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 JASON ROOKE, frontman and guitarist of THE TENANTS, explains to JODY MACGREGOR what he should expect from their upcoming gig at The Waterloo Hotel.
You remember Bathurst’s favourite sons, The Tenants – they were the guys who won the Unearthed competition and had their ubiquitous song You Shit Me To Tears make the Hottest 100 and every backyard party of the summer in 2003. As part of The Waterloo Hotel’s send-off, The Tenants will be reforming to play one of the venue’s last ever gigs. That’ll be news for those who didn’t realise they actually unformed, including lead singer and guitarist Jason Rooke.
The Tenants are reforming. What brought the decision on? Promises of fame and wealth or just a bar tab that was overdue?
Well, we actually never ‘Broke Up’ just slowed down due to the family factor and living in different cities, we have moved closer together now so it is not as tough to get rehearsals in.
So you just took some time off?
We are all great mates and love playing live. We hit that point in life where we needed to do the family thing and being an independent band that is self-managed if you don’t do it no one else is going to get you moving. If the motivation and focus isn’t there (especially for touring around the country) it ends up losing the fun factor and that kills it for everyone.
What makes a place like The Waterloo a good venue?
It is always wonderful to walk into a place that has some history like The Waterloo in Brisbane, The Annandale in Sydney, The Espy in Melbourne. It certainly stirs the juices but at the end of the night if you can get the punters into the gig and all going off, everyone will be walking away stoked.
Your song Disco Ace is about a guy who needs a few beers in him before he’s brave enough to hit the dance floor. How many beers does it take to get you dancing?
Usually more than a few but it is hard to count. There is certainly a fine line (possibly two beers) between getting me up and ‘Never Getting Me Off The Dance Floor’. Come on down to The Waterloo, buy me a beer and I’ll show you...
Do you remember when you first realised you wanted to be a musician?
We didn’t get too many bands touring through Bathurst and Jimmy Barnes had Johnny Diesel on guitar for the Freight Train Heart tour. I came away from that gig just going, “Woo hoo, that is me...” In the next few months (after years of band drought) we had The Hoodoo Gurus and Beasts Of Bourbon come through town, these two bands really topped it off for me (still do) and I have spent the rest of my life in pubs watching band and wanting to be in every one of them. Thus the shit guitar playing...
THE TENANTS will appear at The Waterloo Hotel’s Final Stage event on Saturday, July 5.
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