The Go-Betweens inspire an extraordinary devotion for a band that's never sold many records. As their first three albums are re-released, the Australian group's two singer-songwriters speak to Pádraig Collins.
Found demos and lost singles.Tracks we'd heard of but whose existence we doubted. Songs we'd never even heard of. Life is about to get more interesting for Go-Betweens completists with the re-release of their first three albums.
Send Me a Lullaby (1982), Before Hollywood (1982) and Spring Hill Fair (1984) now each have an extra disc of rare tracks and videos. The one you'd heard they recorded with Nick Cave? It's here, along with tracks from the Five Songs cassette and the Very Quick on the Eye bootleg album.
"I'm very pleasantly surprised and proud of what's come out," says Robert Forster. "You hear things a number of years later and they sound better or worse. Some songs from the first album now sound good, not dreadful." (Forster has cautioned in the past that Lullaby is not a good introduction to the band.)
Grant McLennan also enjoyed hearing the old tracks again. "We wouldn't want to put anything out that wasn't up to scratch . . . There are a couple of songs that record company people were saying should be on there [on the original releases]. The songs that didn't get onto the albums, for tons of reasons, stand up, they're very good.
"It's like finding extra pictures. It was interesting hearing what a punk band we were at first, which I always denied, but it's our version," he says.
I tell them that on a trip, or more accurately a pilgrimage, to Brisbane I found that most people had never even heard of them, that the Go- Betweens were unknown prophets in their own town.
"There's not much profit to be made from your home town," McLennan laughs. "You are breathing the same air, in the same time zone. I don't know if I want to be a prophet."
"We're not a household name here," adds Forster. "There would be a certain group of people who know us and who are passionate about us. We never had a Top 40 hit here. There are advantages to this. It means we can move around fairly anonymously."
Nevertheless, Brisbane seems to have been a huge lyrical font for The Go-Betweens. "We went over to London to live in the early '80s," Forster says. "You have a fondness for it \ and it does act as a reference point. When you travel 10,000 miles away it becomes more special, it's in your mind more."
"For the first couple of years I was trying to learn an instrument so it was very much Robert's lyrics," says McLennan. "'I've got this dream and I've got to get out of this boring, conservative, fascist town', which it was at the time. Then you go away and it's 'shit, I wish I was back there'."
Irish people took to The Go-Betweens more than most, right from their earliest days. McLennan knew I was going to ask about that; Irish journalists always do. "To me, it's that Irish people have a great love of their own voice. If you look at the literature and the musical and political side, it's a very strong, original way of doing things.
"Irish people love to sing and love music. That can come with [The Go-Betweens] playing at the RDS with REM, or club gigs or that beautiful show we played at the Olympia."
"Dublin has produced five Nobel prize winning authors," says Forster. "It's a literate town. I'm trying to be modest here . . . It appreciates a language gift married to a melodic gift, and that is The Go-Betweens." He's looking forward to playing Ireland again, which should be early next year. "We are going to Cork this time. I've been pushing to get out of Dublin. I want to drive out of Dublin, not to the ferry. I've never driven west of Dublin. It will be lovely to drive that road."
McLennan has set his sights further afield: "I've always wanted to go to the Aran Islands, so you never know."
The trip to Ireland will follow the release of a new album, which is being recorded in August/September. "We've made a demo tape with 12 songs," says Forster. "It sounds very, very good. There's a little bit more cross-fertilisation this time. There are two songs where Grant wrote the music and I wrote the lyrics, which we've never done before".
"I wrote a couple of chord progressions and melodies which I thought would suit Robert's voice and lyric writing," says McLennan. "He thought that too and wrote these magnificent lyrics. This is something we haven't done so much over the years. It's kind of like when we first started."
Despite a prolific career outside of The Go-Betweens, with several solo albums and other collaborations, McLennan is exactly where he wants to be right now.
"Everything I want to do solo I'm doing way better with Robert. This is as locked in as we've been since we started the band. We're a very passionate band and that satisfies me."
Send Me a Lullaby, Before Hollywood and Spring Hill Fair are out now on Circus
The first thing I saw when I arrived at Brisbane airport three years ago was a sign saying Spring Hill. I was ecstatic. Not only had I arrived at the hometown of The Go-Betweens, but Spring Hill actually existed! I had thought it was just part of an album title. I had done this kind of thing before - a trip to Athens, Georgia, seeking the spirit of REM - but this was even more important.
A friend went there and saw Grant McLennan playing a free gig on a Sunday afternoon in a half-empty pub. Another guy came across a Forster and McLennan gig in a Brisbane art gallery. It was sold out. He pleaded with the gallery owner to let him in. No dice. He said "You don't understand. I've come here from Ireland. I have to get in." He got in.
I just missed seeing them on a recent trip to Sydney - and I would have seen them if Qantas had been able to change my flights. I got a picture taken of me beside a poster for the gig instead.