“I’m actually using all Sydney-based musicians,” he explains. “I’ve got a crazy kind of personal connection to Australia, because one of my best friends lives in Sydney and he’s opening the tour. His name is Cam Nacson. When I came down in 2012, we just ran around meeting a ton of people he knew, so I kind of have this great connection with Australia through having a really good friend who lives there. Cam introduced me to Michael McGlynn who owns the Vienna People Studio in Sydney, and he’s mediating a band for me, so he found all these great musicians.”
The first single from the album, Lick My Wounds, is a sharp contrast to A Drop in the Ocean, the song that launched Ron’s solo career in 2005, and he thinks the progression is a natural step in his music.
“I feel like if you’re gonna make the same record over and over again, there’s really no point to it. It’s like, ‘Why not listen to the old record?’, so I always figured that if I could evolve, I would probably entertain myself more and entertain the fans more by doing something new and interesting. For me, Calling Off The Dogs was an adventure; I wanted everybody to hear that I was trying to search the depths of my creative ability, and go into everything I understand about music and everything I understand about what it is to be a person, and try to tell those stories. It was definitely an adventure for me – writing and producing this record was really exciting for me.”
Ron’s inspiration comes from the primal instincts of being human, attributing it to the essentials of experiences. “I just try to pay attention, as simple as that sounds. I think great songs generally focus on some kind of fundamental elements of what it means to be a human being, whether it’s excitement or love or hope or faith, desire, things like that. If you don’t understand the story of the song, you know the core, the feeling. A great song about going out to a club, even if you’ve never been to a nightclub, you know what it is.
“If you’re five years old you know what it’s like to be excited to want to go somewhere to have a good time. So whether it’s about falling in love or wanting to dance, I think great songs touch on those deep fundamental human experiences. I’m just trying to figure out what those things are and what I want to say about them. So I pay attention.”
It’s hard for Ron to pick a favourite crowd since he’s still surprised he has fans as far away as Australia, which knocks him off his feet. “I live in New York and when people come to see me I’m like, ‘Huh? Go figure’, because even though I live there and have lived there for 12 years, it’s New York City and they could be at 100 concerts. And then you go to another country like Sweden and people show up and I’m flabbergasted because I’m on the other side of an ocean and people are coming to see me.
“And when I come to Australia, you can’t get much farther from where I created this music then Australia, but people show up to the shows and it blows my damn mind. Every night is incredible and I encounter these crowds that show up and know the music, they’re excited to hear it and sing along. They’ve lined up in front of the venues early and my shows all over the world have been selling out this year.”
And even after being in the music industry for a decade, the little things can still surprise him. “I was once walking somewhere, and my wife called me and was like, ‘You’re on TV right now!’ and I had no idea it was going to happen, so that kind of thing can occasionally happen. Friends will be somewhere, I’ll pop on the radio or something. It’s exciting to be surprised, hearing my music in people’s day to day lives.”
BY DANIEL CONAGHAN
