When Richard Kingsmill took over as musical director of Triple J in 2003, he began taking the station in a new direction, bringing the spotlight onto Australia’s burgeoning hip hop scene. By then, The Herd had already been around for two years, spawned when the owners behind indie hiphop label Elephant Tracks decided to collaborate as a group, rather than working individually. The Herd were one of many hiphop acts to become Triple J regulars, scoring success with their singles Scallops, 77% and of course the cover of Redgum’s I Was Only 19. They are currently out on the road with their new album Summerland, and will be headlining the inaugural Sounds Of Spring festival in Brisbane in October, and FasterLouder spoke to Kaho Cheung aka Unkle Ho about the new album, and being the only hip hop act at a rock festival.
It’s been one of the coldest winters on record for many parts of Australia, so I asked Cheung if they were trying to brighten our lives with the reference to summer in the title of the new album. “No, not really,” he says. “The title is more of a reference to the spiritual birthplace of the last few Herd albums. There’s a place a way north of Sydney, called Summerland Point. That’s where the previous albums were conceived, so we really wanted to reference that.”
And how was the creation of this album different from previous albums? Not very, according to Cheung. “In some ways, it was quite similar. We started by getting a whole bunch of records, doing sampling, getting some rough ideas on how to proceed. Then we brought in the musicians and the beatmakers, who will look at the samples and will know how to get to a bigger cohesive sound. One thing we definitely did different was to up the level of songwriting, we really wanted to make this a better written album.”
“And I think we succeeded,” he continues. “Everything on this album works tighter than it ever has before.”
With eight members of the band, it can’t be easy writing songs together, but Cheung says that, as in all relationships, communication is the key. “It can be a very disjointed process, but you have to learn to trust the other people in the band, thats a very important factor. We’ve learned to do that, after four albums, and we’ve gotten to a pretty good place. In the past, we’ve chopped and changed, especially the touring lineup, but the lineup we’ve got now we’ve had for a while, and we’ve built up that comradery.”
The Herd are also in the middle of the Summerland tour, which has seen them play shows all over Australia, and Cheung reports the tour has been pretty good so far. “We were a little bit nervous at some of the venues, because the presales were lower than we expected, but all of them have really come through. Canberra was one of the tricky area, it’s notorious for not having too many presales, and we really like to have a full house, but we rocked up there and it was packed. Luckily, we haven’t played too many shows not at capacity, because it definitely makes a difference. Plus, it also helps the crowd to get involved when there’s more people there.”
The Summerland tour began in mid-July and will continue through to mid-September, and I asked Cheung if the group ever balked at such a long tour. “No, not really. I guess this was part of the master plan. We’ve been doing this for a long time now, so it’s good to be able to go to the areas we want to. And I mean, it’s the main tour for the album. We’ll do another tour next year, but this is the big one, and you gotta strike while it’s still fresh in people’s minds.
This tour, as well as being quite long, also sees the group introduce some background visuals playing during the performance, as well as featuring many of the songs from the new album. “The new songs is the main new thing, but we didn’t really have visuals before, and yeah they’re all sort of elephant related. It’s nice to be performing, and then turn around and see the visuals backing you up. Plus, we’ve been practising heaps, in the past we probably should have practised more, so we’ve been rehearsing as much as possible.”
And The Herd won’t be wasting any time once the tour is finished, either. “Well, the Elephant Tracks label is coming up for it’s 10th anniversary. It’s been great, to go for 10 years running a small indie label. It’ll be interesting to see if we make it another 10 years. So we’ll be hosting a big party in Australia, with lots of Elephant Tracks artists, and then looking at releasing a dvd of the event, a mini documentary about the label.
The Herd will be one of the headliners of the upcoming Sounds Of Spring festival, and Cheung says he likes playing festivals, because they’re a bit more laidback. “Usually, with a festival, you rock up, do your 40 minutes, and go home. It feels a bit short, but you generally get to play to a lot more people that a club show. You can also finish pretty early, which gives you more of a chance to just hang out, see some bands, catch up with friends.”
The other headliners of the festival will be Grinspoon, Spiderbait and Cog, and I wondered what it was like for a hiphop band to be the only hip hop act headlining a predominantly rock festival? “Well, that’s the story of our lives,” says Cheung. “It’s really the story of the Australian music industry. I mean, we have a lot of respect for those guys, the rock bands, but they do their thing and we do ours, and it’s quite different.”
Maybe an all hip-hop festival could happen, some time down the line? “Sure, I think that would be great to see, because it hasnt really been done in Australia before. Obviously the Hilltops (Hoods) would have to be involved, to really get people going along. It would be interesting to see if a promoter could pull it off.”
You can catch The Herd on their Summerland tour at the following dates :
Thur 21st August @ Baroque, Katoomba
Fri 22nd August @ Panthers, Newcastle
Sat 23rd August @ Woodport Inn, Erina
Thur 28th August @ Great Northern, Byron Bay
Fri 29th August @ The Arena, Brisbane
Sat 30th August @ Coolangatta Hotel, Gold Coast
Sun 31st August @ Sands Tavern, Maroochydore
Thurs 4th Sept @ Hobart Uni Bar, Hobart
Fri 5th Sept @ Billboard, Melbourne
Sat 6th Sept @ Fowlers, Adelaide
And dont miss the Sounds Of Spring festival featuring:
British India, Parkway Drive, Resin Dogs, Behind Crimson Eyes, Rocket Science, Children Collide, Final Days Of Autumn, Blue Juice, Trial Kennedy, Calling All Cars, Laura Imbruglia, The John Steel Singers, Vegas Kings, The Mercy Dolls, Cog, Spiderbait, The Herd, Dukes of Windsor, The Getaway Plan, Dappled Cities, Muph & Plutonic, The Spazzy’s, The Dirty Secrets, Young & Restless, Epicure, Screamfeeder, The Gin Club, The Galvatrons, Intercooler, Root (ex Tism) and Mary Trembles.
