Scotsman – he was sort of very gruff. He put the album on the bed next to him and we kept talking, and then apparently when I left the room, he had the nurse in the room with the speakers up and gave it a go – but he wouldn’t do it in front of me. So, it was very, very cool. So, Peter said, “Well, why don’t we do a little show. We’ll fly people into Melbourne and see how it goes.” So, for me, any excuse to sing Nat King Cole, I just went down there. And a guitar player friend of mine turned up – and I was going to use some of the backing tracks I had given to my dad. But this guitar player – he knew every song – and I had worked with him for about 5-10 years, He said what songs are you doing, so I told him. So, he sat down as I was signing autographs as people were coming in, and just wrote up some charts. We go up there, we had a talk to Peter, I introduced myself to the people who were having a meal and a wine – it was a really nice atmosphere for me because I’m used to big rock concerts. And I loved it – it was a great place – it was an Italian restaurant which is my favorite food. And it was really easy to do. And we filmed it and we were going to release it. But Peter said, “Have you thought about releasing some of the hits that you’ve had?” And I said, “I don’t know if I’d have enough to release” and he said, “Man, you’ve got enough for a double album!” So that’s how it came about – it was just by two people who get along chatting whose passion is music. I was very impressed. So, the albums come out. It’s one of those things. My success has always been – I’ve only had a few go to number one – I’ve got a couple of platinum albums and a couple of gold albums, but they’re creepers. They’re long term on a playlist for radio stations – which is much better for me – because you stay in amongst all the different generations. I’m not exactly 17 anymore, so it’s kind of nice when you’re all up to do a show, and there’s maybe 10,000 people there. And you walk out and do a show – and they come up afterwards and they’re trying to buy your album and they’re trying to get you to sign it. And they’re looking at you and they say, “How old are you?” And I say “69.” And then they stare at me and go “Jesus Christ, man! Where do you get the energy? How do you do that?” This is what we do. I live for this. I’ve been doing this since I was 13. And that’s really how the album came out. There was no messing about – signing contracts and all that stuff. It was a shake of the hand – and two friends getting together trying to put some music out there to entertain some of the fans that I’ve had over the years. And make a couple of new fans along the way. Like me… Yeah! Oh wow! Well, I’ve got a couple of more coming up. My brother Jimmy Barnes – he’s huge here – he’s like Number One. There’s nobody bigger. He’s got Joe Bonamassa and all of those guys coming over to his HIGHWIRE DAZE
December 2021
place – Springsteen and those guys stay there. I lived in a surfing town way out in the Coast – and I love it because it’s just the way I like to live. He lives in the fast lane. I’ve been out in the garden all morning – and I love it. I live a simple life now. I used to have a big boat on the harbor and five acres in Sydney and three gardeners and more cars than you can point a stick at. You could only drive one car at a time – you know? What I decided was – I got rid of all the fancy stuff. I felt like all of this was not necessarily because I want it, but I want people to see that I’m successful. Like look at me! And I find that a lot in rock and roll – there’s a lot of ego involved. And I’m a pretty simple guy. I’m a Glaswegian – we just tell it the way it is, and we get up there and do what we do. And if people enjoy it, that’s wonderful. If they don’t – come back again and I’ll do it better. In addition to the amazing original songs on the album, you have a few really terrific imaginative covers and I’d like to talk about two of them. You did If I Were A Carpenter by Tim Hardin which is amazing – and then Hold Your Head Up by Argent – which is probably one of the most inspired covers I’ve heard of that song… Fortunately, they both went Number One in this country, so it was good. The same company Warner Brothers – lovely people – they wanted to me do this other song. You know how record companies have always got writers and they’re not necessarily guys who can go out there and be stars – but they’re writers. And they had this guy, and he was writing good songs – he had these two hits for himself – and they said, “we want you to record this” and I said “no, I want to record this!” And they said “Tim Hardin?” And I explained the story about Tim Hardin – such a 39
