“It’s the nature of the music for sure,” Hamilton agrees. “Helmet has got a certain intensity to it, and it’s not necessarily about being hard; it’s just kind of intense. Somebody said they saw me playing a jazz gig at a party. My approach to music is that I’m just kind of ‘in’ it I think; I don’t really go through the motions.
“I think it’s in my nature,” he adds. “I’m a bit hyperactive, I think, and music’s a good outlet for me.
“Once I write the thing (a new album), I kinda just let them be,” he states, “and try not to compare them to anything. It sounds like Helmet to me, which is a good thing. I think people get carried away trying to be eclectic,” he shrugs. “People do music for different reasons, and I think Helmet at this point is kinda well established in its vocabulary.
“I love punk music, and if you listen early Helmet stuff, and a song like Impressionable has kind of a punk/hardcore vibe. So I think it’s always been there, and is sort of part of the fabric of the band… I love Gang Of Four and Wire and Killing Joke, Buzzcocks and Undertones and all that music.”
Aside from this, and taking the record’s name from one of his favourite poems, Hamilton is immensely happy with the way the album has turned out. “Yeah, I love it,” he enthuses, “we’re gonna have a really good time playing these songs live. It’s really been a blast.
“I think it had been bouncing around for a while,” he recalls, regarding the title of the album, “there’s this (early 20th century American poet) Ezra Pound poem called The Seeing Eye that I was drawn to, about the notion of karma, and it just stuck with me. It’s like the blind leading the blind notion. I don’t want to get too heavy, but it turned out cool,” he muses.
“I like the title and I like the album a lot.”
Helmet return to Australia for the first time since 2008 in the next month, playing a run of shows around the country, and seeing them land in Melbourne at The Hi-Fi on June 25. Pane Hamilton and his band love the way in which Australians are sincere about their love of the band and rock music in general, and can’t wait to destroy Aussie audiences once again. “Oh God yeah, we can’t wait,” Hamilton says happily, “we’re really excited.
“It’s always been one of the highlights of touring. We’ve always had a great time down there. And people seem to be really into the music, which sounds silly, but so much of rock music is not about the music. It’s about the show, or the fashion or whatever. And Helmet is little to do with that.
“In Australia and Germany and France and a few other places people really just want to hear a band play music, which is great for us, ‘cos that’s what we do.”
Helmet’s history goes all the way back to the late-’80s. They saw the heady heights of commercial success during the grunge-driven alternative rock boom of the early to mid ’90s, before actually breaking up in 1998, completely burnt out by the endless recording and touring schedule and just by being an in-demand band.
After a five-six year break, Hamilton decided to revive the band, and Seeing Eye Dog is their third release since reforming and the band’s seventh overall. Hamilton agrees that it has been a long and storied career for the band, but is very happy with their current musical output and where things sit in mid 2011 for Helmet.
“Yeah, it was ’89 we started,” he recalls, “and then the band broke up in early ’98, the last show we played was late ’97, and then officially broke up in early ’98. Then in kinda re-formed it in 2003, something like that. This is our third album since then, and this is the one I’m happiest with, I’m really enjoying this one, and just loving playing these songs.
“It was a great time, but then the guys decided it was a good time to leave,” he quips, regarding the heady days of success during the ’90s, “and leave me sitting with my thumb up my ass,” he laughs.
“John and Henry (drummer John Stanier and bassist Henry Bogdan – the band’s other two long-term members, from ’89-’98) were tired at that point, and wanted to do something else. It’s worked out fine for all of us. I think they’re happy as far as I’ve heard, and I am.
“But it’s hard to keep bandmates; those problems are economic, people want to get paid… But the (current) lineup’s working out good, I really like these guys.”
And so what of the future for Helmet? “I have thought about making another album,” Page states, “I said that when I hit 50 I’d be done, but I didn’t know it was going to still be this much fun!”
