The Gooch PalmsNewcastle's self-proclaimed “shit-pop” proponents The Gooch Palms are heading up to Brisbane to help launch the new compilation Nuggets: Antipodean Interpolations Of The First Psychedelic Era, which finds a swag of young Aussie rock bands from around the country covering songs from the seminal Nuggets compilation which came out back in 1972. It showcased the crop of garage bands that sprung up in America between 1964-68, and as well as starting an entire Nuggets franchise it acted as inspiration for generations of guitar bands who followed in their footsteps.
The Gooch Palms proffer a gloriously ragged take on Michael & The Messengers' Just Like Romeo & Juliet on the new collection, but this was not a matter of the two-piece's own design.
“We didn't pick it, it just got given to us,” tells guitarist/vocalist Leroy Macqueen. “I was stoked we got that one though, mainly because there's a few versions kicking around and they're all quite different. The Michael & The Messengers one was always going to be hard for us to mimic, so we thought of saw it as a blank canvas for us to attack, being only a two-piece. They're like a full band with a lot of amazing musicians, and I'm a bit of a 'barre chord only' demon – so there was going to be no fancy little open chords – and Kat [Friend – drums/vocals/theremin] only plays the floor tom and snare, not even a full drumkit, so we just found out the chords and took it from there otherwise it just would have sounded woeful. Plus any cover we do we don't try and do it like the original – I'm not a big fan of bands doing the exact same version, it's a bit of a pet hate of mine to be honest. It's been done, so why do it again?”
Macqueen was already a fan of the original Nuggets collection, which no doubt made things easier when time came to tackle the task.
“Yeah, I got shown it when I was probably seventeen or eighteen, and from there I discovered the 13th Floor Elevators and stuff like that,” he enthuses. “I don't know what the world would have been like without Nuggets to be honest, especially as before the internet that would have been how a lot of bands found out about all these awesome bands.”
Don't miss a beat with our FREE daily newsletter
Once they play Brisbane for the Nuggets launch one of the main things that The Gooch Palms have on the horizon is recording their debut album, for which they've already accumulated a heap of new songs.
“Our style of music is definitely changing,” Macqueen offers of the new material. “We never really like being called garage because we don't see ourselves as a garage band, we see ourselves as more of a pop band, playing lo-fi because we only have the instruments we have. So I feel like being dubbed as a garage band has forced me into writing a lot more sort of new-wave-y, quirkier songs now rather than the straight-up punkier ones that we were doing before. And I'm thinking about songs a lot more for the first time. When we first started we always had plans to get other members in and a proper drummer, but now that we're being given opportunities like being on the Nuggets compilation and playing the Big Day Out we've got a lot of confidence that the industry and people have given us the tick of approval to be the two-piece that we are, and that's helped us to write a lot of songs using just what we've got.”
The Gooch Palms will be playing the following dates:
Friday 25 January - Sydney Festival, Sydney Town Hall NSW
Sunday 27 January - Alhambra Lounge, Brisbane QLD
Friday 1 February - The Tote, Melbourne VIC
