Image: Gareth Liddiard by Jamie Wdziekonski – supplied.
Author: Bradley Cork
There are few songwriters that can harness a range of topics including but not limited to executions, disenfranchisement, human cruelty or political warfare with such raw vigour and interest like Gareth Liddiard. The way in which he can articulate a narrative or viewpoint with a couple of chords has always been gripping, with audiences feeling transfixed on the chaos that can take place purely from his words alone. While he is largely known for his raucous and explorative work within Tropical Fuck Storm, Springtime and The Drones, in 2010 he put out a solo album that has only garnered more allure over time. Strange Tourist is made up of Gareth’s Australian drawl and acoustic guitar with maybe the faint sound of a fire crackling or one of many cavernous rooms of the mansion in which these songs were recorded in. It has always been a meditative and solitary listen with the focus being on the delivery and the story telling that takes place. This year marks the 13th anniversary of the album and Gareth will be taking it on the road to mark the occasion.
Part of the reason for revisiting this album is the recent reissue on vinyl via label Joyful Noise but more substantially is the fact that Gareth’s partner and bandmate in TFS Fiona Kitschin is in the midst of treatment for stage 3 breast cancer. ‘She’s just post operation but she’s doing well, everything’s going to plan treatment wise, she’s just really sore and on painkillers watching Netflix. It’s been a crazy few years, so many shitty things have gone on but we’re getting through it, we’re not beaten yet!’ The need for Fi to undergo treatment has put a lot of TFS-related plans on hold for now and a GoFundMe page was set up to provide relief for them during such a difficult time. The generosity provided by the musical community seems fitting for two people who have given so much of their lives to performance and the arts, but Gareth sees it as a way in which people can provide support during other’s times of need. ‘Yeah, we’ve given to GoFundMe’s or certain fundraisers or charities and it makes you feel good that you can do something for somebody else’s problem even if it’s just a little something. So it’s nice to be on the receiving end of that and also that people can show that they care and feel useful.’
Strange Tourist is an album written during a period of downtime between The Drones’ albums Havilah and I See Seaweed. The spare and sparse arrangements crept in on Havilah cuts like ‘Penumbra’ or ‘Careful As You Go’ but even those were embellished by fellow Drones members. As a result, there hasn’t been an album quite like Strange Tourist in Gareth’s discography since. The album was originally meant to be recorded where Gareth and Fi were living at the time, however plans changed with the opportunity to record in an unorthodox location. ‘Burke Reid who recorded it, he borrowed all our stuff and recorded Jack Ladder and he had found this mansion just outside of Yass and then they recorded and then when it came time for him to pack up and drive down to my house he called and said ‘fuck it, just come here, we’ll just rent it a bit longer’ so we got an extra 10 days and it was great and cheap. It’s like this 9 bedroom, 3 story beautiful mansion, it used to be a sheep station so it was in the middle of nowhere and beautiful…it was cold but I just set my shit up next to an open fire place and Burke was in this separate loungeroom which was huge and amazing.’
A big part of the charm of Strange Tourist is in the lyrical subject matter that takes place in alarming sets of circumstances or environments. At the time, Gareth saw the importance of choosing his lines and topics as something that drew the listener in to maintain interest. ‘It was a challenge because it was the first time I’d done a solo thing so everything was riding on the lyrics without any kind of help from anyone or anything. Rock and roll’s great because you got loud drums and fuzz pedals and loud amps and you can lean on them, they can do a lot of the heavy lifting for you. With a lyrical album it’s just so different.’ One such line in the title track is centred around renting televisions in a hospital for the terminally ill and following up if people were late on payment, something that both Gareth and Fi had done when they were working on the dole via the Department of Social Services. ‘That whole experience was horrible! I’d come back to the share house after work and it was me, Fi and a bunch of musicians. And I’d say ‘how was your day’ and for them it was great because it was just sitting around in a backyard drinking beer; or Dan Kelly would’ve been in the studio with Paul Kelly having a lovely day. And I was like ‘well, I went in to shake down a teenager at a hospital for money for a TV and I came in and he was fucking dead!’ Like I thought he was really sick or asleep but he was dead and that sort of shit happened nearly every day.’
It’s within both personal experiences in conjunction with historical topics on Strange Tourist that make Gareth’s words fascinating. He can pick a topic like extremist radicalisation and terrorism or political greed and articulate it in such a matter-of-fact manner. ‘I’ve always been drawn to the heavier side of music, history, and literature. I kind of feel like it has more potency or gives more of a kick compared to the lighter side of things which doesn’t have the punch in the guts compared to the way 1930’s Germany or the convict era of Australia does, I’ve always been drawn to that so I was loving the writing really…Like a pig in shit!’ Further to this, songs culminated in the use of tools like the Brewer’s Dictionary of Phrase and Fable with stories lifted from first- or second-hand telling. ‘Sometimes it’s completely autobiographical and then completely fictional but then there’s always your personal experience and knowledge. It’s hard to kind of make or say something musically without having a decent understanding of what it is, whether it’s grief or shoplifting maybe…You kind of have to have done it.’
The performative aspect of Gareth’s musical life has always been astonishing and cathartic to watch whether it has been in any of the outfits he has fronted or just him sitting down with an acoustic guitar. I shared with him a time in which he closed a solo set with the last song from Strange Tourist ‘The Radicalisation of D’ and how it stunned the room. For Gareth, there’s always a balance between embodying the words and turning on the performative aspect of playing in front of people. ‘It depends how much you inhabit it at the time and how much the song itself has you in it. [With] something like ‘Radicalisation…’ lots of those things are from personal experience in the sense of it’s just a litany of things that disenfranchise or would disenfranchise anyone and they certainly did that to me and put me on a different road to most people.’ Gareth speaks further to the human condition being further akin to nurture with his lyrics often considering the worst aspects of what a human can be capable of but also understanding how this can come to be. ‘I was never empuzzled from anyone doing fucked up stuff; there’s always a reason. Even the worst serial killers, their childhoods are just horrific. People are created, they’re not just born. Then singing ‘Radicalisation…’ like that, it’s intense and heavy and fucking hard work. And you’ve got to make it work too and vibrate so you really have to inhabit it. It’s a blurry line between performance and the real thing, inhabiting it. That line is hard to define.’
Another aspect to life which has coloured Gareth’s peculiar lens was his growing up in Sorrento, Western Australia. For someone who’s upbringing had its challenges, Gareth’s point of view skewed towards the positive and enjoyable aspects. ‘It’s so fucking weird to think now that it wasn’t gentrified; it was kind of lower middle class, working class, fish and chips shop and a caravan park that people mostly lived in rather than just holiday in and it was the end of the line and it was fucking cool, surrounded by bush and sand dunes and patches of suburbia. It was cool but then at the time you take it for granted, it was just so nice and free-ranging, my mother, she was a single mother and she was always at work. Me and my sister would just walk around with our dog and just went to the beach all the time. You’d get home, the dog wasn’t there, you’d go to the beach, he’d be at the beach. He was like a German shepherd free-ranging around, would jump the fence. Yeah, you’d see friends, have fish and chips, smoke weed on the beach, it was fucking good and you just thought ‘oh yeah this is normal’ and now you’d need to be rich to live right down there, it’s ridiculous.’
You can catch Gareth at one of the dates below of his Australian tour and purchase a copy of the reissue of Strange Tourist here.
Gareth Liddiard’s ‘Strange Tourist’ 13-Year Anniversary Solo Tour 2023, with special guest Jess Ribeiro.
Wed 8 Nov – The Gov (Adelaide)
Thu 9 Nov – The Rechabite (Perth)
Sat 11 Nov – Theatre Royal (Castlemaine)
Thu 16 Nov – La La La’s (Wollongong)
Fri 17 Nov – The Factory Theatre (Sydney)
Sat 18 Nov – King St (Newcastle)
Sun 19 Nov – Torquay Hotel (Torquay)
Wed 29 Nov – The Old Museum (Brisbane)
Thu 30 Nov – Thornbury Theatre (Melbourne)
Fri 1 Dec – Caravan Music Archies Creek (VIC)
Wed 6 Dec – Thornbury Theatre (Melbourne)
Melody Menu 