It has been twenty years since the kings of the L.A. swing revival Royal Crown Revue first pulled themselves into a room to jam and thus spark a worldwide phenomenon of quiffs and vintage dresses dresses as people relived.
“I think because of the style of music that we do, even when the band was younger it had that sort of [classic] name attached to it,” guitarist Mark Cally explains. “Because what we actually call ourselves is a classic American music band.”Being a “classic American band,” however, doesn’t bring a sense of nostalgia to the crew, who are celebrating their 20th anniversary this year. “The band is very focused on the future right now. We’re not sitting on our laurels and thinking “aren’t we fabulous for what we’ve done?” Now the challenge is where do we take it now? We’re much more interested in the next twenty [years] than the last twenty.”
“There’s always a period of looking back and you know, the band has done a lot of great things and been responsible for a lot of great things in terms of artists and you know being copied by a lot of other bands. I think the band has a lot to be proud of, but for us it’s also a moment to try and recreate ourselves and to try a new direction as well.”
This new direction is going to be something. Aware of the over-the-top realities of what the genre has become, Cally explains they’re trying to move somewhere different.
“I don’t think it’s ever enough to say “Well we have the Royal Crown Revue sound,” or whatever or we have our big hit and then just go out and play the same old things. I think this year especially, because of the twentieth anniversary we’ve all had to ask ourselves “Well it was great” and we can look back at the past, but it always begs the question where do we go from here? Are we going to just keep on regurgitating the past? Bring out another album that sounds like the last one? We’ve thought a lot about what sort of direction we want to move in, but it’s not as though the band is changing into something else like a karaoke band or something like that, but to take what we’ve done before and to try and expand on it without sounding like we’re still doing the swing thing, because now that sounds very passe.
“What the band started in the 90s and what it became were really two different things and a lot of bands that came after us took maybe aspects of the thing that we had done and took it in new directions and everything became very cartoonish in the swing scene. I suppose that’s the thing that we want to step away from and concentrate more on the music and the artistic side of it and just present really good material and do it as well as we can.”
So while the band are currently on their twentieth anniversary tour, with a best of CD and a live DVD to support it, they’re still looking ahead.
“We’re actually in the middle of writing [the next album] right now,” Cally enthusiastically mentions. “That’s always the most interesting time when we all sit around and see what sticks and what doesn’t.
“[Songwriting] is very much a collaborative thing and usually the spark of the idea comes from Eddie. He says he’s got some idea for something and he’ll have an idea for a guitar or a melodic idea or a name or something like that and whoever is sitting there at that time will expand on it and then it just gets passed around between us all and then you say “Ok, I think we have enough ideas to start to make a song of it” and we have a full rehearsal when everyone has all of their instruments and we start playing it through and everyone says they like this bit they like that bit and that’s it.”
Not that the band is ignoring the legacy of their inspirations.
“It’s exactly the same [with standards]. We sit down and do the same thing with it. It’s never enough to just say ok this is a song by Frank Sinatra or Nat King Cole or whatever, let’s just rip off their version and do it live. We always sit there and say “How can we make it our version?” and that usually involves giving it a little something. Making it a bit more rockabilly or whatever. I write a lot of the arrangements, so I’ll come up with something and Eddie will say “I like it” or “it needs to have more punch of more driving, take it back and work on it some more,” so it’s a process that goes over and over until we get it.”
Royal Crown Revue bring their spectacular new show featuring guest vocalist Jennifer Keith to Australia in December.
Be sure to check them out at one of the following shows:
DECEMBER
8 - Fly By Night, Fremantle, WA
9 - The Tivoli, Brisbane, QLD
10 - The Forum, Melbourne, VIC
11 - Meredith Music Festival, Meredith, VIC (Sold Out)
12 - The Metro, Sydney, NSW
Tickets are on sale now and available by following this link. See you there.
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