‘For Robbo’
Ed Kuepper & Jim White, The Comedy Theatre Melbourne 26th May 2021
In a commercial sense, both these gentleman are virtual unknowns but to the packed house at the Comedy Theatre and the sold out upcoming shows around the country, both are considered as pioneers in Australian music and internationally respected.
Kuepper, 65 and White, 59 have had storied careers that have run parallel in a sense, up until now. It’s been an inspired choice to bring the two together after pretty much 40 years crossing paths across the country and around the world.
Kuepper was the founding member of The Saints who exploded onto the scene in 1976 with their punk anthem, I’m Stranded, and album of the same name. They pressed 500 copies of the single themselves and sent a couple to England. They were quickly signed to EMI and brought to the UK to promote their music. Unfortunately the UK was in the grip of punk and the accompanying punk fashion which flew in the face of what The Saints and real punk music was intended to be. The Saints had long hair and were from the suburbs of Brisbane, as far away from studs, leather and mohawks as you could get.
After another 2 x critically acclaimed albums, The Saints were no more and Kuepper embarked on a slightly different path forming The Laughing Clowns, a bit more jazzy and experimental. After a few more albums with a plethora of outstanding musicians spending time in the band, Kuepper has released over 20 x solo records, some of which in my humble opinion are in the top echelon of Australian music. My favourite is Today Wonder, which is just him and drummer Mark Dawson. They both hooked up after 25 years and played the album at The Recital Centre a few years ago in a spell binding concert. Other classics to emerge from the 90s were Honey Steel’s Gold, Serene Machine and Character Assassination. All gems. Most recently he wrote the soundtrack to the excellent Australian film, Last Cab to Darwin.
Kuepper also formed The Aints, originally in protest to his former Saints partner Chris Bailey keeping The Saints name and recording/performing under the mantle. They are a powerful trio and play excellent, unrelenting, rock n roll not dissimilar to Neil Young’s Crazy Horse.
Jim White’s career started most notably with the Dirty Three, an instrumental 3 x piece consisting of White on drums, Mick Turner on guitars and Warren Ellis on violin. All 3 x members of the Dirty Three are virtuosos in their chosen fields and their music ranges from stunning meditative rhythms to pounding, improvisational rock. They released 9 x albums and all have collaborated with some of world’s great artists, with Ellis of course being a mainstay alongside Nick Cave in the Bad Seeds whilst Turner has worked with Cat Power and Bonnie Prince Billy in the US. Turner also did all the cover art for the Dirty Three albums and is a sought after artist of note. Here is his website http://mickturner.com
Cave, Ellis and Turner also came together to write and play the soundtrack to the powerful Australian film The Proposition.
Jim White is a Melbourne boy but lives in New York and has worked with the likes of Marianne Faithfull, PJ Harvey, Bill Callahan, Beth Orton as well as locals Courtney Barnett and CW Stoneking. He looks like a gentle, dishevelled uncle who turns up at Xmas with funny stories whilst eating and drinking you out of house and home! 🙂 He’s also the best drummer I’ve ever seen or heard, and alongside Ed Kuepper he was magnetic, giving Kuepper’s songs the respectful treatment they required, whether it was delicate for an acoustic number like Horse Under Water or pure power for the Laughing Clowns classic Eternally Yours.
The concert overall took Kuepper aficionado’s through the full gambit of his career. He sits down these days with 4 x Fender Stratocasters on a rack beside him, all tuned differently in readiness for his songs. Ed Kuepper is a brilliant guitarist, song writer and true original…..but I have an issue with the man himself.
He is dour, serious and frankly about as funny as a fart in an elevator. I’ve seen him half a dozen times over 40 x years and his relationship with the punters has never improved. He genuinely struggles with his audience if they enter the delicate atmosphere he has created around himself. At this show, a few people called out for requests and instead of good heartedly brushing them off he made a sarcastic comment, deflected the matter to Jim who had no microphone, then complained that the fans had put him “off” and didn’t know what to do next.
Ok I might have been triggered by an incident during his last tour 18 months ago. He was playing at the intimate Caravan Club and Lynda and I had seats only a few metres from him on stage. Half an hour in and he was looking around for something and taking a long time, creating a huge pregnant pause. Because he has no rapport with his audience, there was a deathly silence with no explanation for his poncing around looking for something we knew nothing about. The silence was deafening, so having spotted his glasses sitting on an amp nearby, I relayed what was nothing more than some healthy OH&S advice, “Put your glasses on Ed.” This produced a few chuckles from the crowd, desperate for something to break the foreboding atmosphere. Sadly, Ed didn’t see it that way. With his unencroachable aura of delicate genius broken, he searched into the darkness in my vicinity and said something in relation to “having me removed from the venue”. Now there’s a way of saying that if you’re a member of the human race that could be funny, but no, he was genuinely offended by my action. He had now created an even more uncomfortable climate for his bunch of paying customers. Nice one dickhead.
At this show he barely acknowledged Jim which annoyed me as well. Jim had no microphone which was odd, therefore we had to rely on Ed’s scintillating repertoire. Lynda and I saw Bill Callahan at the State Theatre last year just before Covid hit, and he was supported by Jim and his Cretan friend George Xylouris, performing as Xylouris White. They have produced a few albums with Jim on drums and George playing a Greek laouto which is like a big lute. George plays it like Jimi Hendrix. The half hour spent listening to these two was spell binding and we didn’t want it to end. As the performance came to a massive crescendo ending with Jim flailing in drumsticks, sweat and hair, the crowd rose and cheered as one. As we all sat down bewildered at what we witnessed, Jim waited for a second’s silence and asked us, “any questions?”. Perfect timing.
Anyway Ed’s not the first artist to be full of themselves but it’s so disappointing when you put a hero on a pedestal all your adult life and inevitably they let you down.
If you’re unfamiliar with Ed and Jim, I will embed some videos here if you’re interested in learning more. A couple of years ago a popular music journalist Toby Creswell produced a book, 110 Best Australian Albums. I received it for Xmas and initially thought it would be full of mainstream records which I would dismiss. I was pleased to see many independent bands get acknowledged including Ed Kuepper’s Honey Steel’s Gold @ 52, The Saint’s Prehistoric Sounds @ 44, and I’m Stranded @ 20 and The Dirty Three’s Ocean Songs @ 81.
There’s only one way to listen to a Dirty Three album, and that’s in it’s entirety.
Here are Xylouris White in all their magnificence.
The legendary punk anthem from the Saints, I’m Stranded.
The classic anti-advertising anthem, Know Your Product, taken from the Saint’s second album Eternally Yours.
The Laughing Clowns produced one of my all time favourite Australian songs, Eternally Yours, which Ed did acoustically on Today Wonder also.
The first track off Ed Kuepper’s Today Wonder, Horse Under Water.
Probably the closest thing Ed had to a “hit”, from Honey Steel’s Gold. It was later recorded by legendary indigenous artist, the late Jimmy Little on his album Messenger which was a huge hit for Jimmy. He did versions of all Australian songs in his own inimitable way on the album.
