Stand By Me

9 January 2013 | 6:30 am | Bryget Chrisfield

"Little Red was – we all sort of kind of wanted to push it in different directions and it was just getting a bit out of control.”

New Gods

New Gods

"Little Red was – we all sort of kind of wanted to push it in different directions and it was just getting a bit out of control,” New Gods guitarist Adrian Beltrame laughs, carefully selecting the words to best describe the reasons behind his much-loved previous band's demise. It must make it difficult when some of the band members have different visions. “Yeah, I guess so. Something like that,” he hesitates.

Beltrame acknowledges “it was a sad time” when Little Red decided to call it a day, before adding, “But the thing is that we've never released our best stuff. The best things I remember about Little Red were just [all] being in the one room, chucking mics everywhere – we didn't know what we were doin' – and just going for it and putting everything in the red. You know, I mean like the levels of the instruments and all that shit is all overloaded and it's great! Dom [Byrne] and I have each got piles of tapes and stuff, just recorded at home.”

From the ashes of Little Red came various new projects: Beltrame and Byrne, both guitarists/vocalists with Little Red, make up two fifths of New Gods; Little Red drummer Taka Honda went on to lead The Hondas on vocals/guitar; Tom Hartney, former Little Red keyboardist/vocalist, now fronts Major Tom & The Atoms; and Little Red bassist/vocalist Quang Dinh is now band leader with Naked Bodies. “I saw Quang's band the other night and also Tom's band as well and they've both gone in different directions, but it's cool. I mean, I'm really happy for them. I love those guys.    

“I get a kick out of seeing 'em play and the truth is that they've both got other bands and we couldn't play their music. Like, the way that they've gone is quite unique and I don't think Dom and I could've played music like that… We just needed a new challenge.”

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On how the New Gods songs take shape, Beltrame explains, “It's Dom's baby. It's always been that way. He's just an incredible, talented person and I wouldn't be doing it without him. I mean, I'd have to think long and hard about playing music if it was with someone other than Dom.” He laughs as if fearing this sounds naff before adding, “You know, we go back a long way.”

When asked how his new band came together, Beltrame observes that the local band scene is “a pretty small community, really... The other guys in the band, we've all sort of played music together at some stage and I think actually a few of them went to music school together. It's cool, you know, it's a cracking band and we've got Dale [Packard, formerly of Ground Components], who plays keyboards – [we] sort of knew him from a long time ago as well and, yeah! It's all been really natural and it just seems to work.”

New Gods are signed to Liberation, Little Red's label, and Beltrame praises, “They've been really good to us, 'cause it's been a tough year... The guys at the label have been very supportive and at the same time me and Dom feel like we just need to unleash. You know, we could record an album tomorrow if we wanted to [laughs]… Everyone's sorta telling us to take our time and we'll do it, hopefully, early next year. We'll get stuck into that.

“I mean, we would've liked to have sort of got our shit out a bit earlier in the year but it's just the way it's gone, and so it's kind of a little bit bad timing and we just missed out on the festival circuit for this summer. But that's cool, we've sorta got time off and it's really up to us now to use that time and work out which way we wanna push it from here.”

New Gods will be playing the following dates:

Friday 11 January - Northcote Social Club, Melbourne VIC
Saturday 12 January - GoodGod Small Club, Sydney NSW