Kim Salmon: you might remember him from such bands as The Scientists, whose reliance on unorthodox bass-heavy rhythms and distorted guitars were, along with a statement from Salmon in the mid-’80s, a major precursor to grunge.
Along with his other bands like Beasts of Bourbon and Kim Salmon and The Surrealists, Salmon’s credits as a musician and songwriter have seen him explore a bucket of blues and rock‘n’roll in his time.
These days, he’s living a duel existence – teacher by day, guitar hero by night. 40 years since The Scientists’ inception and now, off the back of The Scientists’ first-ever US headline tour, Salmon is still privy to first-time experiences, an existential observation he hadn’t thought of until this point. It’s a testimony to not only the longevity of the band and their music. “When you’re making music, you always hope people respond to it for more than just five minutes, and that you have some kind of appeal that reaches people over time and space.”
Salmon is grateful for his opportunities to still be playing music, saying it’s generally thought of as something you do in your twenties before you go off and get your real job. “I’ve managed to get a real job,” he says, “I feel lucky and full of gratitude I was able to travel around – [and there’s] still lots of places to go.”
Teaching students music is perhaps Salmon’s most humble endeavour. His students aren’t receptive to his opportunities, success and fame, nor does he want them to be. “I’m just here to give them the tools to explore making music and take it to another level.” he says. All of those things are about me keeping my job,” he jokes. “Occasionally someone will hear about a connection with grunge.
“One student heard I was the godfather of grunge – he thought that was Neil Young; he was a massive Neil Young fan. I said, ‘Nah, not him. Meet the other godfather of grunge’.”
Salmon doesn’t teach for recognition, he teaches to help. Self-taught, he finds his position as a teacher a bit strange. Nevertheless, Salmon’s duel existence keeps him happy and busy, and with an upcoming show with his band at Swamplands bar, he’s a chameleon in a kaleidoscope of different bands and genres. These days Salmon’s audiences don’t attend his shows in expectation of being privy to any one period of his career, many want to hear a little bit of everything. “I’d hope with The Surrealists, people are there for what I’ve done with that particular ensemble,” he says, “But with all the things I do, I’d say there’s a whole lot of genres that were fairly similar but they have a distinct character or personality as well.
“I’m not gonna throw out any Scientist repertoire, that’s for sure, because I know The Surrealists has its own thing. I’m trying to rein it in to not being Scientists, but I feel more okay about doing things from each and all of them under my own name.”
Though The Scientists is still a place where Salmon has those unexpected firsts, with their own accolade of material, Kim Salmon and The Surrealists may well be the route to ticking off items on Salmon’s bucket list he never knew he had. “I suppose on my bucket list would be to come up with something new,” he says.
“The Surrealists are probably going to be doing recording at some point. I really would like to explore new concepts with that, go somewhere I haven’t been before. And I suppose it’s the same with the Scientists, we just play singles when we go somewhere, but now we’ve entered the States we’ve put out an EP. That’s a good way of going about things.
“With The Surrealists, we keep talking about doing something that’s completely improvised – there’s a lot more jazz with them – it’ very vague and I can’t define it, but there you go, there’s something on my bucket list. The fact it is undefined is very important.”
