15 Minutes With....

Edmond From
Augie March

SG: Hi Edmond. Did you get out to the ARIAs last night?

E: Yeah...I caught up with the old hangover this morning, but it was interesting. Seemed like a bit of a circus. It was my first time. They kind of heard you around like cattle a bit. We were really hungry, so by 9:30 we were just looking for a good meal and I think that coupled with just being at the ARIAs....there were some interesting moments. Dave kept standing up and doing a solo mexican wave so that the camera would catch him in the background.

SG: What is it like being nominated for two awards yourselves?

E: It was good. You get to get into other people's loungerooms that you wouldn't otherwise get into because we're not on the Austereo network or anything- we're not on MMM or Fox or any of the big stations, so its good to have the name dropped in people's minds and I think its just another avenue for that. It's good to be nominated, but the song's pretty old though. I mean it's old and we're moving on. We're doing other things now and I'm a little over that song I must say. It's good to be nominated- means we could be a possibe shoe-in for next year. We'll wait and see what the album does. I'm happy with the album and Waltz was good- I'm happy with all of them, but Waltz was a complete package and I'm glad it got the airing that it has and I see that this ARIA nomination is the end of that airing.

SG: How would you describe your style of music?

E: I suppose its song based music. It's not just built up from guitar riffs or anything like that. There's the songs that you can sing along to, but then there's the music that we put together underneath it to hopefully support it in a nice way. That's about it- the instrumentation as you know is just bass guitar and drums and it seems as if we're just growing out of that and it's a natural thing. We've added some keyboard and other stuff. I guess it's all slow tempo sort of stuff. I'd like to think that its a slow burn type thing. It's not easily accessible from the outset.

SG: The album was recorded over a long period of time with many different engineers and studios- do you think that style of recording had an impact on the sound?

E: It's possible that we may have got a different bunch of hits and misses with the songs, because a few of them were ready to be recorded three or four months before we actually got them to tape, so it was a bit of a gamble, but there were newer songs that were just ready to record so it was done at a few different places and I like that idea anyway- I think it brings a variety to the sound. It doesn't sound as if it all came out of the same moment which is good because the songs don't come out of the same moment and the way we play them and carry them doesn't come out of the same moment, so it makes sense to have them staggered. It's knowing how to do it, and we were very new to it all.

SG: Are you nervous about how it will be received?

E: Not particularly, no. It is what it is and in the world of critique.....I don't know, I mean, that ties in with the ARIAs too. Australia is a very small place and there's limited opportunities so there are only a few channels to go through and the one we're on at the moment is one with a specific bunch of critics in particular circles. I'm not particularly nervous about it at all because I'm proud of what we did. I don't mind if people discover it five or ten years down the track, honestly because it doesn't seem like an obvious thing. I guess I'm still working stuff out, so I will be interested to see what people say.

SG: You design and build some of your own bass equipment- how did you get into that?

E: Really just out of necessity, because it's all really expensive gear, you know? You try to get something that's reliable, so for me to make a speaker cabinet is just to save money. It's not that hard to build them. Put two bits of wood up against each other and nail them in and glue them in then whack some speakers them. They don't sound great and they're not technically good- they're definately better for the studio in controlled environments. THey don't seem to be doing their job that well on the road, but it's just necessity. I have also made a pedal board and a few other bits and pieces, but all that sort of stuff costs money and I can't believe how much they charge for the stuff. If you can make it yourself out of bits and pieces that are lying around.....I mean I have a pedal board that I converted from an ammunition case. I can't remember what was in it- some sort of mortar bombs or something! I got that and converted it to a pedal board which holds all my stuff as well. Once again it's necessity. When you're touring around and supporting people, you just get sick of cleaning up all these pedals and stuff so if you can make that sort of stuff yourself, you may as well.

SG: What do you think of the Australian music industry at present when manufactured bands like Bardot are at the top of the charts while there are hard working bands like yourselves not getting that same level of support?

E: I think that it's like this. For someone who wants that fame and stardom, the industry could be a really harsh place for you. It is quite annoying that the whole Australian music content on radio could be upped twice as much as what it is firstly, but that's a greater cultural thing and that spans a lot further than talking about music, ratings and percentages of Australian music. We bow to America every day and as an Australian band I suppose you really have to stay inside the music and be patient about it. We just want to play music and play it well and that's it. It's because music comes to the surface and you want to put it down. It doesn't need to be any more complicated than that. I don't think any of us really want to be big rock stars or anything like that. But the scene in general, it is what it is. I guess it depends on how far you want to look into it. We've been around for five years and we've toured a little bit, but there are bands like Something For Kate for example. They've toured a lot- a lot more than we have- and a lot of it off their own bat, especially in the early days, so I guess you get out of it what you put into it. I think you work hard and I guess it depends on if you've got a problem with the majority of people not picking up on your record until five or ten years down the track and I don't think I have a problem with that at all. The music industry is what it is and the media industry is just there too. At the end of the day, the music is sitting in this space all by itself and in the end people are going to find it and if they're into it, they're going to grab onto it and not let it go. I'm patient.