It’s hard to believe that it has already been more than ten years since three friends from the town of Finley, NSW, banded together and went on to become one of the most successful Australian rock groups of the 1990s, and, as their number one hit of last year, Black Betty, will testify, of the 2000s as well.

After touring for most of last year and promoting fifth album Tonight Alright, Spiderbait are currently taking their Put It Down tour to regional centres – a move which bassist and vocalist Janet English says is a welcome change from the festival circuit and playing the big cities.

“We’ve really only just started [the tour]. So far so good. It’s been a busy year, I have to say. We pretty much toured on and off for the whole of last year. This is a nice little regional tour to finish it up. A way to say thank you to everyone who bought the record out in the regional areas. It’s nice to get out of the city once in a while.”

No one quite knew what to expect from the latest Spiderbait offering. It’s no secret that each of their albums have been vastly different to each other, leaving some people scratching their heads, and others waiting with baited breath to see what the band had up up their sleeve for the next recording. _Tonight Alright sees the band embrace a fuller rock sound ;once more, the ;end product;being a scorching album full of vigour, big riffs and foot-stomping tunes.

“The audience reaction has been really good. When we brought it out a year ago we had no expectations. Then first single _Black Betty_was really successful and set up the rest of the year for us.”
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Their decision to cover the Ram Jam raised a few eyebrows, but the furioustake on the number ensured that it soon became THE songto blast through your stereo at a ridiculous volume. It also earned Spiderbait their first number one single.

Working with producer Sylvia Shivy in the US also assisted in steering the recording towards a sound that was reminiscent of ;a Spiderbait live show without actually being a live recording.

“She was such a great influence. We basically went in there really respectful of the work she’s done and really happy to take her opinions on. She just nailed our songs and had great recording techniques. We really wanted this record to be like a gig that we were playing. She was a great woman and had lots of good stories about Prince!”

Since being back home, it’s been one big, exciting tour for Spiderbait, with their current leg of regional shows winding up the proceedings. The phrase ‘on the road’ has taken on a whole new meaning meaning.

“We’ve gone to some places we haven’t been to before. We went to WA and played Port Hedland and Broome. The driving has been 15 or 16 hours a day instead of a couple of hours.”

It must be a close-knit band and group of friends that can travel for such long stretches together without getting sick of the very sight of each other. I ask Janet what she believes is the key to Spiderbait’s longevity.

“Starting a band with your friends is the way to go! We all grew up together, so we get along really well. While it’s great to share musical tastes, you need to get along or you’ll kill each other. You have to know how to fight and be nice. Changing your musical styles and genres is important, so that you don’t get stuck in the one way of making music. You have to creatively believe in yourself. It’s the only way we’d still be around, I reckon!”

Will 2005 be as hectic for the band?
“We’ll take a little bit of time out over winter; have some down time in order to get creative and maybe write some more stuff or put together a compilation. Some people think this record is like our first record and we want to say, “We’ve done all this other stuff too”! We might work on that or write some new stuff. But nothing [is] definite. We toured a lot of last year, so we thought we’d give everyone a break, or we’d over-expose ourselves!”

In that case, given the reputation of Spiderbait’s killer live shows, there are few better bands to be over-exposed to!

You can catch the band before their break and win tickets here:

Tue 8 March – ANU Bar, Canberra
Fri 11 March – Prince Of Wales, Melbourne
Sat 12 March – Metro, Sydney