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By Ryan Sparks
Leave
it to the Aussies to remind us over on this side of the pond
just what good old fashioned ass kicking classic rock n’ roll is
supposed to sound like. Airbourne are a bunch of rambunctious
young kids in their early twenties who last year released one of
the best albums of their year hands down with their debut
Runnin’ Wild which was issued by Roadrunner Records. Their
sound is a major throwback, and yeah they do sound like AC/DC on
speed at times, but they’ve been extremely successful thus far
by subscribing to the KISS formula (as in Keep It Simple
Stupid). This is amps on 11, three chord, beer chuggin’, fist
pumpin’, tongue in cheek, rock anthems of the most righteous
kind, and you can expect to see these road dogs tearing it up
live up live all summer long when they hit your town. The band
which is made up of the O’Keefe brothers Joel (guitars, vocals)
and Ryan (drums), as well as David Roads (guitars) and Justin
Street (bass) respectively are surely going to be band to keep a
close eye on in the future. Do yourself a favour and get your
paws on this dirty little gem fast and check ‘em out live before
they go global. Ryan O’Keefe recently gave me the lowdown on
Runnin’ Wild, a brief history lesson of Aussie Pub Rock and
a few beer tips for whenever I visit the land down under.
CRR:
Congratulations on this fantastic album Runnin’ Wild. In
today’s day and age of cookie cutting flavour of the month pop
crap and every other kind of musical categorization they want to
throw at you, this album is a real breath of fresh air and more
importantly a real kick in the ass too.
Ryan: Aw thanks
mate!
CRR: How’s the
response been? I know you’ve been out on touring like crazy
behind it.
Ryan: The response
has been absolutely 100% fantastic. All of the UK and Europe was
sold out and Canada as well. The US shows have been really
vibrant and it’s just been absolutely fantastic.
CRR: Over the past
few years you’ve been slowly building up your reputation at home
in Australia, but was it a bit of a surprise to see the great
response you’ve been getting over here in North America?
Ryan: Yeah
absolutely. It was a certainly a bit of an eye opener when we
were over in the U.K. with the amount of people that were at the
shows and how much they already knew about the band, so it’s
been fantastic to be able to go around the world and start
playing.
CRR: You guys are
fast becoming known on this side of the pond for your energetic
live show and you really harnessed that when you went into the
studio to record the album because it really has that live off
the floor feel to it. Were there any challenges with trying to
translate that live energy over to the record at all?
Ryan: Recording is
always sort of technical but it was pretty easy. We literally
walked in and threw it down on tape and couldn’t be happier with
the way it came out. I blew one ear out when I was recording
‘cause I had my headphones too loud. I recorded the album with a
migraine in one ear but other than that it was a breeze
[laughing].
CRR: So you
recorded direct to tape?
Ryan: Yeah we
compared it to digital and there’s a big difference.
CRR: Is going back
to the older recording techniques more in keeping with how the
band wants to sound?
Ryan: With the way
we play, I guess its one of those things where we find that the
old equipment does the job and for us and we find it’s the right
way to do it. All the old amplifiers, old guitars and the old
ways of recording seem to capture it really, really well so its
kind of like, if its not broken don’t fix it.
CRR: The sound is
a real dry one.
Ryan: Yeah.
CRR: Does it
bother you guys at all when people compare Airbourne’s sound to
AC/DC or call it retro?
Ryan: It’s almost
one of those things where really every band that has ever come
out in what we call the music industry has been compared to
someone. Quite frankly if we’re going to get compared to one of
the best, if not the best rock ‘n roll band in the world, I’m
honoured to be compared to them really [laughing].
CRR: You guys
eventually relocated to the States when you began working on the
album didn’t you?
Ryan: It was
around 2006 I think. We were in L.A. for about six months and a
half months and at the end of January we moved to New Jersey and
started a band house. We were only there for like a day before
we took off for Europe and the U.K. There isn’t really much in
the house except for a couple of mattresses and two chairs in
front of the fire place, that’s about it.
CRR: Hopefully
you’ve at least got a good beer fridge.
Ryan: Oh yeah
definitely, we checked that out as soon as we got there
[laughing].
CRR: You had some
real impressive people work on Runnin’ Wild. Most
musicians would kill to have people like Bob Marlette (Producer)
and Andy Wallace (Mixing) involved on their debut album. How did
that come about?
Ryan: It was
fantastic. Bob really just came in and said the album was pretty
self explanatory. He felt it was like a boxing match with the
gloves off, and he just told us to do what we do, that he’d be
there for us, and to just go in there and have a lot of fun and
that’s what we did. Andy Wallace is Andy Wallace you know, he
absolutely got the album to sound the way we dreamt it would so
we were quite happy. Dave Schiffman was the engineer, he’s Rick
Ruin’s guy and he managed to get the right tones and sounds that
we needed, plus he got my kit to sound real good.
CRR: I’m a little
surprised that you spent over six months on the album because
like I said earlier it really sounds like it was hammered pretty
quickly.
Ryan: We had a lot
of songs ready to go before we went into the studio and when we
got there John and I said we were going to make the best album
we possibly could, so when we were over there, we worked our
asses off to try to get some variety on the album and just tried
to make it the way we saw it.
CRR: You had about
30 or 40 songs written and had to trim it down and filter out
the best tracks.
Ryan: Pretty
much. We just wanted to trim it down and keep what was right for
the album.
CRR: Jimmy Barnes
has spoken passionately about Australian artists saying that
“Australia has great bands because they cut their teeth live
playing to the people” which is something Airbourne has done and
continues to do a lot of. Getting out there playing shows is
what this band is really all about isn’t it?
Ryan: It really
is, its one of those things that I was thinking about the other
day because in the van is where we feel at home, and touring is
the only we that we can really live. John and I started when I
was 11 and the first show was when I was 13. We were travelling
around Australia so it’s a way of life and we’ll always be
touring. That’s all we really want to do is just keep playing to
people, and playing to people that are maybe just hearing us for
the first time, it’s a lot of fun.
CRR: You’ve
described Airbourne’s music as Australian Pub Rock, tell me
exactly what that is and what your influences were starting out.
Ryan: Aussie Pub
rock, the best way top describe it would be, AC/DC was the
biggest pub rock band to come out of Australia, but there was a
number of bands especially in the early days before AC/DC. There
was Billy Thorpe and The Aztecs, and Lobby Loyd, they were sort
of the pioneers of Aussie pub rock. Then it went on to Rose
Tattoo, AC/DC and The Angels, it’s basically just a 4/4 tough as
guts rock ‘n roll. In the late 80’s and early 90’s it carried
on with Kings of The Sun and bands like that, so it’s definitely
a genre down under.
CRR: You’ve been
spending a lot of time in North America obviously, how do you
find the music scene over here?
Ryan: The scene
over here is definitely happening. In Australia there are
definitely a lot of bands, but it’s hard to play because a lot
of venues have been torn down because of noise complaints. It’s
a vast country with only like 4 or 5 major cities. If you do a
tour in country areas in towns like Wagga Wagga, you’ll play in
front of like 50 people or whatever because they’re such small
towns and its so spread out. We love playing over here in North
America because it’s a new city every night, and it’s just a
whole lot of fun.
CRR: Last question
for you, if I ever get over to Australia what beer should I be
drinking?
Ryan: Victoria
Bitter and Carlton Draught. We’ve just smuggled in two cases of
VB from Canada. We got it at the Liquor Depot I think it was
called. It’s like this green six pack with these little stubby
bottles.
CRR: Stubby’s wow!
You don’t see those anymore.
Ryan: [laughing]
Yeah we’re obviously a little behind the times!
http://www.airbournerock.com/
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