EXCLUSIVE: TISM Frontman Reveals New Project & Album

He’s back.

The man once known as TISM’s creative lynchpin Humphrey B Flaubert, but who stepped into the spotlight in his own natural form back in 2007 in the biggest public face-unveiling since Kiss’s Unmasked back in 1980 – which thankfully didn’t actually involve them actually unveiling their hideous visages ­– is back with a new project, Damian Cowell’s Disco Machine.

It’s been a gradual easing back into the public domain, segueing seamlessly from his emergence DC Root (in country-tinged rockers Root!) to playing himself in The DC3 (possibly showing his hand with that band’s first single I Was The Guy In TISM), but now he’s bringing his own private persona even further to the fore.

Self-describing the project as “The sound of Boney M, Sex Pistols and Bill Hicks stuck in a lift”, Cowell used crowd-funding to raise the cash for his band’s debut long-player (effortlessly raising far, far more money than required) and then pulling together a stellar cast of non-musical guests in what must amount to one of the most stunning grabs for credibility in Australian history since Mark “Jacko” Jackson roped in Warwick Capper and Peter Bosustow for the Adults Only comedy tour.

Cowell himself described the project’s origin story thusly:

I SET OUT TO MAKE A DANCE ALBUM…
"…But dance music these days has so many rules. You have be a male model and call yourself NRCSSST.
Then I got out an old Boney M record, and remembered that dance music was once mighty daggy. Bingo! That's when I started using the word 'disco'. I like the word because it immediately conjures up something daggy. But don't get me wrong - this isn't a '70s pisstake album. I've appropriated the term 'disco' just so everyone can relax. You don't have to worry about failing the 'cool' exam when you're listening to a 'disco' album.
It's just dance music with short songs and singalong choruses, played on largely real instruments by a real band.
Oh, yeah, and then there's the guests. You know, if I was David Guettaswissbankaccount, I'd be asking Rihanna to guest on my album. Being me, I wanted a bit more of an interesting approach. So I made a list of people I admired – mainly non-musicians – and, incredibly, they said yes.
See, I think it was the word 'disco'. Who doesn't secretly like to be a bit daggy every now and then?"  

DC has granted The Music (temporary) exclusive access to a few of the tracks from DCDM’s eponymous long-player:

I’M ADDICTED TO MODERATION (feat. Tim Rogers)

Remember all those years ago when DC was interested in apathy? His penchant for sharing his innermost secrets continues, the track a mixture of live instrumentation and electronica – reminiscent of mid-era TISM – before the one and only Tim Rogers jumps in with the following insight:

“I could have been Faust selling his soul to the devil
But I read the fine print
I could have been Armstrong walking on the moon
Instead of that guy whatsisname who minded the ship
I could have been Icarus touching the sun
Except I slip slop slapped
I could have been Robert Johnson at the crossroads
But I’m Hector the Safety Cat”.

DAMIEN COWELL’S DISCO MACHINE PART 1 (feat. Shaun Micallef)

The track’s opening repeated refrain of “What the fuck?” segues into a spoken-word DC diatribe, something of a self-referencing mission statement for the new project itself over a bona fide disco bed. It’s hilarious from the outset, even before the entrance of Shaun Micallef lending his dulcet tones to a further spoken word section as random as you are no doubt imagining.

EPISTEMOPHOBIA (feat. Kate Miller-Heidke)

As with all great DC songs it requires a dictionary or thesaurus to unlock the song’s true essence, “epistemophobia” proving to be basically a fear of knowledge. It has a piano-heavy intro with lyrics such as “My brain is as big as the Eiffel Tower/I’ve got a planet between my ears”, before Kate Miller-Heidke’s shadow vocals begin, the songstress later taking full vocal reins with her super-distinct voice serving the song perfectly. Ignorance is bliss apparently.

JESUS BARISTA SUPERSTAR (feat. Lee Lin Chin)

That perfect enunciation which could only belong to SBS newsreader Lee Lin Chin opens with a looped refrain of the song’s title before the track proper kicks in with a typically lyric-heavy tract that seems to mock Our Lord and our burgeoning coffee culture in equal doses. Talk about shooting fish in a barrel.

DON’T HECTOR THE SAFETY CAT (feat. Tony Martin)

If you have to dig into the past to place that inimitable voice of Tony Martin from his Late Show days, you’ll have to go back even further in time to contextualise the titular Hector The Safety Cat from the road safety commercials of yore. Contains the excellent line “there’s nothing as conservative as cool” – one of the best lyrical grabs in recent memory – but still poses something of a generational quandary given the vintage of the song’s super-altruistic protagonist.

So, as you can see, there are still very few sacred cows in the world of Damian Cowell – everything is fair game – and it’s the continual stream of Australian pop culture references that makes it so compelling (long one of TISM’s main strengths). The album is due in February and full tracklisting is as follows: 

1. Jesus Barista Superstar feat. Lee Lin Chin
2. Damian Cowell's Disco Machine Part One feat. Shaun Micallef
3. Don't Hector The Safety Cat feat. Tony Martin
4. Epistemophobia feat. Kate Miller-Heidke
5. 4D Printer feat. Kathy Lette
6. I'm Addicted To Moderation feat. Tim Rogers
7. I Hope You Get Laid For Christmas feat. Liz Stringer
8. Damian Cowell's Disco Machine Part Two feat. Julia Zemiro and Sam Pang
9. Folk Music Turns Me Into A Fascist feat. Emily Jarrett
10. Things I've Said In Job Interviews feat. John Safran
11. Groovy Toilet feat. Bek Chapman
12. I Wanna Be Loved (By Me) feat. The Bedroom Philosopher

And there’s live shows in the offing too; you can be one of the first on your block to check out Damian Cowell’s Disco Machine at one of the band's forthcoming gigs in Brisbane, Sydney, Melbourne or Adelaide — just head to theGuide or see The Music App for more information.

If he wasn’t a fictional construct we bet Disco Stu would be one happy camper!