Grenadiers Say Rock Music Is Starting To Build Up Again In Adelaide

Grenadiers

Three-piece punks Grenadiers have been bouncing from strength to strength all year, from supporting Cold Chisel at the popular Adelaide Clipsal 500 to having their second album, Summer, featured on triple j. 

"Oh man, it's been a long and arduous one," admits Grenadiers frontman Jesse Coulter of the band's journey to this point. "We started as a four-piece with completely different members to who we have now. We've gone through a bunch of different line-ups. I've kind of pulled a Wolfmother and I'm the only one left!" Grenadiers' debut album, Songs The Devil Taught Us, went pretty well but when contemplating the new record, Summer, Coulter expresses feelings of rebirth. "It feels like the band only started six months ago in a way. In another way it feels like we've been around forever because we have... People are starting to listen to something that we've been doing for fuck knows how long!"

"If you're from Melbourne you can probably play 40 gigs a year just in Melbourne. You can't do that in Adelaide."

We move on to talk about his earliest musical influences. "I've loved The Kinks since when I was like four years old!" starts Coulter with a smile. The Grenadiers frontman also enjoyed The Beatles, but goes onto to explain that he "was always more attracted to The Kinks because they were a bit rougher." The first CD Coulter ever purchased was The Red Hot Chilli Peppers' Greatest Hits. "Don't hold that against me," he says. "I was six years old!" He's always "been attracted to garagey, loud, primal, aggressive music that makes you jump around or bang your head against a wall or something."

Adelaide is often considered a tough city to break commercially, so Coulter diplomatically gives his take on being an Adelaide band. "It's good and bad; bad because you're so far away from everything in terms of industry-type shit, [but] good as well because it forces you, if you really want to have an impact nationally, to try a lot harder." Although the perils of over-saturation are much more dire in Adelaide, Coulter still has great things to say about the scene. "If you're from Melbourne you can probably play 40 gigs a year just in Melbourne. You can't do that in Adelaide." Despite this he believes that "rock music is starting to build up again in Adelaide." He cites Horror My Friend and The Hard Aches among Adelaide's hardest-working bands. Speaking of national impact, Grenadiers have been touring ever since their early days. "Our second or third show was in Melbourne," Coulter recalls. "I've always realised the importance of playing outside the state." Grenadiers are fully booked until the end of the year. Of what will equate to over 60 shows, only eight or nine will be in Adelaide.

"We went to the Northern Territory... We've never been there before! It's a different universe up there man. It's fucking bizarre but great... they have all these gorgeous beaches up there but no one is swimming in them because you'll die!" Coulter remarks that Grenadiers are by no means a big band. Although they get a few spins on triple j he considers that Darwin is more used to the odd international headliner. "So really [in Darwin] I think a lot of people came out just because we were a rock band coming to Darwin, which is pretty rare. 

"It was a modest crowd, but the people that were there, they fucking loved it. We played every song that we had in our set that we knew how to play and people were chanting for more! We were like, 'We literally don't have any more songs, so, we can't do anything,' and they were like, 'Just play something else again!' We were backstage and the owner said, 'Get back out on stage.' We told him we didn't have any songs and he was like, 'I don't give a fuck, get back out there!' That was awkward but at least that means that they liked it!"

Grenadiers are heading back out on the road in late August through the end of September. Coulter has a few choice words with regards to touring. "Not dying is probably the first thing. I think that's the basis of everything — not dying!" Besides a massive national tour, which includes an appearance at BIGSOUND in Brisbane, Grenadiers will continue writing for the follow-up to their second album, slated for an early 2016 release. As for the future, Grenadiers have several European countries in their sights.