It’s fair to say most Aussies haven’t actually done a walkabout around Uluru. “I know,” Nelson laughs. “I feel privileged. There was something very special about being out there in the desert, that’s for sure.”
Despite his familiarity with the country, Nelson’s never toured Australia under his own steam and with his own band. But that’s all about to change when Nelson and Promise of the Real bring their unique brand of cowboy hippie surf rock to our nation for appearances at Byron Bay Bluesfest, as well as dates in Melbourne and Sydney.
“I’ve heard [Byron Bay] is just a beautiful festival, beautiful town,” he says. “Byron, and Melbourne as well, both of them are well known as just great musical towns. The people are just full of youthful energy and have a lot of disdain for their government. All the things that I love.”
Nelson has plenty of disdain for what could be up ahead for US politics. “I’m more worried about what’s coming here at our end, rather than what’s here,” he says. “I’m just hoping that Donald Trump doesn’t start World War III. I think Tony Abbott and Donald Trump is a bad combo.” (He’s somewhat relieved to hear Tony Abbott was recently dumped as Australian Prime Minister).
While not aggressively political, Nelson and his band promise to deliver a power packed show for Aussie fans. “Oh man, however much energy the crowd is putting out, we’re going to amplify that ten times, ten thousand times, and put it back at them,” he says. “We love to play live, that’s what we do.”
In recent times, Nelson and Promise of the Real have worked and toured with some luminaries of country and blues/roots music. They worked closely with Canadian country rock legend Neil Young on his most recent release, The Monsanto Years. They’ve also toured behind his father and former Credence Clearwater Revival frontman John Fogerty.
“It’s just been a masterclass in music,” he says, “and we’ve been soaking up every bit of it and learning so much. Music for us is a way of life, so we really try to carry on the tradition of those who’ve lived their lives in music. So it takes a lot of focus, and preparation and teamwork, but it also takes something that can’t be taught, and that’s the ability to sit back and let things happen. Because as musicians when you’re playing a song it’s impossible to play a good song unless you’re going with the flow. So if you can apply that to the rest of your life and you go with the flow, man things just unfold in such beautiful ways. We’ve been blessed.”
As it turns out, it was actually a Neil Young concert that catalysed the formation and naming of Nelson’s band. “The interesting part of that name is we met at a Neil Young concert, my drummer and I. There’s a song called Walk On and one of the lines in it is ‘Sooner or later, it all gets real’, and that’s the promise of the real in my mind. I thought that would be a great band name, Promise of the Real.”
BY ROD WHITFIELD
