Not Droning, Waving

It's kind of like Gareth Liddiard hadn't thought about being a bit tired, perhaps until he thought he should be a bit tired, his identifiable drawl exhaling as he ponders The Drones' schedule over the past few months. “Yeah, suppose we haven't really had a breath since the record. We've tried to, but every time we think about it – things kept popping up. But that's ended up being pretty normal for us – and that's a good way to be, really.”

Taking I See Seaweed to its audience has seen The Drones in the iconic surrounds of the Sydney Opera House, as well as playing and curating their own version of ATP's I'll Be Your Mirror festival, before taking up an invite to take their so-Australian music to Spain's prestigious Primavera Festival and then onto the rest of Europe as the journey unfolded.

You wonder how well Liddiard's twang translates to a foreign audience. How's his pig Spanish?

“Ha, yeah – pretty shit,” he admits. “You should stick to what you know. I can do the 'hello', 'goodbye' and 'thank you's'. That'll do. And in Europe, it's like one night in Spain, the next two nights in France, another one in Luxembourg, then Germany. Look, don't bother trying to be a smartarse – it's just not gonna work.”

Similarly, the songs themselves. Liddiard considered how a line like “What kind of arsehole drives a lime green Commodore?” can have a context to a Portuguese crowd: “They can just take it at face value, really. Some might dig deeper and work it out. Or know the English as we go. They can just take in the words or the energy if it. Or a bit of both.

“I mean, look at something like Led Zeppelin, the music is the sound of what it is. If you just listened to the words, and you'd probably turn it off,” he chuckles and goes on. “As opposed to something like Dylan. Y'know – the chords are good, The Band are good – but really could be mega-fucking boring, if you were honest about it. It's choices: you can hide behind the words, or hide behind the music.  Like, if you see a hole, you patch it up – that might be with a good line of words, or a good melody line.”

Another of those things that grew as it rolled along was a support spot for Neil Young, the venerable Canadian so impressed with the band, they ended up tagging along to New Zealand for the shows there. For The Drones, Mr Young remained suitably enigmatic, at least early on.

“Didn't really deal with him at first – talked to his manager, the crew, some of the band – [Crazy Horse guitarist] Poncho [Sampredo], he was always up for a chat,” recalls Liddiard. “But Neil pretty much kept to himself. He just napped before a gig, I think. And then he just kinda sneaks up and starts talking. Did it to me and (Drones' keyboardist Steve) Hesketh the one night. We're standing there in the pitch dark backstage – and then you realise there's this guy in a check shirt in the conversation as well. Maybe it's better if you don't know it's gonna happen. Only later do you go 'Fuck! That was Neil Young we were talking to...'”

Liddiard's conversation turns to The Drones' newest member. “Hesketh is used to that sort of thing. He's the one who just seems to know everybody, and just drops it in: 'You know, when I was talking to Slash…' and things you really don't expect. He's had spas with Eva Mendes, as you do. Some of the people in the list of numbers on his phone is quite impressive. Bit of a dark horse, our Steven,” he laughs.

The keyboardist – whose previous credits include times as touring member of Jet and You Am I among others – has changed the band's sound and dynamic, at least a bit. “Yeah…. maybe,” Liddiard conditionally agrees. “We're a band that changes very slowly anyway – maybe you've got to wonder what some of the newer songs might have sounded like if we didn't have him there. Maybe it's just having that extra place the music can go. I just don't like getting stuck in one way of working for too long. We've been enjoying the new songs, and finding new ways into some old ones.

“And what's the worry? Yeah, get another guy in, just see how it goes. It was my idea I suppose – Dan (Luscombe) can play piano as well as guitar, I mean he's good and all, but even he can't play both at once.” There's another dry laugh. He then gets even more practical: “It does help the democracy in the band – it's better to have an odd number. Band votes often come down to a stalemate – you can pretty much guess the teams – and we've now got the tiebreaker.”

Even as the The Drones' go on this latest tour, playing the venues you'd probably more expect to find them, Liddiard's thoughts are turning to the next thing, the next record. But he dismisses the idea of this being a particularly purple patch. “A creative spurt? Nah, not really. I'm always doing stuff. Like between Havilah and the Seaweed, I did the solo album, did the Nothing Butts record with Spencer Jones and James Baker, worked on the Ben Salter record – other things I've probably forgotten. Oh, did our DVD in there somewhere. Toured here, there, and everywhere,” he diarises.

Working with another near-mythic music figure in the many-credited Spencer Jones seems a particularly happy memory, with some odd asides. “Yeah, we did have a good time making that Nothing Butts record,” says Liddiard. “But working with Spencer, just hearing the stories – knowing the history acutely. I mean, dig out that old Beasts Of Bourbon best of… Beyond Good And Evil, and there's a photo taken of them playing at the Metro in Fremantle – and if you look up on the balcony, and there's me, and my sister, and my girlfriend. And that's when I was in high school.” Mr Liddiard has proved his credentials, as if he had to. “Always loved them – those bands, that era – yeah, I know those old farts,” he jokes, before adding, a little more seriously, “…and what they mean to us even existing.”

An existence they worried about continuing at one point: “And then we were in the earthquake.” Sorry? “Yeah, an earthquake – up here at home. It was only a little one – only a '4' or so,” he matter-of-facts. “Y'know, enough to rattle the crockery – we were just sitting there, listening to a playback, and it was like a big storm just whipping up outside.

“But then I realised what was really going on, and I've never been so aware of a ceiling before,” he now laughs a bit at the memory.  “Yeah, worried slightly about the workmanship – looking up, and deciding it was probably a good idea to get out. We went outside, basically to check – 'Jesus, it's not the end of the world, is it?' The funny thing, it woke all the birds up – and you could hear all this chirping and noise out in the dark. That made it even weirder.”