Click here for Part One of Brendan’s chat with Anton. Essential reading.

The line dropping out on Anton’s end provides a short recess in conversation. Anton uses this to divert conversation to level the playing fields and ask questions of his own. “I remember what we were talking about – but let’s move on!” Newcombe fronts me questions about myself, my cultural and spiritual beliefs that ultimately lead back to himself. “What I want to do is enter the popular lexicon,” he says matter-of-factly. “Like Jimi Hendrix. That’s my goal. Not to sell soap. Not to say, ‘Look like me, dress like me, sound like me.’ Not to get a supermodel girlfriend. None of that shit. I want people to come away from what I’m doing and look at it as a gift.”

Newcombe says he’s steered clear of heroin for almost six years now, with the help of friends like Bob Timmins, a drug counsellor who’s helped rock stars including Keith Richards and Nikki Sixx kick the habit. But he also doesn’t see his past drug use as an issue. “Drugs affected me more than you know!” he says. “It felt great.” Later, however, he seems less flip about it. “Did you know that I didn’t leave my house in Laurel Canyon for a year?” he says. “That’s not living. The whole concept of working so hard for something just to throw it away got under my skin. My mom didn’t make me to fail.”

I’m a realist; therefore I accept the fact that a phone conversation is not nearly personable enough to gauge someone to the level that would allow me to make accurate judgments. Courtney Taylor of The Dandy Warhols has known him for over a decade, while he adores Newcombe’s music; he still finds the personality tough to take. “It’s just sad,” Taylor told NME in April 2007. “We learn to stay away from that particular kind of friend by about the third grade. I can’t believe I’m so naive as to have to keep relearning this throughout my life.” As for claimed Newcombe contradictions, Taylor sums it up: “Anton is [about] love, and if you can’t dig that, he’ll fucking kill you.”

Take the fact that Newcombe owns several guns. When asked what he likes about them, Newcombe says he finds them ‘Zen’, a claim that would puzzle most Buddhists. “Guns will always be a part of who I am as a person and as a musician. I’m dynamic, I’m loud and I can be dangerous if placed in the wrong context…by that I mean what you saw in the film DiG!. That wasn’t who I am, but that was dangerous, can you understand that?” Strangely enough – comparing himself to a firearm, while it may not read to make apparent scene, coming from Anton – I do understand.

It is remarkable how closely Newcombe’s creative approach and output mirrors that of one of his most quoted influences: Bob Dylan. Both glorify the enraptured state of youthful innocence and yet seem aged and knowing before their time. They both have a “wrestles hungry feeling that don’t mean no one no good” and feel the urge to be out “on the road heading for another joint” in a state of constant movement and renewal – ever-changing, ever-creating. Among other fragments and disjointed musings Newcombe insists during our interview that he is currently working on “four or five” albums simultaneously.

Out of these constantly spinning projects it is the follow-up from Massacre’s 13th studio effort, My Bloody Underground. The band’s first album in four years was recorded in Liverpool and Reykjavik with traditional Jonestown haste, and features the band’s traditional neo-psychedelic riffing combined with a nod to the more avant-garde. The record is notable for the appearance of Ride’s Mark Gardener and the fact that it is a stunning body of work comparable to the band’s sublime highs watermarks Take It From The Man! and Thank God For Mental Illness.

“I think society being whore-ish is a major inspiration for My Bloody Underground,” explains Anton. “I mean, this is nothing to do with orientation, this is a metaphor based on reality – guys have tried to pick me up; I’m a heterosexual, it all depends on what you do. I am not trying to be a rock star, a pop guy or a poster boy. I am an artist and I really believe in it but it’s really very difficult for some people to understand.

“That is nothing to do with working hard and putting in the hard graft for the long haul. That attitude has just destroyed everything because basically everyone’s a whore now, in life. They say, “I’m not going to put up with all this shit and I’m going to fuck this person over because it’s in my best interests.” I’d beat the shit out of someone if they tried to do that to me; it’s nothing personal, it’s just the way I was raised. I really believe in the power of egalitarianism.”

Anton is married and has his own family. Since the days witnessed in DiG!, fatherhood has not only altered Anton personally, but also has influenced the new direction of his music. “Some people keep their personal life and their artistic talents in different corners of a room, but I can’t seem to do that. My son’s Icelandic – I think it’s important to maintain culture. I decided to make songs in his native tongue because he doesn’t need learn “Swedish Light”, which is English. In case you don’t know, the English language doesn’t come from England whatsoever, not in any shape or form. It was adopted so you could all be ruled and that would be the definition of the word “subject” on your passport.

“I wanted him to have that [the Swedish language] since there are only 300,000 odd people on the planet who speak it. A lot of the bands from there are singing in English because they want to break out of ‘the 300 000 people club’, and I figured I’d go in the opposite direction just to make a statement.”

This dedication to his family is mirrored by his admiration for his band. Admittedly, The Brian Jonestown Massacre has had more said about the outfit’s notorious onstage brawls and crowd abuse rather than music itself, leading to countless line up changes since the band’s conception. However, the right mix of musicians is hard to come by in the business of rock and roll Newcombe explains. “My band are good people, they understand what the Brian Jonestown Massacre is and they are going to blow you away when you come to the shows! The band I am bringing to Australia are the best people I have ever played with in my entire life and they are also my best friends.

“We are all very excited about playing Australia again,” continues Anton. “We already after our shows in August want to come back in the summer and play the Big Day Out festival, because I hear so many fantastic stories about that tour from all my friends in other bands. So we are talking to people about it now!”

With the tour set to continue for a while yet, Anton will always be pushing the boundaries to see how many albums he can attach his name to before the end of the year. “I’m doing five records at the moment did you know, I’m working on the French one right now. I’m also trying to do something very important – which is to have a life that’s lost on every other fucking wage slave hooker in our society. I’m spending time with my wife too and spending time with my son.”

With Anton and my conversation hitting the one hour mark, I attempt to wrap things up. Anton without a doubt is one of the most charismatic and eager personalities that I have ever encountered. His reputation for being a creep rings false, if only to me on the other end of the receiver. If anything, Anton comes across as one of the most sincere and open people I have ever spoken with. While his wordings and examples find him misunderstood within the media world that would love nothing more than to aggravate him for a story, Anton is a far cry from the spiteful and bitter personality that most would expect to encounter.

“You could be out right now with your friends or making art – and yet you are on the phone to me and we are making conversation and connecting about my music and that is worth more than anything [like] money,” he tells me. “If you would like you can come and meet my band and me and spend time with us. See what it is really about.

“You know what, I want you to. I will make time because I am proud and thankful that you understand this. You can write a story about it. Let people know that I’m more than they already know, and that’s a lot. Trust me!”

There may very well be a part three of this interview with Anton, but for now he ends our conversation with something that surprised even me. “My greatest weapon is that I’m underestimated by everybody. It’s easy for people to dismiss what I’m saying, what I’m doing or what I can do. That’s the greatest power,” he laughs. “The cloak of invisibility.”

Experience the Brian Jonestown Massacre at the following venues in August.

Wednesday August 27 – The Arena, Brisbane

Thursday August 28 – Factory Theatre, Sydney *ALL AGES

Friday August 29 – The Metro Theatre, Sydney (Sold Out)

Saturday August 30 – Hi Fi Bar & Ballroom, Melbourne (Sold Out)

Sunday August 31 – Hi Fi Bar & Ballroom, Melbourne