Taste Test: Nick Weaver of Deep Sea Arcade

THE FIRST ALBUM I BOUGHT WITH MY OWN MONEY

I think, to my parent's disgust, it was In Utero by Nirvana. My parents liked Nirvana, but before they knew Nirvana they were just kind of concerned that I was buying an album called In Utero, you know? And I got the guitar book for it as well: I could play any song from that album. I think I've lost it [now], but back then I was the In Utero king. I was probably about 13 or something, or maybe 12, and my brother had previously introduced me to Nevermind.

THE ALBUM I'M LOVING RIGHT NOW

I'm really into... I don't know if you know Richard Hawley? He's kind of getting around a little bit right now, but he's an older guy. He's played in Pulp – a bunch of Britpop bands – and he's just put out this album called Standing At The Sky's Edge and it sounds incredible. It's awesome: quite '90s, but really beautiful production and these massive, slow rock songs.

MY FAVOURITE PARTY ALBUM

I've been looking through my computer and I've just discovered that I'm not the biggest party music kinda guy. I was thinking the closest thing – my idea of a party that might not be everyone else's idea of a party would be, like, The Jimi Hendrix Experience or something like that, which I love. I could totally rev up for that. Or I was even thinking, and I haven't listened to it for a while, but James Brown's Funky People (Part Two). I used to listen to that record heaps and it's basically James Brown producing a bunch of other people. It's like every single song you switch it on and go, 'Oh, the Beastie Boys sampled that,' or, 'This person sampled that,' you know what I mean?

MY FAVOURITE COMEDOWN ALBUM

I've got heaps of those! Probably On The Beach by Neil Young – I love every track on it, hey. I especially love this song called Revolution Blues, which is about Charles Manson: not really stuff you wanna think about when you're coming down. And I love the whole story, like, as a comedown album it's cool 'cause they made the whole album while on these horrible drugs and, I dunno, it just has this really beautiful sort of heaviness to it that I love.

THE MOST SURPRISING RECORD IN MY COLLECTION

I'm gonna have to look at my iTunes for a second. Okay, I really love Catch A Fire, the album by Bob Marley, which might be kinda weird but I looooove the way it's recorded. It sounds beautiful, it's some of the best bass and drum sounds you'd ever hear and the songs are just amazing. It's a killer record.   

THE FIRST GIG I EVER ATTENDED

I think I was about 14 and it was – you know how they used to have those all-ages afternoons on the weekends at the Metro in Sydney? And I went to Regurgitator supported by The Avalanches. I saw [The Avalanches] a couple of times. I saw them later on after they released the album and it was a festival somewhere, and that was cool, but this was three guys playing guitars with heaps of pedals everywhere and a few loops going on. But it was basically, like, a really weird rock thing. I remember going, 'Wow, this is cool! I wonder what this is?' And then everyone found out a little bit later. From what I remember, I don't think they even had a turntablist or anything. I don't remember there being a drummer. I think it was some drum loops, maybe a few samples, but mostly guitars and weird guitar noise. I still love the 'Gurge. Those were fun days. I went and saw Spiderbait there as well and, who else? Oh, Frenzal Rhomb a few times.         

THE WEIRDEST GIG EXPERIENCE I'VE EVER HAD

We went to Spain last year and we did this really weird gig on TV in Madrid. I dunno, TV performances are weird as it is, 'cause it's not like a gig: it's a pretty sterile environment to play in. And they'd hired this audience of Romanian people who had no idea who we were and were just there because they'd get a free buffet lunch. So our dressing room was like basically – you know in old recording studios how they were obviously putting reverb on records? It's something that's often done digitally now, but back in the '60s and stuff they used to have these things called reverb chambers, which were like big rooms that you could basically put a speaker into and then record the sound of the room and that'd be reverb. So they get this little tiny room that sounds like the biggest room you've ever been in somehow – it's really cool! It's how they shape the walls and stuff like that and it just makes this amazing reflection. So this tiny room that was our dressing room was actually a ridiculous reverb chamber, it was amazing.

MY BIGGEST NON-MUSICAL INFLUENCES

Probably film; we're all really big sci-fi movie buffs. Actually Nic McKenzie [vocals] in particular is very into lots of '60s sci-fi stuff: a lot of his ideas are based around all that. I really, really love the original Alien, the Ridley Scott Alien. I find that thing blows my mind. There's a movie that's a really big deal for Nic that I've only checked out really recently called Fahrenheit 451, which is a '60s sci-fi movie that's – you gotta check it out, but it's like a really dystopian idea of the future, which is really cool.

THE COOLEST PERSON I'VE EVER MET

I met Mick Fleetwood! He's so cool. I was just helping out playing bass for a friend's band and he scored the support for Mick Fleetwood's blues band that he was touring with, and he came backstage and met us and was the sweetest dude on earth. And he was like the size of a phonebooth, you have no idea – he's just huge! He must be over seven foot tall and he's just massive, but so nice – he's just really cool and hung out with us all. He just walked in. Everyone was a little bit terrified: it's hard to converse freely with a seven-foot-tall god. And to watch him from sidestage playing and everything, 'cause, you know, his blues band is basically like – it's really similar to the really early Fleetwood Mac stuff when they were playing all the blues stuff in the '60s. And I love that Fleetwood Mac stuff: all that early blues stuff when Peter Green was in the band – that stuff is gold. 

IF I COULD HANG OUT IN ANY TIME AND PLACE IN HISTORY

Definitely the Jurassic period. I'd just be hanging out, 'cause to see dinosaurs in their natural habitat – I saw the robotic T-Rex at the Museum Of Natural History in London, that was cool. The T-Rex, like, it sees if a little kid's just walked into the room, it's got a sensor and it just turns and roars at these kids. It's so funny. They just shit themselves!

IF I WASN'T MAKING MUSIC

Oh, I'd be a palaeontologist of course. Honestly, when I was a little kid I really wanted to be a palaeontologist. I was really into dinosaurs and I used to always tell my mum that I was gonna have a helicopter and, you know, go looking for dinosaur bones and I reckon that'd still be sweet. So that's my back-up plan.