With
the first year of the new Millennium drawing to a close, one of the highlights
on what remained of the Australian rock calendar was the reformation of the
Hoodoo Gurus (pictured left). For those from another planet, the Gurus
were a rare thing in Australia in the 1980s and '90s: a band that combined boundless
six-stringed energy with timeless pop to break through the dross and achieve
mainstream success, without selling their fans (or themselves) short. Slated
to play the all-Australian Homebake festival in Sydney on December 8, this was
a one-shot for Dave Faulkner and Co. that was sure to bring fans of spirited
guitar pop-rock out in droves.. If those same guitar pop fans (and their cousins who like things harder and heavier) weren't already out there for Gurus guitarist Brad Shepherd's band The Monarchs, then they should have been. They're put out what this Bar considers to be the best Australian album of 2001 and backed it up with fiery live shows.
Fuck me if lightning doesn't strike thrice and the guys (Shepherd, Faulker, Rick Grossman and Mark Kingsmill) who are the Hoodoo Gurus aren't also treading the boards in a 60s punk-inspired fun combo. Initially known as The Moops but now going under the moniker The Persian Rugs, their live shows will be followed by an EP in 2002. You have been warned.
With the planets in sequence and time finally appearing on their respective schedules, THE BARMANand the always-convivial Brad Shepherd hooked up to discuss all of the above on November 27, 2001, just over a week out from the Gurus' Sydney reformation.
B: I haven't read a bad review of the Monarchs album yet. How's it going saleswise?
BS: You know I have no idea? (Laughs) I really should check up on things like that. We were touring pretty hard on it for a short period of time and I sort of got thrown in at the deep end with Gurus rehearsals, so it's on my list of things to do.
B:
What's the touring been like? BS: We were weekend warriors. We mostly did the old Sydney-Melbourne-Brisbane run.
B: I missed you by a week in Brisbane. I was up there for work.
BS: Oh man, we had a funny show there. I think if you were in the audience it looked good. I was a bit tired. It was the last show of the tour and I was really beat. But I think we put on a pretty good show nevertheless. My recollection of it is not that good, possibly due to fatigue.
B: Did you play with anyone interesting as supports?
BS: We did play with an amazing band in bloody Ballarat called the Turnaround. A fantastic band, very much - I know it's an oft-used, tired old cliche but they had a bit of the Nirvana in them. Normally when you see a band like that, there's one ingredient missing...the piss and fire...they're like some tired old grunge band. But these guys actually have the ingredient.
B: Are they locals or out of Melbourne?
BS: Oh they're locals, kids going to uni at Ballarat. The main guy in the band, Aaron, just writes these astonishing songs. He plays guitar as well. They put on a great show and he has an amazing singing voice, really gnarled-up, fucked-up sort of tone to his voice. And, you know, all really lovely 20-year-old chaps. They blew our collective minds. I'd play a show with them anywhere, anytime.
It was such a lovely thing. It kinda made me feel that with bands like them around - they're few and far between and you think rock and roll's going the way of jazz; it's a purist's medium - but when you see an act like that, you just think: 'Ahhh, it's in pretty safe hands'. (laughs)
B: I know you guys don't mind touring. Any thoughts about going overseas?
BS: I'm still chasing some loose leads in that respect. I know the Monarchs would meet some degree of response in Europe.
B: I'm sure you would!
BS: Scandinavia and Spain, I guess. Germany and Italy perhaps. But without 'big cheese' record company input, a lot of it's just word-of-mouth. You know that. Like e-mailing your mates.
B: The feedback (for rock and roll) from Europe these days IS pretty up-and-down.
BS: Yeah, and you go with a small independent label in Europe to get your record out and you don't know what their distribution's like. You're almost guaranteed you'll never see a cent.
B: The infrastruture on that indie level doesn't seem to be consistent these days. It's there in patches and some of the crowds are way down. There's obviously still a market in places like Spain that haven't been mined to the max.
BS: Exactly. So I'm just determined to find us a release in Europe. Likewise in the US too. I know rock and roll's kinda gone underground. In some respects that's a good thing. You're not trying to pander to...
B: Expectations?
BS: Yeah, you're not really lured by some sort of commercial intent at all. It's just a pure, undiluted statement. But obviously you don't want to lose too much money doing a tour of the US! We might have to wait till the Aussie dollar's worth US60c or something like that!
B:
I don't want to go through the Monarchs album track-by-track - you've already
done a good job of that at the band's site - but I did want to ask about a few
songs specifically. Which were written in your time with the Gurus?BS: Ohhhh, let me see...ahhh...I'm guessing now..."Nobody's Perfect," certainly, was something I was working on.
B: "Everyone's a Superstar?"
BS: Yeahhhh...
B: To me that sounds like a flat-out, hell-for-leather Gurus thing.
BS: (Laughs) Dave Faulkner (co-credited) reckons that's the worst thing he ever wrote! While we were rehearsing (for the Gurus reformation) he goes: 'God, what the fuck was I thinking then?' (Laughs) I was like: 'Oh, you used to like that song' but then that appeals to the sort of Radio Birdman fan in me. He was scratching his head going: 'Oh mate, I did write some stinkers, didn't I?" Don't whip yourself too much, pal, you also wrote a couple of good ones! (Laughs)
B: Should "Amen Brother" have a Young brothers credit?
BS: What do you reckon???!!!!! (Laughs) Is it Acca-Dacca or is it Finch???? When I wrote that song...I went down to a guitar shop and I was trying out some guitars. There was this SG, and I was bashing it through a Marshall and then I started playing this riff. I thought: 'Fuck, this guitar's got some pretty good tunes in it, I think I better buy it!' (Laughs) So I did!
The riff is S-O-O-O-O AC/DC. I tried to move away from that by writing a particularly fruity melody. Melodically, it's nowhere near AC/DC but it was my intention to steer clear of the obvious comparisons.
B: I have to ask where "Stalker Waltz" came from. It sits beautifully in the tracking.
BS: "Stalker Waltz"...I was going for a bit of a therapeutic run along Bondi Beach, and it kinda came to me. I find that's a useful way of finding your way into a new song, by going and doing a bit of exercise and totally clearing your head. I' ve managed to come up with several songs by going for a run.. Then, from out of nowhere your subconscious starts ticking away about something or other.
As I was coming back from the run, I actually walked past this guy who's...um...a TV personality...and I recalled a story that a friend told me about this guy drinking at the Bondi Icebergs [club] and, as sport, he would intimidate women. He'd go up to them and like: 'Hi...do you like to fuck, do you?' Really creepy, horrible shit. It wasn't a come-on at all, it was this weird power game this guy was playing to freak people out, see how they'd react. Fairly perverse. God know what goes on in that poor fellow's scone!
So the song was originally called "Do You Like to Fuck?" (Sings)....'Tell me, do you like to fuck?' And as the song progressed, I put in these funny major sevenths, and it's got a million chords...it's kinda fun to play and it's unusual for the Monarchs 'cos it's subdued. It's in waltz time...it's in 6/8. And I thought, the song's too good to fuck it up by calling it "Do You Like to Fuck". It stops it cold and turns it almost into a novelty song. So I tried to get away from that a little bit (laughs) but it's still called "The Stalker Waltz"!
B: Better for it to retain an air of mystery?
BS: (Laughs) Yeah.
B: Do you have a favourite to play off the current set?
BS: My favourite is probably still "2001." For some reason, it continues to galvanise the band. Even if we're having a low night, it lifts the show.
B: As the band's grown, have the dynamics changed any in terms of songwriting? I know you told me before the songs were basically all yours.
BS: I think I'm counting on them more for arrangement. Poor old Murray gets short shrift because I'm a frustrated drummer and I always have a strong idea of where I want the song to go rhythmically. I tell him what to play unfortunately! I'm certainly open to suggestions but I pretty much go in to rehearsal with melodies and an exact blueprint of what the drum parts should be. Sometimes we may change. I wouldn't have second guitar parts for Hitchy or bass parts worked out. I'm pretty happy to leave it in their capable hands.
B: Do you and Greg have a volume war going at times?
BS: (Laughs) He started it!!! He started it!!!! The Gurus used to be excruciatingly loud but we wised up when we realised (a.) we were starting to go deaf and (b.) with the hearing we still had, we couldn't work out what the fuck was going on on-stage!
B: So how did the Gurus reformation come about?
BS: It was kind of a strange set of circumstances. We get offers all the time. We still have a manager, Michael McMartin, who fields calls for us. As you might expect, the Gurus is still a pretty big business. We still have income from back catalogue and outgoings and bills now and again. Michael takes care of that. He gets calls. We have to knock back offers, for not insubstantial amounts of money, virtually once a week. We did get this call from a promoter in Brazil. And we'd been to Brazil with another promoter a couple of times, and had a tremendous time. So we actually started to consider that.
B: This is Ian from Tronador Records?
BS: Yeah, yeah, Ian Marshall. So we thought: 'Pretty good fun, going to Brazil'...certainly the experience of playing in a rock band in this bizarre, alien environment is kinda unusual and you want to savour that as one of life's better moments. So we said yes to that and thought we can't really go to Brazil and not play a show in Australia, that's insulting. And while we were mulling that over, Homeback approached us, with the crazy idea that perhaps the Hoodoo Gurus might like to reform and do one show. We put the whole thing in place and the Brazil thing fell through (which is wont to happen in Brazil - they have a lot of enthusiasm for music but the business end of things can leave a lot to be desired.) So that's on indefinite hold. It will probably never happen (laughs). Cos, we're up and running and ready to roll NOW.. It's not like the band exists anymore. So here we are. We're rehearsed up and ready to go.
B: So it's a one-shot.
BS: One night only. We've done a couple of warm-up shows around Sydney in the last few days, under the name Winged Space Beast (laughs). Played up at Kelt's Bar in Blaxland and up at the Cambridge in Newcastle last night.
B: I believe "Black Night" went down a treat!
BS: (Laughs) "Black Night"!!!!! It's a pretty good thing about the Hoodoo Gurus....we all listened to the same records in the '70s. I don't know if [Monarchs bass player] Andy Kelly could play "Black Night". He could probably have a shot at it, but us old bastards in the Hoodoo Gurus know all that shit!
I'm going to Perth tomorrow to do what were the original warm-ups. We ended up doing warm-ups for the warm-ups.
B: You were telling me one of those rehearsals was a bit shakey...
BS: Oh, we were bloody shocking! Honestly, we were like four bums plucked from the Matthew Talbot Hostel on Bourke Street and handed some equipment. 'Here! Play some rock tunes!' That's kind of how it sounded. On our first day of rehearsal we sounded bloody shocking. It came together and now we're sounding good again.
B: I saw a set list posted on the Poison Pen List and it pretty well covers the whole career.
BS: That's true. It's pretty heavy on the crowd faves but there's a couple in there to make us feel like we weren't some sort of singles machine, we were actually a proper rock band! There's a couple of googlies there and the set changes from night to night. It's somewhere to start. We'd just get raked over the coals if we didn't do "Leilani" or "Tojo".
B: There's a contingent coming from overseas, I believe.
BS: Is that a fact? I'm glad to hear it! I'll have to log on later. I hope I get a chance to cacth up with those people.
B: It must be a good feeling to know you inspire that sort of devotion.
BS: It's lovely and they're all lovely people. You know, we kinda had a barbecue for a lot of the US people that came out to see us play when we finished four years ago. We had a bit of a wing ding down at Coogee, cooking up chops and snags. They're all just darlings and it does your heart good to know that you've had an impact on people's lives like that.
You get short shrift from the greater population, being a musician. You're like a bludging bum. That's how people perceive musicians. It's not a real art form, like applying brush to canvas. Somehow it's less worthy than other mediums, so it's nice when you get a bit of feedback from people.
B:
And your other band, the Persian Rugs...BS: The Rugs! The Rugs are on fire!
B: Yeah.
BS: Well, we were called The Moops and...
B: Someone had the name already!
BS: That's right. You go to moops.com, there's this duo of blokes who tour regularly around the US and I guess they make forest-type-trancey-cum-ethnic-field recordings.
B: Of course, you know there's another Monarchs in the States?
BS: Oh God...there is too. I actually found them too. I actually asked around and nobody had heard of a band called The Monarchs, except for my mate Bruce Anthon who worked in record stores...
B: He played in the Survivors.
BS: That's right. He also worked in record stores in Brisbane - has done for 25 years. He said: 'Yeah, there was band called the Monarchs, put out an instrumental single in 1961. Don't think they're around any more.' I thought: 'Fuck, that's pretty obscure'. Turns out it's the same band! They never broke up!
B: You're kidding!
BS: They had one single out and they've played frat rock instrumental music since the late '50s. They're still together, tour round and play. What I found really spooky is the logo they've got on their bloody web site actually looks like the "2001" [single cover] logo. I was completely unaware of that. We nicked the idea [for the logo] from the Aussie biker movie "Stone".
B: If no-one's written an original song, it's only logical someone's going to recycle band names.
BS: I do have a habit of thinking up band names. Making a list of them seeing we had such a hard time thinking of a name for this band. Always in the back of my mind I'm thinking there's going to be a reason we can't use the name Monarchs for some reason. So I've got a long list of bad band names on my computer, so if we get shafted we'll think of something silly to use.
B: So what was the motivation for putting the Persian Rugs together? Dave had a bunch of songs and wanted people to play them?
BS: That's it. He put together a band for New Year's Eve. He wrote a half hour's worth of songs and played them going into 2000 with a band made up mostly of the Intercontinental Playboys at a party at Dover Heights [eastern Sydney suburb]. Just had a ball. So it's really a continuation of that. But he wanted to know if I wanted to get on board. We tried a couple of different drummers and at that point I think Dave thought you can't do much better than Mark Kingsmill. Then there's three of us - we better see if Rick likes the idea too! So here we are: The Old Boys Association!
B: I believe there are a few songs on tape?
BS: Yeah, we recorded some songs at our favourite studio, Trafalgar at Annandale. We did five tracks and one of them is on light rotation on Triple Jay.
B: Richard [Kingsmill, brother of Mark] played it the other night.
BS: It's called "Mooching Around". It was called "Mooping Around" but we changed it for obvious reasons. We're going to put a little EP out. Shock are keen to put out a CD for us and Peniman in Spain have also expressed interest in a vinyl edition as well.
B: Is Shock still going to do a Gurus rarities thing?
BS: I don't know. They still have a ton of cassettes and so forth but they were expecting us to sift through them and I just can't. It's too much of a task. You need to employ someone to sift through these. It's like weeks of work. Dave Williams at Shock said, 'Why don't you send 'em all to me?' That was about a year ago and I haven't heard anything since. I think he's been a busy buy but maybe he hasn't had time.
B: And Dave's solo album?
BS: He hasn't done a bloody thing about it. He has a ton of songs, only some of which I've heard, but they're all good. He's actually written an amazing thing that he's kind of thinking he may never be able to use. It's so obviously a Hoodoo Gurus song! But the Hoodoo Gurus don't exist.
I and Rick Grossman have said to him, completely independently, 'When you record that song, I will throttle you if I don't play on it!' So he's already got the Hoodoo Gurus performing the song, in theory. Maybe he'll just have to live with that when he does his solo album, for old times' sake.
I actually said to him: 'You should do it like a Neil Young record, where it's predominantly a solo venture with other people playing, BUT for old times' sakes you get Crazy Horse to play on a couple of tracks.' (Laughs)
B: Can't see the harm in that.
BS: Can't see the harm in it at all. It's just pointless getting anyone else to play the song. It's a right-at-the-top-of-his-game Dave Faulkner song, right up there with "What's My Scene." I'm actually fond of the songs he did like "Castles in the Air" or "Night Must Fall." Actually, it's kinda like "1000 Miles Away." It has like a forlorn, heartbreaking quality to it and it's so Gurus that it's pointless thinking about giving it to anybody else.
