INTERVIEW from Under the Radar
The Situations are midway through a four-date tour with their pals the Transistors. This weekend will see the two groups performing at Auckland’s Golden Dawn on Friday night and then at the YOT Club in Raglan on Saturday 3rd October.
Last week saw The Situations lift the lid on their second full-length album Forever Scene Changes (which you can stream in full over here), which was perfectly timed to coincide with their joint tour with Transistors (who also released a brand new EP you can check out over here). The last full-length record from the Papakura-based rock ‘n’ roll outfit was unleashed way back in 2007, so we decided to pick the brains of drummer and singer Stu Kett with Seven Quick Questions to see what took so long and what else they have been up to in the meantime…
1. The Situations have been together more than a decade now. How have things changed for the band over the years?
Yeah, we’ve been together since about 2002 in one form or another. We joined our different high-school bands together. Things have obviously changed heaps. We started out playing riffs and monkeying around on stage. Back in the early days it was more about partying and drinking etc. Now it’s about those two things plus trying to make good music and good recordings. Stylistically we are a lot more eclectic but that just comes with exposure to more varied music and influences.
2. You’ve racked up an impressive list of support and backing slots, The White Stripes, Dead Moon, Wanda Jackson, Ray Columbus, et al. What show stands out the most?
Playing as Wanda Jackson’s backing band was a definite highlight. Had the honour of playing with her as – well as our good mate John Segovia and the legendary Wayne Mason that night. Playing with Ray Columbus was fantastic; just a great great man and true pro. We also played as Ray Woolfe’s band a couple years ago which was choice as. Picking standout shows is real tough as we’ve played so many. Sometimes it’s the little Italian village shows, or hitting the West Coast of New Zealand that stay in the mind.
3. You’ve done a fair bit of international touring. What’s one spot you’d really like to visit and play if there was no barriers in doing so?
It would be cool to tour Africa and/or the Middle East. A tour of the Pacific Islands sounds like it would be fun as well.
4. The opening track from your album ‘Hamburg’ comes with a mysterious backstory. What sort of circumstances was the rest of the album written under? What inspired the songs?
The album was written over the period of a couple of years as we were touring and playing all the sorts of shows mentioned above, as well as just living our respective lives. Samuel and Glen are the principal song writers for us and their songs cover a fair bit of ground thematically. On this record there are songs inspired by Ray Warren league commentaries, the Old Testament, working late night shifts, lovey dovey stuff, dualism and life itself, celebrating our suburban heritage and existential musings triggered by observing lunchtime seating arrangements. Most of our songs are grounded in our own lives and experiences over the years.
5. The Situations’ debut album came out in 2007, why has it taken so long to follow it up with another full-length release?
There’s no one reason why its taken a while to get a second record done. We’ve released two 7″ records, two CD singles and an online single or two in the intervening period. We’ve toured Europe twice, played as backing band for Ray Columbus and Ray Woolfe and toured around New Zealand a bunch as well as a few trips across the ditch. A few of us are in Bob Cardy’s band Shaft and we’ve put some work into a new Shaft album as well. Samuel spends most of his time in the Middle East nowadays and that’s meant we’ve had to pick our moments in terms of working on album making etc.
6. Can you fill us in a bit on what recording the album was like. Why did you decide to work again with Bob Frisbee, who you did Get The Basics with?
Bob’s been a good mate and done heaps for us since we first came through to the city from the suburbs back in 03/04. A lot of his earlier work was recording some of our hero bands such as the Rainy Days, Shaft and WWIV. He’s continued making great albums over recent years with the likes of Rackets, Transistors and Beach Pigs and the sound he gets just keeps getting better and better. It was natural that we worked with Bob again.
7. How did you connect with Transistors, and then decide to tour together?
We first met the Transistors in 2006 at Kuaotunu town hall down on the Coromandel Coast. Both our bands had been asked to support Pierced Arrows who had come out of Dead Moon. We fronted with them a bit at first and presumed they’d be terrible. Then we saw them play and they were fantastic. We got to talking to them the next night in Raglan and just connected with them straight away musically, personally and in terms of taste in movies and TV shows etc. We spent the whole night in hysterics and its been like that ever since. They’re some of our favourite people in the world and an awesome band.
