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 NATHAN MURRAY, bass player in KID CONFUCIUS, tells JODY MACGREGOR what his ears can look forward to in their latest batch of songs.
Kid Confucius have been blending soul, hip hop and rock together in varying quantities since 2001. Their recently recorded new album, an as-yet untitled follow-up to last year’s Stripes, is set to tip the scales on that blend once again.
“It’s been a little bit over a year since we recorded Stripes and we’ve been touring pretty much the entire time,” Murray says. “We’ve changed as a live band just through evolution. After many months straight doing gigs every week we got a lot more loose and a lot more comfortable and started rehearsing less and leaving it to the stage, leaving it to our gigs. We found by the end of that we were a little bit more garage-y, embracing the rusty edges and not so much worrying about the ‘pristine sharpness’ of these ‘crystal’ sounds. Getting back in love with the raucous, fun energy of a rock gig rather than a smoother hip hop show. Coming into the songwriting process we were having so much fun playing that style live that we didn’t want to get trapped playing songs we weren’t really vibing on any more.”
Murray promises no seven-minute songs on the new album, and instead a focus on short and snappy verse-chorus-bridge rock. To demonstrate the new sound, they’re playing sneek-peak gigs throughout August.
“We’ve got to preview this new sound we’ve crafted in the studio, which to a lot of people who know us is a little bit of a departure. For me and a lot of the people we’ve been talking to it is a very logical departure and an evolutionary one, but at the same time I’ve been talking to people who expect us to go and record a straight hip hop album and those people, we need to preview these new sounds to them as well as keeping up that momentum of who we became by the end of all that touring last year. After not being on the road for a while it does feel like you need to re-establish yourself, reintroduce yourself, and we’ve also got a new member – we’ve got a new guitarist. This new album’s really guitar-driven so he’s got a starring role.”
Previously, Kid Confucius have often found themselves lumped in with regular hip hop, which their new material seems to be a clear move away from.
“Even when we did get grouped in with hip hop I think that pissed off more hip hop heads than it gained us fans, just because we did have such a melodious other side to us and weren’t afraid of harmonies and weren’t afraid of hooks and things like that, that at the time were absent from Oz hip hop. Obviously they’re not now with awesome acts like Muph & Plutonic and stuff like The Tongue that are really embracing songs, not trying to be tough or cool. I think we’ve got more to gain than to lose with this one.”
KID CONFUCIUS can be heard at the QUT Campus Club on Friday, August 15; then the Sol Bar in Coolum on Saturday, August 16; and the Fisherman’s Wharf tavern on Sunday, August 17. Single GOOD LUCK is out now. www.myspace.com/kidconfucius
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