Patience, John And Daughter Soda Are The Dream Team

It’s been a crazy and hectic couple of years for Patience Hodgson and John Patterson, the core partnership behind much-loved Brisbane indie rockers The Grates. The loving couple have started a family (welcoming beautiful daughter Soda into the world earlier this year) and established a thriving café/bar business in Brisbane (Southside Tea Room), so there’s no room for complacency these days. It’s meant that The Grates have had to take a back seat in their increasingly busy lives, but fortunately for their fervent fans the band hasn’t gone on the backburner altogether.

It has, however, taken a substantially different tack of late. The couple hired a new drummer (Ritchie Daniell from The Trouble With Templeton has permanently replaced founding member Alana Skyring, who quit in 2011), started their own indie label Death Valley, and then adopted a whole new spontaneous approach to record and release The Grates’ fourth album, Dream Team, in record time. 

“There’s a real good spirit to that record, and just the way that we did it which was just really fast without overthinking it,” Hodgson explains. “I guess we spent less time on the band than we’d ever spent – before that the band was all we’d spend time on day in day out, but this time around we just didn’t have that same luxury. So it was really cool that the band became the fun thing to do – we’d set time aside and do it two days a week, instead of treating it like a job and doing it five days a week and then doing other stuff two days a week.

“I don’t think we wanted to stop the speed – I think we were kind of addicted to it."

“Maybe having all that time at our disposal [in the past] made it feel like we always had plenty of time for band stuff, so even though I’ve always somehow felt pressure with the band maybe it was too open-ended, and we’d put stuff off because we knew we had five days to get it done. But now we only have two days a week it was, like, ‘We need to get in the band room, let’s jam! Let’s make some stuff!’ We hadn’t even jammed with a third person for like a hundred years – John and I would [jam together] because I guess we felt comfortable, but we’d never just jam with someone who wasn’t Alana and then even at the end with Alana we weren’t even jamming with just the three of us. So it’s been great having Ritchie onboard – we have such a good relationship with him that we were jamming with Ritchie which we hadn’t done in ages, which was really fun.”

The trio went down to Sydney to record Dream Team with Straight Arrows’ Owen Penglis at the production helm – the ensuing sound is rougher and more abrasive than past Grates fare, without compromising the band’s inherent melodic appeal. Hodgson believes this is partly to do with its relatively rushed gestation, and has no regrets whatsoever about its potential commercial appeal (or lack thereof).

“I don’t think we wanted to stop the speed – I think we were kind of addicted to it, just getting together and writing songs two days a week,” she continues. “And we weren’t even starting early – we’d just get together at midday and have some lunch and then just get back to it and if we felt like calling quits early we would. So the album has a kind of pace to it in a way – just making it those two days a week, it felt like there was a real pace when we got in there to do shit, and then we didn’t want to stop – we just said, ‘Let’s get in there and make the album! Let’s just go down to Owen and not make things hard, and only work with people who are legends. Let’s not have any stress and make it super fun’.

“There was a point in our career too where it probably seemed to other people like there were about a hundred different options that we could have capitalised on, but I felt like there wasn’t actually many options at all. I was looking at other Aussie bands and how their careers had gone, and their decisions to either try and go for Top 40 and try to get on commercial radio, or do you try to go more obscure and drop off the radar?  Or do you try and crowd-fund and make an album like that? It didn’t feel like there was many paths for us – I was looking at all those other things that bands had done and I just didn’t feel like there were that many options. It’s either you try your hardest to be absolutely massive or just sort of release an album the same way and be fully aware that it’s probably going to be your least successful. 

“We just decided to do that latter option – I really wanted it to be a bit more experimental. John and I both felt that we wanted it to feel exciting, and we thought that by just being honest with what made us excited about releasing a record might make our fans feel excited again too. So just not telling anyone, and then making an album and going into the studio and then releasing it within 28 days – that’s the plan and hopefully it feels exciting for the punters. It felt exciting for Owen – he seemed stoked to do it that way so that was enough for us! We said, ‘Owen’s excited to do it that way, let’s just do it!’ he’s got such good taste, it was so much fun working with him. And we trust him so much because of that taste.”

The in-demand Penglis is even going to be helping The Grates onstage during the impending tour that their two bands are undertaking together (alongside rising Brisbane outfit Pleasure Symbols). 

“I’m really pumped to hear what the band sounds like – I know what it sounds like on record, but having Owen playing bass live is going to be super great,” Hodgson enthuses. “And doing it on old Grates songs too; for the past few years since the first album we’ve been taking people on tour to do keyboards and stuff, but now we’re reimagining the old songs with bass – it’s going to be cool. We did a show in Adelaide years ago with a band called Bit By Bats, and their bass player jumped onstage and played bass on Trampoline, and I remember afterwards we all looked at each other and were, like, ‘That sounded fucking cool!’ 

“We’d made our decision by then that there was going to be no bass and just the three of us – and that was awesome for touring, having less instruments and being heaps cheaper – but I’m really looking forward to having Owen’s vibe in the mix. He and the Straight Arrows guys they’re like the original lifers! They’re music lifers, it’s rad. They’re way more hardcore than what I am!” 

The Grates as an entity has proved a runaway success for Hodgson and Patterson since its formation back in 2002 – scoring them Top 10 albums, numerous Queensland Music Awards victories, ARIA nominations, AMP nominations, endless Hottest 100 entries, and years of global touring – yet while admitting it was strange to walk away from it all for a while, all Hodgson feels right now is happiness that they’re back. And relief that plenty of their friends are going to be present whilst they’re onstage.

"I’ll be palming [Soda] off to Phoebe from Pleasure Symbols, like, ‘Thanks! Can you just look after her for the next hour and ten minutes? "

“It’s like a weird feeling – I’m really excited because I think it’s going to be a crazily fun tour,” she giggles. “All of the guys in Straight Arrows are great – we’ve known them for years – and Pleasure Symbols are awesome, and they’ve been recording under our house a lot recently so that’s been fun. That whole side of it’s just going to be awesome, but then there’s a separate part of me that’s like the mum side, going, ‘Agh, what’s going to happen when you wake up at 10.30 and have to go onstage? I’m not looking forward to that!’ I’ll be palming [Soda] off to Phoebe from Pleasure Symbols, like, ‘Thanks! Can you just look after her for the next hour and ten minutes? That would be great! Bye!’  

“We’re just doing it so dodgily, everyone keeps asking whether we’ll be taking a nanny and I’m, like, ‘Are you serious? Who do you think I am?’ It’s almost like a challenge too with all the other mums, they keep insisting that we’re going to need a nanny and John’s like, ‘We’re not getting a nanny! We’ve got Straight Arrows and Pleasure Symbols and friends in all the cities, they’re just going to have to pass her around for ten minutes each until she cries!’ That’s how we roll.”

Any nerves about getting back on the horse are no doubt magnified by the fact that even though Dream Team has been out since late last year they’re yet to perform any of its songs onstage at all.

“We’ve never played any of it live!” Hodgson exclaims. “What’s interesting with this album, is that with the one before [2011’s Secret Rituals] that just sat around for six months – that classic album sorta thing which had happened to all of our albums, where there’s some extended period where you have to wait for it to be released through normal channels. But this time there’s been a big gap of six months or more [until we play them live], but the difference is the album went out to the people straight away. We made the album and it was released straight away and now six months later we’re playing shows. 

“How it’s always happened in the past is that we’ll record an album, then it sits on the shelf at the record label headquarters before it gets released and then you’re playing shows immediately. So the gap between making the album and playing shows is the same, except that everyone’s had the album for six months already – I hope it works out better this way. Management and the record label always want you to do these funny shows – they want you to play these intimate launch shows where you release the album and one week later you play Brisbane, Sydney, Melbourne and sometimes Adelaide and Perth. It’s not your real tour but you end up playing these shows that are always weird because the songs that you’re there to promote – the newest ones – no one knows them. It’s more a show to show everyone that you’re still relevant and to help drive album sales and stuff like that, but nobody knows any of the music. So this time I’m hoping that because we’ve had it out for six months that this goes really well – it’s not just like the shows here you playing music and no one knows any of the melodies.”

Fortunately for the band they have a ‘warm up set’ at Splendour In The Grass to help them fire their way back to gig fitness, the festival having been something of a home away from home for The Grates over the last decade.

“I have really fond memories of Splendour,” Hodgson smiles. “I think it’s extra good because I think I’ve only ever missed a couple [of Splendours] because we were going as punters before we were even in a band – I went with John and Alana to the very first Splendour, that was so exciting! That was the one where a girl at some ungodly time came into John’s tent and he was, like, ‘Woah, what’s going on? Who’s this lady?’ and she was, like, ‘Do you have any band aids?’ Then he looked down and there was blood all over the tent and all over his sleeping bag, the girl had destroyed her foot and cut it somehow. I don’t know how that resolved, but I’ll never forget that incident with the girl with the stuffed-up foot.

"It was one of those moments where you go, ‘I can’t believe how many times we came to this festival and now we’re playing it!'"

“But it’s always been fun – it was actually really quite crazy when we first started playing Splendour, because that was one of those moments where I couldn’t really imagine doing what I was doing. I’d only gone to one Big Day Out at that stage and Big Day Out was pretty mystical but not like Splendour – which was the thing that I’d gone to heaps as a ticketholder – and then to cross the barrier and see the backstage was incredible. But also knowing Paul [Piticco – Splendour co-founder] and having Paul manage us and also run the festival, it felt like we got extra and got to see even more backstage than I’d ever imagined in my entire life! It was so incredible, going on scooter rides and motorbike rides and things like that – it was pretty amazing. It was one of those moments where you go, ‘I can’t believe how many times we came to this festival and now we’re playing it! This is awesome!’”

This relationship has also allowed them to do some pretty memorable productions at Splendour over the years.

“The first year we did all this stuff with balloons which was super cool,” Hodgson gushes. “I remember that year there was some ticketing drama so the gates weren’t open when we had to start playing – I think we were first band on the main stage – and being first band we were saying, ‘We can’t play, there’s no audience!’ They were just, like, ‘You’re the first band, we don’t give a shit. It says your start time is 12.30 so start!’ So we started playing to a completely empty festival, and then after a couple of songs you could just see people running at the stage – it was so cool just seeing people racing through the festival and running to the front of the stage, our most hardcore fans! And we were so new at that stage, it was really exciting. That was like an awesome gig too because half of it was over before anyone got there and then suddenly there was the balloon drop – it seemed like the shortest set with the most things happening of all time!

“And you know what’s really funny – and I feel like this is ridiculous – is that I only remember the Splendours by the outfit I was wearing and not by the year. This will be our fifth Splendour: one year I had a green dress on and then the balloon drop, and then the following time we played I had a blue frilled dress on and after that I was Batgirl, and then there was Woodford and I had an outfit that I had a girl make me in Sydney – it was sort of netted and stuff, but I kept telling her that she had my height measurements wrong and she kept going, ‘No no, I’ve met you and you’re not that tall’, and then when I got the dress it barely covered my butt! I was, like, ‘I told you!’ It was really short, I was knotting string onto the bottom of the skirt to try and give it some length – bits of string like hanging tassels! So I only remember by outfit, but John can remember by year and also by problem – ‘Ah, that was the year that my guitar amp dies for half of a song’, or ‘That was the year that the keyboard went crazy during Carve Your Name and then just fixed itself’. He remembers by problem.”