Interview

Australian band An Horse has a straightforward approach: Kate Cooper sings and plays guitars; Damon Cox, plays drums and sings on occasion. No bass, no extra parts, no drama.  They have a concise muscular sound on their impressive debut record, Rearrange Beds (Mom & Pop Records).  "Post Cards" at a tidy two and a half minutes, is a power pop testament to a bittersweet affair, in the expansive "Little Lungs" Cooper's vocals build from vulnerable to fiercely expressive. The Brisbane natives are living the life of the young band in demand, playing South by Southwest, crashing on friends' couches, and touring relentlessly across America and Europe. We spoke before their vibrant set at Mercury Lounge—where the duo played side by side, harominizing intensely—and sorted out how they write lyrics, why their track "Camp Out" references Hole, and whether they are related.     

DAVID COGGINS: The two-piece band has always been interesting. What's it like playing just one man and one woman?

DAMON COX: It's really good because there are fewer personalities and fewer people to make decisions and less chance that there are going to be problems. We didn't set out to form a two-piece it just happened that way.

KATE COOPER: We didn't try to form a band; we just wanted to play some music together. It turned out kind of cool and we were compelled to keep doing it.

DC: So it wasn't that you wanted this elemental sound—that you didn't want to play with a bass?

COX: Not at all. We were playing in other bands, and we just ended up recording five songs and didn't know whether we were going to put it out or not. Then we released an EP and were asked to start doing tours.

KC: I remember playing it for a few friends at home and they said you've got to release this-it hadn't really occurred to us.  

DC: So there wasn't a specific moment where you declared, ‘This is a band, we are An Horse'?

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Urbane Englishman John Wesley Harding has released more than a dozen records of literate folk pop since his debut in 1989. He now makes his home in Brooklyn and has published his second novel, By George, under his given name, Wesley Stace. His current tour, John Wesley Harding's Cabinet of Wonders, is a show that combines his own performances with other musicians, writers, comedians, magicians, and even ventriloquists.  It's a rousing, updated version of an old-fashioned vaudeville show. (LEFT: PHOTO BY BILL WADMAN)

We met in Manhattan just before the Cabinet of Wonders hits the Poisson Rouge, April 15, and talked about record label love, songwriting versus novel writing, and which comes first: the lyric or the tune?

DAVID COGGINS: How did you come up with the idea for Cabinet of Wonders?

JOHN WESLEY HARDING: Well, I do two things: I write music under the name John Wesley Harding and I write novels under the name Wesley Stace. The idea was to bring both those things under a banner: Writers welcome, musicians welcome.  So you pick the writers who would be good in that setting and you pick the musicians who want to be listened to for lyrics. And you pick the writers who want to be rock musicians, which is all writers.

DC: So you brought them together?

JWH: Right, that was my project.  I had a new album coming out and I've been doing live gigs for 20 years.  

DC: Your first album came out in 1989.

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Photo by David Coggins.

Infectious synth-pop trio Au Revoir Simone (Erika Forster, Annie Hart, Heather D'Angelo) hail from Brooklyn, and they're about to release their third album, Still Light, Still Night. It's their first studio record in two years, full of infectious bittersweet songs, which they previewed during a smart set at Maggie Mae's Rooftop during South by Southwest. We met up the next day on the very civilized grounds of the historic French Legation. In their late 20's, the band members are all tall, fair, and have long dark hair—but don't ask them if they're a girl band, or sisters.


DAVID COGGINS: What's it like playing here as opposed to New York?

ANNIE HART: It used to make me more nervous to play in front of people I knew—it was like playing before people I'm going to see tomorrow.  

ERIKA FORSTER: People's attention spans are so short here-you're only playing about half an hour.

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Elegance Personified at Austin. Photo by David Coggins.

After our first visit to SXSW, we drew a few lessons from non-stop concert going. As self-appointed residents of Austin, we're sharing our hot-spots and our rash conclusions.


Best Venue: Mohawk's.  
An intimate, wood paneled club with good sound, friendly staff, and a stuffed bear in the lounge. Every night they featured a smartly curated selection of bands.  Mohawk's knows what the audience wants and give it to them.

Worst Venue: Prague.  
Not fit for band or beast. Over-designed, under-performing subterranean bar with bad sightlines.  How can you deaden the sound of great Jersey rockers The Wrens?  We have to assume it was The Wrens because we couldn't see a thing.

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