Back in February, before the global pandemic disrupted the whole of the music industry, I took a flight from Perth to Melbourne to catch one of my favourite UK bands, who were playing a Saturday night show in St Kilda. With the Friday night free, I decided to take a cab to the legendary Espy to check out a couple of bands that had been on my radar for a while and who by a stroke of luck, were found to be playing in The Basement. Both Riff Raiders & The Vendettas didn’t disappoint and put on performances that blew me away. With a single launch for ‘Rats on the Wheel’ imminent back in March, The Vendettas were poised to support this with a series of shows up the east coast, playing alongside Riff Raiders before restrictions ended the tour abruptly.
After the gig I caught up with front man Steve Redden for a beer & chat and we agreed to reconnect once I got back to Perth to talk about the single, tour & all things to do with The Vendettas. As you can read in this interview, we didn’t really expect or understand just how serious it was all going to get. Roll forward to right now and The Vendettas are preparing to launch a new single. With ‘Face to Face’ being released on 27th July through Golden Robot Records, we thought it was an ideal time to publish the interview from back then as Steve discusses the disappointment of cancelled shows, his influences as a vocalist and the daunting task of stepping into a studio for the first time all those many moons ago…
(The interview is arranged for 12.30pm and I call Steve exactly on time)
Steve: What a punctual man you are!
Sean: [laughs] I try.
Steve: How are you dude?
Sean: I’m well, thank you. How are you doing?
Steve: I’m good, I’m good
Sean: Surviving the zombie apocalypse?
Steve: I think so. We have started to work on some new songs as there is nothing else we can do and we worked out that as long as we each stay in a different corner of the band room we are adhering to the two arm’s length from each other. So yeah man, we can continue to write music or at least until they shut that down as well.
Sean: Hopefully so many bands can continue to be creative and once this all ends, we will be blessed with a ton of quality new music.
Steve: Absolutely. We recorded two new ideas just yesterday, so I’m just in the middle of mixing them now. It’s keeping me entertained and out of trouble man [laughs].
Sean: It’s been so sad to see bands who have put so much work into things and then to see them scuppered. I was chatting to a Perth band just yesterday who were due to host a video clip launch, but that has been canned due to this unprecedented event that’s sweeping the world.
Steve: I heard only today that Victoria & New South Wales are looking to shut everything down by Tuesday; Schools & everything so… you know we are trying to learn from everything that is happening in places like Italy & China, but China did the full shut down so we’ve kind of seem the blueprint. It’s hard trying to comprehend sitting at home and doing nothing but there you go.
Sean: The bonus for us being in Perth and the fact that we are perceived as being fashionably late for everything means we’ll get COVID three years after everyone else [laughs]
Steve: [laughs] You guys will be sweet mate.
Sean: Well, plenty to discuss but firstly it was great to finally catch you guys live and form some new friendships at The Basement at The Espy. It was a wonderful night.
Steve: It was. It was probably the last gig that we actually played. Yeah, I’m pretty sure it was unless my memory is going on me in my old age. That could be a fond memory for the next few months, especially not knowing when the next gig will be man. It was great to finally meet up too.
Sean: I have to say what a wonderful room The Basement is. It’s got such a great vibe.
Steve: It is, and it does. I’m glad they kept it as well because I was a bit nervous when they refurbished the joint, but I think they have maybe put a bit more sound proofing in there. It’s still got the concrete floor. The PA & the mixing desk that they have in there is great. We’ve played there twice now; the first time we were a little too loud, but the second time we just took it back a notch or two and it sounded awesome.
Sean: It was almost a double bill with your close friends Riff Raiders and you both complement each other so well.
Steve: We love those guys man. That’s one of the most shattering things for us – Jenni (Powell) put in so much work for that tour and we were lucky to jump on near the end for Frankie’s (Sydney), Hideaway (Sydney) & Cherry (Melbourne) which was top of the list of where we wanted to launch the single but you know it will come around. Hopefully, the government can do something for the local scene where venues at least can stay afloat… I mean we all know that when things are back up and running those venues will be sold out for months and months, so we just have to try to get through this tough period, I guess.
Sean: I was very lucky to purchase a copy of your single ‘Rats on the Wheel’ on vinyl on the night and managed to get that home safe & sound to Perth. Vinyl has had such a resurgence over the last few years…
Steve: It’s awesome isn’t it. John (Raptis) from Rue Morgue Records and a few other guys from boutique style labels are doing a similar thing in Melbourne. We sent the album out to a few labels here & there and overseas as well, so when John picked it up and was a fan of it he got in contact and said he wanted to help us push it as far as we could. We put the last album out on twelve inch and kind of funded it and did all that so we were looking for label assistance if we could get it and so John suggested doing the single… we kind of had the artwork ready – I have the original print right in front of me now actually. To have something that is a limited edition as well is kinda cool. I don’t think we’ve ever sold out of any of our merch previously but by the next time we play we will have sold out of this one. I think it’s awesome man. I only started collecting vinyl probably four or five years ago… its very addictive.
“Face To Face” out July 27 – pre-order here
Sean: So, the previous album was ‘Bystander & Destroyer’ which is a great album by the way, but I noticed mention of the next one in your press release which I believe will be your third full length release. I haven’t been able to find your debut album yet so what can you tell me about that one?
Steve: So, the first album was ‘Burn’ and we released that back in 2013. It was about three years before ‘Bystander’. We recorded it back around 2010 and it was our first real studio experience and that was my first time singing into a studio mic too. I was kind of thinking it could unravel real quick [laughs] Screaming into a mic when your drunk in front of drunk people is one thing, but to be stood in this room with headphones on and being told “Let’s see what you’ve got mate”. I felt very naked, but I got through it and it was a massive learning curve. We were probably more influenced from like the Swedish rock scene… we were massive fans of The Helicopters back in those days, we still are. Basically, we were trying to write songs sounding like The Bronx and The Helicopters, Gluecifer – all these kinds of guys. We had two guitarists as well so those sort of riffs were coming through with that influence and then when we did ‘Bystander’ we brought in more of a mixture between the third album that we have done and the first one where you can see there is progression in the song writing, whether its good or bad, that peoples opinion but its definitely going in a different direction and then with this third one we wanted to just basically strip it back and try and get the demos we are doing in the band room – what I mean by that is capture these demos but in a polished studio sound, through the pre-amps – Matty (Robins) has a set down at Coloursound.
Sean: So, you’ve been working with Mat down at Altona then?
Steve: Yeah, we did ‘Bystander’ with Mat as well. We just recorded absolutely everything [laughs]. We probably spent way too much time in there to be honest but you learn and even though I love everything we did on ‘Bystander’ you also want to something a little bit different every time you record, I think. So we decided to try to strip it back on the new album and then inadvertently when we did strip it back we found that we could really push the cymbals on the drum kit and push the mids in certain areas where we would have had to tame it down when we had more shit in there. We basically wanted to try to replicate what we sound like if you come to see us live and with a killer mix. We got there and obviously John Raptis liked it and passed it on to the guys at Golden Robot and they signed us. It’s all very exciting.
Sean: So, is there a release date for the new album as yet?
Steve: We will hope to release another single and then the album, but with everything that is going on we may just bite the bullet and release the whole thing. We’ve been sitting on it for a little while so we are kind of keen to get it out there now that we are writing new songs as well but we are also more than happy to listen to the professionals and see what they think will be the best thing to do. If they want to stagger it out there a little bit and people are hankering to hear it then that’s a good thing.
Sean: Who were your early influences as a vocalist?
Steve: In the early days I idolised Stevie Wonder man. I still do, but that guy… I just recently got ‘Songs in the Key of Life’ on vinyl and you just forget man – he’s a song writer, he can play drums, play amazing songs but vocally I’ve always been attracted to guys who have that bit of soul in their voice so Steven Tyler is obviously a massive influence as well but probably Chris Cornell is the one that I try and mimic, even if I don’t sound like him I try to look for a tone or shape a certain vowel to get a bit more of an aggressive sound so I try to research to see what he used to do. Freddie Mercury too I guess… all the great’s man. I love them all and try to take a little something from them all.
Sean: I like to ask my restaurant question which may open that list up a bit more, but if you could invite three guests from the music world, dead or alive, to join you for dinner, who would you invite?
Steve: That’s a good question. George Harrison would be at the top of my list because I think spiritually & professionally what he did with his life is similar to my mantra a bit. I’d probably go Bon Scott as well just so I could ask him his advice on being a cheeky fucker… not that I need that much advice, but it would be nice to be able to get it from one of the cheekiest fuckers of all time [laughs]. I’ll not be boring and go with another singer so probably my third one would have to be… god this is hard… I’ve got George, who wouldn’t talk much, Bon Scott, who would be drunk and talk plenty so I need someone in the middle of those two… probably Jimi Hendrix and I’m sure he would bring the drugs [laughs] if all else fails.
Sean: [laughs] That’s a good table. What was the last album you listened to Steve?
Steve: The last album I listened to was probably ‘Songs in the Key of Life’ by Stevie Wonder. I had that on only yesterday.
Sean: Finally, as a songwriter yourself, if you could be credited with writing any song ever written, which song would you choose?
Steve: I’ve actually answered this before, but I have to think about what I said… there are a lot of songs I wish I had written, but I think… man, this is like asking what’s your favourite song of all time. It’s just such a difficult question. But let’s go with The Stones as my dad is a huge Rolling Stones fan. I’ll go ‘Dead Flowers’ by The Rolling Stones because it’s my dad’s favourite song and he always used to play it on guitar and sing it to my mum so if nothing else I can at least guarantee that if that song gets written he can have that moment when he has had too many beers [laughs].
Sean: I’ll add it to my playlist. Steve, thank you so much for your time and we wish you all the best for the single and we’re sad to hear of the cancellations of the rest of the shows. We can only hope the good that will come out of this is bumper crowds supporting amazing bands like yourselves when restrictions lift.
Steve: Thanks mate. Been great chatting again and was great to meet you when you were over. I’m sure it won’t be the last time.
