Dave Graney & The Coral Snakes are hitting the road this October and November – celebrating the 30th anniversary of their 1995 album The Soft ‘n’ Sexy Sound. Adored for their art rock posturing and pop indulgence, few could deliver lounge groove like this Melbourne outfit.
The Soft ‘n’ Sexy Sound was originally recorded at Metropolis Audio in Melbourne – produced by Victor Van Vugt [Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds and P.J. Harvey]. It saw Graney pick up an ARIA for Best Male Artist in 1996.
They’ll be performing tracks like Rock’n’Roll Is Where I Hide and I’m Not Afraid To Be Heavy – sure to be a nostalgic trip down memory lane – and songs that continue to stand the test of time.
Dave Graney spoke to The Write Drop for our At The Bar series.
MY CITY
It would be San Francisco some time between 1948 and 1979. I have only visited once, in 1984. I have many books of stories about the city and one great late ‘60s one of just water colour illustrations of various street scenes. Like many of my “favourite cities” it doesn’t exist any more except in books, old tv shows, movies and music. San Francisco used to be a haven for freaks and eccentrics. Going back to before the big fire. Not a super large place but a perfectly proportioned and located one.
FAVOURITE FOOD MEMORY
NEVEDYA is a great vegetarian restaurant in the main street of Upwey. Great food and within walking distance. Only open in the daytime.
FAVOURITE BAR
I haven’t drunk any alcohol for about 25 years. I just got out of the habit. I was a great boozer when I was in that world. I grew up in a boozy culture. Beer and football. I can’t believe how expensive beer is nowadays. How do poor people get rinsed? Who cares what it tastes like?
DRINK THAT DESCRIBES YOU
Ginger beer, or Sarsaparilla.
A BOOK RECOMMENDATION
I bought a book in the 80s called The View From Nowhere. You might still be able to find it. It was a guide to American bars. Bars as in the one in the tv show CHEERS. The sort of place a MAN could escape to and if anybody rang for them the barman would ask, “are you here?” Of course, they were never there. It rated bars for ambience, expense, booze, barman. I am typing “man” because it was all about a mans world.
FAVOURITE WINE
When I lived in Adelaide in the late 70s we used to enjoy flagons of wine. Much classier than casks.
FAVOURITE WINERY
Bellwether Wines in the Coonawarra. We have played some shows there. Set in an old shearing shed. You can camp there in their bespoke glamping tents out in the paddock. Just outside of Penola.
NEXT DESTINATION
A national tour in October / November.
What’s the most memorable aspect (upon reflection now) when making The Soft ‘n’ Sexy Sound record?
It was just at the end of the classic recording period. In a great studio in Melbourne, all recorded to multi track tape. We used strings (arranged by our keys player Robin Casinader), Moog synth, an old loungeroom organ, harpsichord, a lot of backing vocals and worked with Victor Van Vugt in production. Our previous two albums had been with Tony Cohen. Victor had left Australia with us years earlier in the Moodists as our live mixer but had returned briefly to pursue more work in the studio. After this he did Trailer Park with Beth Orton and her second album and PJ Harveys Stories From The City and a whole lot more. He lives in Berlin, after a long time in New York.
What do the 90s represent to you?
Tupac, Notorious BIG, Tricky, Slick Rick, Def Jam, Beastie Boys, hip-hop, trip-hop, great early techno pop hits like PUMP UP THE JAM, The Big Day Out, Triple J going national. Our music reaching its widest audience. Touring regional Australia.
Three songs and what inspired them.
The Birds And The Goats opens the album with a low bent note on the guitar. I wanted it there to sound like the opening to the Quicksilver Messenger Services album, Happy Trails. The song is sung by a character at a bar talking to someone but he has forgotten their name so just ends every line with “babe”. It has some lines from the Ken Russell movie Altered States where two scientists flirt with each other saying stuff like “ a transient event – babe- in time and space…” It has two very direct and heartfelt songs which I am so happy we got down so perfectly.
Deep Inside A Song is about a songwriter who made a career writing torch songs about a lost romance of his youth who is approached by that person – now a singer – to write songs for them. He has to meet and talk about material and who they might want to appeal to and all that.
I’m Not Afraid To Be Heavy was the first single on the album. The person we gave it to at Triple J thought it was some kind of TISM-esque prank. It was a really direct and straight song with all kinds of soft and sweet textures. A song about being tough enough to be serious and soft. This was a very adult album in its thoughts and ideas. (The album sleeve carried a logo made by artist Tony Mahony for our genre – AOART). The ’90s rock scene was very American in influence. Irony was in everything, but not really in our stuff. Sometimes it was so direct and literal that people thought it had to be ironic. Clare Moore [drums] and I had diverged from ALT stuff early on, diverged from all our peers. We weren’t interested in distortion or angst. Still cant take any of that seriously!
YOUR FASHION STYLE
I always look for square toed shoes nowadays and love V-neck knitwear. Adidas Gazelles are cool too. I covet the sneakers Keith Richards wore around 1978.
An album that changed your life?
Perhaps INGENUE by KD Lang which was everywhere in the early 90s. It had such great arrangements and consideration of textures in the music. There was a series of compilations also through the ’90s called REBIRTH OF THE COOL which was great. It introduced us to all kinds of artists and ways of pitching music, songs and voices. All that culture of British remixing songs. Trip Hop I guess. The high point was the fifth album, PHIVE.
Otherwise, I loved TUPACS All Eyez On Me and the Wu Tang Clan’s WU TANG FOREVER, another double album. I knew a great CD shop in Sydney near the Metro that was all hip-hop and one day I wandered in there after a soundcheck and bought the first rush of Wu solo albums from Ghostface Killah, GZA and Ol Dirty Bastard. Once you were tuned into hip-hop you couldn’t listen to guitar music in the same way.
