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Human Frailty Pty Ltd |
20 QUESTIONS: MARK SEYMOUR
Information: A surprisingly good interview from Australian Playboy, featuring some good questions. Author: Kayt Arthur. Date: November 1994. Original URL: (none).
The head hunter of Hunters & Collectors reflects on the status of the Hunners at home, the chances of overseas success and the effects of sibling rivalry. Mark Seymour, the enigmatic front man of Australia's formidable, brave, rock 'n roll tribe, Hunters & Collectors, has managed to keep everyone guessing throughout the band's 13 year history. We decided to ask would the real Mark Seymour please stand up - Rock Babe, Sensitive New Age Guy, Bulldog or just plain Thug? He enters the room carrying a couple of bottles of Coke. (Coke! can you believe it? His reputation as a health freak fizzes into insignificance.) We wipes his hands on his jeans, in preparation for the moment when he will press my flesh. By way of explanation he says with a shrug: "Sorry: steak sandwich." The Melbourne based musician recently entered the rends of first time fatherhood, and at nearly 40 he agrees the experience has changed his life for the better. This is a man to whom relationships are an emotional wrecking ball, and he readily admits he has none of the answers. Popular preconceptions about him as the muscle behind the music - the domineering ring master - quickly fall flat. It has been suggested that group dynamics and in-house fighting have forced him to stand down. To the contrary, he says he has chosen to take a back seat, because maintaining creative control over a group of individuals is not within the realms of possibility. He is haunted instead by the fact that mainstream credibility and a sizable slice of the overseas market continue to elude them. Talk of the band's debut in the early 1980s sets him wondering about their collective arrogance as young hopefuls. "We thought we were the bee's knees." Hunters & collectors quickly became known as the band who played gas cylinders as percussive instruments, long before it was fashionable. They dared to be different, and from these humble beginnings they coined a new musical language. Relentless and haunting, the twist of their tunes knife the memory and refuse to leave. It is not just a series of disjointed songs, it is a continuous chant, the washing machine talking, a train, the purr of life, a helicopter overhead - an omnipresent melody that scrapes and turns in your head long after they have left the stage. And throughout it all the mournful integrity of Seymour's lyrics and vocals, his gritty delivery, thick with tenderness, makes you wonder if the bulldog of the band has gone soft? Soft with love for his family, and hunger for an ordinary life. Melbourne based Playboy contributor Kayt Arthur caught Seymour in a sombre and somewhat reflective mood on the eve of the launch of Hunters & Collectors' latest album Demon Flower. 1. PLAYBOY: When you initially started the band, what were some of your aims? SEYMOUR: God! I don't know. There have been points in our career where we have had a goal, when we have said: "We want to make it in England, or make it in America..." But whenever we have set goals, we have never achieved them. They are always margins that are theoretically presented to us by people outside the band. Benchmarks of success that other people talk about, not us, and they become things which we feel we have to live up to. In the wisdom of our years we have realised that they are not really within the realms of our control anyway. The only thing that really was uppermost in my mind, when I first started singing in Hunters & Collectors, was the atmosphere and the energy of being part of the sound. Just the actual getting on the stage and performing, because at that time my horizons were fairly limited. If you've only been playing on stage for the last three or four months, you don't try to reach a conclusion about why you are doing it. You really don't think beyond the next 24 hours. 2. PLAYBOY: Your first show - was that New Year's Eve 1982 or 1983 at the Astor Theatre, when you got booed of the stage? SEYMOUR: No, that wasn't the first gig. The first gig was at the Crystal Ballroom, at the beginning of 1981, and we were supporting Snake Finger, who is an American, a sort of eccentric rocker. I didn't really know that much about him, I think it might have been a benefit for him or something. We used to do things like that, we supported The Cure at the Ballroom. Eventually we got a regular night at the Oxford Hotel opposite RMIT in Swanston Street. We did that for two or three months and then we started going up to Sydney, just doing three or four shows in Sydney. We'd drive up the Hume. God knows it wasn't even a double freeway, it was just like a two way road all the way. A lot of those early shows were really, really successful, when we had the original format of the music, but that Astor Theatre show, that came about after we had come back from England. 3. PLAYBOY: When you say you are not surprised that people booed, why is that? SEYMOUR: I wasn't talking to Greg Perano (gas cylinder percussionist). We just didn't have anything to do with each other at all, and creatively it was fucked. We'd spent all this time in England, and weren't able to get any shows. The record company lost interest very quickly, there was just a lot of negatives. Largely brought about by our attitude. I think, we were very arrogant boys. We thought we were the bee's knees. 4. PLAYBOY: How old were you then? SEYMOUR: 25? You could trace it back, I'm 37 now - 26 possibly. Yeah, but I didn't really give a fuck then either, not at that stage, I had earlier on. I remember when we did that gig that night. I was very ambivalent about the whole thing. I was angry with other band members as well. We got through it all. 5. PLAYBOY: Is success the best revenge? SEYMOUR: I think you have to be very careful that you don't think on too parochial a level. We have always had problems with traveling overseas, because there is this odd sort of internal energy in the band which comes from some people. Especially towards me there is a certain amount of control that people want to have over me. 6. PLAYBOY: Who do you think the average Hunters fan is? SEYMOUR: God, it's sort of hard to say. There are definitely people out there who we don't reach. There is a certain fringe of Australian punters that are deeply conservative, and they're not interested, and they think we're weird. 7. PLAYBOY: Do you still think so? SEYMOUR: Oh yeah, yeah, I was on a Triple M bus the other day in Sydney and their publicist said to me: "With this album you might go mainstream...You've always been a bit of a cult band, you've got that cult following." And I'm going: "You're joking, how can you still think that?" But some people have that perception, it's amazing how public perception really determines a lot about your level of success. People definitely bring a set of values, when they go out and pay money to see an artist, a performer, a band or whatever they are bringing along their values - their social and cultural values. So I dunno, it's hard to say who our fans are. I s'pose they're like pretty young. 8. PLAYBOY: Do you think your followers are mostly men? SEYMOUR: Um, depends on the night. There are some gigs which we do which would be male dominated. If you play the Ballroom, or Selina's in Sydney, all the surfies will go. They know if they go to Selina's their mates will be there, and it's almost a sort of parochial thing, seeing us at that gig. So that's the one they'll go to. But then we might play Parramatta Leagues club the next night, and they'll be just girls down the front - there will still be lots of blokes, but a greater proportion of girls. We did a gig a Wyong the other day, and there were just lots of girls there. See the thing about all these places is that they are very, very regional. There is certain venues they will go to, like a local haunt. It is a great advantage for us to be able to say that we can draw people in their local area, and they will come along purely on spec. 9. PLAYBOY: How many times over the past 13 years have you thought about leaving the band? SEYMOUR: Uhh! I think about it every second day, but that is just me. Gudinski (head honcho at Mushroom Records) would say: "You're too negative." That is just my nature, I question. I question the validity of what we are doing, and why we are doing it. I'm very aware of every song we do. I have to be able to claim that it is a statement of some kind, that I am making some kind of statement. It doesn't matter what it is, each song has to make sense on some level. Like it's about this situation between people. It has to raise questions, and there has to be some sort of issue. 10. PLAYBOY: What would you like to be doing in 10 years time? SEYMOUR: I'd like to live in New Zealand. My girlfriend is from NZ and my daughter is from NZ. We've got New Zealand passports. [He gives a half laugh, half snort]. I really like NZ. I've had a growing love of the country over a long period of time. It started in about 1986, and it has been developing since then, gradually, very gradually. I went back there at the end of '92, just to promote the Cut album, and I was only there for a little while. We hadn't been there for years, but it brought back a lot of stuff: a lot of experiences that I had there, and had been at the back of my mind. Experiences that had actually been really important to me earlier on. I'd like to live there one day. 11. PLAYBOY: Would that be about living a rural life? SEYMOUR: I really want to live a normal life. I think my life is pretty normal, it's becoming more and more normal. Don't get seduced. It is stupid and foolish and unwise to believe that all the flattery and the praises that people extol towards you as an artist or a star has any meaning whatsoever, and has anything to do with reality. So many artists allow their lives to become a reflection of how other people see them. So you acquire, you gather the accoutrements of being a pop star. You have a particular type of life, involving certain types of relationships, and a certain kind of house and a car, in a particular kind of suburb. And after a few years you suddenly realise you have become a walking cliché. I think I reached that stage myself. [Laughs] I decided there were other things in life that are a lot more important, and that they are truisms, but they're truisms for a reason. What goes on in the band and what the band does, it's a job and all my creative energy gets channeled into that. And all the energy I put into my other life is quite separate, or I try to keep them as separate as I can. 12. PLAYBOY: How have your parents reacted to your career? Has it been a case of "Get a real job"? SEYMOUR: In the beginning it was pretty bad, yeah, very bad actually. [Laughs] With Dad - especially my father - he didn't know how to deal with it. I didn't know how to deal with it either. When I decided to be a professional musician, to try to make a living out of music, I didn't know why I was doing it then. Really, it was an act of rebellion in a way, I was a very angry person. It was a very instinctive thing. I think at the time. I couldn't intellectualise a decent reason for doing it, for making the decision. I did, but at the same time I had a really strong gut feeling that I was going to be able to pull it off. I just had a sense about it. 13. PLAYBOY: Like a calling? SEYMOUR: Yeah, probably, but I can only say that now, because at the time I was terrified. Everything, everything, was a threat, every person was a threat, and anything anyone ever said to me about what I did creatively. I couldn't have a normal conversation with people about music. I can imagine a lot of your musicians would be like that. I've met people in some of the Melbourne bands who are doing a lot of stuff, musical stuff, and they are really trying to do something different, and they're really fucking paranoid about people laughing at them. I can really relate to that, cos I was feeling threatened at the time, but at the same time I knew it was serious business. Whereas now I tend to think: do it, who cares! 14. PLAYBOY: Have you been able to maintain contact with old friends, continuity with from the past? SEYMOUR: No, I tend to burn my bridges actually. I wouldn't say that I'm ruthless, but I tend not to regret losing contact with people, because it has become such an inevitable part of my job. Also just getting older, I wanted to get my life organised in such a way that I felt happy with it. And not just dropping everything and going down the pub for beers, with whoever just for the hell of it, just because they rang up and asked me if I wanted to go out. There was a period of time when these friends were heard to groan: "Orr, Seymour never comes out." But that was my decision, it's my bed, I've got sleep in it. Huh! 15. PLAYBOY: Is image a factor if you want to go and buy something that could compromise your credibility rating? SEYMOUR: Not really, not in terms of my own personal life. I don't worry about that. It's not a thing that I worry about at all, but in terms of the way the band is viewed by the industry as a whole, I get pretty pissed of about the kind of credibility we have got. I've got this sixth sense which tells me - people might tell me I'm being paranoid about it - but I just get this feeling about the way Richard Wilkins introduced us as: "The band that ought to be doing a lot better than they have." We did the gig, and we were like, "What are you saying?" I like Richard Wilkins but little things like that keep coming up, and I just start thinking: "We've never really been in the club." Other guys in the band say: "Who gives a shit, who gives a fuck about that?" But at the same time, after a while you start thinking: Well what is it about our music? We don't quite belong here and we don't quite belong there. 16. PLAYBOY: But you must be very close, are you? SEYMOUR: After a while I started thinking, well, maybe it's something about me, that I just don't want to be that readily acceptable. Maybe that's what it is. I found it really difficult to accept my bother's success [Nick Seymour, bass guitarist from Crowded House], but it hasn't made him any happier. In terms of the way the band is viewed historically, my worst nightmare is that we will always be considered an obscure group. People seem to have that perception, I don't know who they are, and I wouldn't want to list them on a page, but I just get the vibe that's how we are seen. And yet we do huge business. 17. PLAYBOY: Did you set a precedent by becoming the first famous Seymour, and does that make you resentful? SEYMOUR: I dunno, he had to fight a lot harder, because he's got a chip on his shoulder about the amount of regard the family holds him in - the younger brother type thing. 18. PLAYBOY: Is he the youngest? SEYMOUR: Yeah. That sort of cliché thing is definitely true, brothers are like that. As far as going out and being first, that's not what bugs me bout it. The thing that bugs me about it is that he has had overseas success and I haven't, as much as I would really like to be able to say: "I don't give a fuck." Even though I don't like going overseas, and I don't really actually like touring overseas very much, I find it does get the better of me after a while. I miss being at home, but I would like the success. The success came to them because they were in the right place at the right time, and it was very quick. They were in the States, and their single went rocketing up the charts, and nothing had happened for 18 months. Their album had been out in Australia, and then that song happened. 19. PLAYBOY: Who would you most like to meet in the world? SEYMOUR: That's a good question. I dunno, there is a lot a people I would like to meet. Van Morrison, but I imagine he's be an incredibly hard bastard to talk to. I reckon I could have a few drinks with him and loosen up. I've got a really strong feeling about him. I'm trying to think of a woman... I like K.D. Lang, she was Triple J the other day, and I had a listen. There are always dead people I would like to meet, like my father's mother. 20. PLAYBOY: Do you believe in prescribed gender roles? SEYMOUR: Jesus! At the front line of heterosexual relationships, people talk about there being a sex war. But when either the male is making a pass at the female or the female is making a pass at the male, they bring all the baggage of their existence to that one point in time. And yet the actual mechanism involved is incredibly basic, it is just having sex. And because of the simplicity of the actual act it makes all of the complexity of their lives get turned upside down. In a way it is like a wrecking ball. Almost immediately after the act people re-establish who they are, or who they think they are. And suddenly you've got problems. I think the only real change that has taken place in recent years is that some women are determined to have successful careers, and be competitive with men professionally, but I don't think that is the majority. The one thing I find really spurious about the whole debate is that we are moving in a forward direction, and that we are somehow getting towards a better state of things. I just really question that. Australian Playboy: November 1994
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