Grow Forth And Prosper

What is it that makes a man great? It is a question that every man asks himself from time to time. “It is the ability to solve mathematical equations,” says the engineer. “It is contemplating everything while listening to the river,” says the buddha. “It is Jane and swinging through the jungle,” says Tarzan. According to Nathaniel Beard, they've got it all wrong. He thinks it is much more simple. For him, what makes a man great is his beard.

The bushy-faced bassist from Adelaide band The Beards is sitting at a table in a bar, wringing his hands thoughtfully over a glass of water. He is wearing a blue-and-beige bomber jacket and a newsboy cap. “I consider myself to be the intellectual of the band,” he says, “in that I have an arts degree. So I've taken on the role of interpreter of these parchments.” What in the world is going on here, you might ask? Well, the end of it all for the beardless, of course. According to Beard and his parchments, anyone without a beard will soon be doomed. “Facey McStubblington, our guitarist, was rifling through his neighbour's garbage and he found a wooden chest, an old wooden chest, and the parchment was within that. The gist is that we're currently living in the Fourth Age, or the Beardless Era. The prophecies say that on December 21st of this year, which conveniently ties up with the end of our tour, the Great Bearded Spirit will be roused and he will cleanse the world of he who shaves.”

Terrifying, to say the least. We'll let that simmer for a moment. Presently we seek to better understand why this band of bearded propagandists started in the first place. One does not simply create a band whose existence is entirely concerned with beards. Well, actually, one does. But why? “We just formed to play one show,” explains Beard, “because we were fed up with the way society treated bearded people like second-class citizens. We started out because there was no one providing a voice for the bearded man. Employers were asking bearded men to shave and wives were asking husbands to shave. Even just people attending a wedding were expected to shave. And that still happens, you know. These are real, serious issues affecting bearded men everywhere, and we sort of formed to combat that.”

Everything is truly about beards in The Beards. You might think that when a band's entire ethos is essentially the hair that grows from a man's face, they may suffer from a kind of creative burnout; a lack of depth in the songwriting well. But these men are extremely passionate about what they do. “We didn't realise how many songs about beards we had in us. But once we started writing about beards we thought, 'why would we ever write about anything else?' Because, as an artist, you've got to write about what you believe in. And the only thing any of us believe in is beards, and having beards. So, yeah, it brought a lot more honesty to our music.” Quite conveniently, all four members of the band have names relating to beards. “There's four of us,” says Beard, “I'm Nathaniel Beard, Johann Beardraven is our frontman and saxophonist and keytarist, Facey McStubblington is our guitarist, and John Beardman Jr is our drummer.” Beard's long, reddish-orange beard bobs up and down as he speaks about a rather sour revelation in the band's history. “John Beardman Jr is our second drummer. His father, John Beardman, came before him. We had to kick him out of the band after we became aware of the fact that he had been wearing a fake beard the entire time. He sure fooled us. It was a very high-end fake beard, obviously, but yeah, they don't speak anymore, they're estranged.”

Ironically, Beard says that Beardman Jr actually has the best beard in the band. He is quick to comment, however, that it is not the size or thickness of a man's beard that is important, it is just that he has one. “I'm trying to grow my beard so it's longer and better than his, but I mean, I probably shouldn't be doing that. We have a saying in the band, like if we're ever having an argument or something we'll say, 'come on guys, calm down, we've all got beards here'. Because the war is out there, you know. When you have bearded people fighting amongst themselves, that's not what you want.”

Beard says that he would sooner be dead, pulled limb from limb, than cut off his beard. He once had a nightmare where he shaved off his beard. “Sometimes when you're just slightly trimming your beard – you know, because one side might grow more than the other and a little bit of trimming is therefore required – you can go too far. I had a nightmare where I ended up cutting the whole thing off, and that was just horrible. But I don't think I'd ever make that mistake in reality. Bearded men are quite intelligent, so I don't think that any of them would be that stupid.” Wisdom and smarts are not the only qualities that, according to Beard, a bearded man inherently holds. Beard states his philosophy of the all-embracing superiority of bearded men over their clean-shaven counterparts: “I think that people with beards are superior in all ways to people without beards. They're smarter, faster, stronger, better looking, better at writing songs about beards – all of these things.” You have to respect a man with principles.

Beard talks about his experiences touring around Australia. He believes that because of The Beards, and perhaps Brad Pitt too, the popularity of the beard is on the rise. “Since we formed, we've noticed an extreme increase in the amount of beards in every Australian city. Brisbane, for example, when we first went there we were horrified at how beardless a place it was. It was just awful, it was a depressing place to be. But now, the streets of Brisbane are filled with bearded people. Oh, it's becoming a really bearded city.” He tells a tale about the time The Beards went to Alaska. “We were invited to play at The World Beard and Mustache Championships,” he says proudly. And it really was everything they could ever dream of. “On that weekend, in that city, in Anchorage of Alaska, the best beards in the world were there. It was as if for one weekend we were living in the utopian society that we hope to one day create. Where bearded men can walk down the street and get the respect that they deserve. It was just great.”

But alas, the time has come to return to that awkward elephant in the room: the prophecy of impending doom for all beardless men. The Beards are going on a tour around the country to celebrate. As for the rest of us, believe what you will. Beard may or may not be the next Nostradamus (who, incidentally, had quite a large beard), but to all the clean shaven men out there, you've at least been warned. “Good luck with growing a beard and saving your life. And I'm sorry it's come down to that, I'm sorry to everyone. We don't want to kill people for not having beards, but you know, we didn't write these prophecies. Don't shoot the messenger, just grow beards.”

The Beards will be playing the following shows:

Wednesday 24 October  - Bar On The Hill, Newcastle NSW
Thursday 25 October  - Wollongong UniBar, Wollongong NSW
Friday 26 October – Baroque Bar, Katoomba NSW
Saturday 27 October  – Beachcomber Hotel, Central Coast NSW
Thursday 1 November  - ANU, Canberra ACT
Friday 2 November  – The Metro, Sydney NSW
Saturday 3 November  - The HiFi, Melbourne VIC
Thursday 15 November  - Prince of Wales, Bunbury WA
Friday 16 November  - Settlers Tavern, Margaret River WA
Saturday 17 November  - Rosemount Hotel, Perth WA
Sunday 18 November - Indie Bar, Scarborough Beach WA
Thursday 22 November - Karova Lounge, Ballarat VIC
Friday 23 November – Queenscliff Festival, NSW
Saturday 24 November - Queenscliff Festival, NSW
Thursday 29 November – Royal Oak, Launceston TAS
Friday 30 November - Republic Bar, Hobart TAS
Saturday 30 December – Jive, Adelaide SA
Sunday 2 December – Jive, Adelaide SA