That riff mongering, Aussie classic rock behemoth that is Electric Mary are back, 8 long years for us long time fans after their last album release. This week I had a chat with frontman Rusty Brown about their new album Mother due out on 15th February worldwide. An album which I’ve spent the last few weeks listening to and have no hesitation in saying is Electric Mary’s best album yet. An opinion I’m not alone with, it seems according to Rusty “You know what, those people that have heard the new album are saying the same thing, that its our best yet. I think it’s because there’s a real depth to the songs on this album. “
Band member departures and illness saw the last few years pass on by, but 2019 marks the return of this mighty band with a new album and a renewed enthusiasm to put Electric Mary in it’s rightful place in the rock world.
“Life is not a rehearsal, you only get to do things once. We all know what we want to do, but whether we do it is the other thing. I’ve always done music and I’ve had some shit times where I haven’t had any money, but the journey to get there is just so good!”
Speaking of journey’s, the origins of what the world will soon hear as Mother, started back in 2017, with first single Woman being released in mid 2017. The obvious question for Rusty, was whether the band considered this delay a blessing or a curse, which in his emphatic style, declared it a blessing. “Well I think definitely, as it gave us time to really think about this record. Even during the mixing stage I sang three backing vocals while we were there. I was thinking there was just something missing, so I said is there any chance you can set up a mic to record some more vocals, which they said yeah go ahead do it. So that was at final mixing stage, and even Pete was recording some guitar parts too. So we were recording this one right down to the final stages.”
Having this extra time, right down to the wire meant that Rusty’s trusted song writing rule wouldn’t slip by, and discussing this, you realise why the music of Electric Mary over the years has been so timeless and a cut above most. “One of the rules I have when writing is asking myself, would I sing those words, or sing that melody in 10 years time. If the answer is No, then I’ll move onto something else. Because you want to think your band has longevity.”
Diving into more of the songs on the album, first single Woman will have you thinking that Electric Mary have never been away, it picks right off at the likes of earlier Mary tracks such as Let Me Out and Gasoline & Guns. A stomping riff courtesy of guitarist Pete Robinson, who was responsible for writing most of the albums faster and heavier songs, including one of my personal favourites, Hold Onto What You Got. “Pete was actually was with Paul “Spyder” Marrett (drums) in the studio working on this one. Pete had this riff and Spyder was playing to it and I was like, what is that, as it sounded like a song they knew. They were like it’s nothing, we’re just writing it. I was like no way, this is so good. I’ll tell you why, if you go back and listen to how Spyder is playing the drums, it reminded me of Barracuda by Heart, which is not a drum pattern I’d ask to be played in one of my songs. But it’s a song that I love. What’s funny, Spyder didn’t even know what Barracuda was and that’s even better (laughs).”
Circling back to an earlier comment about the depth of this album in comparison to the last few, the benefit of having that extra time, really became evident, especially with Rusty reflecting on the bands earlier three releases. “As of right now, Down To The Bone seems to be most peoples favourite and III, well that was a really disjointed album. We recorded some of it in America, some in Australia on two occasions, we had Jack (Jones aka Irwin Thomas) on parts, then we didn’t have Jack (Jones), we had Glenn (Proudfoot), then we didn’t have Glenn. We just went around in circles, I love the songs on that album, but whether we got to do them right is another thing.”
If you loved the bands debut album Four Hands High as much as I do, then Sorry Baby and Long Long Day will be right up your alley. Two of the longer tracks on the new album clocking in over 6 minutes each, these slow burners dial back the intensity and bombast of the rest of the album, but this just serves to further showcase the sheer quality of the bands song writing and musicianship. As with all great songs, the origins of Sorry Baby as Rusty shared, was more a happy accident, then a stroke of musical genius… “Sorry Baby is also one of my favourite songs, the album version of that is the 3rd middle section we tried on that. If you watch the live YouTube version it’s a totally different middle section, which there was nothing clever with how that came about. Alex had played a wrong note and I went “man, what was that…..”. He was like, sorry, sorry…but I said, no, no, that’s it, that’s it, that’s where its going, so that’s how the song ended up. The start of that song, that was written by Brett, when I wrote that song I just had the laid back guitar. But Brett bought the guitar parts you hear at the start and end of the song.”
With Four Hands High pushing 15 years since it’s release, I couldn’t help but dig for Rusty’s views on this album, especially given for me, some of the songs on Mother stylistically remind me of that era. “If there was my 10 year rule back then, I wouldn’t sing any of the songs from Four Hands High. But it surprises me actually that people keep asking me to play the single from that album, Sail On. I guess we never really talk much about that album actually and I tell you why… Venom and I play most of the record. See I’m not a great guitarist and never really wanted to play guitar. So Irwin (Thomas aka Jack Jones) plays on it, Pete (Robinson) plays on it, Cam McKenzie from Horsehead also plays on it, but they’ll just be playing a solo or a bit of a song, so its mostly just me and Venom playing everything. With me doing most of the guitars, it’s probably why I don’t like it that much, maybe there’s also a part of me wishing I had of recorded those songs better. John Lennon often talked about re-recording some of the earlier Beatles songs. C’mon man, that’s The Beatles, so everyone thinks like that.”
Noticeable on the new album, is the slower tempo and more distinct light and shade, “which is actually my favourite style” beams Rusty. “I think it’s actually a good thing for this album, as it means we were more open to doing different things, which goes back to the album having depth. For a lot of years I’ve had people say to me, you’ve got to do a ballad, you’ve got to do a ballad. I’ve always had my standard answer, mate we are a V8, we turn the key and we go and that’s what we do. But on this album there’s definitely different song styles. And you know what else, 3 of the faster songs, which have that Electric Mary element, weren’t actually started by me, they were started by Pete. But we all worked on this album in a pre-production sense at another studio, which we’d never done before. It was a case of best idea wins. We’d already demoed the songs, but if someone thought it could be better, it would be OK tell us what you’re thinking. Sometimes, it didn’t work, sometimes it did. Everyone in our band is a rock star, it’s about how good a band we are, not how good we are as individuals.”
Gimme Love opening up the album bleeds 70’s styled classic rock, has a stop start riff and throws in the hint of a psychedelic interlude half way into it’s three minutes, before closing out with some tasty soloing. A song made for the stage, you bet that you will hear this one getting played on the upcoming run of album launch shows. “We’ll probably play 5 or 6 of the new ones, so more than half the album. Gimme Love…24, 7 ours, noting that’s not hours, it’s ours…. Woman, which we’ve already played so it’s not new to the set. Hold Onto What You Got, The Way You Make Me Feel, Sorry Baby and It’s Alright, which is actually a really positive song. It’s about depression and anxiety, there’s no negativity in that song at all.”
The true Mary experience is seeing them live, something they’ve built a reputation on and toured with the likes Deep Purple, Whitesnake, Alice Cooper, Glenn Hughes, and Judas Priest to name but a few. So if you’ve never had the chance, then don’t miss them, rock bands in Australia don’t come much better, believe me, I’ve seen them many a’ time. The mid 2010’s saw them conquering crowds around Australia, USA, England, France, Spain and Japan and the obvious question for Rusty is if an overseas adventure is on cards again? “We’re looking at Europe in November, where it’s not just their love of classic rock, but the opportunities for shows. If we get in a Tarago and drive to our gig in Sydney, we’re only playing at the SSA club in Albury on the way through. If we get in a car in Paris and drive for 10 hours, we’ve gone through three countries and played 14 shows for that same 10 hour drive, and there’s Festivals in that.”
2019 has the feeling of being a big year for us lovers of classic rock music, with a bit of a renewed buzz around the traps with the likes of Rival Sons, Greta Van Fleet, The Temperance Movement and locally, Palace Of The King all having new albums already out, or on the way. Make no mistake, once Mother is out and stages around the world are once again conquered, Electric Mary will re-affirm their place in that rock brigade delivering classic rock ‘n’ roll the way that it used to taste. “Were not playing music for the day, classic rock is not the music of the day. R&B and hip-hop, that’s the music of the day, but we don’t write like that. Sure, we write in a certain style, but its not 2019, it’s more 1975.”
