Bones' Report

Rip It Up, Issue 45, 1 April 1981, Page 8

Bones' Report

Roy Colbert

“Hi, this is Buster Stiggs, and I’m with the Swingers.”

Well, that’s how it used to be when the Swingers hit town. Buster handled the band’s PR with a real flair. But now it’s Bones Hillman on the other end of the line from Melbourne.

“Why did we get rid of Buster? The same reasons as any band that has a line-up change really. We didn’t think he was a strong enough drummer for the more progressive songs we were moving into. He didn’t have the style, so we got lan (Gilroy) and Buster joined the Models and everyone’s happy. It's better now, our rhythm section is so much stronger." Bones says he is really enjoying playing with the new drummer, and he’s certainly playing with him a lot the all-night recording session for the new. single with David Tickle, which Bones had not long reeled out of for this phone interview, included 14 hours working on the bass drums alone. “It was hard work, but it had to be done. There are no holes now.”

The new single is to be a surprise. No, says the bassist, I can’t even tell you the title. The last one, it says here, went to number one in Australia faster than any single since ‘Daddy Cool’ and 'Eagle Rock’ back in 1971. Were the band surprised ‘Counting The Beat’ did so well?

“We recorded it in August, so it had been sitting around for six months, during which time

we were telling ourselves ‘yeah, it’s a number one’, but when it did get there we were flattered." For my money, the re-done ‘One Good Reason' on the flip was at least its equal. Was there any conflict for radio play? “No, not really. The B side got played on a few FM stations though.” Producer Tickle is spending a couple of weeks with the band before they go into the Music Farm studios in mid-April for a month to do the album. The Swingers have always had plenty of songs to call on what will actually make it onto the album? "That’s the hardest part at the moment coz there are so many songs. We're well ahead of ourselves in our music, we’ve just got to wait for everyone else to catch up. I think there will be two songs at the most which we were doing in New Zealand. 'Counting' will be on it, and the new single, too.” New Zealand bands heading across the Tasman usually experience varying success, possibly because they carry with them widely varying plans. Mi-Sex, after all, did it one way,

Toy Love another. What was the Swingers’ approach? “We didn’t have a plan as such. We knew it was going to be hard work. The first six months we were just managing to stay alive, making sls a week each. But we stuck it out.” After doing the album with Tickle (a producer Bones says “sparks something in the band that’s magic”) the Swingers will be doing a fiveweek national tour, and then it will be home in August for two weeks. “Then we should be going to England a couple of labels are already interested” he concludes, fingers audibly crossed. The new single will be important for the band, the first album crucial. But at least the songs are there. Those who have followed the Swingers through the past two years will know they have already ditched songs (‘The Sound Of Lovers’, ‘The Way That We Used To’ etc) that most bands would be overjoyed to call on

for a debut album. Whatever, as~ winter descends, things could hardly be better. (A footnote for rock historians: Phil Judd is currently bi-nomenclatural. You can call him Phil if you like, but you may also call him Bud, as many a Mushroom handout is wont to do at the moment. Bones, however, is sticking with 'Bones’, and lan with ‘lan’. We’ll keep you posted.)