OPERATOR PLEASE - Cement Cement
(CD)
Let's get it out of the way - I'm almost 30. It has slowly
dawned on me that, like my parents before me, the kids of today just
confuse the hell out of me. I don't understand their language, their
ideals or their musical tastes. Just when I think I've got them pegged
as a bunch of lazy, cooler-than-thou miscreants, a group of people like
Operator Please come along and prove me wrong.
Five kids who met in high school after a reconnaissance
mission by vocalist / guitarist Amandah Wilkinson (to fill numbers for
a band competition), collated their collective musical quirks and somehow
made the incongruous concoction work. I mean, they employ a violin and
yet Woodford Folk Festival would sooner club baby seals than putthis
energetic and eccentric outfit on a lineup. "We rehearsed at lunch
times in the practice room," explains Wilkinson. "I picked
people at random who I knew played an instrument, and they just said
yes."
Those people were Timothy Commandeur on drums, Sarah Gardiner
on keyboards, Ashley McConnell on bass and Stephanie Joske on violin
- who has since been replaced by the classically trained Taylor Henderson.
"After ten years classical training gets super boring," she
asserts. "I was on the verge of quitting when I got the call. To
tell you the truth, violin in a band - I originally thought it would
be yokel, not that there's anything wrong with that."
Like all good fairy tales Operator Please won the band
comp first prize - a box of doughnuts that were donated to the school
which they never even collected. "Someone stole our frickin' card
that we needed to pick them up!" quips Amandah, but rather than
waiting until studies and exams were out of the way, Operator Please
saw a golden opportunity for good times and made the most of it. An
independent EP was recorded on their own, and after a run of shows and
some hardcore DIY promotion (not to mention a quick jaunt to New York
to prove that they didn't just bring their school friends to shows),
people started taking notice. Not only the cool kids on MySpace either,
but the stuffy suits of my generation who generally need to be clubbed
like the aforementioned seals before noticing fresh talent.
End result? A quick signing to Virgin/EMI for Australia
and New Zealand, and a deal with the influential Brille label in the
UK. "It's really weird," laughs Wilkinson. "It's really
alien to us even still, we weren't expecting anything and we still don't
expect things to fall into our hands, we were and still are just playing
shows, it's cool when people turn up to them and it's a bonus if people
like it. At first I thought someone was just screwing around with us,
and I didn't email back. The person emailed me again and I realised,
oh, maybe this is real."
"To be quite frank, I'm not taking everything for
granted and not letting it overwhelm me either way," adds Gardiner.
"I think people are very suspicious of us, they just assume that
we must have friends in high places, or that we've done something magic
or that we're evil."
Perhaps it's simply a jealousy thing - after all, who
wouldn't begrudge the youth for succeeding where they themselves have
failed? Especially when succeeding was actually the last thing on their
minds.
"It was difficult for a couple of months, 'cause
I was in my final year," admits McConnell. "But now Taylor
and Timothy are doing their school via correspondence, so everyone's
making this their full time priority."
Just like art, I may not know much but I know what I like.
Whilst I don't understand how these kids can go against the slacker
grain and grow their own band into an exciting business, I can understand
the energy they demonstrate on stage. While I have no idea what their
constant screams of "rickymarus with mullets!" means, I can
appreciate the exciting and dangerous music they create. Despite their
wide-eyed wonder and obvious joy from the simple pleasures of playing
with their favourite Australian bands, I can whole-heartedly champion
the final words of Gardiner.
"I'm a big believer that you have to work in order
to achieve what you want," she shrugs. "We've worked really
hard! And it's a bonus that some people like what we do."
'Cement Cement' is out now.
