desire has turned into a reality.

MAX:  When I was reading reviews of this record, a word that continued to pop up was “experimental”… 

JL: It’s a dower word that, isn’t it. It’s a bad word. It implies assholes that can’t quite fix their car [laughs]. It’s not like that. It’s the subject matter that leads the sound and tone of the overall song. You have to have sounds that accompany the emotions I’m trying to describe accurately. I mean, I love writing. I would have loved to have been a writer when I was young but I’ve found the written word is somewhat limiting. But when I combine that with music, it becomes something else. Whereas I don’t think music on its own quite achieves its goal either – but the two combined gives you an infinite garden to dwell in. And it’s not seasonal! It’s all year round this way.

MAX:  Is it almost a badge of honour though that reviewers and critics have to use words like “experimental” to apply to your music because they can’t quite find a place or a time or a context to place it?

JL: You could take it that way. There are times where I used that angle with the press. But generally speaking it’s always upset me because it shouldn’t be that way. I don’t do any of this for pretentious reasons – it’s too fucking expensive! The way I’ve gone about my life is outside of the norm. I can’t help that. It seems to always be that way and it seems to be necessary. I’m so happy to be away from the constrictions of record labels.

MAX:  Is music your sole focus and career again now. You’re not going to be returning to TV gigs anytime soon?

JL: It’s what I think I was naturally born and intended to do. It seems to be the thing that I do the best. I mean, I can operate in other fields, somewhat artistically, but when you’re songwriting, as I was trying to say earlier, it’s from the heart and the soul. It’s a genuine thing. You’re not fabricating a mythology in a song. You’re trying to tell it as you experience it – life, and how you come grips with it. And of course, because it’s honest songwriting, all the warts are there too, all the faults and phobias in me and I have to deal with them accurately. My band know that and they know that about me and we know that about each other. The songs are not just me internalising, it’s about everybody’s experiences. A huge amount of time is spent talking on the tour bus for instance, which for us is our preparation for a new recording. The songs are already grounded mentally in solid good reason and when that unfolds with instruments and microphones put in front of us, this is what happens. This is PiL!

MAX:  You often speak from the heart and you obviously create art from the heart, do you find that being so close to your emotions you feel you are really good at reading people and finding inspiration in situations where others wouldn’t?

JL: Well, I think the more you learn about yourself in life the more forgiving you are of others. It’s a fair trade. It can be quite painful though because I open myself up here, particularly live or the making of any record at all. You’re opening yourself up for criticism and you have to always be aware that the lowest common denominator will always be out there wanting to stick a knife in your back. It’s how you come to grips with that. Of course, in the very early years I would’ve been defensive but you learn not to be – you learn to take the blows, much like a boxer has to.

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h3UEQv2hsCI]

MAX:  You were forced to sit on the sidelines creatively…

JL: Yeah, a terrible period, but I didn’t go into self pity. I didn’t become a drug riddled idiot.

MAX:  Were there times that you thought your career might be over? 

JL: Yeah. All the way through it.

MAX:  Was that an incredibly frustrating period?

JL: Yeah. Career isn’t one of the words that I would be using. It was that I had no outlet musically.

MAX:  Do you think you could have made this record without that period of frustration and that forced break?

JL: Probably not. I had to learn to have more patience than a hospital and maybe that’s a good thing. I’m here, aren’t I? I’m hardly going to complain.

MAX:  During that time, however, you did have a front row seat to the demise of the structure of the music industry.

JL: Yeah, on one side of me of course there was the spiteful, going, “Ha, ha, ha! Told ya so!” But on the other side was a real sadness because of what record companies used to offer new and exciting bands. They offered them a safety net. You could be thrilling, you could experiment and you’d have backing. But as they slowly but surely handed over all their power to their accounting departments, that’s where the problems began. They gave up long term viewpoints and just went for instant success. That’s when the idea of, “Why don’t you write a hit single?” seemed to me to be the most offensive thing you could say to me. Because, you know, as abstract or different as my music is, it’s always been there! And every style I’ve introduced to the wonderful world of music has definitely been co-opted into everyone else’s agenda.

I miss the good sides of the labels. I certainly miss the staff. I never had bad relationships with the general people that were doing the work. It was always the people that run it from a distance that created the problem. The accountants! Accountants are basically lawyers without imaginations.

MAX:  What do you think of the current industry then – in terms of there may not be the same kinds of record sales but your music may have a further reach with the internet. What’s your opinion on the current set up of the industry?

JL: The internet is a bit vacuous really and it hasn’t answered all of the problems. In fact it’s created newer ones. If you download from the internet, it does not have the quality that a piece of vinyl can give you. I’d settle for just CDs if I had to. I certainly don’t want to go into downloads as being the only source of modern music because you are cheating the listener. There’s so much going on in the studio that goes into the grooves, why would we want that eliminated? Just so you can sell it on the internet?

Now we went to a great deal of trouble just making downloads possible [for This Is PiL] by guaranteeing the maximum potential – and that cost us. And that cuts into, obviously, profits, but we’re PiL and we’ll do that. But ultimately, I want an audience to have available the best musical response possible, to fully comprehend what we do and how we combine the depths of bass with the highs of treble and the textures and tones we create there inside. Otherwise it’s like listening to a tinny radio. That’s all the internet offers me, is a tinny radio racket.

MAX:  Was it a thrilling experience for you to be back in the studio with PiL?

JL: Yeah, very frightening though. The fear of letting everyone down, letting myself down, letting an audience down. But, you know, you have to smile and you have to put faith in your abilities and trust in what this is all about in the end anyway. This is what I wanted to do and I found myself in a position of being actually scared to begin the process. But joy of joys, so did everyone in the band. We all looked at each other the first day after setting up all the equipment and microphones and said, “What the fuck are we going to do now?” Ouch! Well, you know, we got drunk and moved on. Sometimes alcohol is wonderful!

MAX:  Do you think being scared during that process may have brought out an honesty in the songwriting that may not have been there without it?

JL: I think it’s the same thing I feel before I go on stage. It’s a stage fright, but it gives you an amazing energy. If you can just conquer the fear and get over that little stumbling block it’s then a wonderful universe. But it’s that initial process leading up to it – and before I go on stage I’m usually just such a bad bag of nerves that I can’t eat or drink anything because I’ll upchuck it almost straight away. I go into – I don’t know – almost mild depression. I can’t converse with anyone, I can’t be sociable, I just sit in the dark in silence.

MAX: And what does it feel like once you’re actually out on stage?

JL: Fantastic! Yippee! It was worth it! But every single time is painful to go through that and then the experience of – well – the release of being a human being free of ego. Free of any of the problems, the calamities that you spend so desperately long beforehand worried about. For me, it’s a real nightmare being an egomaniac about this. So, I’m constantly re-checking myself, analysing myself and making sure that that’s my motivation or driving force. I’m not doing this to pamper my ego, there’s something far more serious in me and always at the back of my mind is not wanting to let people down – but in particular the memory of my parents and my friends that are still living or dead. I can’t let them down. It has  to be the truth, the whole truth and nothing but.

Originally published on MAXTV.com.au

The last time I saw Tex Perkins before our current phone interview, he was on stage in front of an unresponsive, bordering on hostile crowd at one of Australia’s biggest country music festivals, CMC Rocks The Hunter.

“Afterwards, for days and weeks on Facebook and social media, there was an onslaught of the “true believers,” the true country people/fans. The attitude was, “You’re not country, you’re shit.” I always knew the country scene was a real kind of closed shop. I’ve been playing this “urban country” thing for 30 years, on and off. But ya ain’t fooling them. It’s nowhere near enough country for those people.”

It’s humbling to hear that despite having over three decades of experience as a frontman for a revolving cast of players, Perkins, one of Australian music’s most respected band leaders, is still aware of his limitations and that his music may not be for everyone.

“I think if we ever did something like that again, I’d be fully aware we were just there to annoy people.”

That disarming, honest straight talk has been winning Tex respect from fans, critics and interviewers since the 80s, no matter the musical vehicle he’s steering, whether it be Beasts Of Bourbon, The Cruel Sea or the subject of our discussion today, The Dark Horses and their new album Everyone’s Alone.

From the outset Perkins openly admits that he may not be totally prepared to answer every question I’ll have for him today, including my first question about the provocative title of the new record and what it was about that name that the band felt suited the title track and the title of the record as a whole?

“That’s a very good question. I don’t have a definitive answer, but I’ll struggle. First interview of the day and you’ve hit me with a beauty. If we were going to have a feature song, that was probably the one for it to be. That’s probably the one that’s the most concise song on the record and I think the art work and the various ideas of what the album should be called – it just seemed to fit with the artwork. I think the album is large in its scope. There seems to be a lot of wide open spaces in this record and Everyone’s Alone seems to be thought provoking.”

Perkin’s description of the record is fitting. Revelling in the “urban country” style that he’s built upon throughout his career (particularly with the Dark Horses), the album ebbs, flows and echoes into a shadowy darkness, like you’re driving along an eerie, outback road in the middle of the night, with only the car headlights and stars in the sky illuminating the road ahead.

The record waltzes from song to song with each track varying in style and pace, but all seemingly connected by the murky darkness that drifts throughout the album’s entirety – something Perkins attributes to the writing and recording process.

“This record really came together over a short space of time and therefore the songs are of a time and they all seem to have a connection to each other. They all seem to come together, to come from a similar place in time. And even though it’s fairly eclectic – there’s a bit of a roller coaster through the whole record – but I do see a thread through the whole thing.”

It’s that common thread weaving its way in and out of the themes and the sounds on the album that, Perkins admits, lends itself to being a heartbeat away from being a conceptual piece.

“It feels like almost a concept album in your classic sort of Pink Floyd, prog rock sort of fashion. I’m not sure what the concept is, but it’s like an album struggling to be a concept album. There’s probably a few ideas in there that if I had a little bit more bullshit in me I could paint a conceptual picture for you.”

The album’s lyrical themes also link the tracks together, with recurring notions about day to day existence in both life and relationships. Perkins says such lyrics are not related to his own life, but emerged from a subconscious narrative he developed throughout the album’s improvisational recording process.

“I’m a subconscious lyric writer most of the time. Especially with stuff like this. A lot of times I just open up my mouth  –  I’ve just got to have the courage to open up my mouth and start letting things out. Sometimes  you do that with “non-words” so that you can get phrasing and melodies, and sometimes they actually are words and sometimes, once you’ve established the melody and the phrasing, then you’ll go back and write proper words.

“But a lot of these lyrics came straight from the depth of my subconscious into my laptop. There was a bit of cut and paste and fixing up things afterwards, but essentially it’s direct from the subconscious. I’m not even sure what some of these songs are really about.”

That uncertainty of the meaning behind his words doesn’t leave Perkins concerned, however, as he says he finds more comfort in the way the audience relates to the images and the stories painted within the music than any interpretation or context that he can apply himself.

“I don’t really get a true perspective on my work until much later anyway – till the dust settles and you can just see it for what it really is. Also, I believe what may seem meaningless to me finds meaning with the listener.

“I’m not dogmatic at all about what my songs or my music is about. I’ve been fascinated over the years with what people have come back at me with what they interpreted of songs and what they’ve meant for them in their lives. And with that knowledge I guess I’ve semi-deliberately left out a lot of details that pin things down. Sometimes in a song you put in many details and colour and describe a whole setting and paint a picture. Sometimes I leave things deliberately vague so that all manner of interpretation is possible.”

It’s that free-form, making-decisions-on-the-run ethos that seems to have guided the Dark Horses through the entire recording process of Everyone’s Alone, from the music, to the lyrics, to the title – even the cover artwork.

“I think we got to a stage where we were like, “Oh we need artwork. Okay…” and everyone started throwing ideas around – pictures back and forth. I just started going through a bunch of pictures that my partner Christina had taken and that is a shot from New Zealand. It’s an interesting sort of combination of baron land in the foreground and beautiful mountains in the far distance. Basically, you just go with whatever works. You just slap it all together and go, “Yeah that works!” You don’t really want to spend a lot of time deliberating over these things, just like we don’t with the music. The music comes flowing out freely and I guess all the other aspects of the presentation should too.”

And as much as Everyone’s Alone feels like a midnight journey, it seems like the first thing appearing on the horizon for the Dark Horses is yet another record, as they enter into the dawning of what Perkins describes as one of the most creative periods in the band’s career.

“I feel like we’re on a bit of a roll, so I’m actually looking forward to starting work on another one as soon as possible.”

Originally published on MAXTV.com.au

Can you just “decide” to be happy? Through all the trials and tribulations of day-to-day life: work, family, health, money – is it possible to just make a conscious decision to remain happy despite whatever problems and burdens you may face? That was the question Clare Bowditch posed to herself and it’s a question that ultimately inspired her new album, The Winter I Chose Happiness.

After spending time on an inspiring tour with Canadian music legend, Leonard Cohen, Bowditch embarked on a quest to discover what the true meaning of happiness was with help from friends and experts, and as well as a new perspective on life in general, emerged from her journey with a great new record in tow.

We caught up with Bowditch in the middle of her current national tour to talk about how that tour with Leonard Cohen affected her so deeply, what it’s like to debut a song on a high rating TV show, and what it’s like to crack into the pop charts this far on in her career.

Your tour with Leonard Cohen a couple of years ago had a big impact on you as an artist and as a person and how you went about making this new album. What can you tell me about that experience and how it affected you?

Well what it did was it was basically hanging out with him after for a month, so it was like seeing and being reminded of what is possible when you contribute your lifetime to creativity and to art and to excellence. You don’t neceesery follow popular trends you just keep contributing the best work that you can. But more than that it was more about the experience of seeing someone who has really sort his whole life for happiness and is finding it. His songs are in that vein, he was really someone who contributed and gave himself to his audience.

I still didn’t know at that stage though that the theme of the album would be happiness. That really only happened when I sat down on a piano stool next to my friend Wally, otherwise known as Gotye, and we started writing a song called are you ready yet. I sang the words, “Are you ready yet..” he sang the words, “… to be happy?” We had a conversation that morning about that very thing and then the theme became kind of apparent. At first I thought it was a little bit too soft – how can you actually create art if you’re not suffering. But I found a way.

How long have you been working on this latest album, The Winter I Chose Happiness?

Two years.

And was that time writing and whittling down songs or did you spend a liot of time in the studio figuring things out? How did the process work?

The way my life normally works is that a key to continuing to create is continuing to be inspired and that often means opening yourself up to some risks and some influences. So I did quite a bit of co-writing this time with a whole gang of different friends – some famous people, some not famous people. It was just about getting in a room and trying new things. But I also like to do a lot of research on my “things.” In the past my “things” have been grief, and addiction for the last time, but for this one I ended up doing a lot of reading and a lot of research and a lot of interviewing people on the topic and the question of happiness and whether it was possible to choose and those people ranged from Stephanie Dowrick and Dr Robert Holden to books like The Brain That Changes Itself to neuroscience studies and also anything that people tipped me on to. So, all my friends were aware I was sort of on this quest to find out whether or not it was possible to choose happiness. The point is that was the first real journey and it kind of filtered out in its own way to the album. But this is certainly not a “self-help” album, it is an album that supports people and hopefully inspires them – but it’s also quite real.

The first single from the album, ‘You Make Me Happy,’ debuted on the show you appear onOffspring. What was it like to launch a single in that format? As a musician you’re probably more used to people gradually hearing your work through the radio or CD or the internet but in this case you had something like 800,000 people hear it all at once. Was it nerve racking delivering it in that way knowing you would get an instant response?

It was actually exciting to do it in that way because I’m not the kind of artist who’s ever had any relationship with commercial radio. I’ve had a lot of support from a lot of people over the years but to release to that many people was really fun. The song was written specifically for Offspring. I knew I was free to write a different kind of a song – possibly a more popular sounding kind of a song – because it’s more of my character, Rosanna’s journey. But ironically of course it meant that it was my highest ever charting single, which made it a pretty delightful way to release a single.

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5-sF1HpAcf0]

Was that a strange experience for you? You’ve had so many accolades, to finally crack the top 40, what was that experience like? 

It was just more funny than anything. My last album we cracked the top 10 with Modern Day Addiction. I’m not the kind of artist that ever expected these things to be a part of my career but it’s always lovely because more people are getting to hear what you’re singing about which is important to me.

The video for ‘You Make Me Happy’ is out now too and it’s shot beautifully. What is the idea behind the concept of the video, it seems to suggest the character you play in it is part of a relationship that has ended or is sick of the situation they’re in. Can you elaborate on what the idea was behind that?

The last few years I’ve been working with a film maker named Kess Broekman-Dattner and we just discussed the themes of the song and his interpretation was that there was a bit of disturbed spirit in the house. The song itself talks about happiness but it’s actually quite a melancholy song. And strangely one of the houses that came up as a possible location was the house that Nina and Patrick lived in Offspring, so that ended up being where we shot the song because it was actually written about the characters.

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b6jLkJYh3Vs]

You’re on the national tour now in support of the album, how is it to be playing live again?

It’s awesome! I’ve never stopped, actually, I’ve kind of toured constantly, but it’s nice to have a very, big chunk of touring – two months of weekends set aside, featuring this new band. It’s a really dynamic show; very humorous; a lot of connection with the audience. A lot of people come to my show and say they’ve never been to a show like it. I will be touring less in the future –  next year I’m launching Big Hearted Business, which is basically an online creative business mentorship that discusses creative intelligence and how right brain thinkers can gain the skills that they need to have a long, rich, creative career in Australia, so I would say that this is one of the last opportunities for at least a year to see me with a big band.

Originally published on MAXTV.com.au

For bands that are fortunate enough to survive 20 years, it’s rare that their later albums match the creative quality of their earlier work. Nada Surf defy that trend. Celebrating two decades together this year, they’ve just released their seventh, critically acclaimed album, The Stars are Indifferent to Astronomy, and it’s a cracker!

I spoke to the band’s frontman and chief songwriter, Matthew Caws, about the recording process for the new record, how his band have managed to survive 20 years together, and how fans that have followed their whole career are now bringing their kids to shows. 

NW: I’ve been listening to this album for a few weeks now and it’s got a great energy. What was the recording process for this record?

MC: It was different to the last few. We’ve really made an effort to have the songs ready to go. For the last couple of records the songs haven’t been totally finished before going into the studio, and that’s an exciting way to work but not ideal, it’s very stressful.

But when we made this covers record a few years ago called If I Had A Hi Fi, I noticed we played more like we do on stage or in the practice space, which is pretty free and a little bit faster and a little bit rockier. And I noticed that because we hadn’t been done with the songs in the studio on the last couple of records we were playing them really carefully just because we were thinking the whole time.

So this time I really made an effort to have it all finished. I just worked on 10 [songs] instead of working on 25 unfinished things. And so we recorded five days of basic tracking near our practice space which is an old apartment in Brooklyn. We didn’t have to check the metronome or anything. We were like, “We know how this feels, let’s go!” And Chris Shaw the producer on this record is so fast it felt a little bit more like a gig in a weird way, with that kind of rush of performing.

It’s an interesting album title, The Stars Are Indifferent To Astronomy, what’s the story behind it?

Well, that’s actually an expression of my dad’s. He’s a philosophy professor and that’s a thing he’s said a few times in class over the years to make a point to his students about our insignificance. He said something like “A dog doesn’t know it’s a dog; a bird doesn’t know we call it a bird; the stars and the planets don’t know that we gave them names – and it really doesn’t matter to them.” And it struck a chord with me on a lot of levels. On an interpersonal level – you know either in life or in relationships or in relationship to our own lives I think we sometimes like to think that because we believe something that it’s true. You know, that we can think something into being – and we can’t. It also, for whatever reason I don’t understand, makes me think about the environment and that climate change is indifferent to your belief or disbelief in it. It makes me think that people that don’t believe that it is happening and/or  that we have some part in it, aren’t gonna be phased by that belief when things get weird.

It’s interesting that you say that because it feels like what you’re saying now has transferred over lyrically to the album as well. There seems to be an underlying sense of nostalgia and an awareness of change throughout the songs.

That’s very true. Like, missing the world that we have now and imagining that we might not always have it. It’s more about that than age – it’s funny, I think because of ‘Teenage Dreams’ and ‘When I was young’ – I always sort of sang about childhood or the past. There’s still a lot of that but I think it’s just pulled back a little bit and other things jump out more.

You guys have had a 20 year career now, during a period of great shifts in the music industry, as both a major label and an indie label band – how have you guys managed to stay afloat and successful for all this time?

We certainly had some rocky times at the beginning but it’s actually been pretty peaceful for the last almost 10 years where we’ve just been on the same labels and just kind of been able to concentrate on the simple things like make up songs, make records, try to play shows and not think about business that much. Just check in now and again and see if everything’s with the right people in the right situation.  And even when it was rocky we were lucky that the shows have always been a positive experience and we’ve been really lucky to have an always supportive audience for a long time, so even tiny shows felt really good. In such a way that we think about a big show/a little show, it’s all kind of the same. I really just enjoy the experience and enjoy connecting with the band and with the audience.

Have you noticed your audience change much over 20 years?

Miraculously  it seems to have  regenerated itself a little bit in that our audience has grown up with us. I think there might be a lot of older sibling/younger sibling action. Some people bring their kids – two generations that are into it.  Crazy! Yeah crazy! I think it’s just grown in variety.

The record’s been out for a few months now and you’ve been out on the road for a little while now – what kind of reception are you getting from audiences for this new record?

It’s been great. Honestly, this tour we just finished in Europe was my favourite tour ever. There are five of us on stage now – that’s a new thing – there’s Doug Gillard who was in Guided By Voices and a lot of other bands that I really like and he plays all over the record, and our friend Martin Wenk from Calexico who’s been playing on and off for us for a long time and plays trumpet and keyboards.  The shows have felt fantastic, the audiences have been incredible and these new songs are really fun to play live, again, because we tried to marry those two “bands” that we’ve become – with this live band that’s always been a certain way and this kind of more careful studio band, hesitant maybe because we’ve had to figure out our writing as we went along. So this has been really, really fun, and a really positive reaction and I can’t wait to do more of it.

Has there been a track from the new record that you are really proud of or that you really enjoy playing live? I’ve got to admit that I’ve had ‘Clear Eye Clouded Mind’ on repeat for a while now.

Oh, I’m glad you like that one. We start the show with that one. It feels really good to start with it. But, yeah, finally having an extra person [on stage] has been really great because – I don’t really like giving myself compliments – but the guitar solos on ‘Teenage Dreams,’ ‘Jules and Jim’ and ‘When I was young,’ they’re all knockouts to me.  This is definitely the record where we’re playing the most songs from it on tour. We’re closing in on doing all of them live. We’ve gotten up to nine.

Well, I’ve got to finish up now, but the obvious last question is when do you guys plan to tour the record to Australia?

We’re very much hoping to be there next fall [our spring]. I can safely say that it’s very likely we’ll be there in the fall.

Originally published on vmusic.com.au

If you ask Australian country music fans who the current best group in the country is, you’ll likely get the answer, “The McClymonts” nine times out of 10. The group, made up of sisters, singers and multi-instrumentalists Brooke, Sam and Molly McClymont, are superstars of the local scene.

Over the last few years, however, they’ve been making a major push for the mecca of country music – the American market – with relentless touring across both the US and Australia.

Next week the girls release their brand-new record, Two Worlds Collide, in a massive party in their hometown of Grafton, before they take off back to the US for another mega tour. We caught up with Brooke McClymont to talk about how this new album sets itself apart from their previous record, whether this is the album that will make their name in the US, and whether the group thinks they’ll ever relocate over to America to chase their big dreams.

So you guys are all set to release your brand-new album next week with the big home town show in Grafton, are you excited for the big release party? 

Oh absolutely, it’s been a long time coming. This record has been in the works for twelve months or so it couldn’t have come quick enough.

What can you tell me about the new record starting with the name, Two Worlds Collide?

The name was because us three girls have been back and forth from America these past three years because we are constantly back and forth from the two countries. Juggling both places, so to us this just seems right.

How would you say this is album is different to your previous work? 

Well I think in this one we have definitely matured again. There is a lot more personal songs in this album for the three of us and we’ve spent a lot more time making this record so we really got down and picked the songs that were us. It’s a very mature record that’s all I can say to explain it.

You guys decided to us three different producers for the album. What was that process like? And how was that in bringing your sound out? 

We loved the process of having three different producers. Again, it was something different for us, we are always up for something different us three girls. Each individual producer brought out something different for us, but it also made our album, you wouldn’t even be able to tell that we had three different producers on our album, that’s how good when it comes to mixing and mastering these people can make an album just sound in unison. It really brought out our sound and working with three different producers we learnt so much of how people work different and creatively. It really showed us how we can have a lot of input and have a say voicing what we really wanted. I think that was the most amazing thing, to be able to be so involved with these producers and to be able to be heard. The end product of this record is that we are so happy with it, which is always a good thing, that at the end result you love the record!

So what would you say are your favourite songs of the record? 

There are actually quite a lot! I love the record from the start to the finish. I’ve tried to pick a favourite. It all depends on what mood I’m in. If I’m in a really up mood I like one of the faster songs. But if I’m in a really somber mood I like on of the slower ones. It all depends on what mood I’m in.

What do you think fans will be surprised by when they hear it for the first time? 

I’m not sure, I hope they love it as much as we do. Like I said it is a very matured album. We have a lot of “up” songs, but not as many as the previous albums. There is a lot more honesty on this record, which is what they’ll be surprised at, which is a good thing. They get to learn a lot more about us.

Obviously you mentioned before that this is record is the culmination of a lot of hard work over the past year, in particular off the back of some pretty heavy US touring. How important would you say the success of this record is in terms of your career? Do you think this one will hopefully be the one that gives you a boost in your career over in the US? 

You know what that would be awesome. I think everyone wants and everybody waits for that big moment and wants that big moment. We’ve been trying in the past two albums and we’re going to try on this one and not give up until we feel like we have really achieved something. We are really happy with everything so far and what we’ve achieved, but we are not giving up yet and we love going back and forth from the US. We’ve been chasing the summer the past few years, it’s been a while since we have had a winter, which has been nice. It’s been great that we can continue to make music in both countries. We couldn’t ask for anything more really. If it happens it happens, we will just go with the flow and see what happens and see what this year brings.

We know from your CMC blog last year in the US already, are you going to go back on that area and build on that fan base or are you going to go to a lot of new areas. 

Look I think we are going to a few new places, as well as a few of the old ones that we went to. But anything can happen in America, and here in Australia. The music industry changes day to day minute by minute, so anything could happen. We could be playing with Alan Jackson next week. Wouldn’t that be nice! It is just always making sure your ready and prepared for whatever happens.

Do you think that you’ll ever relocate over there or are you happy with the situation of splitting it between the two? 

I don’t know. It things really picked up over there I say we would. It would be one of those things that we would sit down and consider it because we have always wanted to forge out a career over there. Anything is a possibility.

What can fans expect at the big Grafton launch party. 

Oh we are so excited! It’s always a big crazy party when we go back to our home town. They are going to hear the majority of the new record as well as stories of the past and how this record was made, so we’ve got so much to tell them about that. It will be a good family atmosphere.

And when can we expect to see you back in Oz so the rest of Australia can hear you guys? 

I know! We have been trying since March here in Australia, we just headed to Grafton. But we are coming back at the end of the year in August, then we are touring from August to the end of the year. Because we don’t want to forget our fans here. Just check the website for touring days because we are definitely coming home!

Orignally published on the Country Music Channel website

I’m going to go ahead and admit that I know and quite like Catherine Kelleher aka Catcall, and that I recently took a day in lieu to watch Wrestlemania with her boyfriend who is also a friend of mine. That pretty much dissolves any non-bias one should expect from an album review as I: a) am obviously going to find it hard to criticise someone I’m friends with; and b) don’t want to feel icy tension between Mr Catcall and I whilst I’m trying to enjoy Summer Slam on our next day in lieu. That being said, when I initially discovered Catcall, which involved me seeing the brilliant Satellites video directed by SPOD, I had no idea who she was and loved it straight away.

There was something about Satellites that immediately appealed to me. Obviously the tune is catchy as fuck and is one of the standout tracks on The Warmest Place, while the video is vibrant and striking and wonderfully simple yet clever. But something about Catcall was unlike anything I’d really seen from an Australian artist previously. Now that I’ve had a little time to reflect and gotten to know Cathy and her music better, I think I’ve realised that what I was initially drawn to in Catcall is simple — she’s complete.

Whereas so many other local artists take time to find themselves and establish their music as unique, Catcall feels like she’s arrived fully formed. Whether it’s her music/style/album artwork/videos/live show — they all appear to be very calculated and meticulously thought through, not in a cold or scientific way, but more like a fully formed character in a compelling story by a novelist. Catcall is Catcall and it’s hard to say that she’s imitating any other artist.

And with the release of The Warmest Place, it’s evident (in Sydney at least) that I’m not the only one that is enjoying the refreshing citrus burst that Catcall has dosed into the local, rather stagnant music scene. Her picture has graced the cover of various print and online media outlets, her album is getting a decent earful of airplay (although Triple J yet again failed to show any foresight and picked Temper Trap knock-off The Medics as this week’s feature album) and she’s generally getting the kind of equally decent alternative/mainstream coverage most artists only dream about.

You could argue a lot of that comes down to the support of her label and the team of creative minds she has working around her, but I really think that this entire project has involved a lot of strategy and awareness from Catherine. She even said herself in my recent interview with her that she’s disenchanted with the current state of popular music in this country.

“Everything in Australian music feels really earnest at the moment and it’s pissing me off! Like indie music with like the Jezabels and Matt Corby, that music is really emotional and heartbreaking and everyone’s clips are whimsical.”

I fully agreed with her at the time, although I was surprised to hear an Australian musician be so openly combative with other local artists. It is, after all a very one for all and all for one scene. Again though, it was refreshing to hear an artist express her own, legitimate opinion.

That courage is also reflected in her art. It surely would have been easier to make an album that was darker, more drenched in reverb, more moody, more “earnest”, especially given the record’s context (The Warmest Place is largely inspired by the death of her father a few years ago). Going to the lengths of transforming the most traumatic event in your life into the inspiration to craft a bright and upbeat pop album, rather than take the easier, more self-pitying creative path should be commended.

That being said, I think those murky emotional undertones are what gives the music on this record it’s most appealing element — a true sense of vulnerability that the listener can connect with on some level, either consciously or unconsciously. It’s the cliched “thing you just can’t put your finger on,” that I think a lot of people will also identify with when they hear it.

I can’t be completely one-sided on the positivity metre. Kelleher isn’t a trained musician like a Kate Miller-Heidke or a Katie Noonan, and that is reflected in the somewhat awkward/overly simple arrangements on the record. She’s also not going to be competing on The Voice anytime soon. She does, however, have an obvious ear for crafting pop hooks and a honest and personal song writing style that adds to her context and her aura — and she’s surrounded her self with the right collaborators in both her producers and her live band that have helped to effectively articulate those ideas in a way that compensates for her lack of traditional musical skills.

In the end though, the best way I feel I can explain my reaction to this album comes down to iPod Shuffle. Whenever my playlist is set to random and a Catcall tune kicks in, I feel an instant wave of change in my mood. I’m literally transported to a “warmer place.” I know that sounds corny but it’s true. Whether I’m drifting along to Swimming Pool, strutting to August, or throwing a lounge room dance party on pingas with Satellites*, there’s something about this music and what it’s emotionally and artistically wrapped in that just gets to me.

The Warmest Place excites me not only for what it does musically but for what it does for music. I really hope it inspires some more local artists to take risks too and to invest themselves more personally in their music. Whether this works for Catcall in the long run is yet to be seen, and I’ll be closely monitoring her career as both a friend and a critic to see if she’s successful. One thing is for sure though — curiosity may kill the cat, but she won’t be going out a pussy.

* True story.
Originally published on Polaroids Of Androids

McAlister Kemp have had an explosive couple of years. Going from virtual unknowns to festival main stage players, they’re fast becoming one of Australia’s favourite country acts.

We talked to Drew McAlister about playing CMC Rocks The Hunter, what his highlights from the road have been from the last couple of years and why he thinks country fans identify so well with the duo’s music. 

You guys are playing CMC Rocks The Hunter again next year – are you guys psyched for that? 

Mate, we sure are. We’ve actually been lucky enough to get a spot this year opening the Main Stage on the Friday night and the ‘This’ stage on the Sunday. So, mate, we’re absolutely stoked.

What would you say is your favourite part about playing at CMC Rocks?

Well, we played there last year and I remember this vividly – this was a turning point for us – we went on stage and we started playing our songs and… everyone knew the words! We were absolutely both blown away. It meant that all the work we’d done before was starting to pay off. Next year we’ll be on the Main Stage and I can’t even imagine what that’s gonna be like.

Are you nervous to be debuting the new record, Country Proud, live on stage or are you confident with what you’ve got?

Nah mate, we should be alright. We’re gonna do plenty of rehearsals and make sure we don’t screw up any notes or any chords or lyrics. It seems to be the perfect place to do it so we’re looking forward to that.

What can you tell us about the new album, Country Proud?

The new album is probably a little bit bigger sounding than (debut record) All Kinds Of Tough. We’ve tried to put a few more rockier songs on the album than we did on All Kinds Of Tough, which I guess has just lead a natural progression from our live show. This album kind of reflects where our live show is at.

You wrote your first album while you guys were largely on the road – did you use the same formula for this album or did you do a bit more in the studio?

It was similar. We wrote a few in Nashville and we wrote a few back here but it varied. We both co-wrote a lot of the songs together and sometimes I’d go off and write with other people and Troy would go off and write with other people and come back and meet in the middle sort of thing. But, yeah, much the same way as we did the first album.

Cool! What was your time in Nashville like?

Awesome mate. We did two weeks there and wrote about 14 songs. And the very last song we wrote was ‘Country Proud,’ which is the first single. But it was great mate, too much chicken wings and too much beer but it was a really good experience and hopefully we can go back again next year.

You guys have had a pretty solid rise over the last few years – what do you think it is about your music that country fans identify with?

Mate, we hope that it’s the stuff that we write about. We just try to write about real stuff, the things people can relate to. That’s what we hope it is anyway.

I think also that there aren’t to many other duos going around and probably not to many other dups that are as tall as we are. A talking point every time we do a gig is always people who come and get photos with us because we’re quite tall.

But I think the core of it has to be that the songs somehow relate to people and that’s what we’ve tried to do on the next album as well – not move too far way from those core issues.

You’ve toured pretty heavily over the last year or two – what have some of the highlights been from your time on the road?

Mate, have to be Alan Jackson. That was insane. That was just amazing. We were talking about it afterwards that we got to stand there on a stage that we literally had dreamed about since we were kids – playing your songs to that many people. It was amazing and we’re still getting people coming up to us after gigs saying “We saw you at Alan Jackson.” It was an amazing opportunity and that we got to do that was pretty cool.

I’m sure most of the CMC audience have heard and love the latest single ‘Country Proud’ but if you had to, how would you describe it?

I’d say that’s anthemic, which is what we were shooting for when we wrote it. And it’s about two things really – it’s about celebrating the fact that you’re a country fan but you’re also celebrating the fact that you’re proud to be Australian. Those are the two things that we tried to touch on. And making a mention of Slim Dusty in the song, we wanted to sort of pay homage to people that have come before us I guess. And you know, Slim’s the King. So, hopefully it will be something that people will take on board as being something that they can identify with and not be ashamed to say “I’m a country music fan,” because it’s never been more popular than it is now and it’s only going to get out there to more people.

What would you say is your favourite song off the new record?

They’re all my favourites at the moment. But ‘Country Proud’ is definitely one that we’re very, very proud of. Also, there’s another song on there, ‘Finish What You Started,’ which is the opposite of ‘Country Proud.’ It’s a slower song and it tells a bit of a story. So, there’s lots on the album that will cater to what people liked on All Kinds Of Tough that they’ll find on this album too.

Running on from that, do you have a song from Country Proud or All Kinds Of Tough that you particularly enjoy playing live?

Well off the first album ‘Hell Yeah’ and ‘All Kinds of Tough’ are great band songs and I think on this next album a song called ‘Cold Beer and Hot Women,’ which is a pretty up tempo, rocking song. And ‘Feed My Tractor’ – that’s another up tempo one that I think’s gonna be a lot of fun to play too.

The CMT website has been doing a series on what country stars did before they were famous, so I thought I’d ask you the same question – what’s the worst job you’ve had?

Mate, I’ve had so many jobs over the years. I remember working in an abbattoir when I was in Dubbo during the school holidays. That was pretty intense. But I’ve done all sorts of labouring and any labouring job is hard.

You guys got started playing Jonny Cash covers but your sound has definitely a newer school of country sound – do you think you’ll ever be tempted to record in a more classic country style?

I think there will always be elements in there. The stuff that we listen to and have listened to for a long time is definitely more the contemporary stuff and definitely the direction we thought we were most comfortable going in. But I think no matter how the music evolves, you have to keep the integrity of the lyric in there. That’s what makes country music what it is. You can put all sorts of stuff around a song but, for us anyway, it’s important to keep the integrity of the lyric. We’ve still got pedal steel and all that sort of stuff – there’s probably just a few more guitars on this album than there was on the last album.

Finally, what are your plans for the rest of 2012?

Mate, more touring and obviously releasing the album on March 16 and mate – more touring! There’ll be more videos released and singles and we’ve just got to keep building our brand, get in front of more people. The reality is we feel like we’ve done a lot but we’ve barely scratched the surface. There’re a lot of people who don’t know who we are and we’ve just got lots more hard work coming up really.