What was your initial reaction when you found out about Icehouse’s induction into the ARIA Hall Of Fame?

I’m very proud of course, and more so on behalf of all the people I work with and have worked with, because it really has been a collective, which has changed over the years obviously, but some of the people I’m still working with when I play in the band have been in the band for 19 years. And the manager, with whom I work with nearly daily, has been there for nearly 30.

Take us back to the band’s early days; your first album [originally called Icehouse, by Flowers, but swapped around when the band changed its name from Flowers to Icehouse] did exceptionally well. Were you surprised?

I think the overriding reason behind that was that we did an enormous amount of performing. So by the time that album came out, a lot of people in Australia were familiar with all of those songs and just, almost be default, wanted to buy that album. That was just sheer work, something that the management we had at the time absolutely prioritised – we worked for 18 months non-stop.

I guess the pinnacle of the band’s success was with the Man Of Colours album – that was a huge hit not only in Australia but in America as well, what was it like to be riding that sort of wave of success?

I guess when Man Of Colours cracked the American top 50, I felt that really the work that had been put in with Measure For Measure [the band’s previous album] had really set Man Of Colours up, it didn’t really come out of the blue. And we’d also already had a fairly sobering period following a very big success with [1982’s] Primitive Man, so I don’t think at that point anything was going to go to our heads ridiculously; we were five albums in and a lot of road miles. It was fantastic obviously to be working on that level. The thing that probably brought it home most for me was during the whole Man Of Colours period and for some time after I had to have a personal minder, which was quite peculiar, but was ultimately absolutely necessary.

I guess with that sort of fame comes attention from different quarters. I remember you getting interviewed by Smash Hits during that era, being asked questions like ‘what colour underwear are you wearing?’ and sort of being regarded as something of a sex symbol – was that a bit surreal for you?

I don’t know if I ever really registered it for what it was because by then I was at least 30, and it was a new generation of fans who were quite distinct really from the generation of fans who went back to the late’ 70s and come out of that whole punk movement and so on. I remember a couple of those sort of excruciating interviews... but no, I think by then we were a pretty experienced band and pretty well driven by the music and I guess I considered that sort of thing to be a necessary periphery.

What are your plans for the actual performance at the Hall of Fame ceremony?

Can’t tell you, not allowed! I think it’s safe enough to say we’re doing two songs and that what I’m trying to do for this particular performance is to do something a little bit differently to what we might do normally.


Icehouse perform at the ARIA Hall Of Fame ceremony on Wednesday August 16 at Melbourne’s Regent Theatre. The event will be broadcast on VH1 on Sunday August 20 at 8:30pm.
 

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