fergus brown interview

Fergus Brown is a man that we've become fond of here at Album of The Week. He's an Australian singer-songwriter whose debut record Burgers Frown has had a fair amount of play time around our office and who has been generating some buzz for his intimate, narrative brand of cleverly-worded indie pop tunes. Recently we chatted to Fergus who was in his home town of Sydney to play a few shows between supporting fellow Australian troubadour, Josh Pyke, on tour. He riffed articulately on the nerdish delight of nailing a killer lyric, the ups and downs of the dynamic Sydney music scene, and "putting across the fun" when performing. It went a little something like this:

Fergus on the response to the album:

"The reactions have been great and lots of nice things said, as well as a few tours on the back of it. Everything I've hoped for has come through - which is nice because it took a while to make my record to be honest and you can be really proud of it inwardly to yourself, but until it gets out there it's all a bit "make-believe" in your head. So it's nice to have the reality that when someone says "hey I'd like to hear your album" you can actually say to them: "here it is" - rather than getting crazy looks from your mates who suspect you've just been wasting time in the countryside somewhere."

On his local music scene:

"The Hopetoun [legendary live music venue in Sydney's Surry Hills precinct] has closed. It's really sad because it's sort of where me and all my mates' bands… they pretty much had all their first proper gigs at the Hopetoun. And even if they all moved on, or moved upwards or broke up it was always the emotional heart of the scene. There's a lot of new places where you can play, but the Hopetoun closing is still sad. It's closed before my time once before, so hopefully someone will re-open it someday soon."

The musical influences on his record:

"Somewhere between classic singer-songwriters from decades past - like Randy Newman and Paul Simon and Harry Nillson. But I suppose I listened to a lot of American Indie stuff as well while I was making the record. Mainly Nineties stuff like Pavement and Weezer and later on a lot of Grandaddy and Mercury Rev… That whole family tree of music slowly filtered through my music. So I guess you could say I love the classic songwriting structure, but maybe through a slightly more modern filter."

What comes first - lyrics or music?

"At the moment I'm writing a lot of music without lyrics, but I don't know whether or not I should be a bit worried about that because I've always done it in the other direction - start with the lyrics and build it slowly from there. I love playing around with words. It sounds a bit wanky but it's a really fun thing when you come up with something that you're pleased with - a little lyric that you love singing cos it sounds good coming out of your mouth… And if other people like it too … well that's good!"

On his backing band - is there a solid line up or does he just play with whoever's free?

"It's getting solid - I've been playing with Holly [keys, loops, back vocals] for quite a few years now. I've got a new bass player who's been with us for a year, and he's an absolute legend. Because we're quite independent often people have to disappear and do their own projects, but for most gigs we're the same line-up."

On Holly:

ha ha ha! She's cool man. She comes from a theatre background and nothing worries her - so once she steps on stage you just have a good time. That's something I've learnt from her: you've gotta have the fun to put across the fun."

On being a "natural performer":

I've never been shy. I was probably the annoying kid at school who was cool with public speaking. I like the stage but the confidence does come and go. Having a good band there and good mates to play with makes a massive difference to your confidence."

On touring North America:

"It was surprisingly good! I didn't know what to expect - I thought the venues might be a bit random - you could be in some biker bar or have two people standing in the corner. But the crowds were good, the venues were good… I was surprised to be honest. I thought we'd have a few brilliant gigs and a few clangers, but we had a lot of great gigs. Chatting to the locals there, they were like "how did YOU get this gig?" and I was like "shit I don't know! I'm not complaining!"

Fergus Brown's album of the week:

"There's a couple of things I really liking… Can I just choose a song instead of an album? The song "My Moon, My Man" by Feist. Feist is an artist I never really got into before and sometimes with artists that everybody loves at the same time you instinctively get turned off it a bit. So with this song I really like the spareness of the record and the way her voice is sort of put in front of everything - the simplistic arrangement. It's a really cleverly graceful sounding record."

Fergus told us that next year he'll get back on the overseas tour circuit - with an appearance at South by South West in March, and also do some recording early in 2010. He is about to kick off a few dates on the east coast of Australia, so if you're in area and you're into pretty, clever Jens Lekmann-style folk-pop tunes, check out the dates and make yourself available for some of the sweet sounds of Fergus Brown. - That almost rhymed.




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