Stranger Danger

One part lovable larrikin, one part sensitive new age bloke, Bob Evans has spent close to 15 years endearing himself to Australian audiences both in the live realm and through a trilogy of increasingly well-received records; Suburban Kid (2003), Suburban Songbook (2006) and most recently, 2009's Goodnight, Bull Creek! Moving into a new phase of alter ego explorations with the release of Familiar Stranger last month, Kevin Mitchell uses Bob Evans as a vehicle to explore a new musical aesthetic and wrap his head around every man's inevitable goal posts: life and death.

From his “thinking man's man cave” in his adopted hometown of Melbourne, Mitchell proudly proclaims that he even has a filing cabinet amongst the collection of gear, books, booze and records that help stimulate the creative process. While it's a seemingly tongue-in-cheek stab at the responsibilities of adulthood, further reflected by the playful lead single Don't Wanna Grow Up, Mitchell's easy-come laugh and affable nature quietens as he explains the significance of his fourth solo record through its name.

“The thing that appealed to me about that title was that it holds lots of different meanings to me,” he posits. “I mean, the main one I suppose is that when you become introspective and when you're sort of thinking about life and death and the meaning of the universe, I find that it's almost like looking at earth from space, or looking at yourself like an old photograph. You take on this kind of elevated perspective of yourself and your life, and sometimes it can feel like you recognise yourself but at the same time it's, like, that person's not me, you know? The familiar stranger I guess is myself, but I also liked it because on another level it kind of relates to the music; I wanted to retain elements of the last few records – a sense of warmth and intimacy and those kind of things – but I also wanted to recreate myself a little bit. So even on a silly kind of level it kind of works just as far as the description of the music; it's familiar but it's also a bit stranger!” he chuckles.

“I'm not intentionally trying to be heavy, but there are two experiences in my life in the last few years since the last Bob Evans record that sort of bookmarked this record and one of them involved the death of someone very close to me and the other was becoming a father for the first time,” Mitchell explains of Familiar Stranger's vast range of emotion. “Every song that happens on the record is kind of floating around between those two experiences.”

Mitchell was quietly working away on the finer points of Bob Evans' evolution while in the midst of his busiest years; touring and releasing a debut record with Australian supergroup Basement Birds in 2010 was followed quickly by work on Jebediah's long-awaited fifth album Kosciuszko, and he even found time to pay tribute to Bob Dylan in a series of concerts. He was so evidently busy with other projects, as well as welcoming his first child into the world, that no one was asking him about how his mate Bob Evans was going.

“It was kind of gradual,” Mitchell admits of how he edged away from the subtle alt.country styling of the suburban trilogy. “When I first started laying down demos I didn't really sort of know where it was headed. The first 12 months was when it really kind of became clear – I was still writing songs in a similar fashion as I was before but I was definitely just playing around with aesthetics. I was using a lot more electric guitar and I was using a lot more keyboards and synths – just trying to demo the songs as if it wasn't Bob Evans, it was just me trying to get away from I s'pose that acoustic singer-songwriter kind of thing.

“And also try to just have fun, you know. I was tryin' to just focus on not giving a fuck about anything and just havin' a good time recording songs and being sort of playful with the whole process because usually the lyrical sentiments of a lot of my songs, they're generally on the serious side; they're always pretty personal and often they are of a serious kind of nature, so I was really acutely aware this time around that I just wanted to try and offset that a bit,” he confesses. “You know, The Flaming Lips on the exterior are like this zany, colourful, whacky, happy, trippy band, but if you listen to the songs and read the lyrics they're writing about these really heavy concepts, and whilst that's not necessarily something that I was thinking about at the time, it illustrates my idea well…. You can write about heavy themes but present them in a lighter kind of way.”

After working with producer Brad Jones in Nashville for the last two Bob Evans records, Mitchell was keen to put the mark of a new recording environment on Familiar Stranger. 

“I think I decided pretty early on after making the last record that I didn't want to go back to Nashville again,” he admits. “And you know, it wasn't necessarily an easy decision because I fuckin' loved going to Nashville to make records and in a way I could quite easily just keep going there to record every two years for the rest of my life because I have so much fun there and I love Brad and everything, but I knew I had to push myself out of my comfort zone. And that meant working with different people and doing things a different way.”

Working with American producer Dean Reid in Melbourne's Sing Sing studios where Jebediah's first two records were made in the late-'90s, Mitchell's move beyond a reliance on acoustic guitar meant the rhythm section would be prove to be hugely important throughout the recording process. It was also an excuse to recruit his “favourite drummer in the world”, Beck contributor Joey Waronker, via the connections of his chosen bassist.

“He'd worked with Joey before, they'd made records before and they'd become friends so that was my connection,” Mitchell says of Tony Buchen, “one of those sophisticated guys who can just do a lot of things really, really well”, though perhaps best known through his role as a Sydney-based producer. “[Waronker] flew out for five days to do all the drums on the record. He would be my number one choice of drummer for this album if I could have anyone in the world, so it was a real thrill to have him there.”

Preparing to hit every state and territory of the nation for the Familiar Stranger tour, Mitchell is stoked to have a star-studded band along for the ride.

“I can't wait – I haven't done a proper tour like this with Bob for years. I've got Davey Lane from You Am I playin' on guitar, and Tony Buchan playing bass and Mal Clark from The Sleepy Jackson on drums and a young guy named James on keyboards. It's gonna be the best fuckin' thing the world's ever seen,” he says with a big belly laugh, an infectious sense of humour no doubt contributing to his ability to collaborate widely.

Having well-and-truly earned his place in the upper ranks of Australia's music industry in the only career he's ever known, Mitchell surprisingly credits luck in his success. When it comes to being spoilt for choice as to where he next concentrates his creative endeavours, he keeps it real by allowing some conflicting feelings to spur him on.

“It's scary and invigorating,” he admits of soon being in the position of figuring out what the hell comes next. “Being a musician is scary full stop; you never really know when something's going to work and when it's not or what's around the corner, but that's what's great about it as well and that's what makes it an interesting kind of thing to do. I feel very lucky that I've got the opportunity to do more than one musical kind of project and for them to work separately from each other because I think it's pretty rare – so yeah, I'm really lucky to have that. Hopefully I'll be able to keep doing it you know, maybe make another Jebediah record, then some other things I want to do too; I want to collaborate with other people and make different types of records, so I think there's gonna be more different stuff I'm gonna do over the next few years.

“The last Jebs record and the last Bob record and the Basement Birds, whenever I've been making a record over the last sort of six/seven years, I've always been in the middle of making another one at the same time,” says Mitchell, who finds himself truly in between projects for a change. “Part of me is kind of thinkin' I'd like to make another Bob Evans record quickly. The way that I've been doing it, I've always left massive gaps between records because I've done other things, so just once I'd like to follow up a Bob Evans record with another Bob Evans record in a normal space of time.”

Bob Evans will be playing the following dates:

Thursday 11 April - Woombye Pub, Sunshine Coast
Friday 12 April - Tanks Arts Centre, Cairns
Saturday 13 April - The Zoo, Brisbane
Friday 19 April - Discovery, Darwin
Wednesday 24 April - Hotel New York, Launceston
Friday 26 April - Republic Bar, Hobart
Saturday 27 April - Fowlers, Adelaide
Thursday 2 May - Settlers Tavern, Margaret River
Friday 3 May - The Bakery, Perth
Saturday 4 May - Prince of Wales, Bunbury
Thursday 9 May - Cambridge Hotel, Newcastle
Friday 10 May - Oxford Art Factory, Sydney
Saturday 11 May - Zierholz @ UC, Canberra
Sunday 12 May - Heritage Hotel, Wollongong
Thursday 16 May - Yarra Hotel Geelong
Friday 17 May - Corner Hotel, Melbourne
Saturday 18 May - Meeniyan Town Hall, Meeniyan