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ESKIMO JOE |
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 On this page:
*Eskimo Joe interview (with Stu)
*Eskimo Joe Discography (available on Whammo)
*Eskimo Joe Australian Tour dates
ESKIMO JOE - THE WHAMMO INTERVIEW - MAY 7, 2003
Western Australia is emerging as the country's premier breeding ground for musical talent and Eskimo Joe, based in Fremantle, are one of the clearest examples of the brilliant sounds emanating from the west. With their independent debut, Girl, this trio of melodic rockers presented a youthful flare for bratty pop-punk that built upon a steadily growing live following; a snowballing fanbase that answered the call and made the album an unexpected hit. But living in relative isolation has its advantages and while other acts were subject to the influence of urban fashions, Kav, Joel and Stu were oblivious to transient trends, evolving naturally into an act worthy of mainstream recognition. The resulting LP, A Song Is A City, suddenly presents Eskimo Joe as a new incarnation, capable of intensely dramatic compositions and emotive lyricism without losing the energy that attracted their early fans. A Song Is A City is one of the most talked about Australian releases of the last few years and the album that promised so much delivers beyond expectations; a carefully crafted major work of dark pop that has already spawned the Top50 hit, From The Sea. I interrupted the band's rehearsal sessions to have a chat to Stu, who was completing a long an arduous day of interviews...
Whammo: Obviously, this is the crap part of the process, but soon you'll get to the good stuff: tour, album release...it's all pretty exciting.
Stu: Yeah, that's the fun part for me. We love being in the studio - we are a studio band - but it's also great fun to get out on the road and show people, live, what we've been doing as well.
Whammo: From what I can gather, especially from fans that visit Whammo, you've got a great live following.
Stu: Yeah, we love playing live. It's great fun and I think the songs translate really well. We've got a guy on keyboards as well now, so it's fun getting out on the road, meeting new people and catching up with them next time you tour.
Whammo: Hasn't there been a bit of a swap around? Joel's gone on to guitar and you've got a new drummer?
Stu: We've got a new drummer because Joel was just getting really bored of punching in, playing drums, then punching out. It just felt like a real job to him. He's a child of melody and he needs to have some sort of outlet, I think.
Whammo: It's good to have someone who's multi-instrumental.
Stu: For sure. When we record we tend to swap around a bit and play different instruments. I'll play a few bass lines, Kav will play guitar on a track, I'll play keys, Joel will play keys...it's good that we can get different dynamics happening from different instruments.
Whammo: I guess you've got that philosophy where 'the song is God' and it doesn't matter how you get there, as long as you get the song out.
Stu: That's exactly our motto: the song rules. It doesn't matter what we think, it's what the song wants.
Whammo: The different direction you've taken seems to be quite organic, but you're really opening up the market with strong use of melody and dynamics. I know you don't like to use the word 'mature' but it's the obvious word to use.
Stu: Hopefully, bands shouldn't be playing the same music for ten years. I think you have to evolve and you have to try and go somewhere else, otherwise it's not going to be honest or enjoyable any more; you've got to keep it fresh. As long as you don't try to push it in a direction - you just go where you're going - and try for a sound intentionally, then if it's honest, it's going to sound good.
Whammo: I guess it's like seeing an old friend. If you see them every day, it's hard to notice change. But for me, suddenly hearing your music for the first time in a few years, the new direction was obvious. Did you notice your music changing?
Stu: It's a good metaphor actually. I might have to steal that one off you at some stage.
Whammo: No Problem.
Stu: But I haven't really noticed a change until recently. My girlfriend forced me to drag out the old record (Girl) the other day because she hadn't heard it before. I was begging her not to. We had a listen and (laughs) yeah, it really did hit home; how far we've managed to come over the years.
Whammo: There was already a fair amount of interest in the band with 'Girl' doing well, but signing to FMR (Festival Mushroom Records) must have been a bit of a step.
Stu: Well, it was great. I really love the guys at FMR because it's all about the music and they just want to see good music do well. They really want to work our arses off, which is great (laughs). As much as we bitch about doing 20 interviews in a row every day, they're working hard for us. It's good.
Whammo: I assume, after the success of Girl, that A Song Is A City is expected to attract some real commercial success. Have you felt any pressure?
Stu: No, it's been quite bizarre. We didn't expect to get any commercial play off this album. There's one song, which we picked as a commercial song on the album, but being on commercial radio already is a bit surprising for us. We're pretty happy about it.
Whammo: The single (From The Sea) struck me immediately. The production is very crisp.
Stu: Working with Paul McKercher and Nick Launay; they were definitely the right guys for the job and really relaxed guys to work with. It was easily the best recoding experience I've ever had.
Whammo: From what I understand of Paul McKercher, his strength is support rather than invention.
Stu: Well, he is quite good with the songs, but when we gave him our songs he said "I really don't think we need to work on these much at all". He gave us a few suggestions and said "chop that bit out, that doesn't need to be there" and that all worked really well. In terms of bringing anything new to the songs, he didn't think they needed it, which was a bit of a boost to the egos.
Whammo: So give me a bit of a picture of how the songs take shape. Does Kav bring in half-formed ideas and you guys workshop them?
Stu: Yeah, exactly. He brings in the torso and the head and we'll sew on the arms and the legs. Then we'll give it some clothes and there it is: Frankenstein's monster. It generally happens that Kav will bring in the bare roots, give it to Joel for the arrangement, then they'll bring it to me and I'll say "cut that chord out and put this one in"; then we'll take it into the studio and jam it out acoustically until the structure feels right. When it feels right, stripped down to the bare bones, we'll start demoing it and layering it up. A day later and we've got a full song.
Whammo: It's good to avoid the control freak mode where someone's standing over the other band members saying "no, not like that, play it like this".
Stu: I think we've all learnt to play off each other's strengths and weaknesses. When we work on a song, we'll layer it up so much that by the end of a recording session we'll cut out 30/40% of the tracks we've recorded; just because there's too much going on and we've got to strip it back. We've learnt to not be too precious about parts. You might work on a solo for an hour or a piano line, show the guys and record it; then at the end of the mixing process you realise it's taking up too much room and you've got to chuck it anyway.
Whammo: So, there's no tears?
Stu: No, it's good. Like I said, "it's what the song wants, not what we want".
Whammo: I'm a big fan of the Western Australian drive towards recognition. People still think of Melbourne as the Mecca, but I think it's much more interesting to look at Perth and Fremantle.
Stu: Becuase it's a tight musical community, we tend to feed off each other's music and spur each other on to do bigger and better things. It's a real inspirational circle of friends.
Whammo: Do you have any peers as far as bands go?
Stu: Well, I'm living with Rodney from End Of Fashion, at the moment. They're always demoing and rehearsing out the back. They'll listen to our album and we'll listen to their songs...and (laughs) get pissed off about how good they are. It's good healthy competition. The Little Birdy guys; we love hanging out with them. They're great guys.
Whammo: The End Of Fashion EP was great and you could name so many other bands from Western Australia...
Stu: ...and there's more to come. There's a guy - Steve Parkin - who's about to release a solo album, which is unbelievable. I think, just because of the fact that some bands from W.A. are starting to 'make it', it gives a lot more bands more drive and hope.
Whammo: With the metaphor of 'A Song' being 'A City', what's that all about.
Stu: Well it's like a Dragnet thing: '50 million stories in the naked city and this is just one of them'. Each song can be viewed as 'a day in the life' and taken in so many different ways; so many different stories told in one song. We figure it's a pretty good metaphor.
Whammo: Kav sounds brilliant on the album.
Stu: For sure. He's been singing every day for the last few days; a couple of hours a day. It's like anything: when you get better at it, you just want to do it more and more. It's really starting to shine now.
Whammo: Would you say that the lyrics are autobiographies or observations?
Stu: A little bit of both. He tends to be a bit cathartic through his music. He likes to get it all out on paper then through a tune, much to his girlfriend's dismay (laughs). |
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 ESKIMO JOE
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Everyone's giving this album glowing praise but nobody seems surprised; in fact, A Song Is A City is one of those rare moments when an album's build-up is justified by the finished product. The single, From The Sea, gave a solid indication of quality and also highlighted the amazing voice of Kav Temperley, which rides along on waves of melody; a traditional strong point of Eskimo Joe's sound. While the band are dodging the notion that they're 'maturing', it's obvious, from the opener Come Down, that their bratty pop-punk beginnings are behind them and to fill the resulting void, the band have found a richly textured style that remains pop but introduces a more introspective element, both musically and lyrically. Pianos, strings and an array of cinematic sounds garnish electric guitars, but while songs like I'm So Tired and Carousel suggest the band's evolution, Older Than You and Don't Let It Fly retain the energy so often displayed by the earlier incarnation of Eskimo Joe. Bluebottle Kiss has already shown that an act can escape pop origins to successfully mature with their audience and it seems that Fremantle's finest act is ready to make the same transition. The trio have discovered the key to producing fine songs; a philosophy that the band describe with the motto "it doesn't matter what we want, it's what the song wants"; the reason why A Song Is A City will easily take its place among the finest Australian albums for 2004.
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 ESKIMO JOE
Add to basket. Normally ships within 10 days $4.95 (US $3.20) (UK £1.71)
cd single
A few articles in 2004 are suddenly labelling Melbourne as the country's most prominent breeding ground for Australian musical talent. It's nice to see that a few young journalists have finally got their cadetships and decided to tell us what we've known for the last 10 years. How about writing about something exciting, like the fact that Melbourne's influence is slowly being undermined by the thriving scenes in more isolated cities, like Perth and Fremantle; home of Eskimo Joe and a host of equally impressive young acts. Musically, Western Australian acts are developing at a frightening rate and From The Sea places this popular trio high on the list of 'most improved' bands. In fact, the 4 fresh tracks on this disk are among the finest I've heard so far in 2004. The title track is built for radio with melodic and restrained verses that bust at the seams to reveal a powerful chorus. Kav's lyrics prove the value of age when representing thoughts through language and the vocals are captivating enough to hypnotise a world audience. This Room and Commitment provide consistency, perfectly complimenting From The Sea's tones of beauty, sadness and subtlety, but See Saw - an obvious attempt to lift the mood - seems like the proverbial 'fish out of water'. Over-all, this single is outstanding and the younger generation's need for truly emotional musical will be sated by this outstanding preview of a new, improved Eskimo Joe.
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 ESKIMO JOE
Add to basket. Normally ships within 10 days $26.95 (US $17.40) (UK £9.31)
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The much anticipated release from Western Australia's darlings of pop rock. The album shows maturity and depth from Eskimo Joe and quite rightly, people are going nuts for it.
Starting out with the riff heavy Head Hurts, Girl then divulges into radio friendly tracks Wake Up, Planet Earth and Who Sold Her Out, then rounds out with Driver, a more sedated and airy affair that is not unlike something Radiohead were capable circa OK Computer. Girl is easily one of the best releases of 2001. (Review by: Martin Slattery)
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ESKIMO JOE: NATIONAL TOUR DATES
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May
28....Barwon Club, Geelong, VIC
29....Hi Fi Bar, Melbourne, VIC
June
2......ANU Bar, Canberra, ACT
3......Newcastle Uni Bar On The Hill, Newcastle, NSW
5......The Metro, Sydney, NSW
9......Armidale University, Armidale, NSW
10....Plantation Hotel, Coffs Harbour, NSW
11....Arena, Brisbane, QLD
12....Troccadero, Gold Coast, QLD
19....Globe, Perth, WA
20....Globe, Perth, WA
July
24....Splendour In The Grass Festival, Byron Bay, NSW
25....Splendour In The Grass Festival, Byron Bay, NSW |
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