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April 20, 2025 • 13 mins

Australian musician James Reyne is coming from down under to visit our shores for a tour in August. 

You might know him from hits 'The boys light up', or 1991's 'Reckless' - James was the frontman for Australian Crawl.

In the late 80s James began his solo career and went on to release album Hard Reyne - featured the hits "House of Cards" which was #17 on the ARIA Charts and "One More River" #22 on the ARIA Charts.

James Reyne talks to Tim Beveridge about the tour. 

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Episode Transcript

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Speaker 1 (00:09):
You're listening to a podcast from news Talk zed B.
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Speaker 2 (00:39):
Welcome Holiday Breakfast. On this Easter Monday, Australian musician James
Rain is coming from coming from down Under. I guess
to our down Under to visit our shores for a
tour in August. You might recognize his voice from this hit. Strategically,

(01:02):
James was the front man for Australian Crawl Crawl, releasing
hits like Boys, Light Up and Reckless. In the late eighties,
James began his solo career and went on to release
the album Hard Rain, featuring the hits House of Cards
which was number seventeen on the ARIA charts and One
More River which was number twenty two on the ARIA charts.

(01:22):
And James Rain joins me, now.

Speaker 3 (01:24):
Good morning, good morning, How are you.

Speaker 2 (01:26):
I'm good. Thanks. Hey, you've been doing this quite a while.
I was thinking you must have you must have begun
your career back in the days of vinyl and cassettes,
then CDs and then streaming. What was your favorite era?

Speaker 3 (01:41):
Well, I have to say now, don't I You know, well,
I'm a child of the album, you know, I'm a
child of the my formative years when out as you say,
when albums were the the probably the only albums and
singles are the only medium for recorded music. So I
was an avid when I was a kid, I was
an avid. I was just a music freak, and I

(02:04):
was an avid collector. I used to collect lots of albums,
had a big album collection. I still do. Actually I've
lost some of them all the way. But yeah, so
that's probably my favorite thing because that's what I grew up,
and it was a big format that the album cover,
and you'd look at all the liner notes and who
played on white and you could make connections with this
band and that band, and so and so play with
them all, and he also played over there with this

(02:25):
other person.

Speaker 2 (02:26):
Can you still do albums now in the same way
or do you have to sort of shape your music
for the streaming audience who might listen to one song
and flog it to death.

Speaker 3 (02:35):
Yeah, I think that's more the case. I think people
just you know, it's one song at a time. I mean,
I've been recording some stuff recently and I'll probably released
on streaming, So it's just one song at a time,
because that's what people do. I don't think that by
and large, I think the concept of the album, buying
the album and pouring over the lyrics and as I say,
the liner notes and listen to every song and you know,

(02:56):
finding that what they call now called deep cuts. But
kind of the album tracks.

Speaker 2 (03:01):
Actually does it make it harder? I mean, do you
prefer being inspired by the idea of an album? Is
it harder to just write songs and release them? Went off?

Speaker 3 (03:12):
Not really, I'm not really no. I mean it's a
different mindset. I think. You know, when when you made albums,
you had, yes, you had an album mindset. You had
to go in with a collection of songs and you
would have there'd be some kind of flow, and I mean,
you know, you tried not to have any what they
used to call filler. So you know, the albums used
to be where they'd have three or four Well, albums

(03:32):
started when it was just a singles market, and then
they put if someone had two or three hit singles,
they'd put them on an album and just go, oh,
we've got to fill up the rest of the track.
So they just put you know, probably recordings of covers
or just any old stuff they had or B sides,
because singles used to have B sides. For people that
don't remember singles, the A SIDEHI would be the single
the song that was, you know, the hit, so to speak,

(03:54):
and the song on the other side was just something
that was just lying around usually.

Speaker 2 (03:58):
So when you were flogging those those old vinyl records
when you were a youngster, which of those artists you
were listening to had the biggest impression on you.

Speaker 3 (04:09):
There are quite a few, I said, boy, I love
Credence Cleared Revival, but I love bands like Little Feet.
I used to love their albums, but then I like
things like Dan Hicks and John Prime and all that
sort of people like that.

Speaker 2 (04:23):
When did you decide you wanted to do it for
a living.

Speaker 3 (04:27):
Well, I didn't really. I mean it was we did
it for fun and we were just doing because we're
all doing other things. When we started the band I
was in, but we were very young and we'd had
a band before that, Like we didn't really do anything,
and we said it was similar the same sort of
band has changed the name really, but I don't know.
We just started doing it for fun and we liked
doing it, and we started to get more and more gigs,

(04:49):
and I think it got to the point where we
were getting so much work that we we had to
make a decision to go. I guess we've better, you know,
folk to concentrate on the band rather than the other
things we were doing. I mean, I was a drama
school and a couple of them at university. I'd been
at university and one was I was drafted to play

(05:10):
Australian rules football. So he actually chose music over being
a you could have been a champion football. So I
don't know whether he thinks made the right decision, But this.

Speaker 2 (05:20):
Is Australian crawl, of course you're talking about, or.

Speaker 3 (05:22):
This Australian crawl. Yes, And I think we just decided
one day, well let's give it a year, let's concentrate
on this for a year, and if things continue to
go okay, we'll just keep We'll give it another year.
And we did that and then it just became what
we did.

Speaker 2 (05:36):
How much of the years, And an Australian crawl then
sort of influence the way you are now, or if
you did you when you became a solo artist, did
you change things up quite a lot?

Speaker 3 (05:49):
Again, it's probably a different mindset I mean, I used
to jokingly, but I was sort of truth in jest.
I used to say, when you go solo, you don't
have to pay lip service to band democracy anymore, because
if you're the solo actor, pretty much, you know, you go, well,
I want to do this this way, especially in the studio,
and I was writing a lot of songs, and you know,

(06:11):
in a band, you know you have to you know,
suddenly the drummer is a songwriter and there's someone else's
a song writing and you've got to and you've got
to you know, you got to be You've got to
consider it, and sometimes you just go well. I'm not
saying that was specifically what happened, but you hear these
stories with every band. I think the bands that stay
together longer works something out, especially with the songwriting, because

(06:33):
especially in those days, people realized. It wasn't long before
people realized the songwriter probably makes more money than the
other people.

Speaker 2 (06:40):
Oh yeah, I think there's been a few spoof bands
sort of documentaries which highlight on that, like how much
did you make out of that song?

Speaker 3 (06:48):
Anyway, that's one of the main reasons band split.

Speaker 2 (06:52):
Is that the reason you guys split?

Speaker 3 (06:54):
Uh No, not really, No, I think it was one
of the pressures, one of the inner pressures that contributed
towards the split. But when you're living, you know, you
get together in a band with your mates when you're
young and you're doing for funny, you're all having a
great time. And the first couple of years always great
fun and great and especially if things start to happen
and you have some success, it's fantastic. And these are that,

(07:15):
they're the great years. And then all the little the
things that are in any other world are completely petty,
become big issues. And if you live that and work
that closely with anybody, and you spend all your time together,
you're you know, you're working together, doing gigs, you're traveling together,
you're always in a car, or you're always in a
car in Australia especially always in a car or a van.

(07:37):
And then you're sharing rooms and you're just living constantly,
and then things just start to annoy you.

Speaker 2 (07:43):
Yeah, you know, of course, that's that's almost forty years ago,
isn't it. Since you guys broke down, So we should
we should move on to your solo solo career. Don't
get stuck on that James. Hey, you're known sort of
writing some cryptic lyrics and with a poetic quality. Do
you start with the lyric or the melody.

Speaker 3 (08:04):
Both both? I think sometimes there was something I'm messing
around the guitar. I think, oh, that's interesting, and I
start singing noises, panetic noises, and sometimes if noises start
to sound like a word, which might trigger something. Or
sometimes I just think of I have a line, or
I have a I think that's a good title. Have
it be an interesting title, see if I can do
something with that. Or sometimes there's a couple of lines

(08:25):
or you or I'm working on some one song, on
the lyrics of one song, and I have think of
a couple of lines and I think, oh, that that
doesn't really fit here, but you put it aside. I've
got realms and realms of just words or two lines
or one line or titles. I've got realms of stuff
on my computer.

Speaker 2 (08:42):
So you just sort of put those on the side.
So I might need might need that one day.

Speaker 3 (08:46):
Yeah, And sometimes yeah, when I'm writing something, Oh that
was that line I had? I thought that was an
okay line. Maybe will that work? Or can I twist it?
Or can I change it around or move it around,
make it work for this whatever you're working on.

Speaker 2 (08:59):
So do you is it hard to finish recording a song?
Are you one of those artists who that you know,
you're sort of a band in it in its best state,
or are you actually really like, Yep, I've nailed it.
There we go, that's beautiful, let's send that off.

Speaker 3 (09:15):
Both again. I think I never think, oh, God, that's beautiful.

Speaker 2 (09:21):
To go God, that's good, God, I'm good.

Speaker 3 (09:24):
Yeah, sometimes you think that sounds pretty good, actually, because
you usually when we finished stuff in the studio and
there's a mix, I usually listen in the car so
I can drive around the car when it turned out
really loud. And sometimes you go, no, that's so bad.

Speaker 2 (09:37):
What song?

Speaker 3 (09:38):
What?

Speaker 2 (09:38):
Sorry? Carry on? What song are you most proud of
when you look back? Have you got a favorite? Not really,
you just move on from one album to the next
and you put the past behind you.

Speaker 3 (09:50):
Yes, I do, absolutely, And I don't listen to my
own stuff. I mean I listened to it when we're
working on it, when you know you've got to take
rough mixes home or something, but or listening in to
the car. But I never listened to myself at home
a tragic Actually, you know, God, I'm good.

Speaker 2 (10:07):
Is that the sign that you careers over when you start?

Speaker 3 (10:10):
That's right, that's the sign I think you should give up.
But I'm sure there are people who do it.

Speaker 2 (10:16):
I'm sure there are. You've done a bit of acting
in your time as well, because you mentioned drama school. Yeah,
and played Tina Turner's manager, Roger Davies. How is that?

Speaker 3 (10:27):
That was really great? Eventually, it was really great the
first day of filming because they'd all been filming for
a couple of months. When I look in that film again,
the part you blink and you missed me. Really, it's
a tiny part. But I sort of came on the
first day. I mean, I was very nerve wracking the
first day because I just I walked onto this set.

(10:48):
Well every you know, they'd all they all knew each other,
and as I said, they've all been working together for
two months and I had to walk into this kind
of already established kind of dynamic. But look, it was
a great thing to do. And I think after after
two or three days, I started to kind of get
into the strike, the rhythm of it. But then, you know,

(11:10):
you do a whole lot of stuff. And because the
part of Roger in the context of what that story
is that what's love work to do with it? It's
about the Tina Turner and Ike Turner kind of relationship
that culminated in her leaving him and her having the
successful career she had with Roger. And I was managed
by Roger for a while and I knew Roger, so

(11:33):
so the part of Roger sort of comes at the
end of that story. So it's only a small bit
that was great, and you know, I didn't really capitalize it.
I probably should have stayed there because I was I
was off. I went to a couple of meetings with
these directors who were saying, you know, things like, oh,
we could you know, possibly do this and do that,
and then I sort of sat around. I thought, well,

(11:53):
I'm just sitting around here. I should get home. So
I went home, whereas I probably should have stayed there.
But again, again, you know, you don't.

Speaker 2 (12:00):
Know, Hey, tell us about your your upcoming New Zealand too.
What can we expect from that?

Speaker 3 (12:06):
Well, I think we're on doing one or two shows
in a Auckland. It's an acoustic duo, just me and
my friend Josh Iwen, who I did lots of lots
of shows with Who's in New Zealand actually, and so
we're just doing playing Auckland and it's been ninety minutes
of aged to ninety minutes of just acoustic versions of
all the stuff that people would expect to hear from me. Excellent,

(12:27):
all the hits, Australian crawl and solo stuff and everything.

Speaker 2 (12:30):
Good stuff. Hey James so much, it's so great to
talk to you. I really appreciate your time.

Speaker 3 (12:34):
No, thank you for having me.

Speaker 2 (12:36):
Best of luck for the best of luck for the gigs.

Speaker 3 (12:39):
Thank you very much, Jim.

Speaker 2 (12:41):
Yes, James Rain, I loved that chat. Actually, what a
good guy, a great sense of humor. I'm not sure
what my favorite better that was, but just probably over
before you know your drummers a songwriter. Anyway, we'll be back.
We're gonna have a quick chat with Francisca Ructtion. Who's
up after nine o'clock, It's twenty seven past eight.

Speaker 1 (13:01):
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