Australian Rock Collective Take On The Eagles ‘Hotel California’

Local supergroup Australian Rock Collective (ARC) announce a new tour, performing Eagles’ legendary HOTEL CALIFORNIA in full, along with a selection of the band’s greatest hits, across Australia this June. ARC is undoubtedly Australia’s most celebrated all-star ensemble with a combined thirty three ARIA Awards and sixteen Top Ten ARIA Albums. Comprised of four living legends in Australian rock music – Kram (Spiderbait), Darren Middleton (Powderfinger), Mark Wilson (Jet) and Davey Lane (You Am I) – they bring to the stage the rabid enthusiasm of friends who grew up as diehard music fans combined with the legacy, skills and experience of artists who have directly contributed to it. Davey Lane talks to Hi Fi Way about the challenge of taking on Hotel California.

Attention is back on the Australian Rock Collective, Beatles, Pink Floyd, now the Eagles. Was there a lot of discussion around what band or what album they were going to take on this time?
Yeah, there was a bit of to-ing and fro-ing, it’s the fiftieth anniversary of that record, but it also the sixtieth anniversary of Revolver, we could have done that, we talked about doing Paranoid by Black Sabbath, but the Eagles is something that we haven’t done anything like that before. We all have… I hate to use that term, guilty pleasures, because I don’t believe in it, but it is one of those records that is for a lot of people, it signifies bloated, cocaine-fuelled excess, but for a lot of other people they’re just amazing country rock songs that played very well and sung beautifully.

Did you all agree unanimously that this is the album that we’re going to do or is that a dart board or something similar to narrow down the choices?
It doesn’t really get to that. We just sit around and go, what about this, what about that? And everyone has their own opinions, but it’s all first and foremost, we’re all really good mates. It never gets heated, or kind of like, no, well, fuck you, I want to do this! We just weigh it up and with a lot of things, I mean, I’m such a fan first and foremost. I would be happy with choosing something that’s really obscure. Last year we did Pink Floyd, I was like, let’s do Piper at the Gates of Dawn, that’d be great, and of course that would be great, but putting on a show like this you do have to consider what people might want to come and see as well. So, that’s the thing, Hotel California… it is such an omnipresent record, and it is one of those records that is one of the biggest sellers of all time. Just digging into the record, there’s a lot to love. Obviously the massive hit singles are on there, butfor me, the real gold is in the album tracks.

Do you think certain tracks sort of gravitate to you all individually, or how does that process work in terms of who’s going to take the lead on certain songs?
We have listened through to work out what suits our voices, and that’s the thing with a band like the Eagles, there are three, even four singers in that band who all have different voices. When we do ARC stuff, we all have different voices. Kram’s got a voice that can be really tender, but has the voice that strips the paint off the walls, they obviously go to him. Darren and I can’t sing like that. Darren has a really, kind of sonorous voice that’s great for the intimate ballad. I have no idea where I am. I’m somewhere in between that.

I guess you guys are almost like the Australian version of the Traveling Wilburys?
Yeah, well, I suppose, yeah, and that’s a record that has come up. But unfortunately, the Traveling Wilburys record is a bit patchy. It wasn’t… well, I’ll just say Bob Dylan’s contributions probably weren’t his strongest at that point.

On face value, is it a really difficult album to even contemplate, let alone learn how to play some of those songs? I’m assuming that they are not as simple as what they appear to be.
No! Well, that’s the thing, when you sit down and go, these are the chords, they kind of seem straightforward, but I’m just going in now and digging in and mapping out all the harmonies, and working out who’s going to sing what because there’s a lot really complicated harmony arrangements. Funnily enough, some of them remind me of things that Todd Rundgren would have done in the 70s, and thankfully I’ve had experience with working with that kind of stuff. I love just digging in and forensically going, well, okay, this is it. Of course, you can’t really one hundred percent replicate to the letter. We have our own idiosyncrasies as players. It’s going to come out, as much as we try and be faithful to everything, it does come out sounding like us playing their songs whatever we do.

How much research and digging in, going back through archival footage, listening to the album numerous times, to get into the heart of the record?
That’s the thing, we’re all nerds anyway, and we love kind of digging in and working out exactly what’s going on. I was just saying to somebody earlier that for us, it’s like every time we do this, we accrue a new kind of skill set. Even doing Beatles, we haven’t done Beatles for a few years, but going in and doing those records, I’m like, my bookshelf is mostly Beatles books, so I’m a card‑carrying nerd, and I go into this thinking, “I know Abbey Road back to front, I know how to…” and then you dig in, and the more you scratch under the surface, there’s so much going on that you had no idea was there. There are harmonies in there that, when separated on their own, make no sense whatsoever, and they’re not at all what you think they might be. But when they’re put together, you learn how they work.

It’s a really great thing for us to do to benefit our own creative pursuits, because every time we do a different band or tackle a new record, there’s another skill set to take away. All these records are put together very differently, different sounds, different song writing devices, different methods of recording. So yeah, a lot of work goes into it. Obviously there’s the big thing about AI, but one avenue, AI’s use in medical technology is more than welcome, but for me, in terms of learning exactly what’s going on in songs, the new stem‑separation tools are pretty amazing. It’s really helpful to pull the songs apart and figure out exactly what’s going on.

Have there been any facts about the Eagles you’ve learned through doing a deep dive on this album that surprised you?
No, not really. I’ve seen the doco, I’ve read a bunch about them, and nothing you read about them in terms of the dysfunctionality of the band, how much they all hated each other, all the hedonistic excesses… nothing really comes as a surprise.

When do you guys start rehearsing?
I finish the Augie March tour at the start of May, and then towards the middle of May we’ll all start getting together, jamboree‑style with acoustic guitars and stuff, at least playing through things and having a sing. The harmony parts are so important on this record, so we’ve got a lot to learn there. We’ll probably do that, and then go into a room with the full setup, foldback, drums, everything and start putting all the pieces together.

With You Am I, is much happening there? I know it’s thirty years of Hourly Daily, and Convicts turns twenty this year as well.
Yeah, we’re definitely doing something around Hourly Daily, which we’re putting together at the moment. There’ll be something coming up with that, and we’ll be touring at the end of the year. Last year was one of the busiest years we’ve had in a long time, so we’re mapping out all the nuts and bolts at the moment. But yeah, we’ll definitely be doing something to mark that anniversary, and definitely some live stuff towards the end of the year.

Hopefully the world’s settled down a little by then?
I’m supposed to be filling in for Ash Naylor with The Stems in Europe in July, so we’ll see what happens there. You just try to be optimistic, but you wake up and see the news, and it certainly gives the optimism a knock the more you hear about what’s going on. But you hope for the best.

Interview By Rob Lyon

Catch ARC Plays Eagles on the following dates, tickets from Live Nation…