Fun Fun Funk

“The music program was really good,” recalls guitarist Lewis Coleman of The Cactus Channel, who formed at high school just a few years ago. Today they're living proof of what he says: Carlton North's Princes Hill Secondary College offered not just a wealth of Latin and jazz bands, but precisely the right vibe to inspire this invigorating and genre-melding 10-piece to really attack funk.

The band's core simply started practising while hanging out in the music department together, and the music soon evolved from sounding like Toots & The Maytals into something increasingly diverse. These days there's any given number of genres up for grabs. Need some examples? Check out the mariachi aside three-quarters of the way through Derty D's Thang, from the band's debut album Haptics. Or the jazz drawl into the horns at the end of Budokan. Or the many action-packed themes that could double as seedy old B-movie soundtracks.

“It's just the different influences we all have in the band,” notes Coleman. “We don't just wanna copy or recreate something. We want to add our own little bit of flavour. A lot of mariachi, a bit of surf. And of course Afrobeat and funk and soul.”

It helps that The Cactus Channel are purely instrumental, which means they can make hairpin turns into any genre without worrying about a singer stumbling during the transition. The absence of words also gives their album a definite soundtrack feel, tending towards the dynamic and hard-strutting. “Our single, Emanuel Ciccolini, has been described as the theme to a '70s Italian gangster heist film,” Coleman admits. “Because we're instrumental, we might be trying to incorporate a bit of theatricality, which might translate into soundtracks and stuff like that. I guess we are trying to evoke a particular kind of theme.”

It's a bold move recording a whole album of funk-centred originals without either vocals or cover songs. But that's what's so appealing about this band: there's no concession to crossover success. The music is enough, whether on the colour-saturated Haptics or live on stage. “Initially people are expecting a vocalist to come on after a while,” says Coleman. “But I think we compensate enough with the horn melodies. It's pretty dance-oriented. We haven't gotten a vibe that not having a vocalist has deterred fans from dancing to our music.”

While there aren't any covers on the album, a few might just pop up during a gig. There's an adaptation of the 1974 single The Dap by New Orleans hero Porgy Jones, which appeared as the B-side of the band's debut Pepper Snake single, and also a version of The Dap-Kings' Nervous Like Me. Oh, and a James Brown medley.

If those choices steer The Cactus Channel dangerously close to being throwbacks, they're not avoiding that by having recorded Haptics straight to analog tape. But that's just the way releases on Melbourne's burgeoning HopeStreet label — and its in-house studio — are done, and it absolutely suits the songs. “It makes everything a bit grittier,” reckons Coleman, “listening back to the recordings.”

As if the band didn't cram enough genres into their 10-piece setup — bass, two guitars, organ, drums, three saxophones, two trumpets and percussion — these young guns have two offshoot bands to explore more territory still. Coleman describes Karate Boogaloo as an “instrumental, old-school, funk-oriented” quartet in the vein of The Meters, while the insane-sounding Emanuel Ciccolini's Tex Mex Takeout is “Ennio Morricone-inspired, Spanish-y, Mexican-y” surf.

They've clearly come a long way from jamming at school and checking out Bamboos gigs for inspiration. Now they're part of a larger wave of acts that includes Saskwatch (just a few years older than them), Adelaide's The Shaolin Afronauts and HopeStreet labelmates The Putbacks, The Bombay Royale and Public Opinion Afro Orchestra. That's quite a stack of peers in Australia alone. Coleman agrees: “There's lots of good bands and people in the funk scene.”

The Cactus Channel will be playing the following shows:

Friday 28 September - GoodGod Small Club, Sydney NSW
Saturday 29 September - Transit Bar, Canberra ACT
Friday 12 October - Ding Dong Lounge, Melbourne VIC
Saturday 13 October - Rocket Bar, Brisbane QLD