In three short years, the four self-confessed “mostly private people” from Calgary have survived the scandal and success of a band double their age. In a Facebook post late last year, they admitted the band name had been a rushed decision and they never meant to cause people pain. Nearly four months later, with no name change as yet and their first Australian tour due to kick off in a couple of weeks, Beat speaks to guitarist Scott ‘Monty’ Munro to set the record straight.
“We’ve got a bunch of names picked out already – we just haven’t narrowed the list down entirely yet,” Munro says. “It’s hard to pick a band name, you know? Especially the second time around.”
Despite the naming dramas, Munro is in good spirits and excited for the year ahead. “Honestly, we’ve been tossing around ideas for the name change since the beginning of last year,” he says. “We’ve been billing ourselves as Formerly Known As, and we’re going to finish the Australian tour under that name. But once we all agree on something, then we’ll make an announcement.
“It will give us the opportunity to make a different-sounding record too,” he adds. “We’ve been working this project on and off for two years – even before our self-titled album was released. So with the name change and a new record, it’s almost like getting born again.”
Those paying close attention to Viet Cong’s recent social media posts will have seen photographic evidence that from now on they plan to do things differently – and that includes their choice of recording studio. Opting to lay down tracks in a huge converted barn, Munro says the time away from worldly chaos was just what they needed to get their creative juices flowing.
“We’ve mostly finished now, although we need to do a little bit of tweaking, then we have to mix everything – but it will probably be wrapped up around February and then the record will come out in the fall, around September or October.”
While they were busy working on new material, the band members traded records and immersed themselves in the classics. “We listened to a lot of The Cure and the Iggy Pop records that David Bowie produced in the 1970s, like The Idiot or Lust For Life, which are still always on rotation,” Munro says. “I play The Idiot at least once a week still. It’s now to the point of disintegration but I don’t care – that record gets played a lot.
“Another personal favourite of all of us is a band called This Heat. They put out a couple of great records in ’79 and ’81. They weren’t a band for super long but they were fantastic, and we’ve been getting into all the bands around that time. The singer/drummer had a band called Camberwell Now and the guitar player had a band called the Lifetones – they’re a little more dubbed out but they’re also really good. All the stuff that came from that scene was pretty cool, and the new stuff we’ve written is heavily influenced by it.”
There’s still a while to wait before the new record, but we could be in for a preview at the band’s upcoming shows. “We will hopefully be playing a bunch of new tracks,” Munro says. “Although I’m not totally sure – we might just play our normal set, which has never been played live in Australia before, so I hope that won’t be too disappointing.”
BY NATALIE ROGERS
