Dead Farmers: Ploughing Ahead

Ahead of a Melbourne album launch, David Akerman and Daniel Grosz from Dead Farmers talk to TIM SCOTT about Sydney’s recent purple patch, home recording and how lyrics come secondary to aural assault. Photos by DARYL PRONDOSO.

[Historical image is withheld pending rights review.] When David Akerman and Daniel Grosz started searching for a drummer for their band Dead Farmers they did it the old school way. Armed with a roll of tape they went around Sydney postering flyers in record stores and on telephone poles. Citing The Stooges, Comets On Fire, Blue Cheer, Boris and The Minutemen as influences, it wasn't long before they found first drummer Chabbs – at a Deerhoof show, no less – whose loose style added another twisted dynamic to the pair’s psychedelic garage sound. (He’s since been replaced by a more rigid time keeper in Kowalski from Pee Wee).

Since that time Dead Farmers have become a band to watch. Mining the same sounds and energy as those aforementioned acts, they quickly sold out of their debut single 'Violence', released through Melbourne imprint Aarght! (Super Wild Horses, The UV Race). The recent release of their debut LP Go Home, this time through R.I.P Society, sees the trio basically taking the same sound and then throttling it.

Why the move from Aarght! to R.I.P Society?
David: Aarght! had a bunch of stuff coming out at the time and the waiting list was too long for us since it had already taken so long for us to get our shit together. We spent a long time collecting equipment for the recording and figuring it all out, so by the time we finally had everything ready to press we didn't want to wait another few months. R.I.P. Society is a Sydney-based thing so that made sense as well. Plus our friend's bands are on the label so that was good motivation.

Daniel: R.I.P seems to have a really similar mindset to Aarght!, and Nic [Warnock], who runs the label, is a friend of ours. With R.I.P I think we just feel that it’s close to us, that we can stay in control of the whole thing, and have a say in what the finished product ends up as.

You re-recorded 'Suns of Thunder' and 'Run'. How different are they now from what appeared on the first 7”?
David: It just felt right. When you're putting together something like an album and you visualise the whole thing in your head, those two songs felt like they needed to be on there. 'Suns' was the quickest song we wrote and it came together in a matter of minutes. It’s also one of our favourites, so we decided to redo it in the session with the other songs that made the cut. Also the intention was to get a bit of a clearer recording. Whether or not that happened is left open to interpretation.

Daniel: 'Suns and 'Run' were both B-sides on the 7”, so I guess it never felt like they were totally played out and done with. When we did the recordings, we recorded almost all the songs anyway, so it was just a matter of picking out what we thought sounded best, and what would work in a particular order.

“Sometimes I think of this band as an aural or visceral thing more than anything intellectual.”

Sydney seems to have an awesome music scene at the moment. What was it like when you were younger? Was there any noticeable event, venue or band that you see for turning the city's music around?
David: There used to be a lot more hardcore and crust stuff going on, but most of the DIY spaces have closed so that sort of died off, which isn't something I lament really (the hardcore bands disappearing, not the spaces closing). All the R.I.P Society bands and a few others around Sydney are taking up most of my attention as of the past year. I haven't checked out much overseas stuff since last year, I don't feel the urge to like I have before. The coming together of the more fucked-up side of things like Naked on the Vague and all these dissonant bands with the lower-brow stuff really opened things up and created a great community in Sydney that I felt was closed off until only recently.

Daniel: I honestly feel like bands have gotten less serious in the last two or so years, which is a really good thing. We’ve only been going to local shows and been active in Sydney since 2005, so we haven’t seen a whole lot, but there has definitely been a move away from noise/experimental stuff to more song based material. I think that it was kind of an inevitable change, because the noise stuff can only go so far before it all becomes the same sound, which gets boring really quickly. I got the feeling people used to look down on us a bit for playing straight-up rock music, like there was no depth to it, and therefore had little to no value. As time went on, around 2007 or so, things seemed to shift around, and people kinda lightened up or something.

You started the band when you were all pretty young. What kind of music were you listening to at the time of starting out?
David: Yeah we started when we were about 18. Listening to Boris' rock records, Comets on Fire, Lightning Bolt and stuff like that: a pretty heavy diet of overblown psychedelic rock. Stooges have always been there, but to me bands like High Rise and Acid Mothers Temple have taken the proto punk thing and really pushed it to the outer limits, which excites me. When I left high school I was discovering all sorts of different stuff but that's narrowed over the last couple of years as I get bored with all the different genres that get invented by bloggers, and the loads of bands that pander to the traits of said genres.

Like the bands you’ve mentioned, Dead Farmers seem focused more on the sonic power of the music rather than lyrics.
David: Yeah. Sometimes I think of this band as an aural or visceral thing more than anything intellectual. I like lyrics when I'm listening to Dylan or Neil Young, stuff like that. Guys who have a strong foundation with poetry. Some days it's just fruity though. But as far as loud abrasive rock music goes, I loved discovering that the words don't necessarily matter. I could listen to a Japanese band and get more of a feeling from what they do without understanding the lyrics than I could from a band where I can clearly understand what they're singing. It's more about a feeling I think. The lyrics thing is a quagmire. That's folk music to me.

Daniel: I think a lot of that comes from practicing without mics, which directs our focus to the instruments more and helps to push a shouty style of vocals a lot. Even though some of the newer songs are more melodic there’s still very little focus on lyrics. That’s because we write lyrics separately, so when we sing together it comes out all mashed up. Also the lyrics tend to change around a bunch – I’ve been singing one thing for ages, and then in practice I’ll start singing something else that I like more. I do think strong lyrics are important, but for this sort of music, I think they should be economical, straight ahead and steer clear of that wordy poetry style.

I do like the line, “Chopping bibles wait for intervention”, in ‘Lucky Stars’. What's that about?
David: I honestly can't remember. Something hostile towards religious people probably.

Daniel: That’s one of our lyrics?

[Historical image is withheld pending rights review.]

Your original drummer Chabbs recently left to pursue study but you now have Kowalski from Pee Wee. Are they different in style?
David: Chabbs had something a little sloppier about him than Kowalski does, which served the band really well for a while, but as time went on we needed someone with more time who could always hit hard. Kowalski has been solid at all times so far.

Daniel: Chabbs moved around the kit heaps. He’d be playing everywhere, all over the place, in a more psychedelic style. Kowalski plays much more rocky. He’s really solid, and marks out the sections really clearly.

David, you’ve also done some recording including the latest Bed Wettin’ Bad Boys. What have you learned through these recordings?
David: Oh man, I've been through hell learning everything myself. “Sound engineering” as a formal practice is way more complex than I ever expected. Luckily if you keep things simple with a little practise you can get stuff sounding good. The Bad Boys recording was a breeze. I couldn't list all the things I've learned, but I've barely hit the tip of the iceberg with this stuff. It's great to have so much to know about. I've got a zine coming out at some point in the coming months all about punk recording, with some overseas interviewees as well as local.

That sounds rad. Who did you interview?
David: It's basically four interviews with Mikey Young, Kelley Stoltz, Chris Woodhouse, who has recorded Thee Oh Sees, A-Frames and plays guitar in Mayyors and I'm waiting on answers from Greg Saunier [Deerhoof]. I ask them stuff about their attitudes towards the whole idea of recording yourself, and they talk about their process a bit. I don't think it will appeal to people not interested in recording as half of it is pretty technical.

It's intended not so much for casual people who will record a demo in GarageBand but more for people who want to improve their own stuff and to show them that it's possible to get good sounds on the cheap. When I was starting out I couldn't find any resource with people I actually respected, just the internet which is full of nobodies with nothing to their name, and a bunch of expensive books, none of which offered much that I felt I could trust. So I spoke to Mikey [Young] and Greg from Deerhoof about things and they were both really helpful so I decided to ask others who were doing cool stuff and make the zine. Hopefully it'll be out mid-year and if people like it I'll do another one.

Who would you like to record with in the future?
David: 'm recording another Sydney band, the Whipped Cream Chargers next week. Circle Pit have expressed interest as have Angie and Harriet's other band Southern Comfort. I'll take whatever I can get, I'm a total novice. Luckily, I get to sit in on some My Disco sessions while they finish up their album in May. It'd be great to watch Mikey Young do his thing. He taught me a lot of what I know. Everything he does sounds amazing, particularly the Dick Diver 7" and that last Eddy Current single ‘Wet Cement’.

What do you have coming up after this weekend’s Melbourne launch?
Daniel: After Melbourne we've got shows in Canberra, Newcastle and Brisbane. No plans further than that at the moment.

David: I'd like to write a bunch of new songs that have been on the backburner and get it all recorded. And then do this all again.

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DEAD FARMERS LAUNCH 'GO HOME'

Saturday, May 8
Birmingham Hotel, Melbourne, VIC

Sunday, May 16
Phoenix Bar, Canberra, ACT

Friday, May 28
Hamilton Station Hotel, Newcastle, NSW

Saturday, May 29
Brunswick Street Mall, Brisbane, QLD