The interview was carried out over a lengthy period - Grant 2004

05/07/2002

Q: How has independent/alternative....changed....since ...,?.

This is, of course a very broad question....you did ask me to confine this to the period spanning the beginning of the Cowboys to our 1997 cd, "Things To Come", but I need to go back to the start of my playing career to give you the best answer and correct context....as for the post-96 period....from afar, I have a few comments on this too...

The Dawn of Time:

I grew up in Mt Waverley, a suburb of Melbourne. The lifestyle was "Pleasnt Valley Sunday" (the Monkees). The Whitlam years was a period of liberation, and we knew our 'Miranda rights' from watching US cop shows...My buddies were the late great Tracey Pew (Birthday Party), and Chris Walsh (Moodists/Dave Graney). By 1975 I was into Alice Cooper (Killer/ Billion $ Babies), The Stooges (Raw Power, earlier LPs not yet available in Oz), Lou Reed, and Patti Smith....

Walsh and I started a garrage band with high school buddies....around that time Radio Birdman did a gig at a small pub in St Kilda, we hooked up with them after the gig and went back to their hotel to listen to Fun House and the first Stooges album (not yet for sale in Oz). Before long Walsh and I had our first band playing, and had installed ourselves in St Kilda 'The Reals', with Ollie Olsen (himself & Max Q)....soon we  had Archie & Jugheads and could by old Stooges and Velvet Underground records, but it was still hard to find places to play as 'an alternative' band.

English Punk had emerged, but it didn't embody the ideas I wanted to express, nor reflect my background....on an ideas level I respected the Clash, but I wasn't 'into' them, and the Pistols were 'a right larf'....I guess on a fashion level we cut and dyed our hair, to draw a sharp line between ourselves and the music "establishment"....back then, the Stooges had not so long ago finished, and the Velvet Underground not too long dead either, with Reed still doing intersting things....the best Oz band for originality to break were The Saints, and Birdman were a good blend of originality, playing the covers of key influences as well....

The Wave Breaks

In the late 70's, Mushroom records saw that a few bucks might be made and set up "Suicide Records"...they put out a compilation album with the numero uno "alternative" bands from all over Australia...My band was "The Negatives", with Chris Walsh and Mick Holmes (Paul Kelly/Zimmermen), the Boys Next Door, JAB, etcetera...now it may seem we were 'mainstream', with Molly Meldrum flashing the album cover on Countdown, but we were ripped off badly: however, a kind of scene was developed, the most influential being Melbourne and Sydney, in that order, and from by the early 80's a myriad of bands emerged encompassing 'new wave pop', The Models (Mark Ferrie, Johnny Crash, Ash Wedneday)....and the darker side The Birthday Party.

The state of the "Alternative Scene" when the Cowboys started in 1982-1985:

So far I've only spoken about music....and of course, that's what we're here for....but the key to the music was the inspiration, for me the greatest lyric writers, and whatever it took to fuel that, writing being my chosen direction...since the 70's we'd read "New Musical Express" and "Rolling Stone", and this gave me insight into authors I hadn't discovered myself, movies, American and European, and many other things....so you're looking at Satre, Huxley, Burrows, Hunter S Thompson (an infinite list)....and so the "alternative scene", was not only musicians, but writers, painters, film makers, students, old rock'n'rollers relating it to a kind of 'rennaissance', a là the late 60's....so when you played live, the audience often consisted of a variety of creative people out to have the best time they'd ever had, and you knew how to make that happen....

Now, the purists in the scene, on the musical side, believed they were creating something that would change and influence many things.... whether that was simply having a completley original 'good time', with no particular message, to those who saw alternative music as a valid and real creative forum influencing everything from day to day life to a more creative and and substantial form of expression....and the Cowboys fell into both categories, with no conflict of interest... and in one category more than another depending on the weather

At this time record companies were still fairly free with their check books, even if you didn't make a gold record, or worse, so you could usually find someone to bankroll your record...and so, for a few years, creating whatever you wanted was generally possible....but for most truely "alternative" bands (anti-pop, if you like, may need clarification), the key to securing this backing, and a future, was to go and work in Europe....the Cowboys didn't do this (which disadvantaged us a lot), but our capacity to sell records in Europe helped us to stay active in Australia, and release records up until 'Things To Come' (1997), when I left the country.

The Late 80's and 'the death of rock and roll'.

After a brief interlude,  1987 saw the Cowboys starting work on "Trouble From Providence". The deal with Citadel was won on our reputation, "great-live-band-that-sells -records-in-Europe". Me and the bass player were based in Sydney, so recording happened in both Melbourne and Sydney. Our manager, Roger Greerson, said at the time  "rock and roll is dead"....by the end of recording, we were all based in Melbourne, and after the release we set off on a tour of the East Coast of Australia. The first gig was in central Sydney, at the trade union club .... : then it was back to Melbourne, at the Prince of Wales for a full house....and then a series of gigs in Sydney, and Queensland....despite great reviews from the critics about our album and the live shows...it began to appear that our manager was right....the old rules of touring and playing no longer applied....in Australia ...no link between playing and selling records, and with rare exceptions, all of the creative people that sought out music as an inspiration or an outlet... no longer existed, music was no longer a catalyst.... playing live is always great....but the rationalisation of venues ....

The Early '90s: the depression someone needed to have:

Fortunately, as a band with the will to keep on creating, 'Providence' was our move from 'live phenomina' to 'awsome in the studio'. But more and more, only cover bands and the rich and famous were getting gigs in the sour economic climate of the early '90s. 'Providence'  should have set us up for a more productive 1990's....but the check books were no longer opening freely for the 'first wave' of alternative bands....and it wasn't really until 'Nirvana type bands' , and the end of the recession, that new talent was able to emerge....but was this really a true 'alternative' scene...? ... we saw some good music, we were entertained, we had Woodstock 2 and lots of marketing.....but the Sydney based "alternative" musicians evacuated Sydney....Spencer Jones, Penny Ikinger, Tex Perkins...the list goes on..... and moved to Melbourne...

Post 96 from afar.....

In Sydney, the musicians have to pay everyone: the bar staff, the cleaner...the house mixer, even if they use their own....a zero sum game...

Melbourne is the last "stronghold"....if your at the top of the pyramid, you live overseas, and play there once a year; if your based in Melbourne, or nearby, and at the top, you gig occasionally...others gig when they can, record when they can.....

But I can't speak about who's emerging now, I've been away a few years...I'd like to think there's a new movement of creative, inspired, people, committed only to the music, ready to be be totally uncompomising about what they want to say and do....whose goal is to create something extraordinary....if not, let me know, I'd love to make another album....

Hope this covers this question,

Best Regards

Garry Gray

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