Men at Work frontman now successful troubadour
In the old days, they would have called Colin Hay a troubadour.
And he would have traveled from town to town on a steed, guitar strapped to his chest, regaling those he met along the way with songs and poems of love, both requited and not.
Instead of a horse, Hay uses a Mercedes-Benz Sprinter. And instead of singing or telling tales to pass the time, he and his friend/road manager/engineer/roadie/everything else, Ace Baker, listen to satellite radio religiously.
But the troubadour moniker still fits. In fact, he was cast in a television show once as a character simply titled that. Hay has found success in this role since fronting the 1980s pop band Men at Work. His solo work, filled with intricate acoustic guitar licks, has found its way to movie and television soundtracks - as well as weddings and receptions - and opened the door to a whole new generation of fans.
Ahead of his Saturday show at the Park West in Chicago, Hay took a little time to talk about the songwriting process, discuss his touring routine and reminisce about his career-boosting guest stint on the sitcom "Scrubs."
Q. What's different about this tour?
A. Nothing. Well, it's not the same, really. So you can expect more.
Q. How do you determine your set lists?
A. I've got a fair idea of what I'm doing before the tour starts, but then I start changing some things up a couple days out. I start off with a long list and then decide what songs I feel like playing. I'll ask Ace sometimes if there are any songs that are missing and he'll tell me to throw in songs that he hasn't heard in a while.
Q. Is there a song you have to perform at every show or feel like you'll disappoint your fans?
A. There are definitely songs that people really want. One is "Overkill" and the other is "Waiting For My Real Life to Begin."
Q. What are those songs about?
A. "Overkill" I wrote in Melbourne when the band was really exploding, so I just knew that everything was going to be different and kind of uncontrollable and that nothing was ever going to be the same. I wrote "Waiting For My Real Life to Begin" in about 1992 or 1993 when I'd been dropped by my label and I was thinking about what I was going to do. I didn't have any structure and was wandering around. Then I realized that nothing was going to happen and the present moment was which to inhabit. I started doing things instead of thinking about the next project forward or reflect back. Rarely do we sit around and be where we are.
Q. Are those your favorite songs too?
A. I guess I never really think like that. I like a lot of the songs on the last record because they have a lot of personal meaning for me because of my father's death. My song, "Looking for Jack," I think is a pretty good song if I think about it objectively. Songs tend to fall in and out of favor.
Q. What's harder for you; music or lyrics?
A. Lyrics. Because I always start messing off with musical ideas and those ideas for me are always quite spontaneous and seemed to flow quite easily. The songwriting process for me can take anything from 40 minutes to 10 years. Finishing a song is usually a lyrical thing.
Q. Have you ever written a song about a woman and then regretted it later?
A. Nah. Because I don't write songs for a woman. I write them about women.
Q. You had a pretty significant role as "Troubadour" in an episode of the sitcom "Scrubs" several years ago. What did that do for your career?
A. Zach Braff (who played the lead character in the show) would come to my shows before his show ever started. I remember him telling me he'd gotten me a gig on "Scrubs" at a party one night. He'd brought my CDs to a guy named Bill Lawrence (the show's executive producer) and Bill called to tell me he was going to use a bunch of my songs on the show and he couldn't believe he hadn't heard them before. The one thing it does is reaffirm what I believe I do and that my songs are worth listening to. It's opened up a whole new audience to me and I was very lucky and fortunate.
Q. What's touring like for you?
A. We pick up a Sprinter and load it up and travel in that for the length of the tour, me and Ace. We get up around 9 in the morning and we're usually on the road by 10 and drive four or five hours to the next show. Oh! The van's got to have satellite radio. We have Howard Stern on all the way and that's all we listen to. If we didn't have that in the car, I think we'd cry like children.
Colin Hay
When: 8 p.m. Saturday, March 10
Where: Park West, 322 W. Armitage, Chicago
Tickets: $28.50; jamusa.com or (773) 929-1322