Australian alt-rock legends You Am I are currently mid-way on their national Hi Fi Daily Double Down tour, celebrating thirty years since the release of their ARIA award-winning album Hi Fi Way.
On this tour, they are performing in full Hi Fi Way, and the follow-up, Hourly, Daily, which received six ARIA awards. Hi Fi Way was the first of their three consecutive albums which debuted at #1 in the ARIA Albums chart. As with their debut album, Sound as Ever, Hi Fi Way was produced in the USA by Sonic Youth‘s Lee Ranaldo.
I caught up with Andy earlier in the week, to chat about the tour so far, distant memories from recording Hi Fi Way. We also chatted about the fan archive on their website which has some incredible material dating back to the early ’90s, and much more.
The tour will continue on later in the month – hitting Brisbane, Adelaide, Perth and Newcastle. All the dates and ticket links are below.
Hi Andy, how’s the tour going so far?
It’s going really well. We didn’t know how well it would go. We’ve done pretty much the same format before, and it went really well, about a decade ago. I think the two favourite records, one after the other, resonates. This time round it’s pretty much done the same thing,
We’ve approached it from the point of view of people essentially need a break from whatever is going on in the world and their lives, and they are looking forward to getting in a room with like-minded people. Call it reminiscing or call it whatever, but it’s gone really well. Ticket sales are good – we sold about three and a half thousand in Sydney which is great
It’s a winning format. I went to the 2013 gig at The Enmore – it was brilliant. We had a photographer, Pete Dovgan, who went to the Enmore this time ‘round. The photos were great – it looked like an awesome night.
Yeah – it was really fun
Some of these songs you haven’t played since 2013. How did the rehearsals go for these?
We ended up rehearsing 35, 36 songs – and we had to get that down to about 32. We had to make a couple of decisions as to whether there would be an encore. Last time we had a horns section, actually two. And we had a cello player and a keyboard player.
This time we thought that maybe we won’t do that, but how can we replicate those songs without someone playing samples? How do we it legitimately? We came up with some ideas. There was a bow on the bass that played the cello parts. There was a mellotron and we bought that out. We managed to put it together. So yeah, there was a bit of rehearsing.
That’s got to be fun. Keeping it fresh?
Totally. You can go out there and do your hour, week after week. But to put two sets together, and to have the first set quite complicated, it was good. A good challenge. Everyone was up for it.
It’s a long night. 33 or 34 songs…
I thought they (the crowd) did pretty well. Two hours on their feet. Everyone’s getting on. The first night at the Enmore, there were dudes in their 50s who were crowd surfing. I shit you not! There they were. As you are playing, you can see what’s going on. People watch a show like they watch a film. They don’t realise that you are watching them back. You can kind of clock what’s going on.
I could see these two security guys on either end of the barrier thinking that this is going to be a quiet night. Quietly looking at their phones with their headphone muffs thing on and their radios, and the next thing they know, some bloke comes flying over the barrier and you can see them leap up thinking ‘this is not meant to happen’, calling security down. Five or six guys came over the barrier, and no one had a heart attack! Bless them!
That’s a gas. So – Hi Fi Way – you recorded in New York over 7 days, with Lee Ranaldo producing, who also recorded Sound As Ever for you. That must have been a fun but hectic time.
Yeah – we talked a lot about that process with Richard Kingsmill on his podcast. It brought it all back into a place. For a lot of those pieces, as time goes by, you either get them out of sync or you forget certain things, so I think that between the three of us, we can put it all together. Exactly what happened. It was good that Richard corralled it all with everyone’s interviews into a story of what transpired. It’s been good looking back
It was pretty stressful. We were on the road for quite a long time before that. It felt like every six months we kicked it up another gear. There were more dates, it was further to travel. More people at the shows, which brings its own workload and pressure, then we got to a point where we thought we had to make this record.
Do we go home, sleep for a week, see our friend, family and hang out at home, and lose all your match fitness from being on the road, which is a real thing, and then at some point pick it all back up, get together and try and get that together again? Or do you come straight off the read and hit Greene Street Studios five floors underground, and make the thing? And that’s what we did.
It was a fair bit of pressure but at that point we were running on nervous energy. Why stop – just keep going. At that point, we had no idea if it was any good or not. Honestly, we were wondering whether it was a pile of shit or was it good. Who knew? We had no idea. It was only really when we had a bit of perspective on it and the mixes were being done that we thought it wasn’t too bad.
We were doing one or two takes of things, and the engineer was saying ‘we’re good, next’ – so you had no time to listen back or really reflect. You’d have to start to think about the next thing. So yeah, we rolled the dice on it. It could have gone the other way. We could have listened back and scrapped it and just come home. That could have easily happened.
And less than a year later, you’re recording Hourly, Daily – no mucking about.
Yeah – that whole thing of having a record a year was always a thing. I think in the ‘50s and ‘60s they were putting out two records a year. Then it settled into this pattern where bands would put out a record a year. Then, after a while, it became more about shorter form formats. Back then, it was an album a year back then, and that’s what everyone did.
You produced it yourself. That showed a fair bit of confidence back then.
Lee (Ranaldo) couldn’t do it – can’t remember why. Between Paul (MrKercher) and Wayne (Connolly), I think we just wanted to do it at home. We’d been sort of thrust into the American market. Yanks only want to talk about Yanks stuff. They don’t really give a rat’s arse about the territory you come from. They just think that if we can get what you do and slightly Americanify it, or at least get our hands on it, then we can pitch it into our market. That’s their only thinking.
The idea that you would go home and make a record in Sydney is too much of a risk for them ‘cause they need control. But we just went fuck it, this is what we want to do. We don’t want to spend a lot of money on a producer, this is what we are going to do. So, we had a lot more time, a lot more space. That’s why the record sounds very different from the last. The process was really different. And as you look at what you’ve done and digest all sorts of different records you get to a point where you have more time and add things and really think through the process rather than just spurting it out.
And it paid off. Six ARIAs was proof. You threw in strings, horn sections. It had it all.
Yeah – we had arrangements. We had jazz nerds smoking joints, the classical guys with ham and cheese sandwiches on their laps.
It must have been gratifying to get the ARIA for Producer of the Year
Well – we probably should have shared it with Paul and Wayne (laughs). I suppose it’s the statement you make when you go down the not-US producer route. So, if you’re not going to do that, then you’re making a statement, let’s just be the producers. We should probably have been co-producers with those guys in hindsight.
They’ve had their fair share since!
They have!
And you’ve been self-managing since 2002. Has that helped the longevity of the band?
Yeah, I guess. That’s been my role. There are pros and cons. I think being connected to the band’s psyche has been important, knowing what they want, where their heads at, what’s working and what’s not. When you are in tune with it, it’s helpful
Yeah – I’ve heard Zia from the Dandy’s (Warhols) has taken the same role, and talked similarly about the benefits.
I ran into Sarah McLeod the other day. She is doing the same thing for The Superjesus. There’s a lot to get around. There’s a lot of knowledge you need to have. If you can pull it off, and it makes you happier, and you can benefit from it, then sure, do it.
You guys are tight. It’s obviously worked well. I’ve been taking a deep dive into the fan archives, that has been put together by long-time fan and collector Stuart Allen. Holy shit. There’s a ton of material there.
How good is it? The job he has done is great.
He was doing it pretty secretly, then he reached out and asked some questions – what year did so and so happen? It was some pretty nerdy timeline questions that we couldn’t answer. I said why are you asking these things? He said ‘I’ve got this collection and it’s pretty extensive’.
I dangled the carrot, we’ve got a warehouse full of stuff, and I could feel him salivating. How about you come and have a look through? You can take pictures, you can scan etc. How about we turn it into a database? It’s kind of what he was building. We gave it the artwork and made it part of the website. It’s worked out really well. He is grateful to have access, and we are grateful to have something where people can dive deep into the history.
There’s some amazing stuff in there. Phoenician Club audio from May 92, which wasn’t long after you had joined.
Yeah. There’s more audio too. He’s going to put more and more up. It’s crazy to think that you can listen back to that era.
Rage from 95, with the late great Chris Wilson on harmonica – that was pretty special. And the gig posters. You toured with Beasts of Bourbon in ‘93. That must have been an experience. I’ve been reading Tony Cohen’s book (legendary producer) about his dealings with the Beasts. Not for the faint-hearted!
It was scary. Those guys were serious.
I didn’t know Tony that well. The stories of Tony were pretty hilarious. The first show with them was at Canberra ANU, and they were doing a really long soundcheck. Someone said that Tony Pola, the drummer, had just got out of jail, and they need to rehearse. It was pretty wild. Those guys back then were scary and dangerous.
It’s a treasure trove. People should check it out.
I think it’s great that it’s all in one place, and everyone can contribute.
Thanks Andy – good luck with the rest of the tour.
You Am I’s Hi Fi Daily Double Down Tour
The remaining shows – tickets available from youami.com,au
APRIL
Saturday 26 Fortitude Valley Music Hall, Brisbane
MAY
Friday 2 Hindley Street Music Hall, Adelaide
Saturday 3 Metropolis Fremantle, Perth
Friday 9 NEX, Newcastle
Photos from Pete Dovgan – Enmore Theatre – 4th April, 2025 – you can check out more photos from the night HERE
