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The Beautiful Girls: Australian tour 2011

21 January 2011 View Comments

Mat McHugh, Paulie Bromley and Bruce Braybrooke have packed their instruments, surfboards and barbecue equipment and kicked off their around Australia. They spoke with Bella Papadopoulou Dobrowolska about their second single My mind is an echo chamber from their latest album Spooks.

Mat McHugh, Bruce Braybrooke and Paulie Bromley (L-R). Image: Bella Papadopoulou Dobrowolska.

While on tour, The Beautiful Girls take time out of their schedule to enjoy the Australian summer.

“It is really all about going to the beach, having barbecues and travelling around the country, meeting up with our fans,” Bromley said.

The band is hosting the Pre Gig Swig, an opportunity for fans to meet and enjoy a drink with band members, while raising money for Surfaid International.

“We like meeting our fans and it is a good environment to do so before the show. For us it is not only about the music but about the lifestyle and the culture so I thought that it would be a fun idea to have a barbecue every night and invite people down. We like to share our life with all of those who come to our shows and hopefully get a stronger connection, become friends and build a big family,” McHugh said.

Pre Gig Swig manager, Tatianna Alpert, told Reportage Online of the bands efforts to raise awareness of humanitarian issues.

“Last October the Mentawai Islands were hit with an earthquake and tsunami that devastated the area. The band has been an ongoing supporter of a humanitarian organisation who works primarily in this area, SurfAid International. When they decided to host these barbecues, it was a perfect fit to fundraise for the most recent disaster. They wanted to meet the fans, but they also wanted the fans to meet them, and that means knowing about how involved they are in the global community,” she said.

The Beautiful Girls also devote their time to assisting young musicians with their careers.

Peter Goetz is a Californian musician who is joining the band on a couple of shows on this tour.

“I grew up listening to their track La mar, so it feels a bit surreal being here playing with them now, but it is an honor to be a part of this tour,” Goetz said.

The Show

What should the audience expect from this tour and what is the band expecting from the audience?

“We are expecting to see a lot of people dancing, us having fun and hopefully making a few mistakes so that we can laugh about it later,” Braybrooke said.

“As for the audience they will enjoy almost all of the new tracks from their latest album as well as some old goodies.”

“Something that we think is important when we structure a concert is not to show all the history of the band but for us it is more about playing a mix of songs that creates a good mood through out the evening,” Bromley said.

Music and Labels

Up until now, we have seen a lot of people trying to put a label on this band describing their music with one word. Some call it surf music, others call it roots music. What do you think of your music?

“Some people call our music surf music, but if you think about it, surf music in the sixties was 20 electric guitars while in the eighties it was heavy music and now it is acoustic music. In the end it doesn’t mean anything just that for some reason or other we have been associated with the surf culture,” Braybrooke said.

“We don’t mind roots music as a classification, but to me it’s not really the case when it comes to our music,” Br said.

Paulie agreed, telling Reportage Online, “this is a complicated question because to me roots music is music that is true to a cultural or spiritual form or belief and that is not our music. We just love music and are true to the roots of music in itself.

The roots of The Beautiful Girls music starts when Mat McHugh takes his guitar and starts to write a new song.

“I get my inspiration from everything around me because everything can be inspiring if you just look at it the right way,” he said.

“Touring around the world is a big part of musical education. It is not about pretending to play another country’s music, but you can add some of the flavour to your own music style.”

The Message

The one message that The Beautiful Girls want to pass through their music is love. For life, music and humanity.

“Life is hard enough as it is with all the intolerance, hatred and disasters in this world, but at the heart of every human being lays always the same concern and that is to love and to be loved in return. This is what we want to put out through our music, the positivity and the love,” they said.