Australia was the first country in the world to give the group their first hit with Total Control in 1979.
“We were excited to tour Australia in 1980, and genuinely surprised at the success of the first album, which didn’t do well here in the US,” keyboardist and saxophonist with the group Marty Jourard said.
“Total Control is an unlikely song to become a top 10 single, but it happened in your country and was our first real chart recognition.
“Molly Meldrum and his TV show Countdown were very supportive.
“We were on the show two weeks in a row.
“The Motels toured Australia four times.”
There have been many highlights to Jourard’s career with The Motels, but one stands out.
“It was the first time it felt like the big time for me in the summer of 1980 on the Cars/Motels US tour, promoting our second album, Careful,” he said.
“The Cars were filling arenas and coliseums, and for seven weeks, we were the opening act.
“We got good reviews and had a nice tour bus.
“That felt like a big step up from previous years of recording and touring.”
Eighties music has experienced a resurgence in recent years.
Jourard believes it’s because “those ’80s records sound alarmingly cheerful, fun and upbeat, the rhythms, the party-oriented lyrics, the quirky synth sounds”.
“Martha [Davis, The Motels’ vocalist] calls it the Won’t-Go-Away-ties,” he said.
“Every generation cherishes the music that was popular when they were young.
“And ’80s music is popular with younger people now as well.
“Our songs have been in current television series such as American Horror Story and The Bear.”
The Motels remain active today and continue to perform shows around the US.
Aside from the with group, Jourard keeps busy with other projects.
“Locally I’m working with a guitarist/songwriter, Mark Bombara, in his band, Johnny Astro.
“Retro sax and surf-guitar soundtrack kitschy stuff.”
And when it comes to the connection with Australia, it runs deep and personal for Jourard.
“My son has lived in Melbourne for many years and is now a permanent resident,” he said.
“And plays in a band called Mercy, Please!”
For more on Marty, check out: jourard.com
Music news
Led Zeppelin fans can rejoice as April will see Jason Bonham’s Led Zeppelin Evening here to celebrate the 50th anniversary of Led Zeppelin's Physical Graffiti album.
English alt-dance group Happy Mondays will be touring Australia in September to celebrate the 35th anniversary of their influential 1990 album, Pills ’n’ Thrills And Bellyaches.
San Francisco Bay Area thrash metal legends Exodus have announced a new studio album, titled Goliath, which will hit stores on March 20.
In a history-making moment in British music history, Robbie Williams has overtaken The Beatles to become the artist to have amassed the most UK number one albums.
A new box set from The Beach Boys, titled We Gotta Groove: The Brother Studio Years, is out February 13, and will include among its contents the long-shelved Adult/Child sessions.
The Adult/Child recordings were originally scheduled for release in 1977, but were shelved.
The box set also includes a newly remastered edition of 1977 album The Beach Boys Love You, along with material from the 1976 15 Big Ones sessions.
The view from here
I was recently asked to appear on ABC TV News to express my views, as a musician, on the recent controversy surrounding the banning of a song from the official Swedish music charts because it was AI generated.
The song, titled Jag Vet, Du Är Inte Min (I Know, You’re Not Mine in English) by an artist named Jacub, had clocked up over five million streams on Spotify and was number one on the Swedish Spotify chart.
Yet, both the song and artist are completely AI-generated.
Listeners were not aware of this fact until a Swedish investigative journalist revealed the song was registered to group of executives at a music publishing and marketing firm in Denmark, with two of them employed in their AI department.
With AI technology rapidly progressing, it’s time the music industry looks at regulating the use of AI.
And it needs to do it quickly; otherwise the music industry will face a crisis similar to the one when Napster came on to to the scene at the turn of the 21st century, which forever changed the music industry and the way we listen and consume music.
I agree with the decision to not allow the song to be included on the official music charts because including would set a dangerous precedent.
With more music becoming AI-created, along with the lack of total transparency at present, the music listening public will continue to be deceived.
Due to the advancing technology, it’s proving more difficult to tell the difference between an AI-generated song and one created by a human.
This fact was highlighted by a survey conducted by market research firm IPSOS and streaming platform Deezer late last year that found a staggering 97 per cent of people failed to tell the difference between AI-created and human-made music.
In the interim, one solution that could provide transparency for listeners would be to create a separate chart for AI-created music.
And regardless whether we are for or against AI music, the technology is here to stay, but protective measures must be put into place — and urgently.
No.1 singles 50 years ago this week
UK: Mamma Mia — ABBA
US: Theme From Mahogany (Do You Know Where You’re Going To?) — Diana Ross
Australia: Jump In My Car — Ted Mulry Gang
Fun fact
Prince recorded the synthesiser solo for his 1984 chart-topping hit When Doves Cry at half-speed and pitched an octave lower.
He then sped it up to create the final track, which was then given to Prince’s keyboardist, Matt Fink, who was then tasked to learn and perform the solo at full speed.
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