Straight Arrows: ‘I Hate Jamming’

Straight Arrows used to be one of a modest legion of garage-psych bands in Australia. Now, as the Sydney quartet releases a second LP, the country is teeming with them. DOUG WALLEN takes stock with leader Owen Penglis.

[Historical image is withheld pending rights review.] Every record is a time capsule to some degree, but Straight Arrows’ 2010 debut LP It’s Happening is especially fascinating for coming at a time when a Sydney garage band was more noisy anomaly than standard practice. Just four years after the quartet were inclined to put on their own shows because there weren’t enough likeminded bands to play with in Australia, there’s now a robust national network of such acts. That leaves us, as Straight Arrows frontman and in-demand producer Owen Penglis observes, with more shitty ones as well as more good ones, and we just have to decide for ourselves which is which.

That decision has always been easy, though, when it comes to Straight Arrows. If you like oversaturated blasts of dank anthem-making that proudly take notes from the original Nuggets school – and you love having your ears blown out live – then you’ll be right home with the racket made by singer-guitarist Penglis, bassist Angie Bermuda, guitarist Alex Grigg and drummer Adam Williams. And as a bonus, you can segue from there right into Grigg’s band Palms and Bermuda’s many other projects, including Ruined Fortune and Angie.

Compared to what Penglis calls the “super frantic and weird” It’s Happening, the long-awaited second album Rising is more steeped in “paranoia [and] mixed emotions,” he says. There are definitely slower and darker moments, but the songs still average around two minutes and come juddering down like a distorted jackhammer. Produced by Penglis half at home and half at his newfound Goliath Professional Record Studio, it still sounds defiantly vintage – like something unearthed from a water-logged basement decades after the fact. Yet for all the noise, ‘Without Ya’ sounds like The Stones threatening to break into The Archies’ ‘Sugar Sugar’ while tunes like ‘Changing Colours’ and ‘Don’t Call My Name’ are more sweetly jangly than brashly rabble-rousing.

Interrupted in his reading of the conspiracy-fuelled book Wild Things They Don’t Tell Us by late Troggs frontman Reg Presley – which has some “interesting ideas,” he concedes – Penglis discussed the possibility of too many garage bands, his transition to a more “pro” studio and avoiding jams.

Obviously it’s been a while since the last record. What took so long?
I think it’s just we’re always busy. I got real busy recording other people’s stuff, which I really like doing, but after a while you realise it kind of takes a toll on you. When you spend all day working on someone else’s record, you don’t really wanna listen to music for the rest of the afternoon. And y’know, everyone else has their own stuff to do too. I guess I’m the one making stuff go forward with Straight Arrows, so it’s down to me to make the time.

Yeah, I know Alex and Angie have been pretty busy with their own bands, so I wasn’t sure how much that played a part.
Yeah. Whenever we have stuff to do, it always works out. There’s never really been a clash. In the end, we’ve all got to stuff to do.

“It’s a little more professional than the drum kit in the kitchen while my housemate’s trying to make breakfast.”

You had switch studios halfway through, right?
Yeah, I’ve been recording at my house for six or seven years. I’ve been in the same house [all that time]. I never had any problems until this new neighbour appeared. She really hated us. She was here for a few months and now she’s moved out. [Laughs] But it was a good impetus. I came across this [new] space by accident, in Potts Point. It’s good because it’s a little more professional than the drum kit in the kitchen while my housemate’s trying to make breakfast.

So you’re recording a lot of bands in the new space?
Yeah, I’ve got a bit of stuff on at the moment. I did a new record for The Living Eyes, maybe a month ago. They came up [from Geelong]. I’ve been doing some stuff with Shogun from Royal Headache, and a Sydney band called Bearhug. I just finished their record. Palms have a new record on the way too – and so does Angie! [Laughs] Hot scoop!

You did both of their records?
Yep. Angie’s is pretty much done, and Palms is like halfway.

Is Angie’s another one just under her name?
Yeah, another Angie one. This one’s a bit different, but it’s cool.

Since your last record there’s been so many more garage and psych bands in Australia. Do you think it’s oversaturated, or hitting this peak point?
[Thinks about it] I guess when we were starting, there was no one else really playing the same kind of music as us. There was Eddy Current in Melbourne, and a band called The Pink Fits out of Wollongong – there were a couple of Tumbleweed guys – but there wasn’t anyone for us to play with. When we started it was just putting on our own shows, just for that reason. A lot more bands have come up in the meantime.

I guess, with more bands, there’s more variety so there’s some shitty versions of that garage/psych stuff and there’s some really good versions, y’know? [Laughs] It’s up to the discerning public to make their decision. Sure, I guess you can’t just go, “I’m in a garage band” anymore and have people say, “Oh, cool.” Now people are like, “Oh … let me hear it.”

“People have to track me down. Usually that gets rids of the people who aren’t that dedicated.”

Do you have to use that same quality control with bands you produce? Do you have a lot of bands coming to you that you’d rather not work with?
Yeah, I get a lot of people contacting me, but I try to make myself pretty un-contactable. I don’t advertise, I don’t put my information out there. People have to track me down if they wanna get a hold of me. Usually that gets rids of the people who aren’t that dedicated, y’know? [Laughs]

I guess you wouldn’t feel a rivalry when you produce these bands, but do you ever hear certain things that you want to use for one of your own songs?
Not so much. Usually when I’m recording stuff, I’m just busy trying to make other people’s stuff sound cool. I probably get more inspired just listening to old records. But I’m sure working with all this stuff has had some kind of effect on me.

Are you able to make decent money off it, or what do you do for work otherwise?
I’ve got a few kind of jobs. I DJ a lot with a couple friends [as Yo Grito!], maybe two or three times a week. I had a badge-making business for about seven years. That was my main rent-paying job for maybe the last six or seven years. Before that I was a mechanic.

What kind of mechanic?
On old Vespas and Lambrettas. Two-stroke.

Does that come in handy with you’re producing? Fixing amps and wiring and all that?
Definitely. I was probably better at the electronic side than the technical side [of being a mechanic]. It’s great because it means you don’t have to call some guy that charges $200 an hour to fix the tape machine or whatever. I’m not great at that stuff yet, but I’m getting better. It’s just out of need.

You could be that guy eventually: the guy who charges $200.
[Laughs] The guy with the ponytail?

Is it you singing lead on every song for this record?
Yeah, it’s me. Sometimes Alex and Adam will sing as well. Angie didn’t sing on this one, actually, because she was in Brazil doing an artist’s residency when we were doing all the vocals for it. But she sang on the last one.

When I heard ‘Without Ya’, I was wondering if that was still you. Maybe it’s just less noisy and you can hear you better…
Yeah, it’s just less hidden between a blanket of shitty noise.

How many songs did you have to cut from the album?
Usually I write all the songs and then just cut stuff [along the way] – a lot of stuff won’t make it through the start of the recording process even. But I think we probably got three or four songs left over from it. So we’ve got some B-sides for some 7”s that are coming out in the UK soon. It’s always good to have some spares floating around.

“I just found out we’re playing on a boat in Venice!”

Are you going to tour overseas again soon?
Yeah, we’ve got booked for a tour in UK and Europe in December. Which is awesome. I just found out we’re playing on a boat in Venice! [Laughs] We’ve got a label in the UK, Agitated, who are really cool. They’ve done all the Scientists reissues recently, and some Electric Eels stuff. Stuff I really like.

Do you just demo songs and bring them to the band usually?
Most often I’ll demo it and bring it to the band, because I find it hard to write in a group. I just can’t focus if everyone’s there. It ends up pretty muddied. And I have a pretty strong vision of how I want stuff to sound, so it’s best to come to the group with a solid skeleton of a song – and then we’ll just all add to it together in practice. We can always pull it together out of that, and hammer it into shape.

Do you have any solo or side stuff that you do?
Yeah, I’ve been working on this weird kind of soul project, just for the hell of it. It’s all songs that are dance crazes I made up. There’s one called ‘The Ape’, one called ‘The Barefoot’ … I have to work on the rest. I don’t know what’ll happen with that – probably nothing – but it’s good to do other things.

Have you made up the actual dances too?
Oh yeah, they’ve got proper dances to go with them. [Laughs]

You can work one into the Straight Arrows set. Do ‘The Ape’ in the middle of the set…
I’d like to do that. I think we tried to work on it, but it’s just too weird for us. I think it’s just too far outside what we do. Plus it had this weird electric piano on it, and no one wants to cart one of those around.

You said you’re working with Shogun. His solo stuff seems pretty different, so I was wondering if it’s been a challenge to work on something that wasn’t noisy or didn’t have that garage element?
Ah, no, we’ve just been doing the vocals [for Royal Headache’s second record]. Slowly, slowly.

How’s that coming together? You’d be one of the first people to hear it.
Yeah, it sounds cool. It’s like the last record, I reckon: good, solid. [And] same with the last record: that was in the mixing and vocal-recording world for like a year, year and a half. Hopefully this all gets finished, but those guys…

Yeah, I know the situation. So when he’s recording the vocals, he’s just trying to get it right and that’s why it’s taking a while?
Yeah, and he’s probably his own harshest critic. He’s definitely an indecisive guy too. Every different day we record, he’ll come in with a different style he wants to do the song in. [Laughs] And then we’ll just argue – we’ll sit there and have a heated argument for half an hour about why it shouldn’t sound like an Oi! song or whatever.

“I’ve started to get more gear with actual names on it. Brand names people have heard of.”

Is the new studio a work in progress still, or how far along is it?
It’s better than … at my house, it was just like the bin outside Vinnie’s or something. It’s just all this shit thrown together and not working to make a sound I like. [Laughs] But now it’s a bit more legitimate. It’s in the basement of this old building, and I got a big tape machine that works well and solidly. I’ve started to get more gear with actual names on it. Y’know, stuff like that. [Laughs] Real brand names that people have heard of. It’s a bit more pro, I guess.

Have you had to start charging more?
Yeah, it’s pretty much just because I have to pay rent now. Before I was just at my house and I didn’t really care so much [about money]. But everyone respects that. I still don’t hassle people for money, but there is a business side to it now.

The songs are pretty short on the record. I was wondering if you weren’t tempted to jam a few of them out instead of keeping them to 1, 2, or 3 minutes?
Nah, I hate that shit. [Laughs] I hate jamming. The closest we came is on the first song, ‘Introduction’, which is an introduction to ‘Fruit of the Forest’. I cut that into two songs because I didn’t want people to have to listen to the introduction if they didn’t want to.

I really like it, opening with the instrumental. It’s a good way to ease you into the record.
Yeah, I wanted it to be more … I mean, the first record was super frantic and weird. I wanted that to be the start of the trip, so to say, and this is like the coming up – the paranoia and the mixed emotions.

So the next album will be the comedown?
Nah, it’ll be the peak! [Laughs]

[Laughs] Okay, so you’ve got a four- or five-album plan in place?
Yeah, I could probably stretch it out for a few more years.

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‘Rising’ comes out this Friday (June 13) on CD, digital and vinyl through Rice is Nice (AUS), and later in June through Hozac (US) and Agitated (UK/EU). Pre-order it here. Launch tour dates below, with TV Colours supporting on every date.

Fri, June 13 – Wombarra Bowling Club, Wollongong, NSW
Sat, June 14 – Newtown Social Club, Sydney, NSW
Fri, June 20 – The Brightside, Brisbane, QLD
Sat, June 28 – Fishbowl, Newcastle, NSW
Sat, July 12 – Northcote Social Club, Melbourne, VIC