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October 1, 2024 10 mins

Waikato rockers Medusa Glare have covered one of their favourite 70s songs, using the same instruments as the original version. Their bass player and singer Nato called in for a chat about staying true to their sound while replicating someone else's and gave us a review of the recent Iron Maiden tour. 

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Speaker 1 (00:02):
Welcome to Radio Hodarchys Off the Record Podcast with Greg Treble.

Speaker 2 (00:08):
Let's have a chat with Medusa, Glare Kilder, Nathan Hey, Greg,
how are you?

Speaker 3 (00:11):
Yeah?

Speaker 2 (00:12):
Really with thanks real good to see you. How's how's
you guys been for Meduca Gleair? What's been going on
in twenty twenty four.

Speaker 3 (00:18):
We got some time earlier this year where we had
a day and we jumped into Roundhead Studios up in Auckland,
and I thought we'd do something a little bit different
to what we've done before. And we did one song
in one day and we recorded live a cover of
Van Halen's Atomic Punk.

Speaker 2 (00:35):
Well, so that's an early Van Halen tune that's like
one of their seventies numbers.

Speaker 3 (00:39):
Yeah, it's actually older than I am, that song, but yeah,
it's off their first album. And we wanted to really
capture a song off that album because it's such a
hallmark album in so many ways. But we didn't want
to play a song that was, you know, we'll cover
a song that was one of the big hits, if
you know what I mean. We didn't want to do
Running with the Devil. We wanted to do something that
was a little bit not expected and an album full

(01:00):
of great songs. I think there's nothing on that album
that's unexpected, you know. Finding the right song was a
lot of fun. But we all really loved that song,
so that's why we went with it.

Speaker 2 (01:09):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (01:10):
I love every song on that album. That's one of
the I think the greatest debut album of all type.
A lot of people say it's Guns and Roses or
other albums, you know, but I really like Little Dreamer.
There's a number of songs on there we could have done,
but we all leaned to Atomic Punk pretty quick because
it's just one of those songs.

Speaker 2 (01:27):
You know, and is this the one you think you
knew the best in terms of you be able to
cover it so you can just rock and play because
you know it like the back of your hand more
than more so than other songs.

Speaker 1 (01:35):
Ah.

Speaker 3 (01:36):
Yeah, It's funny when where we started jamming on it,
and that's when you realize what you think you know
isn't exactly how the song goes. And there was a
little bit of oh, have I been playing this right
or have I been playing it wrong? Or have I
sung the words backwards or all that kind of stuff,
you know, So when you're covering a song like that,
I think the scrutiny from yourself and certainly from the

(01:56):
audience as such that you've got to get it right.
So it was a case of making sure done our
homework and you crossed our tees and not cross their eyes,
you know.

Speaker 2 (02:04):
Yeah. And so for those who haven't analyzed the debut
album from Van Halen as much as you have, and
perhaps only know the hits like Running with the Devil, Yeah,
what are they am for for this song? What is
the vibe?

Speaker 3 (02:15):
It's an upbeat rock song. It starts with a phaser
on the guitar and a palm shuffle. It's a real
distinctive Eddie van Halen trick that he used right the
way through his career, so we kind of wanted to
capture that. So the vibe of the song as well
is we tried really hard to capture the essence of

(02:35):
Van Halen. So Simon who's on guitar, is playing and
Eddie van Halen signature Ernie Ball guitar. I'm playing a
Fender Precision bass, which is what Michael Anthony used. We
recorded it live to try and just get that one
two three go vibe and essence of the song, and
I think we got it vitality too. Yeah, yeah, that

(02:56):
sort of danger. You know, you've got to get it
because it's a one shot, you know. So, yeah, it was.

Speaker 2 (03:02):
It was fun. Just something you said earlier. The palm shuffle.
Is that something on the guitar that Eddie van Halen did? Yeah,
so what is it?

Speaker 3 (03:09):
So he's got a phaser effect on the guitar which
basically gives it that sound. And then the way that
he's played it and Simon's got it wonderfully is he's
basically just rubbing his the side of his palm across
the strings to get that sort of sweeping, shuffling sound.
It's kind of hard to describe, but if you listen

(03:30):
to it, you know exactly what I'm talking about.

Speaker 2 (03:32):
Well, let's listen to it, then, shall we. Yeah?

Speaker 3 (03:34):
Sure. Hey, I'm Nathan from Medusa Glare and you are
listening to our version of Van Halen's Atomic Punk on Radiohardechy.

Speaker 2 (04:12):
It's already I heard oki and that is a brand
new version of a van Halen's song by Medusa Glare,
And we're lucky enough to hear the bass player Nathan
in the studio with this now I killed and Nathan,
thanks for bringing us to that tune.

Speaker 3 (04:22):
Hey, Greg, Hey, thank you very much for having us.

Speaker 2 (04:24):
I always thought when I was growing up that van
Halen was some kind of holy gray alt. They were
gods of rock, they were titans of their instruments, and
there was no way anyone in New Zealand could even
come close to that. But so that that's a bloody
good version of that van Halen song.

Speaker 3 (04:37):
Well, I think what we tried to do there was
not change it too much, to play it the way
we hear it and play it the way we play it.
So there's a lot of Me, Simon and Rick in there, naturally,
because it's us that are playing that just tonally. We
tried to get it close by using as many pieces
of equipment that are the same or similar, Like the
guitars are very loyal with the electric guitar and the

(04:58):
bass guitar are the same models that van Halen used.
But just the way that Rick plays a drum pattern
in there, it sounds like Rick's playing van Halen or
van Halen's been played by Wreck and that's great. I
think it's a real testament that we haven't tried to
clone the song with it's Medusa Glare that's playing it.
You know, I'm no davidly Wroth, but that's always going

(05:19):
to be my voice that's on that track. So yeah,
for better for worse, that's me singing Van Halen, but
so it's going to sound like me, you know.

Speaker 2 (05:25):
Yeah. Van Halen aren't a band anymore. I mean Eddie's gone,
Alex isn't going to do anything. Yeah, Sammy Hagar's sort
of carrying on with Michael Anthony doing stuff. Is there
a thought to maybe send it to the remaining members
of Van Halen and say, yeah, we thought we'd pay
tribute to you guys.

Speaker 3 (05:42):
You know that that thought hasn't gone through my mind,
but yeah, look, I'll ask you later for Sammy's number.
If you've got it, man, I'd be quite happy to
pass it to the guys. I think they'd be happy.
I mean, you know, if you look at Van Halen
in the mark that they've left on the world, they're influential.
Most people know who they are. I think they'd be
pretty happy there. They've had another band sort of following

(06:02):
their footsteps and pay homage to them, you know.

Speaker 2 (06:04):
Yeah, and for any music that you do in the future.
Is it going to have a van Halen vibe now
that you've gone in and covered them like this?

Speaker 3 (06:12):
Well, that's another fantastic question. I guess we've got some
more stuff in the pipeline. I don't know if any
of it sounds directly influenced by Van Halen, but you know,
you wake up in the morning and an idea comes
to you. You never know what ideas are going to
pop out when you pick a guitar up or drumsticks
and stuff, So there's every possibility that something's going to
come out a little van Halen ish. We've all listened

(06:33):
to that album growing up, so there's it's going to
seep into our pause, I think.

Speaker 2 (06:38):
And what else is ish wise? Could your new music sound.

Speaker 3 (06:42):
Like things like Black Sabbath and led Zeppelin and Iron Maiden.

Speaker 2 (06:45):
You mentioned Iron Maiden. They were just in New Zealand. Yeah,
they were just in Australia. Yeah. How many shows did
you see this time?

Speaker 3 (06:52):
Six? Yeah, I'm a bit of a fiend for Iron Maiden.
If you've known me for three minutes, you know I'm
that Iron Maiden guy. So yeah, I was quite lucky.
I actually got to meet Steve Harris after one of
the shows in Auckland as well. So there's a bucket
listening for me.

Speaker 2 (07:07):
So founding member, the songwriter, he's the guy Iron Maiden,
and what did you say to him? The first thing,
aid mouth.

Speaker 3 (07:14):
The first thing actually was thank you for coming back,
because Iron Maiden hadn't been here since twenty sixteen, and
that planned to come in twenty twenty, but obviously everything
stopped for a period of time. So the first thing
was thank you very much for coming back. The second
thing was as a great show to what she said,
thanks mate and that Eastern axcent.

Speaker 2 (07:35):
So, yeah, it was kind of.

Speaker 3 (07:37):
A surreal moment, one of those things I'll play back
in my head a million times. I'm sure probably only
took twenty seconds of my life, but it feels like
time stood still. It's all the cliches, Greg, but it
was magic.

Speaker 2 (07:48):
Yeah, it's awesome because you've been listening to him since
you're a little kid. You've been thinking about this moment
for decades, and here's Steve, he's just met you and
for twenty seconds he's got your time and yeah that
click contrast.

Speaker 3 (08:00):
Yeah he got to meet me. Sure, Yeah, but it
was it was great. I mean, you've met some famous
people in your time broadcasting, and you know they say,
never meet your heroes. I don't think that was the
case here. He was. He was great, he was humble,
he was attentive, and and then he was gone. It
was it was it was like a real brief moment.
But it was just just cool, you know, and it

(08:21):
highlights that, you know, how cool these people are and
that they would be nowhere without their fans. You know,
you need to have people listening to your music. So
it's it's really cool.

Speaker 2 (08:30):
You've got that memory. Did someone take a photo or
did you get a selfie with him or something?

Speaker 3 (08:34):
Yeah, my wife Kathy was with me, my long suffering
wife came to all the Iron Maiden shows with me.
Bless her, thanks baby, and so yeah, she was the
first person to grab my phone and take a camera
with Steve. And the last photo that Steve took actually
I asked him to hang around for one more and
got a photo Kathy's with him, so and it's the
only photo I think that he's smiling. So he was

(08:56):
pretty tired. But I think I said something along the
lines of one more photo, Steve, she's the best looking
at the bunch and he kind of giggled, you know,
it wasn't a lie. So yeah, she got a photo
out of it too, which is pretty cool.

Speaker 2 (09:07):
And of those six shows that you saw on this
tour here in Australasia, was the Aukland one the best.

Speaker 3 (09:12):
It was Auckland was the most responsive crowd. Actually, the
singer Bruce Dickinson said at the end of the night, well,
it's Monday night in Auckland and it feels like Saturday night.
The crowd was really hot, everyone was really attentive and
Australia was good. But I think there was one show
in New Zealand, so everyone who wanted to go had
to go that night. So it was kind of the
cream of the crop from a from a fan point
of view, you know, and it was just it was

(09:33):
really good. It's cool to see that guys at that
age are still that passionate about music. I mean, they're
all well past pension age now. They could they could
retire if they wanted to, but they love doing it
and it's that's that's really inspirational as a musician that
making music doesn't have a time stamp on it. It's
not like I'm going to get to I was going
to say forty, but we're passed the end, you know,

(09:53):
I'm not going to get to a certain age and go,
well that's it, hanging my boots up. I can keep
making music indefinitely and there's only one thing that's going
to and yeah, hopefully that's all we way away yet.
So yeah, it's cool.

Speaker 2 (10:04):
So if we want to find out more about your
music that you're making in twenty twenty four, we're the
best place to find information. Just meduca glare.

Speaker 3 (10:11):
I think on Instagram it might be meduca dot glare,
but it's pretty easy to find. Yeah, chucking into chucking
into googling, it'll pop up pretty straight away.

Speaker 2 (10:20):
You know, Nathan from Medusa Glare. Thanks your Tom and Headache.

Speaker 3 (10:24):
Thanks again for having me.

Speaker 1 (10:26):
Radio hod Aches Off the Record Podcast. Why not subscribe
so they download automatically and don't forget to rate us
five stars?

Speaker 2 (10:34):
Thanks mate.

Speaker 1 (10:35):
Find out more about this podcast and the people who
make it at hodache dot co dot Nz
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