Australia's Sick Puppies take over US Music Scene

[Katy]

Ashley Jones
Issue date: 11/5/07 Section: Entertainment
(Edited to remove source as it was no longer valid)

The Vanguard: "Where did you guys meet? And what made you decide to start a band?"

Shimon Moore, Sick Puppies guitarist and lead vocalist: "We wanted to start a band because we started out with bands like Silverchair and Green Day and started playing cover songs of theirs. We met in high school, in a music room, because the music room got double-booked by accident - everyone knew all the same songs by the same bands. After the first week of jamming on covers, we just decided we would start the band. We thought of a name a little bit after that."

V: "Who are your biggest influences?"

M: "Incubus, Red Hot Chili Peppers and Sevendust - bands that just have really good guitars and rhythms."

V: "Did you ever doubt your ability as musicians to make it happen?'"
M: "I don't know. No. We never doubted ourselves. I mean, we were pretty terrible at the beginning -- even then we still didn't doubt ourselves. I think that comes with it. It is sort of an unwavering self belief - no matter how bad you are, as long as you know you can get better and work as hard as you can to get through until you're as good as you need to be to move forward."

V: "Coming up in the music industry, what were some of your hardest times to get through, and how did you deal with them."

M: "That is an interesting question. Probably one of the hardest things was being in Australia and releasing our first record we had out. We had an album that was released in Australia in the beginning, when I was just 17 years old. It was sort of a little taste of success. In the grand scheme of things, it was basically nothing. But for us, it was great because we would go to clubs and get free drinks and people knew our name and all that stupid sh*t. Then we thought we were great. Then, the record label went bankrupt. The record sort of fell over. We toured for as long as we could afford to, and then we had to stop. Gradually, people forgot our name, and no one really cared about us anymore. We had to start from scratch again, which is when we decided to move over to the states - we thought, well, 'we got nothing to lose.' Losing that can be a difficult thing to come to terms with because you think you are the sh*t, and you have got it made. Then, you realize it all just fell apart, and you have got to do it all again. You sort of question why you do it, and you find all your reasons for doing it and having to do it all over again. Moving to the states was very difficult. We didn't have a lot of money. We didn't have a lot of food. Every day, we didn't know if we were going to get sent home because we just could not afford to stay in the United States. We would go request more money and they would give us enough money to survive and then survive again. That was really tough. That was about a year and a half. We still are just beginning to get out of that. We wrote a top -10 single and everything, but it takes a lot to actually stay out on the road. Those were some rough times, but mostly just figuring out how to remain a band in general. Staying afloat can be a difficult thing sometimes, when you are staring out and doing it for as many years as we have."

V: "How does being on tour affect how you get along?"

M: "It doesn't really. You hear stories about a lot of bands having tension, but we are pretty cool. We just started this tour with Evanescence. We just had our first show with them. If some people want to go out and party, there is another band on tour called Julien-K. I saw them up front at the buses, when I was getting ready to go to bed, having a party, just chilling out and doing their thing. We kind of just keep to ourselves. We are kind of homebodies. We like to have our little space, watch some movies and chill out - really lame. It keeps us going on tour because the more you party, the more energy you burn, and you have less energy for your show-- which means your audience suffers as a result, and that really is not fair. We try to make sure the show counts every night and do everything we need to stay focused."

V: "Did you know Evanescence before, and how did the idea of touring with them come about?"

M: "No. I didn't know them personally. We basically put our CD in and tried to get it. We submitted that we wanted to tour with them. Probably like hundreds of bands submitted for the tour. At the end, it comes down to Amy (Lee). I think she's the one that picks the bands, and she picked us. I have been hanging with her. She actually seems pretty cool, and she is really chilled out as well, like really laid back. We just got really lucky getting on this tour. I think the next couple of months opening for them will be really cool."

V: "What is on your current playlist?"

M: "The new Used record, Mutemath and the new Paramore song I am really into for some reason. I don't know why I like it. It is so poppy, but I can dig it."

V: "What do you wish to accomplish as a band, and do you have an overall message to send out?"

M: "In terms of what we want to accomplish as a band, is just taking it as far as we can take it. It takes everything you have got to be doing what we are doing. It is a lifestyle. It is like a religion. It is the same thing - something you have to do all the time. It is a lifestyle. It is something that you are. We just want to see how far we can take it while we are doing it. Hopefully, we will wind up being some headlining band that is capable of touring the world. That is the plan. That is what we are working towards. In terms of a message, I think some of the best bands in history have just tried to be as honest as possible. They are just trying to be honest with themselves and to the sound of their music and lyrically. To speak truth is what we are really focused on. And every time we try and waver from that, we try and get ahead of ourselves or try to indulge in stupid ideas - there is always some reason to take it back to just simplicity and truth. We always try to find the best way to say something pure so that it connects with people, so you can actually say you have done something worthwhile. We just want to be able to connect with as many people and try to make people feel something good."

V: "How did your idea for the 'Free Hugs' video come about?"

M: "That came about because I used to work at the same place as the guy who does Free Hugs. I had this footage I had taken with my friend's camera in a stage of his life. He called me up one day from Australia and told me his grandmother had died. I put together this video as a video get-well card for him. That was pretty much it. It was supposed to be like a gift to him, but it turned out to be a lot more than that. It was a bit of a fluke in terms of what happened afterwards because it wasn't a marketing tool or anything. It was just a gift, and it turned out to be a gift for even more people."

V: "What is the craziest thing that has happened since the 'Free Hugs' video?"

M: "Probably just a couple of weeks after it was released we went on Oprah. That pretty was f***ed up. A little punk rock band from Sydney, Australia. You know how many Australians of relevance have been on Oprah? You think about Russell Crowe, Nicole Kidman, the crocodile hunter, like how many people get to go on Oprah from Australia. For us, we definitely weren't big. We sort of began getting big overnight. The fact that she invited us on the show and then created a whole competition influence by the whole campaign. She gave everyone a camera and a $1,000 and said 'go and pay it forward and document yourselves doing it.' She started begging people and moving it forward. It was cool. To be able to say you were a part of something like that is pretty cool."

V: "The 'All the Same' video is such a dramatized video. Do you incorporate this into you live show? And if so, how?"

M: "We just want to be a band and not be a whole bunch of smoke and mirrors, and not be a whole bunch of backing musicians just yet. I am not saying that we are not going to do that a lot later in our career. At the moment, we really just want to be a good, simple three-piece band that connects with the audience. We just pluck the guitars and just do it old school."

V: "Have you ever played the South before and what do you expect?"

M: "We have been down South. The thing I like about down South is they just love the music. They really get into it in a way that - I don't know, maybe there is more alcohol involved or something, but you guys just go on. The whole reason we are in the band is to be doing stuff like that, so we are happy to come down there any chance we get."

V: "What would you say to college students to make them want to listen to your music and come to your show?"

M: "Our music, you listen to it because it is great or because it will change your life. I can pretty much guarantee if you come out to the show, you will have a good time. You can have the lead singer's personal guarantee that if you come out to the show you will have a good time. And that is f***ing it. If you don't go, you are going to miss out. That is the whole point of being in this band. It's not about creating a spectacle or anything. We just want to have a great night and have a great party. We try and give the people something that they will not get from any other band, and we really try to involve the audience as much as we possibly can - just make it a room full of people as opposed to a band and a separate audience. We try to make it all as one."

[Samsung]

Thanks for posting that! It was cool

[Crystal]

That was a great article... Thank you for sharing!

Shim talks a lot... Hahaha.