On The Broad Appeal Of The Wilson Pickers & Why They "Took Off"

Guitarist Danny Widdicombe of blues/country/roots act The Wilson Pickers is very happy that his band are soon to play the Broadbeach Country Music Festival. Speaking from his home in Brisbane, he tells us that he is just as happy about the fact that The Wilson Pickers cross-genre classifications can be appreciated by a broad range of music lovers.  

"It's funny how we straddle different genres," he notes with a touch of surprise, "because the week before we're playing at Splendour In The Grass and then we play this. So it's great, it's great to be able to do that. It's good to cover both sides: the cool kids and just the general music fans." 

Does that mean that you guys have a very broad appeal? "Well, apparently!" he laughs. "I didn't think we would but, yeah! It looks like it." 

When asked to describe his favourite kind of gig, Widdicombe shares, "For me, daytime outdoor festival gigs are the best; there's just something about the feeling - people are inspired, they're really happy to be out and about and listening to the music. There's something special about it, compared to a normal club show. 

"I like to be able to see the audience as well, which you can't generally do at nighttime in a club," he adds. "So it's gonna be great, I can't wait." 

For what is a relatively new festival, having only started in 2013, this year's Broadbeach Country Music Festival has attracted quite a stunning line-up of country and alt-country talent, and Widdicombe is quite humbled to be a part of it all and looking forward to seeing some of the other artists playing when they're not. "Our good mate Troy Cassar-Daley's playing, which is huge," he says. "His band is amazing, he'll have some pedal-steel in his band, which we're excited about seeing. There's heaps of other great artists, including a great up-and-coming young artist called Dana Gehrman, who's hot stuff up here at the moment.  

"We're going to stay the whole weekend, getting amongst it." 

All members of The Wilson Pickers have many other projects on the go and the band really only started as a side project for them, but it quickly evolved into more of a focus for the people involved. Especially after they received an ARIA nomination in 2009. 

"You can tell from all the activities we do independently of each other, that's how we always operated," he recalls, "and then [singer] Andrew Morris had the idea of, because we're all friends, getting together and making some sort of music that sounds like bluegrass, but with an Australian flavour. And it just took off."  

And Widdicombe has a good idea about where their creative success came from. "I think the appeal is the five-part vocal harmonies. I think it just really resonated with people," he muses, "and it became the most successful thing that any of us had done, which annoyed a couple of them," he laughs.