Welcome To City

Where better to interview Davey Craddock about his debut album, City West, than the cultural hub of City West itself?

"Was this deliberate?" Craddock laughs. "That's quite funny. It's a good shtick."

Camped amongst prams and schoolkids visiting Scitech, however, it should be pointed out that the title has a meaning beyond being a mere homage to Harvey Norman...

"They actually paid for the whole album," Craddock jokes. "Can you include a logo?

"No, what it is, is that I wanted to somehow evoke Perth and Western Australia," he offers. "I thought about it a lot, both musically and the themes of the album, are about the country colliding with the city. In terms of the music, I'm not from America, obviously,  but a lot of the sounds are very American and country, blues, New Orleans, soul -  it's very American as a sonic palette.

"Theme-wise, I grew up in regional WA (Bunbury). It started being written when I moved here, a couple of the songs are very old. So it really is about the collision of the city and the country.

Craddock says his arrival in Perth "wasn't a violent collision, just an awkwardness. It wasn't like City Slickers.

"But also a lot of those songs were written at the start of the boom in Perth. I wanted to evoke Perth somehow and I really didn't want people to read that and think of it as a country album. I don't think of it as a country music, so I really like the word 'city' being there. It's a nice middle ground, being kind of a country-sounding album and an urban, cosmopolitan-sounding album. I just like the words."

One word that Craddock is not so comfortable with is the use of the catch-all 'Americana' to describe his music.

“I’m a little uneasy about the word 'Americana' because, while it’s useful to describe some of the actual sounds and musical styles on the album, the songs are all about very local, Australian things. Americana can be a useful umbrella to bunch together like-minded fans or musicians, but as an Australian songwriter the word is kind of problematic."

The songs on City West are very much Craddock's friends, many having travelled with him through solo gigs, demos, band shows and various versions and recordings. Their evolution is at the very fabric of what Craddock - who will tour nationally this year in both solo and band guises - and his outfit The Spectacles represent.

"The earliest song, Rolling River, is a song from 2004," he notes. "I didn't want to put it on the album at all, but Todd (Pickett, original drummer) really likes that song and he actually covers it in his solo sets.  He almost insisted on including it. Luke (Dux, guitar) really likes playing that song, he does this really weird gypsy-sounding guitar solo on it. So that's why it's on there.

"Other songs, like Girls Light Fires, that was written with the band in mind. I never could have written that song four years ago because I didn't have Luke Dux in the band, or Mo Wilson (keys). It's like, I know I have this palette, and these sounds to deal with, so now I can write that song." 

For a solo guy getting a band around and behind him, Craddock could never have once imagined the calibre and community assembled within The Spectacles. All band members literally love The Band, and echo that group's lively call-and-response-to-action as they drive through the songs onstage.

"That's been such a blessing. Todd recorded the album, but he's no longer playing with us so Bryn Stanford (Mathas, Mei Saraswati) is, and he's a fantastic drummer as well. It's always been about friends, not design. I've been so lucky to have all the pieces fall together like that."

Originally published in X-Press Magazine