In January 2004, we played the Big Day Out. According to Wikipedia, ‘The Big Day Out (BDO) is an annual music festival that tours Australia and New Zealand which originated in Sydney in 1992.’ We were looking forward to it, as most bands we’d talked to reckoned it was the most fun you could possibly have on tour: the crowds were enthusiastic, there were plenty of in-between dates to visit the beach, and the girls were reckoned to be ‘the easiest in the world’ – though I still preferred the ‘catch me if you can’ variety, if truth be told.
Unfortunately, by the time we arrived our antipodal fantasies had soured slightly, and for that we only had ourselves to blame. The Aussie press had picked up on our motor-mouthed rants against The Kings Of Leon and The Strokes, and were stirring things up. Of course, bands don’t always get on with each other, a bit like prom girls in a high-school beauty pageant or pussy cats in a pet-shop display box – they’re all desperate to be picked out and petted to prove they’re cuter than the rest.
It’s true we gave the impression of being brattish and proud of it. The defence would argue we were just having fun. The prosecution, however, would have had us down as spiteful and ungracious. It was inevitably going to catch up with us eventually. Still, in the first few days we had a great time, bonding with The Dandy Warhols over a shared love of ping pong, kissing each other’s arses and getting heroically shit-faced.
In Brisbane, I came off stage with the mother of all hangovers. The rest of the band and crew drifted back to the hotel. It was a long hot Gold Coast afternoon as I mooched around the backstage area slurping at ice-cold piña coladas from Hospitality.
Two members of New Yorkers The Strokes were heading towards me. We hadn’t yet met, but I’d always been intrigued by the blank-canvas aspect of their personas. Give or take a silly moustache and pirate headband, I was a bit of a blank canvas myself. But what was going on here? My excitement grew as I noticed how animated they were, a pair of Strokes with their very own security guy in tow.
It was the drummer and singer. ‘Hey, man, we need to talk to you about shit,’ said Fab, the drummer, famous at the time for dating Drew Barrymore. ‘We hear you’ve been dissing us in the papers. What the fuck’s your problem, man?’
Vague insecurities began to engulf me – a cynic’s karmic desserts, no doubt.
Then the singer, Julian Casablancas piped up: ‘Yeah, where do you get off on that shit, man? Where we come from respect is important; we don’t just go ripping into other bands for no reason. You guys are just gay fucking metal anyway.’ There was a real Italian meatballs vibe coming through. Nevertheless, the stroke of pain tore my heart and opened my jaws slightly, in readiness for a reply.
When once accused of being drunk by an upset hostess, Winston Churchill replied words to the effect of, ‘I may well be drunk but you, madam, are ugly and I will be sober in the morning.’ How could I possibly live up to that? Instead, I feigned ignorance: ‘OK, guys, maybe someone in my band did slag you off in print, but it wasn’t me personally, so what can I do about it? Anyway, I thought you lot invented free speech?’
Julian eyeballed me aggressively, while Fab seemed to be practising at ‘bursting for the toilet’ in a Lee Strasberg method actor’s workshop, before finally signing off with a volley of insults. Now it was just the singer, an embarrassed-looking security man and myself. Casablancas glared at me derisively, snorted and shook his head in exasperation, before flouncing off as well, security in tow. I was delighted to have finally found myself in a scene from a Godfather movie.
A couple of roadies had overseen the confrontation and the festival gossip machine soon went into overdrive – everyone kept coming up and asking what had really happened. There wasn’t much to tell – The Strokes were young, temperamental and full of hot Italian blood. At least, they acted like they were. However, just like those trigger-happy New York Italians from the movies, beneath all the jive there was an underlying sense of honour. The following day, drummer Fab marched right into our dressing room, as we prepared for showtime, and, in front of the whole band, apologised sincerely – with good grace and no little humility. He knew it was wrong for three guys to gang up on one. The two of us then enjoyed a sloppy hug – meaning that I hugged the guy who was sleeping with Drew Barrymore, practically making me ET.
Around this time, we all kind of ditched the siege-mentality mindset that had previously helped forge us together as a band. It was time for a change. The rest of the tour was all about doing our own thing: hanging out side-stage for The Strokes and The Kings Of Leon (Ed), ordering banana smoothies from room service (me), frolicking on the beach with the road crew (Dan) and ducking into toilet cubicles with a certain renowned heavy metal drummer who must remain nameless (Justin).