Bootless and Unhorsed, Music

Review of 2012 Cold Chisel album, ‘No Plans’, published Reverb magazine, April 2012

Backstage at a Tamworth Country Music Festival show in 2005, Jimmy Barnes is shrieking like a cranky cockatoo. He grins apologetically and remarks, “It’s my warm-up routine,” before joining fellow vintage rockers Normie Rowe and Ross Wilson onstage.

That unmistakeable scream is the first thing that jumps out on Cold Chisel’s first album in 14 years, as Barnesy warms up on No Plans.

Spraying f-bombs over a blues jam circa Rising Sun, Barnes comes out swinging while the band flexes its honky-tonk.

Continue reading “Review of 2012 Cold Chisel album, ‘No Plans’, published Reverb magazine, April 2012”

Bootless and Unhorsed, Music

Ed Kuepper interview for Reverb magazine, March 2011

Ed Kuepper claims he’s ‘difficult to work with’. But that hasn’t stopped him from founding the Saints, the Laughing Clowns, recording dozens of influential albums and recently, joining the Bad Seeds, possibly the most important band of the past 20 years, as guitar-slinger. On the eve of a national tour with Laughing Clowns drummer Mark Dawson, he reflects on the convoluted artistic process that has brought him to this point.

“I take what I do fairly seriously, I know that can be a kind of , a pain in the arse to people if they’re just trying to have a great time. Hopefully I don’t wallow in too much artistic angst while I’m onstage.

Continue reading “Ed Kuepper interview for Reverb magazine, March 2011”