Melbourne rock powerhouse Electric Mary release their new record 'Mother' in February, just days before they light up the stage at Adelaide Fringe.
'Mother' is the fourth studio album from Electric Mary and their first release since the 'Alive In Hell Dorado' album in 2016.
Vocalist, frontman and founder for the band, Rusty Brown says they spent a lot more time in pre-production for 'Mother' to get the songs how he wanted them. “We wanted more depth on this record, so we made sure that it wasn't just full of V8 songs, there were cruising songs as well,” Rusty says.
“The best way I can explain that is when we went to pre-production, I said to everyone 'best idea wins'. So whatever that best idea was at the time, that's how our DNA felt at the time and that's what we put on vinyl.”
Electric Mary take 'Mother' on a short tour this month, playing a limited run of just three shows, including Adelaide. Electric Mary's performance at Adelaide Fringe, just days after ‘Mother’ is released, will be one of the first live airings for the band's new material.
Their show at Fringe is on the line-up for the 'Rockfest: War Of The Surf & Rock Guitars' event, which also includes performances from Gail Page, Darcee Fox, Atomic Riot, Diva Demolition and more over ten hours. “The five boys in the band will be the same, so if there's anyone out there who loves those five guys there will be that DNA onstage,” Rusty says of the Fringe show.
“We have a lot of new songs we're going to throw in there, added to of course the old songs, and this show in Adelaide is going to be amazing actually.
“We've been together for 15 years, so muscle memory will be pretty much intact for the old songs; we played a few of the newer songs at our last show but there's a couple we haven't played before. At the Melbourne show we're having a listening party as well, so you can come early and listen to the record, then we come onstage and play songs from the above.”
Rusty formed Electric Mary in 2003 after a trip to New York where he visited Electric Lady Recording Studios, founded by Jimi Hendrix, and met the studio manager and industry legend 'Electric' Mary Campbell.
After hearing the stories she told and feeling the sheer musical energy of the room's rich history, it inspired Rusty to create Electric Mary using her name for that of the band. “I stood in that studio at one stage and said to Jack, who I was playing with at the time, 'we're actually standing in rock & roll history',” he recalls.
“We were standing where David Bowie, John Lennon and Carlos Alomar wrote 'Fame'; we were standing where they would have been, nutting out 'Fame'. Foreigner, AC/DC, The Kinks – the only person who never played in there was Jimi Hendrix,” he laughs.
