Kasey Chambers may have made the best record of her life with the love of her life. “When we started out making this record it really was a personal thing,” she outlines. “It wasn’t one that we thought would end up on the charts or anything like that. Obviously you hope people like it…but it means more because we were expecting less than ever.”
There’s a back-to-bones naturalness to Rattlin’ Bones, her collaborative effort with hubby Shane Nicholson that was, perhaps, entirely absent from her solo predecessor, Carnival. While, Kasey attests, the move back to a ‘live’ sound wasn’t a conscious move, it’s nevertheless clear that both Carnival and Shane’s previous solo release, Faith & Science, were far more advanced in terms of using sonic trickery in their sounds. Rattlin’ Bones isn’t like that at all – instead, it’s got a very relaxed, familiar vibe.
“They were both the most overproduced and close to ‘pop’ records that either of us had made,” she agrees of the duo’s most recent solo outings. “So I think it was a knee-jerk reaction to want to go back to the roots of the music a lot more, and the real organic sounds and more traditional ways of making records.
“I wanted to delve into the pop side of things and try out some non-acoustic things,” Kasey clarifies, “and I really enjoyed that and it was fun, but it’s also really what made me go back to where I come from.”
This record is far closer to the sort of music that the duo listen to when in the comforts of the confines of their home near Byron Bay, in New South Wales, where they listen to the likes of Ryan Adams and Gillian Welch. You can certainly hear the same sound and tones on Rattlin’ Bones as on Adams’ solo debut, Heartbreaker, where the likes of Welch and David Rawlings worked together harmoniously and completely in-sync. “I’ve always made records in a reasonably live fashion,” Kasey explains, “but this one was a lot more live – we really went into the studio, set up in one room, and played the songs.”
Rattlin’ Bones has been a phenomenal success all around – not only has it been a major commercial and critical winner, but it’s clear that the creators are more than happy with the end product as well. It leaves a tantalising taste of what is to come for the duo; how can they possibly make music apart, having found such a wonderful chemistry on this album?
“Shane is writing, he writes all the time, but who knows where that will take him?” Kasey questions. “We’re not writing together, but when we first started talking about making this record it really was going to be a one-off thing; just a bit of fun for us personally. But now, having gone through the process and even when we started the process, it really WORKS, and we really enjoyed it. We connected on a creative level and maybe it is something we could do more of in the future, and it would be really fun to treat it as another artist that we are – a separate thing to our solo careers, but definitely something we want to do more of. We definitely haven’t made our last album together,” she assures.
The album itself features Kasey’s dad, Bill, and is produced by her brother, Nash (as have been all her records, and Shane’s solo releases). But, it is not released on Essence Records, the label that Nash runs. It raises interesting options for Kasey – originally signed to EMI as a solo artist, when Nash created Essence she was shifted to being released on his label, still under the EMI umbrella, but Carnival was the last album of her contract with the floundering major. So where to now?
As one of her former label’s biggest artists – along with The Living End, who have split to major-affiliated indie Dew Process – Kasey is all of a sudden doing something on a different label, and still being a major success. “My deal had finished,” she confirms. “I’ve had an amazing career and relationship with them, and we left on really great terms. But they’re a different company than they were 10, 5 or even 2 years ago. Essence I think is something Nash would like to keep going, and maybe work through Liberation [the label that’s distributing Rattlin’ Bones. Nothing has been set in stone as of yet.”
When it comes to performing live, Kasey, Shane, and Bill have been touring acoustically, performing together and alone. “It’s been great,” she says. “Playing acoustically with dad and Shane has been really great because it makes all the songs really fresh for me again – playing songs from The Captain and Barricades & Brickwalls and that sort of thing. It makes the songs a little bit different for me.”
Rattlin’ Bones is out now. Chambers and Nicholson visit the following venues this August.
Wednesday 13 August – Thebarton Theatre, Adelaide
Thursday 14 August – Hamer Hall, Melbourne
Friday 15 August – Royal Theatre, Canberra
Saturday 16 August – State Theatre, Sydney
Sunday 17 August – Brisbane Concert Hall, QPAC
