L7 make their comeback to Australia and New Zealand in 2021, gracing Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Adelaide, Wellington and Auckland stages with a snarl, a wink and a new album Scatter The Rats in tow. On L7’s new album Scatter The Rats they remain a raucous, subversive, and vital voice in rock. Back with their trademark distorted, heavy riffs, headbanging rhythms and indelible melodies, L7 are taking on society’s biggest dickheads, the fakers and liars, and everyone who doubted them. We spoke to vocalist/guitarist Donita Sparks ahead of the tour to discuss their return to Australia as well as their latest album.
At the time of this interview, tours in Australia and around the world were being in jeopardy due to the Corana Virus epidemic and at time of publishing, it was uncertain as to whether the tour would happen in May 2020. Since then a reschedule tour has been announced, see new dates at bottom of article – Editor, April 18th 2020.
Andrew: So it’s been a couple of years since we last saw you in Australia so we are very excited to see you coming back!
Donita: We are very excited too, we can’t believe it, it’s so great. It makes sense because we put out a record last year and we’re still kind of touring that album “Scatter The Rats” so it’s great. We’ll be playing some new stuff and we’ll be playing a different set than what we played last time, we’re working on some ‘new’ old songs! Songs we didn’t play last time
Andrew: Nice! Obviously Scatter The Rats” came out last year and so it wasn’t out yet when you came here last time, that is a great album by the way so how do you guys feel about it now that some time has passed since it was released?
Donita: We feel great about it! I mean it didn’t sell a gazillion records but how many records sell a gazillion anymore, but it achieved what we wanted to which was get new music out there. We’re happy wth the tracks, we love the production and yeah, it was good to write some new material for the band.
Andrew: And playing them live as I assume you’ve been on the road quite a bit since it was released, how have they been fitting along with the older songs and how have the crowds been responding to them so far?
Donita: They like the new tracks a lot. When the new album first came out they were already singing the lyrics so that’s always a good sign if they are already singing the lyrics and the record hasn’t been out that long. We haven’t been touring a few months but we toured all summer so now we’ll be picking up the touring schedule again starting with Australia and then right up to June.
Andrew: So putting a new album out and adding some new songs to the setlist can sometimes to some bands be a difficult task, how mahy songs have you been able to squeeze in there so far?
Donita: From the new album?
Andrew: Yeah.
Donita: Well we squeeze in 4 and we’re also playing our two singles that came out before the album did. So we’re not playing all of them because nobody wants to hear an entire new record but I don’t know, we’ll probably play about 4 new songs or something like that.
Andrew: Cool well we look forward to see that. So obviously it was a long time coming for the album to be coming, it was 20 years since the last one came out so when you went in to write and record those songs did you feel any kind of pressure at all to kind of please yourselves and the fans at the same time?
Donita: Well we had recorded two singles before we recorded the album so I would say I was a little more nervous when we did our first single which was called “Dispatch from Mar-a-Lago” and that we did in 2017 I think. So I was like, ‘Ooh shit, the heat is on!’ [laughs]. But after that recording the next one we did was “I Came Back To Bitch” and we liked that so then it was like, ‘Oh cool let’s do an album’. Yeah I wasn’t nervous, I was cool.
Andrew: What was that feeling like with you guys in the band? Was there a sense of nostalgia, a new adventure?
Donita: It was a different adventure, we were working with a new producer and we’re just different people. We’re older, we live in different parts of the city, we don’t hang out with each other, only when we’re on the road and only when we’re doing band business. The music brings the players together, we get together for the music, so it was a creative task that we were doing and it was great.
Andrew: Based on any great feedback that you’ve been getting and being pleased with how it’s come out, do you think in the future there will be another album then?
Donita: Well right now we’re sort of interested in putting out some singles, doing some collaborations and maybe an EP at the end of the year or beginning of next year or something. I think that I love the immediacy of the internet, the only thing that we were waiting on was vinyl for our album to come out so we were just waiting for the factory. That’s not how I always want to be with music, I kind of want to release it if we are able to do it which we are because of the internet. I’d like to release it a little more immediately so that makes me interested in smaller projects, shorter projects if you know what I mean, not a monumental album but just like, ‘Oh let’s do this, this and this’. We just did a cover of a Joan Jett song called “Fake Friends” and Joan Jett sings on it and plays guitar on it and we’re releasing it only for this Australian/New Zealand tour, so that’s going to be available only at the merch stand for that. So that was really cool and like, ‘Ok Fake Friends, how great!’ and then we did another track for the B side and it’s like, done so I like that a lot.
Andrew: That does seem like that’s the way it’s going these days in the music industry is rather than doing these massive full length albums, that band bands seem to be putting out singles more and more often. So does that certainly interest you more these days then?
Donita: I think albums are great and I think if you are the kind of artist that has a concept and you want to see it from beginning to end of this concept idea that you have, I think that’s fucking great. We’re not really like that, if we do a slow song next to a fast song it’s not this pre-meditated thing, it’s just what comes out of us. So if any of our albums have been a journey of a listen for the listener, that’s great but it was not pre-conceived. Which makes me think that we can release our stuff however we want to, we’re not doing Sgt. Pepper, there’s not this little end story that there’s a threadline through the whole album. I don’t think we could get on the same page to do that anyway because we got many different writers in the band.
Andrew: Yeah I get it and there’s a freedom to that as well stylistically speaking, I guess that’s how you approached the recording for “Scatter The Rats” then. So when you approached the recording for this album then, was it much different to how you had previously done or was it largely the same process?
Donita: It was the same process, we did one song that we wrote in the studio in real time and that’s called “Scatter The Rats” which is the last song on the album. That one is cool and fun because we each took a different verse and we didn’t know what the other was going to sing over the melody they were going to sing and we each came up with a different melody and so it came out really cool and very unique I think. But we’re just not the kind of band that has the budget to go in and fuck around in the studio, I love doing that but that’s not in our budget. We’ve gotta go in prepared because the clock is ticking [laughs].
Andrew: In saying that then, if you did have the budget and the complete freedom to do whatever you wanted to do in the studio, what do you think that would be then?
Donita: I think we would go to Barbados and fuck off and go swimming as opposed to being in the studio.
Andrew: [laughs].
Donita: Like all those bands that kept those huge budgets like in the 70’s and 80’s, you’d think they would fuck off to the Caribbean! I mean how great is that! I think that would be great, what I felt on this record was time pressure because we had a deadline. We delivered this to Blackheart Records and when you deliver an album to a label, they’ve got a schedule and if you miss that schedule, you’re fucking them over. So that’s what I felt, I didn’t feel creative pressure, I felt a bit of time pressure so we couldn’t fuck around in the studio, we had to have songs that we brought in and they were ready to go. Some of them of course we embellished when we were in there, we’ve always been a band that has brought in songs.
Andrew: Well we are very much looking forward to hearing some of these songs live then because as I said before, it’s a great album and in fact the title track you mentioned just then is probably my favorite song on the album as it is very unique and cool to listen to as well. Is that one you are playing live by any chance?
Donita: Well if it were up to Dee, that answer would be yes because that is Dee’s favorite song on the album so she really wants to do “Scatter The Rats” live. So I don’t know, maybe we’ll do it! We haven’t been rehearsing for this tour yet so we have yet to determine the exact setlist but maybe we’ll do that one, I don’t know, I’m not sure but Dee wants to do it.
Andrew: We’ll have to try to coax Dee to bring it up then!
Donita: Yeah exactly!
Andrew: Do you have any last words or messages for the Aussie fans before you come down to Australia?
Donita: We’re so looking forward to it and let’s hope it happens because it’s full steam ahead for us to go down there and everybody stay healthy so you can come sweat your ass off at our show. So we’re all going to have a good rock and roll time and let’s all stay healthy and fit and let’s rock and roll.
L7 AUSTRALIA & NEW ZEALAND TOUR DATES 2021
WED 19 MAY – THE TRIFFID, BRISBANE (previously May 23)
FRI 21 MAY – METRO THEATRE, SYDNEY (previously May 20)
SAT 22 MAY – FORUM, MELBOURNE
SUN 23 MAY – THE GOV, ADELAIDE (previously May 24)
WED 26 MAY – GALATOS, AUCKLAND (previously May 28)
THUR 27 MAY – SAN FRAN, WELLINGTON
Tickets: https://sbmpresents.com/tour/l7/
