On August 14, 2001, 30 Odd Foot of Grunts did a live interview with DJ Tom Marker at radio station WXRT in Chicago, in support of the shows at the House of Blues. The band also played two songs unplugged.

Tom Marker: WXRT 93, WXRT Chicago. Let's make it official. We're at the top of the hour on a beautiful afternoon in Chicago and with us in the studio today we've got a band that played a sold out show at House of Blues last night and they're doing the same again tonight. "Bastard Life or Clarity" is the name of the brand new album. Welcome to WXRT, 30 Odd Foot of Grunts.RC: Hey, man, how ya doin'? (All band members offer greetings at the same time)

TM: Sounds like about thirty odd foot. (band laughs) And, uh part of the reason we find these guys here is that somebody in the band is already somebody you know, Russell Crowe. Hello, Russell.
RC: Oh. Hi, how ya doin'?

TM: Okay, so here we all are now, last night at the House of Blues I hear it was a terrific show, I wasn't there last night, I'm hoping' ta weasel my way in tonight. And Russell, I hear you're real chatty between between the songs.
RC: I like to tell people the story that the narrative of the song is about, you know. I find that for a certain person who likes that type of music, you know, the type of music that we do, telling them what the song's about and the time and place it was written in, is kinda good for a perspective when they're hearing it, you know?

TM: It is good. It helps, uh, it helps to understand the song, helps to make somebody, uh, you know, just kinda ready for what the story is, I think.
RC: Also, a more personal experience when they hear it, you know?

TM: Now, your songs oftentimes are true tales, set in your hometown in a lot of cases, right?
RC: Um, well, wherever I happen to be living at the time. (laughs) But they're not necessarily geographically specific, and you know, sometimes the protagonist in a song are made up of a number of different people over a number of different situations, so it's not always just, you know, as, simple as it may sound.

TM: Um-hm. Now of course a lot of people know you from your work in the movies, but you've been doing music for, since you were sixteen anyway, you started a band, right? With, uh, with Dean here, who's on guitar, Dean Cochran, and you've been working together for twenty years?
RC: Uh, since '84, so that's like about seventeen years, something like that.

TM: Hmm.
RC: Yeah. But the band itself has been, um, well how long, we met Garth in '87, so, you know, I mean, we've been around for quite awhile.

TM: So it must be when you were a teenager you're getting interested in music, and I heard also, that in your early years you were exposed to some theater? Through some work that your parents were doing? And...
RC: Ummmmmmmmmm, no. (laughs)

(Grunts laugh)

TM: (amused) No, not exactly? You don't . . . (laughing also)
RC: (still laughing) Man, I haven't had enough sleep to . . . to . . . to . . .

TM: No?
RC: . . .please, just read the website, dude, and get back to me, all right? (laughing)

TM: Okay.

(Grunts laugh.)

RC: (laughing) When you've got a few more details and everything? I'm just, I'm really good at 'yes' and 'no' right about now. (laughing)

TM: (over laughter) Okay, all right, well, why don't we hear a song--
RC: Cool.

TM: Maybe you could even introduce the song, then?
RC: Cool. This is a song called "Sail Those Same Oceans."

(Band plays an acoustic version of "Sail Those Same Oceans")

TM: All right, then, how 'bout that?
RC: Cool.

TM: 30 Odd Foot of Grunts live on the radio right there. Sounded real good.
RC: What you were getting at was my mum and dad actually worked for a couple of years as caterers on TV and film sets.

TM: Uh-huh.
RC: So that when I was six, I got my first, job on a TV show. Basically because I just happened to be in the right place at the right time. Um, but uh, yeah. Not theater. (laughs)

TM: So when you first go into music, did you think that that might be your career at that time?
RC:Totally. That's exactly what I expected.

TM: So the acting was, kinda came as a surprise to you? Or you--
RC: Well, I'd always done it, because, you know, I'd done that sort of thing and stuff and a few other things as I went through high school and stuff. I did a play here and a play there type of thing, you know? Um, but I, in terms of working as an actor professionally, it was always around my job in a band, you know? And working nightclubs and touring and stuff. Um, but I did "The Rocky Horror Show," uh, 415 performances of that in the middle of the '80s, and I played Eddie and Dr. Scott.

TM: Oh-huh!
RC: I was like a 21 year-old, coming out as a 65 year-old man in a wheelchair.

TM: Yeah.
RC: That was kind of like, that was my first real taste of pure characterization. And that was when I got the buzz for it, you know? And I had to sort of pursue that a little bit further.

TM: Now, how do you keep a band together, when you're do, you must be spending a lot of time making movies, so what do these guys do in the . . .? Are they a band on their own when you're not around, or . . . ?
RC: No, Garth's a, he works for a merchant bank. Dave, you know, plays music, he writes songs, he has another band called Utopian Babies. Stewie's in another band called Cracksquad. So they're actually the leaders of their own bands. Dave Kelly has a post-production facility, a digital post production facility for editing and stuff. And um, Dean is probably the only absolutely 100% full-time Grunt. (giggles, everyone else laughs)

TM: Now, he's been with you from the beginning, you were . . .
RC: Yeah.

TM: friends when you were teenagers.
RC: Uh-huh.

TM: Now the uh, you know, it, I wonder . . .
RC: Now we just put up with each other. We were friends when we were teenagers, but now . . .

(Everyone laughing)

TM: It works out. I'm thinking, you know, a lot of people, when you just did that song, a lot of people heard that song for the first time just then, and they're, they know they're hearing Russell Crowe. They know you from other places, and they know that that's you singing. Is it impossible to get somebody to give an objective listen to your music? I knew you were Russell Crowe when I first heard the record you know, and I'm thinkin' "Oh, there's Russell Crowe, well, he can actually sing, it sounds like a real record." But, you know, you've got that in the back of your mind, who's singing and you wonder . . . you know that when you first hear the record. How do you get around that?
RC: Um, I don't know, man. You know, I don't try and use one thing to sell the other, I never have.

TM: How?
RC: You know, um, I mean, just for an example the record deal that we've done in America, I mean, this is our first deal since, I don't know, for about 5 or 6 years, 'cause we decided quite a while ago that we didn't wanna be, you know, dictated to, as to what we could do, and, what sort of songs we do, and what our covers should look like, and where we should be playing, and what we should be wearing, and all that, you know? So we've basically been selling records on the internet for the last 6 years. And this deal that we have with Artemis, you know, I mean, I think the record goes in the shops about September 11th, but it's all purely about, you know, they're a conduit for our creativity, they're just gonna put the stuff that we give them into the shops, you know?

TM: Perfect.
RC: Whereas, you know, we had a lot of really big dollar deals offered us that come with a lot of hype and start shoving things down people's throats and that's really not what the band's about, and not the way that I wanna approach it, or none of us wanna approach it that way. You know, so we just, you know, we just do it, and sooner or later--it's just like the name of the band, it doesn't really mean anything, until you know the songs, then when you know the songs, then it takes on its own meaning.

TM: Now, we had, we did a blind taste-test when we first got your record here, where we played it on the radio and told people we were playing a new record, but we didn't say who it was by, played the record, Frankie Lee, the guy who comes on after me, played the record, and then solicited phone calls from people, asking them who they thought it was, and whether or not they liked it. And 28 out of 29 calls liked it, so there's the good news, but they were all over the place as to who they thought it was. A couple of, I think more votes for David Bowie than anybody else. (some laughter) So, but that's, that'd be the good news . . .
RC: Cool.

TM: People like it not knowing who you are. You recorded this record in Austin, and uh, you started-- early in your tour you played Austin, you're playing Austin again later in your tour, do you have some Austin connection? Do you have . . .
RC: Only that . . we kind of discovered it as a place that, that is . . . I went there in about '97, and I thought this would be a wonderful place to record a record, you know, because there's just so much live music and the people there are really into music, you know, and so I took the band there and they feel the same way so that's the connection, we spent 6 weeks there last year recording this album, and um, so we went back, did a couple shows, we're actually going to do a charity show for the governor's daughter when we go back there again. You know, it's just our sort of place, man, people are really into music and they don't judge us as harshly there as they might in other places that are a little bit more cynical and stuff, you know, they're very open. And we play and they realize, you know, that this is a band, and they can hear it's got some miles in it. And there's some sense behind the song writing, and some truth behind it, and they kind of accept us and so, you know, we like them, too. (laughs)

TM: That's good. Now, um, Austin is also not a real high-tech kind of place, and I understand that, they in Austin know a good live band when they hear it, and your album sounds like a live band playing an album, and that's a good thing, right?
RC: For us, yeah.

TM: Now, even 'Gaslight' was the name of an earlier album you had, now, wasn't that named after a club that you played, and because you wanted it to be . . . to sound like a band playing live?
RC: Well, there's some live tracks actually on that record, but Gaslight came from a line out of a song called "The Legend of Barry Kable". Um, where this--the story of the song--this guy actually dies in the bottle store, which is the liquor store of a hotel, called the Gaslight Hotel, so, that's why it was called Gaslight. But it also implied low-tech, you know, as opposed to electric lights. You know?

TM: It looks like Dean's ready to go with another song. You got a . . .
RC: Ohhhhffff

TM: . . . something else up your sleeve here?
RC: ooh, b-b-boy, (giggles). You ready Deano?

Dean Cochran: Mighty.

RC: Okay. You gonna play on this Stew?

Stewart Kirwan: Do you want me to?

RC: If you want to. Everybody else is gone.

TM: The band like, cleared out, all went out for a smoke or something, there, right after the last song.
RC: For a sleep, mate. (giggles) They've all gone for a sleep. (giggles)

TM: (also laughing a little) Oh.

(Dean starts playing "Judas Cart")

RC: All right? (RC starts singing. They get as far as the line "Can't remember any loving at all." Now clearly off-key, they stop.

RC: Oh, man, we're screwing this up. Can we start again?

DC: Absolutely. (laughter in background)

RC: (giggles) Live on the radio. Mate, you're gonna need to turn it up, 'cause just the one guitar, I can't hear anything.

DC: Cool. Thanks, brother, let's go. (Starts again.)

(RC starts singing again.)

(Play "Judus Cart")

RC: Well, we got it together eventually. (laughs)

TM: That sounded great. (all laugh)
RC: (laughing) Imagine doing that on the radio? Excuse me, do you mind if we start again? (laughs) Sorry about that, folks at home! but . . .

TM: (laughs) That's fine. Uh, yeah, Dean really is a musician, there isn't he?
RC: See Dean had to run outside and he had to de-tune the guitar, and then run back in, we didn't actually have time to listen to how just the two of us were going to sound, so folks, we, uh--sorry about that.

TM: Doin' it the right way, that's what it takes. One of the songs on your new album I really like is the song "Memorial Day," is that the name of it?
RC: Uh-huh, yeah.

TM: Now is that a true story? There's something about your grandfather and medals? And . . .
RC: Yeah. My granddad was a cinematographer in the Second World War and when he died, my grandmother gave me a whole bunch of his stuff, you know? Step-grandmother, actually. And, uh, one of the boxes that I opened I came across these little, tiny wax paper envelopes. And some of them had medal ribbons in them, and some of them had medals. So, even though he'd been awarded like, uh, 7 or 8 different medals, you know, 'cause he was in every different theatre of war, in the Second World War that Australian-New Zealand troops went to, so he'd never actually taken the medal and put the ribbon on it. So, uh, it was kinda just really strange--started looking into what he did, so really it's a song about him, and one particular night when he knew he was dying, he came to tell me, and when I was living in Sydney, and um, me and Dean at that stage were busking on the street, so we didn't actually have a lot of money to go around, and he asked, you know, he asked me where I wanted to go and eat, and I said to him this Japanese restaurant which is right next to where I was living, 'cause every day I was like I'd walk past it going, (whispers) "I wish I had enough money to eat there." (back to normal) You know? And so, he came and he took me out to dinner. And I'm like, halfway through dinner before I realize that he hasn't touched any food or anything, and he's like, really uncomfortable. And, um, it sort of dawned on me that it was all about his experiences in the war, and here he is a 65, 66 year old man, and he still wasn't able to forget that, wasn't able to walk away from it. Could not sit in a Japanese restaurant and eat rice. Because, and it wasn't--he's not, he wasn't a bigot, he wasn't a racist or anything like that. It was just the overwhelming experience that tainted him for his whole life, you know?

TM: Yeah. Aren't you involved in a movie about Australia's role in World War Two? Isn't that something you're working on now?
RC: Yeah, I'm sort of, uh, sort of beginning the writing process of the script. It's called 'The Long Green Shore'. It's based on a book by a fellow called John Hepworth. But that's a long journey.

TM: Yeah.
RC: But that, you know, that's really got nothing to do with him, it's just ironic and coincidental, that some of the places the book is set in he went to.

TM: Well, you've got a lot of places you're going to. I understand Thursday night we'll be able to see you on television on the Jay Leno show, on uh . . .
RC: Yeah.

TM: So that'll be part of your tour. And then you end up your tour at The Stone Pony (RC laughs), in Asbury Park, New Jersey. Is there a reason for picking that club to end your tour?
RC: Um, well, we just, we were gonna add one more show and I think we were looking for a New York show and then somebody just kind of threw the idea up in the air and that sort of sounded pretty cool, you know?

TM: Yeah.
RC: I mean, it's, you know, reputedly where Bruce Springsteen started his whole thing, right?

TM: Yeah, it was his launching pad.
RC: (Laughs) Come on, we're still, you know, open and wide-eyed enough to think that's a pretty cool thing to do, so that's why we're gonna go and do it, yeah.

TM: It is cool. Well, all right, Russell Crowe and 30 Odd Foot of Grunts, thanks so much for stopping by, taking time out, I know you're busy while you're here, and another sold out show at the House of Blues tonight, so congratulations on that, and we can actually look forward to buying this record in a record store in a few weeks then?
RC: September 11th, I think it comes out, yeah.

TM: Okay.
RC: Cool.

TM: Thanks very much.
RC: Thanks, mate.

TM: 93 XRT

(Special thanks to Amy and Shana for providing us with the tape and to Inuka for the typing!)

Russell Crowe Shows Off His Musical Muscle
By Robert Elder
Chicago Tribune, August 15, 2001

Russell Crowe may have won a best actor Oscar for his performance in Gladiator, but now he's fighting for respect in a different arena: the concert stage.

With his band 30 Odd Foot of Grunts, Crowe is auditioning for the role of rock star during two sold-out shows this week at the House of Blues.

On Monday night, Crowe certainly looked the part in front of 1,300 screaming fans - some who started arriving at midday. At 6 pm, four hours before the mostly female crowd would swoon as a bearded Crowe growled into a microphone, a crowd of nearly 200 gathered outside the House of Blues. Tonya Durdel, 32, waited seven hours to see the Oscar winner and his band.

``The closer you get, the better he looks,'' said Durdel, who owns all four of the Grunts' recordings and saw the sextet in Austin, Texas, last year.

Tom Storcz, 28, attended the show with his wife Penny, 26, who wanted to get close enough for Crowe to ``sweat on her,'' as she playfully put it.

``It's about 98 per cent obsessed women and two per cent insecure husbands and boyfriends,'' said Tom Storcz, assessing the crowd.

After opening acts including a comedian, barbershop quartet and Aboriginal dancer, the Grunts opened with songs off the band's latest album, Bastard Life or Clarity while Crowe sang two songs sans guitar, smoking and singing and swearing through a grin and tousled hair.

Crowe is in the awkward predicament of performing songs from an album almost no one has heard. Recorded in Austin last year, Bastard Life or Clarity has only been available online (www.sanity.com) to fans outside Australia. Yet, a sea of oestrogen-fuelled fans sang right along with the country-rock Things Have Got to Change and the sugary ballad Hold You.

Having written lyrics and songs with partner Dean Cochran since 1984, Crowe has cautiously guarded his musical labour of love. For every Jennifer Lopez movies-to-music crossover success, there's a Keanu Reeves playing bass in the lukewarm garage band Dogstar or worse, Don Johnson singing Heartbeat.

It seems, however, Crowe is taking his band to the next level. Although contracts have not been signed, Crowe announced the US release of the album ``very soon'' on New York's independent Artemis Records, promising an end to problems experienced by fans trying to import the album.

Crowe's 30 Odd Foot of Grunts (named after a sound-effects request in the script for Virtuosity) played with fire through a polished set. Crowe could have read the Illinois penal code and received just as enthusiastic a response.

Halfway through the show, however, the novelty wore off and the fan in the gladiator mask faded into the background. The crowd quieted between songs, and stopped screaming during Crowe's song origin stories, and seemed to be genuinely won over, as much by the music as the man.

Had this been Crowe's audition for rock stardom he certainly won this crowd over with a two-hour set.

Obviously enjoying themselves, the band displayed ample musical ability and could effortlessly blow most bar bands off a stage. Crowe, a charismatic frontman clad in jeans and untucked dress shirt, seems at home on stage, swivelling and snarling during songs, laughing and flirting with the audience during breaks.

The audience clapped along to the retro pop Swept Away Bayou and swayed along with Memorial Day, Crowe's wistful Bruce Springsteen-esque ode to his grandfather.

Crowe talked about writing songs while filming The Sum of Us and joked about his love life, and announced: ``Tonight, in the Chicago House of Blues, there will be no womanising'' - which received the biggest and only boo of the night.

Russell Crowe Needs a Barbershop Quartet, Stat!
By Mike Conklin
Chicago Tribune, August 17, 2001

Frantic phone calls locate Kenosha group; `It was crazy'

Four white guys in their 60s, dressed in black tuxedo pants, white dress shirts and red vests, bringing down the House of Blues by singing "Oh Please Mr. Columbus Turn the Ship Around" -- a cappella? In front of 1,300 mostly screaming women?

"I mean, they were shoulder-to-shoulder, butt-to-butt, and lined up a couple hours before we even went on," said Frank Marzocco, lead melody singer for Shear Delight. "It was crazy. They were yelling, 'We love you' and all kinds of things to us. If I was 30 years younger, I would've jumped into the crowd.

"Every time we mentioned his name, they got even more excited."

That would be Russell Crowe's name. And, as unlikely as it was that a barbershop quartet was center stage at the House of Blues, how Shear Delight became the opening act for the actor's band, 30 Odd Foot of Grunts, in less than 24 hours was just as improbable.

The chain of events started early Sunday morning, the day before Grunts was scheduled to open its Monday-Tuesday gig here, when HOB talent manager Michael Yerke got an "urgent" telephone call. It was from Grunts band manager Andrew Watt in Texas, where Crowe's group just finished a performance at Stubb's in Austin.

The message: Russell, apparently a guy who appreciates all kinds of music, thought it would be a kick to have an old-fashioned, American-style barbershop quartet join the comedian and aboriginal dancer already traveling with Grunts as warm-up acts for the first night. In Austin, a local classical guitarist was added to the bill.

"I can definitely say we've never had a barbershop quartet perform in the House of Blues," said Yerke, of music usually associated with ice cream socials, church bazaars, and, well, old-fashioned barber shops in Norman Rockwell paintings. "This was a first for us."

The call actually landed in the HOB ticket office at 9 a.m., which turned out to be good timing as staffers were preparing for the weekly "Sunday Gospel Brunch." The message quickly was relayed to Yerke at home, setting off a wild morning. "Time was of the essence," he said.

Instead of dialing 911, which he felt like doing, Yerke started with 411, consulted Yellow Pages under "Entertainment -- Family & Business," and eventually, through an agent, got the name of a group in Oak Brook. But, getting no response, he broadened the search.

Returning to 411, he learned the national headquarters for the Society for the Preservation and Encouragement of Barber Shop Quartet Singing in America (SPEBSQSA) was in nearby Kenosha, Wis. No answer there -- it was Sunday morning, remember -- but, in the process, he got two more numbers under "Barber Shop Singing" in the Milwaukee area white pages.

One was for Shear Delight. John Gibson, a tenor, got the call in his home at 11 a.m. "I gave him a `Yeah, right, who is this?' a few times before I realized this was legit. Then I was flabbergasted. I told him I'd have to check with boys.

"I got right back to him and said, `We're on. We can't pass this up.' We had the whole thing wrapped up in 45 minutes or so and it wasn't even noon."

Furthermore, the "boys" had heard of Russell Crowe! "One giant leap of faith," said Yerke, describing the booking of a group he had never heard do songs totally unfamiliar in his venue.

Meanwhile, back in Wisconsin, Shear Delight quickly mobilized as word spread among friends and relatives and everyone cleared their calendars. "My daughters went nuts," said Gibson. "They knew a lot more about Russell Crowe than I did."

A hit with Crowe

Tickets were scarce -- the concert had been a quick sellout -- but HOB did allow the singers to bring wives to the show. "We had a small caravan going back and forth from Milwaukee," said Gibson.

The quartet was a hit with the audience and more importantly Crowe, who invited them back to perform Tuesday. On the second night, the quartet was invited into the Australian's private box, where he posed for pictures the group plans to post on its Web page.

"He was really kind of quiet, but real nice to us," said Gibson. "He told us he likes all kinds of music and likes to give local groups a chance. He said he was counting how many times we mentioned his name during our act."

Singing five tunes each night in their crisp, tightly-harmonized barbershop style, the group went with what Gibson calls "our G-rated night club package." This included standards "Basin Street," "New Orleans" and "Java Jive." They took a chance on one novelty song, "Oh Please Mr. Columbus Turn the Ship Around," and, as the singer said, "I'm sure that's one they'd never heard before."

The crowd ate it up. Emboldened, Shear Delight went with a different opening tune on the second night when they went on stage a little after 10 p.m. -- a song written for the group by Marzocco.
Copyright (c) 2001, Chicago Tribune (Thanks to everyone who sent it in)