Fighting The Good Fight

Texan rockabilly legends The Reverend Horton Heat have had a long and eclectic career since convening in Texas back in the mid-'80s, and the good times are showing no sign of abating. The hard-touring outfit are in the midst of writing and recording their 11th studio album – scavenging time in between gigs and road trips, naturally – which is also their first since signing to Chicago-based indie behemoth Victory Records. On the eve of their impending Australian sojourn, frontman and songwriter Jim Heath – whose stage name of The Reverend he shares with his band – tries to make sense of their new material.

“I kinda have to let it unfold as it goes – you never really know what's going to happen,” he offers in his relaxed Texan drawl. “I try to predict what kind of album it's going to be, and it always ends up being something a little different than what I started with. But that's because I'm reaching out and trying to find new creative songs, and you kind of got to take whatever comes out of the cosmos and hits you on the head. My idea right now is that our last album [2009's Laughin' & Cryin With...] verged on being a straight-up country record – there was a lot of country on it – and I kind of envisaged just getting back to the straight Reverend Horton Heat rock'n'roll stuff, a little bit harder-edged stuff. Then we got talking to this label Victory – of course they do really hardcore stuff – so it's a little bit unusual, but that could be a good thing. Their setup is brilliant and they're great at what they do, so I'm flattered they want us. Gosh, it's so difficult for us because we play so many gigs that it's really difficult to write, record, rehearse – that sort of stuff that we really need to be doing. We'll make it work.”

One thing they won't be doing at their new home is easing back on the humour that so liberally laces The Rev's best material.

“I kind of had an epiphany during doing that last album that our funny songs are the ones that are most popular with the audience,” Heath continues. “I don't know if I could only have every song just be funny. Actually my newer songs that are coming down the pipe are not necessarily funny, comical, zany things – I've got a little more serious stuff coming. There's going to be some zaniness on there – there's always got to be some zaniness on a Reverend Horton Heat album.”

Even given Victory Records' roster of punk and hardcore bands, it's not that much of stretch envisioning The Reverend Horton Heat amid their throng. This is, after all, the same band that was signed to Sub Pop throughout the entire grunge explosion of the early '90s and who got to witness that strange era of musical history firsthand.

“It was a great time,” Heath smiles. “Honestly, back then there weren't really many rockabilly bands – there were a couple, there were several in America and of course every major city probably had a rockabilly band – but overall there wasn't much out there. So Reverend Horton Heat always played the punk rock venues – the so-called 'alternative venues'. We could play blues clubs, we could play country bars, we could play some of the more traditional type venues, but especially when we went on tour we were always playing the alternative/punk venues.

“So in the Sub Pop years, one of the reasons they signed us was because we were already playing and doing well in the same venues as Nirvana and Soundgarden and Cat Butt and Mudhoney. So even though our music was far away from the grunge thing, we were already playing the same places and it kind of made sense in a way. But it was an interesting time just to see those bands just explode that big, especially Nirvana. Nirvana went in a very short time from a band playing in the little places that we were playing to just exploding almost overnight. Then all of a sudden, I remember those Sub Pop guys having a lot of money, so that Nirvana explosion especially was good for bands like us. 

“Sub Pop promoted us really well, and worked out a deal for us to be co-distributed through a major label, Interscope – they tried to latch onto the whole Seattle thing and somehow a Texas band got on there. A lot of people really didn't like us getting signed to Sub Pop, because we were a rockabilly band from Texas, and Sub Pop was supposed to be about 'Seattle underground bands' – that's why it says 'Sub'. But we've been one of the highest-selling bands that Sub Pop ever had, besides Nirvana and Soundgarden, because we've sold really consistently the whole time. If you sell well consistently for a long period of time, slow and steady wins the race.”

Even though The Reverend Horton Heat are still rocking hard and relevant, Heath seems incredulous that his band's been on the road for the best part of three decades now.

“Oh I know, it's pretty crazy, I can't believe it,” he laughs. “It doesn't seem like that at all – a lot of stuff that happened like twelve years ago seems like it happened a couple of years ago, and I'll realise, 'Wow, that was over a decade ago!' But I try not to think about that or dwell on that, because I'm a fighter – I'm out here dealing with some stupid issue every day to make this band work, and I'm still competitive. I still want us to be good, I still want us to be taken seriously, I still want us to be a band that's looking forward to our new projects as opposed to a band that just sits back and goes, 'Yeah, those days were really great, but it's all over now.' 

“I don't like to think about all the years that are gone – I like my memories and everything – but one good thing about being busy, being a busy guy in a busy band, is that I don't have time to stop and think about a lot of stuff that people might imagine a band should think about. Some of my friends who are my age go, 'Isn't it going to be a little weird, isn't it going to be a little creepy if you're eighty years old and still up there? What are your plans? What are you going to do?' And I say, 'I'm going to play music! Sure it might be creepy if I'm eighty years old and I'm up there playing this music, but who cares?' If they want me I'll go and do it, I don't care!”