Latest / HEAVY Music Interviews / Chewing The Fat With PETE COOPER From THE PORKERS

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Chewing The Fat With PETE COOPER From THE PORKERS · HEAVY Music Interviews

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  This is Pete Porker. I'm from a band called The Porkers. We've been
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  around for a while. We're currently doing a tour. It's the Hot Dog
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  Dakery twenty fifth Anniversary Tour. That was our album that we released in ninety
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  eight, which is actually twenty six years ago. But we're anniversary tour this
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  year and we've already done Queensland and this weekend where heading to Victoria and we've
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  got Sydney in all sorts of places after that. Yeahful, brother, thanks
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  for joining us today. That's all right. That wasn't that smooth? But
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  anyway better than what I would have done. Brow I'm fucking useless. As
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  you say, man, The Porkers are part way through a run of dates
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  around Australia celebrating twenty five years of your loved album Hot Dog Daker. How
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  the show's been going so far? Pretty crazy? Pretty crazy you could probably
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  tell by my voice. Ye, last weekend shows were pretty hectic and I've
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  come home with a good dose of the flu and a sore throat. And
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  tomorrow we're off to Melbourne. Yeah yeah, hey, And that next show
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  is on March twenty first in frankstin bra then you wind through Melbourne, Canberra,
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  Newcastle and Sydney areas before finishing Pronulla on March of twenty third. I'm
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  no good at mats Bro. But if the album is twenty five years old,
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  that's going to put you, guys at least thirty one. So it's
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  a lot of shows for a smoldfellas. Yes, yes, that was actually
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  one thing I said on stage at the weekend after we completed a couple of
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  songs. I went, these songs were written for a much younger man to
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  sing. So yeah, it's been a bit of an effort, been a
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  bit of a long effort. Yeah, because Hot Dog Degree was our second
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  album, so we had a few years before that, a couple of years
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  experience, a couple of years experience. So on that back to like that
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  age fact to me, because we are all getting older, whether you're like
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  it or not. Light do you have to compensate at all during your live
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  shows because your body's screaming at you saying you just can't do that anymore?
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  Absolutely, I'm I'm well, I'm nowhere near as fit as I used to
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  be. I'm currently not match fit at all, and i am I am
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  suffering the consequences of a frivolous younger life, and things are starting to catch
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  up with me a bit. And I think it was about seven years ago
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  now I have a stroke and I ended up in hospital and then ended up
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  having to have heart surgery and everything. Everything's just been more effort since then.
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  They told me when I left the hospital was going to feel like a
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  million bucks, I was going to feel like a new man. But no,
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  I've just felt tired. Yeah, right, How do you go on
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  stays bad? Is that in the back of your head that you can't go
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  too hard? Otherwise you might I've got an old not in the back of
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  the head that I can't go too hard that I'll die. But it's in
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  the back of my head that I've got to make it to the end of
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  the show when I've got to pace myself. And it's usually when I when
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  I when we get to our last song and I know, okay, I
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  can make it. Now the goalpost is in sight, so I usually spend
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  whatever I've got left in that last hole. So and then you've got people
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  out there to screaming one more, one more, and you're like, I
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  just haven't got it in me. Well, no, I say that,
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  Yeah, it's not the actual Sorry, yeah, I've already told him it's
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  the last song. But by that point so I know I'm not coming back.
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  And that's another thing the is we don't do on calls. We get
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  we get to a certain part of the set and as the people do,
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  they want some more, and if we get a half bag, yes,
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  we go okay, then we'll do some more because we can't be bothered walking
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  back there and coming back and having away. How's this structure that I made?
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  Like, are you planning the whole album start to finish or I just
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  select songs? Not where playing the album start to finish? There was there
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  was a couple of little novelty fill in tracks that we're that we're not doing,
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  but the bulk of the album start to finish in order. That's what
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  we're doing. How do you go with that? Man? Like when you
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  when you rate it all those years ago, like, I don't think you
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  would never have imagined that you were going to have to play the whole thing.
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  So is it difficult to sort of get it feeling right? I guess
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  it is, and I and also too, it's a reasonably long album compared
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  to our normal set. So by the time we do the whole album and
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  a couple extra songs, it's it's it's a good twenty minutes longer than we'd
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  usually even play, twenty minutes half hour longer than we'd normally play. So
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  it's like and so and Yeah, as I said, the album was written
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  for a much younger man in mine because a couple of the first songs go
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  pretty hard. By the time I get to the fourth one, which is
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  a needs a lot of effort, I'm just going holy ship. So yeah,
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  it's yeah, not as easy as it seems. How the songs going
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  down live man like they stood the test of time strangely enough. Yes,
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  Yeah, there's a few that that we haven't really played much over the years,
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  and they've been the most most fun fun to play because they're kind of
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  new and fresh, and people are going, oh, never never ever thought
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  I'd hear that one live, so and and it's kind of been oh,
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  that was a fun one to play. So that's been really good. And
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  and yeah, and and one or two of those as well have just been
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  like, wow, that's actually really good song. Wow, you know,
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  surprising yourself, just going yeah, that's kind of cool and I remember it,
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  so I can imagine your fan base it have a pretty twisted sense of
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  human bro So over the years, has anyone ever brought you in a hot
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  dog dackery? No, not as such, but we had we had a
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  man naked on stage with us in Brisbane last Friday night, and and and
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  let's just say, it's not the first time he's done it, so a
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  hot dog jackery of thoughts. No, no, no, one's actually actually
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  done that. So but yeah, yeah, and I can imagine it tastes
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  like ship and there be no point in doing it. But but the story
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  for the original title title was we didn't have a title for it. And
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  we're on the Van's Warped tour in in ninety eight here in Australia with penny
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  Wise and uh, one day Fletcher Fletcher from Pennywise was threatening to get some
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  was it, some of the some of the cold meats we had backstage and
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  he was going to put them in a in a blender with some alcohol and
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  was going to make a hot dog dackery. I can't say whether he actually
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  did or not, but we went that's the album title. Things you do
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  backstage? J Yes, yes, if you made an album title out after
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  you did backstage made it up to come into a fucking R rated label,
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  Yes, it would, it would. So what are some of your best
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  memories of making that album? Bright? Oh? So many. It was
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  done done over over a few months and at different times and also you know,
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  purchasing overnight rates and ship like that. So and and there is one
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  of the filler tracks on the album that that we were using as an intro
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  chune for this tour is caught Smoke on the Porker and it's actually being interviewed
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  for two GB Radio in Sydney because we got evacuated from the recording studio because
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  there was a fire in the industrial complex next door that was pretty out of
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  control one night. And it was quite a funny, funny interview where the
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  guy asked me, ye, know, what were you doing and how did
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  it happened? And I said, yeah, Well, the police came to
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  the door and they bashed on the door and told us to get out.
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  And the guy said, well what did they say to you? And I
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  said, can you get out? And after he said he said okay,
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  yeah, so what did you do? And I went we got out and
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  so we got a copy of that that actually went to air on two GB
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  radio back in ninety eight, and we cut that up into into a track.
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  So that's that's And still I still have people walk up to me and
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  go, Pete Cooper, get out big, So what did you do then?
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  But that's probably one of the most memorable things that happened during that But
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  ah, I can't really remember any other stories, but it was, it
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  was it was a good process and we did some crazy ship. So yeah,
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  did you think that album is your best play like or have you got
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  another favorite? As whole albums go out, Yes, well, yeah,
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  it's probably the best. It's it's the most popular, it's the most eclectic
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  as far as styles and uh songwriting. That was one where you know,
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  the Porkers have had a lot of members turned over over the years, and
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  we we had we had ex members that we've remained friends with, some ex
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  members we haven't remained friends with. But so at the time I was co
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  writing with people in the band and people outside the band, so it sort
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  of brought a mix of styles and I think that's what gave that album the
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  color And yeah, and again the timing and the fact that we're playing lots
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  and lots of the time and it all just just came together and it all
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  worked, and yeah, just seems to be seems to be the good one.
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  Yeah. When I was writing these questions out, man, this next
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  question is sounded like a good one, But after speaking, I reckon it
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  might be a little bit too deep. So if you don't like it,
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  just fucking hand pass it on and we'll keep going. Right. So,
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  even though I hot do on dat returned twenty five, the porker has had
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  another decade on top of that, bro, So you've been around the block
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  a bit. So what are some of the main changes in the industry since
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  he started? And do you think they're for the better? Oh? Lots
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  of changes. Probably Probably the main one is streaming and it does have its
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  its benefits in many ways and getting yourself out there. But the thing that
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  I see, and I've been mean to bring this up with people, the
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  change I saw in the music industry was digital downloads became a thing and suddenly,
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  you know, the artist was going to be in control. When we
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  were taking back our music and we were going to cut the record labels out,
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  the big guys out that were getting all the money and we were going
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  to be in control, and it was a it was a it was a
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  new frontier. And then within a couple of years we just gave it all
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  the way to the streaming services and they've become the record label in a way
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  now and we didn't make much more only out of it, and it's really
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  disappointing the way that that's turned out in the way. So I reckon if
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  if the streaming services actually paid more than it'd be a really really good thing.
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  But currently there's a monopoly on it. And the only thing streaming gets
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  you is, you know, availability to more people than fans and m as
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  much as you hope, you know, people who want to listen to your
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  music will pay for it them don't want to the op listen and get away
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  with it, you know. Yeah, the streaming services have basically turn music
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  into the Barley DVD. You know, people will go and by the the
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  ship version and not care. So that's probably not my thing. And and
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  also to the fact that you know, we'll go into a recording studio and
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  spend thousands of dollars to make something sound really good and then everybody's happy to
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  listen to it at a compressed level and shitty quality, which is just a
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  waste. Really. It's just like, yeah, yeah, I've spent a
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  thousand dollars on this on this track, and it sounds like a thousand dollars,
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  but you're happy to listen to it at yeah, fifty bucks at will
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  worse price, Like it doesn't really matter. I really didn't need to polish
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  it that much and spend that money because you're going to listen to it on
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  a ship player anyway. So that's what I find frustrating. So so still
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  got my CD collection and my uh the seventies and eighties full stereo I set
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  up at home, and I love listening to remastered c d's. That's that's
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  that's good good. Yeah. When the Porkers came on the You're Bleaming of
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  punk with funk and reggae was relatively untried and new back then made. So
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  where did you get the idea from merchandise genres? Yeah? So, oh,
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  our our influence was, well, we're in the reggae and scar and
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  uh let me seek you know, bands like Madness and Specials that that that
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  played Scar in the seventies and eighties, but also bands like Fishbone that that
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  played a wide range of different styles. Could you could play a reg a
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  song, you know, a you know, a full on metal song.
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  They were a huge influence on us. So and again I suppose that the
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  scar genre, a lot of bands are formed within the scene, like you
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  know, any kind of music genre, and they're pretty well, this is
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  what we're doing because these are the bands we like. But I kind of
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  found found that I ended up with musicians from all walks of life, and
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  everybody brought something different and that's what became in the Poker sound, you know,
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  it was it was it was uh, you know, white rock,
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  surf music, rockabilly swing. Yeah, yeah, there was there was no
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  no, no real real thing. It was sort of like, this is
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  sort of what our sound is, but it also includes this and that and
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  this. So yeah, it was always happy to do something else. So
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  that's kind of the best way I could describe it. Yeah, yeah,
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  cool. Like I said that, there was a few bands overseas doing that,
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  but in Australia it was relatively untried. So did people gravitate towards it
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  straight away or did it sort of take them a while to come around because
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  it was so different. Oh yeah, sorry, I didn't quite finish the
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  question off. But so again, yeah bears like the money Buddy Bostones in
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  the States, no doubt, to a certain degree, we're doing that sort
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  of thing. I actually traveled to the States in ninety two, but I've
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  been in contact with those bands for quite a few years before that, and
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  saw a whole pile of bands and sort of went, Okay, I get
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  this now, this is this is this is growing, this is going to
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  be big. We need to be on top of this. So so when
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  we sort of start, well go back trecking again. We were always the
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  crazy scar band that played everything way too fast, and then I kind of
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  found the direction of Okay, this is how I sort of wanted to go.
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  So we started mixing in more stuff and that was sort of that alienated
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  a few people again in the scar Seed. We weren't liked particularly too much
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  before that. We weren't liked anymore after that, but that's when we started.
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  I also saw two of the States. You'd have a bill where you'd
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  have a punk band, you'd have a punk metal band, you'd have a
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  reggae band, you'd have a scar band. There'd be a swing revival band,
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  and I was just like, Wow, this is what we've got to
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  do. So we started playing with other bands and it was when I,
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  you know, I connected with the Sydney punk scene that we started to find
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  find our audience. And in the Sydney punk scene, you know, there
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  was a lot of people that you know, grew up listening to Scar,
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  so listening to Scar and it got into punk and things and sort of gone
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  under there. But they weren't sort of necessarily going out and seeing Scar bands.
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  So we took it to them, and yeah, we started playing with
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  bands like the blitz Babies and Toe to Toe in Sydney and that really sort
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  of where things webbed up for us and it was a good formula and it
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  worked. So yeah, did you ever play with our dream Killer as much
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  back then? You know, I don't think so. I think that was
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  one band we kind of missed a lot, and we did play I think
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  on a bill with them. I've in Brisbane in the last ten or so
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  years. I think that was actually the first time. Oh I could be
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  wrong. Maybe there was one time back in the nineties when we shared a
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  bill in Brisbane with them, but yeah, never never got to play with
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  them down here. I don't think yeah that the very first band over saw
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  back when I was fucking fourteen. Nice, nice, very all right,
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  bro, will I let you go? So s got a voice for this
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  weekend, But the Porker tour does continue on this weekend and let me get
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  my notes right here. Treenty first in Frankston and then you're going through Melbourne.
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  So just check out the band's socials if you want to know. It's
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  the first in Frankston, which is which is tomorrow, and then the second
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  of the toad and then we're Sydney Newcastle over the next couple of weeks.
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  So in sacial bro, we'll hope the rest of it soil it goes well
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  and catch you on the other side, all right, it'll be nice and
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  fortieth hell yeah if I'm still kicking Calo, thanks man,