The Snakeheads Unleashed: A Long-Awaited Record, A Tribute, A Celebration

Snakeheads is a unique project from James Roden and the late Pete Lusty, marking a friendship that spanned over thirty five years, born of a shared love of punk, rock and a love of music. Pete Lusty was one of the most influential figures in the music business from the early ‘00s, playing a major role in taking Australian music to the world, with bands like The Vines, Jet, and Empire Of The Sun. Lusty also co-founded one of Australia’s longest running and most respected independent labels in 1997, Ivy League Records (Youth Group, Cloud Control, The Mess Hall, Josh Pyke, Alpine, The Rubens, Teskey Brothers). Tragically, Pete died from lymphoma in 2020, a week before the world went into Covid lockdown.

Five years on from Pete’s death, the first and only Snakeheads album Belconnen Highs, started at Belconnen High School in Canberra and refined in Pete’s basement and recorded in various Sydney studios, has been finished by James, now released as a tribute to his much-loved oldest and closest friend. The seventeen song album has been released by new Sydney-based label Cassell Records on gatefold vinyl (via Impressed Recordings) and is available all streaming services. James Roden speaks to Hi Fi Way about finishing the album.

How does it feel to finally see the album through to release?
Really important to actually be able to see this album through to release, finally.

Was there ever a point you thought it wouldn’t get finished?
Yeah,there were definitely many, many, many days I just didn’t think it would ever finish. Obviously, for the biggest reason, but also, it just seemed to turn into what was an effortless project into a too complicated a project. Too many songs, too many moving parts. Too many bits to finish.

Did the process change from how it started?
It was all on my own, whereas before it was a group thing. I had Pete, and we were starting to get a band as well, Kit from Rocket Science on drums, my brother Harry on bass, Wayne in the studio. But all that fell apart, so it kind of moved from a very outward sort of project into just me, and then trying to piece it all back together. So, yes, it’s been a nightmare.

It must feel like a moment of triumph with the release now?
It’s really great that these songs are going to be out there. It’s kind of air punches and high-fiving myself. I wish I was more like Noel Gallagher or Howlin’ Pelle from The Hives. I have a little bit more self-doubt running through me, so I fluctuate between “Yeah, it’s awesome” to “Is it the right track order? Are the vocals loud enough?” Endless torment coexists with the high-fiving. But I guess I should, I should definitely take a moment to, enjoy it, because it has been an incredible amount of work.

How was it receiving the physical copy?
It’s unreal. The test pressing was a great feeling, but this has the classic gate fold, track listing on the back. This was a potential album cover, I made it into the label side. That makes it worth it. There’s something about it being physical, not just a stream, that I really like.

Did you underestimate how much work it would take?
I question my own sound sometimes. Graham, who drummed on eleven of the tracks, is in a band called Sick Fizz. In the time this has taken, they’ve put out three albums. There’s something inherently difficult about finishing an album, but I must have brought something to the table too. I want to speed that process up. I probably need to let go of things a bit. Maybe there was an element of not wanting to finish it in a sense. Making sure it’s right, because I won’t have another chance at these songs. Also losing Pete as my wingman to bounce ideas off is gone, so I have to think about it all. Because normally, if you record a song, you have someone to go, oh, are the drums too loud? Or can you hear the vocals? I can ask people, but I didn’t have the original creator, so it gets messy.

Was the process cathartic, and a way to honour Pete?
I think so. It would be kind of sad for him otherwise. He’d been a musician since he was young, then stopped maybe fifteen to twenty years ago and focused on managing and releasing bands. He was a big champion of bands. He still had guitars, still played, still talked about it, probably still saw himself as someone in bands. But he’d never released an album. I’ve released a few under a different project, so this kind of honours that, something’s committed to vinyl that he was working on. It’s important to finish what he started. What we started, but certainly what he started.

What do you think it is about Pete’s musical ability that drew you to start these songs with him?
I think it’s the similar taste. It’s a friendship that’s that long, you have a shorthand with each other. You can say, oh, it sounds a bit too X, or it sounds a bit too Y. It might be disparaging about bands you don’t like, or it might be positive about bands you do like, and so you’ve got a way of communicating that’s sort of intuitive, because you know exactly what bands you both like, and what sounds you’re trying to capture or create. That’s what probably drew us back to each other, because I’d done my band, The City Lights, and I was the main songwriter, and eventually that gets a bit… I like being in bands where there are other songwriters bringing stuff to the table, stuff you get excited by that’s not you, that you don’t have to finish off. Probably a little bit lazy. Some people love it. I actually find it quite hard work, finishing songs, particularly the lyrics. I sort of dread it. I don’t have poems in my notes, I don’t walk around writing. I write riffs first. So the lyrics can be a challenge.

How did the Snakeheads actually start? How did you guys find each other?
Well, we met at high school, so we’ve known each other for thirty five years. City Lights were released on Ivy League, which was his and Andy Cassell’s label. So I’m deeply immersed in his world, but we just didn’t write together anymore, because we’d played in bands when we were young, but he had stopped. As far as I knew, secretly, he’d been writing songs and recording them for himself. So when City Lights put out its third album, I just ran out of steam and wasn’t doing anything for a couple of years. Then he and I got to talking, and I went to his house, and we had drinks, and it was really fun. We did that every week, pretty much. Every Monday night, I’d go to his house, and we’d jam, and it was unreal. It’s like a friendship where you’re doing something together, which can be really, really fun. And we started building up this pile of songs. So it just started from going around to his house.

Were there ambitions at that stage, or was it just mates catching up and jamming?
Yeah, after a few drinks, you have incredible ambitions. That’s the problem. Six drinks in, you think, we could be the biggest band in the world. You really do and that’s the beauty of having a few drinks. You become a bit unfiltered. Then you wake up the next day and think… probably not. But it was that sort of level of excitement. It was just like being a teenager. It’s exactly like when you start a band, you fantasize about what’s the track order going to be? How’s this song going to go? That sort of stuff. We had no concrete plans, because it was only the two of us. Then we slowly but surely brought in Wayne to help us finish songs and start talking about recording. We needed a drummer, so I got a mate, Kit from Rocket Science. He flew out for one jam and my brother Harry, we had one jam before we went into the studio. So it was starting to build something. I’m not sure what it was going to be, and then Pete got very sick very quickly. So yeah, who knows what it would have been in a parallel, different universe. Might have hit the same old problems bands often hit, which is not knowing exactly what to do with the album, or how to tour it, or play it, or whatever.

Does it feel like a strange moment now that the album’s coming out, but you don’t know what’s next?
Spot on. It is a strange feeling. I mean, I still have that youthful enthusiasm that maybe I could put a band together and play it live. That’d be really fun. But then, reality hits, and that’s quite difficult to work out how that would work, given Kit lives in Melbourne and Graham plays in about fifteen bands. So, yeah, don’t know.

Does that uncertainty also bring some excitement?
A: Yeah, anything is possible, and now that the hard part is sort of done, I should allow myself to have a break, and a breather, and do something that feels right. Feels fun, feels enjoyable. I don’t have to push myself anymore. It was hard to finish this album, for obvious reasons. But it exists now, the recordings are done, it’s mastered, I can’t change them anymore, I can’t fiddle with them. So I can go into that period of… see what happens, you know?

Now that you’ve got the record, do you think you’ll be able to sit back and listen to it like a fan would?
I hope so. I definitely have a tendency towards overthinking thing. I put it on, and I still go, “Can I hear the vocals in that room?” And it’s like, it’s too late! Let it go, you know? You cannot change it. When the vinyl turned up, before it arrived, I wasn’t even sure the colours would look right, or if it was printed in the right way. There’s still things to think about, but I’m happy with it. It looks great. It looks exactly like I imagined.
Same with putting it on, it’s sounding like I imagined and as I hoped. So yeah, I think I’ll be able to listen to it with a bit of distance, pretty soon.

Do you feel like the shackles are off now that it’s done?
Yeah, I’ve probably driven my poor old friends and family a bit mad with all the various versions and questions. I don’t do this on my own, a lot of people help. You’ll see the list of people that played on it. A couple people sang on it, backing vocals, and people have heard various versions along the way. It would be nice to not be in that level of concentration, absolutely, and just be able to think about other things.

Did people come from everywhere to help you get this finished?
They did, which is really, really nice of people, because it’s a big ask. I mean, one friend of mine, Todd, has made three videos, handmade, hand-cut. He gets photocopies of various things and takes frame by frame, like a cartoon or comic, to get the movement. It’s taken him months. He did that, and then people have drummed on it, played bass on it, recorded… there’s a lot that goes into the album. There’s a lot of to-and-fro-ing that goes on behind the scenes. Often, obviously, you don’t hear from bands when they’re working on things, and then they present a finished product. But there’s so many conversations around it, getting things mastered, sent off to get manufactured. People did the artwork. Louise did the artwork. I changed the cover on her at the last minute, I flipped it. It was going be the front, and that was going to be the back, and we signed off on it, and I got her to change it last minute. People have been unbelievably generous with their time.

Do you see The City Lights doing anything else in the future?
No, The City Lights sort of blew into Snakeheads, Harry played bass, and Graham drummed on it, and they were the final members of The City Lights anyway. I think I definitely want to create music, but I don’t know what banner I would hang it under if you know what I mean. I’m not sure what I’ll do next. But it won’t be The City Lights.

Interview By Rob Lyon

Belconnen Highs is out now, purchase HERE…