The Thousands

Perth muso Mike Litton has a wild head of curly blonde ringlets, the kind lots of little kids start out with but that evolve into something darker and more restrained as they grow up. The fact his wild child hair has stuck with him into adulthood is a trait that is indicative of Litton as a person, and his music-making as Cow Parade Cow: unrestrained, swirly and fun.

Up until recently, CPC has just been Litton in his bedroom, crafting tribal-infused, psychedlic pop (check out his album To The North) that you’ll love if you’re a fan of the sounds of that other animal, Panda Bear. Mid last year, Litton rounded up a bunch of local musos for some seriously fun performances; being present at one is like being part of a big hippy jamboree. Together with local act Goodnight Tiger, CPC are the winners of Path To Laneway, which means they have got a coveted spot in the line up of this Saturday’s Perth Laneway Fest. We stole Litton away from his steel drums to chew the cud.

Danielle Marsland: Hey Mike, what’s up? Sorry I forgot to call you before. I don’t have a diary yet for this year, maybe I should buy one…
Mike Litton: Well, the good news for you is that I think we’re going to try launching a calendar! A Cow Parade Cow Calender!

DM: A ‘cow’ lender? I will hold off on the diary purchase now I know this!
ML: Do you know what I started last week? A guest book of my life.

DM: Like those things people write in when they’ve had a good time at a hotel?
ML: Exactly. So if I hang out with someone one-on-one, they have to write in the guest book when they leave.

DM: Awesome! Who’s written in it already?
ML: (laughs) Um…a girl who I had a one night stand with! That was an interesting entry.
DM: I hope she gave you a good comment!
ML: Well, that’s the thing, you can’t really write something negative in a guest book. You’d never write it was awful.

DM: (laughs) So it was like, “thanks for your hospitality last night!”
ML: Mum wrote in it too – I didn’t let her read the preceding entry! (both laugh) My housemates occasionally write in it, but they’re a bit sick of it.

DM: You should get people at your shows to write in it – your fans. Then you can look back on it in 30 years and read entries like “I had an amazing time at your show, Cow Parade Cow are the best!” Then when you’re an old, washed-up rocker with not much to live for, reading it will make you really happy.
ML: (laughs) Woah! You just turned a wonderful life of doing things into a really depressing thought!

DM: This would probably be a good time to start the proper interview! Back in January 2011, you popped up in my Facebook Chat, saying you wanted some advice. Here is my reply: “hey man! yes of course i know you. sorry left my computer on while I went to check on burrito mix in the frying pan. what advice were you after?” and then you asked me what the best way was to “whore your music around”. At which point I gave you a erm, comprehensive guide on how to achieve fame and fortune in the local music scene.
ML: Basically, I will go on record as saying this: we owe everything to you.

DM: (laughs) OK. Awesome. You just won the Path To Laneway competition, congrats man! This means you’ll get to share the stage this weekend with totes big indie acts. Pretty good!
ML: I’m excited about seeing Girls. I’ve got a real crush on Laura Marling as well. Hopefully we’ll have some kind of backstage pass and I can schmooze her. Walk past security, like, “Don’t you know who I am?!” (laughs)

DM: Was it a tough competition to win?
ML: It’s a strange story. We had actually decided to go on a bit of a hiatus. At that point it was just the same people, but two people were going away: John Tanner was going to New York, another band member was going to India. We thought we’d go on a gigging break while I finished the second album, which is what I’ve been doing. Then we got a call on a Monday saying ‘Do you want to play on Thursday for a spot at Laneway?’ So we got two new people in, taught them the songs on Wednesday night, and we won! It was pretty funny. Yeah, but now the original members are back and there’s all sorts of turmoil as to who will get to play Laneway.

DM: Really? That’s so different from in the beginning, when Cow Parade Cow was just you. Now, Cow Parade Cow just keeps getting bigger – in both a figurative and literal sense!
ML: You see, we’re basically trying to match the ratio of people in the band, to fans. The more fans we get, we’ve got to just keep adding members!

DM: So every person in the band can have at least ten fans to look after. Makes sense – it’s important the fans get the attention they deserve. So who plays what?
ML: I play steel drums, guitar and sing, Cam plays bass, Nicola’s on flute, we’ve got two guitarits – John, and Karl and Courtney.

DM: What? Karl and Courtney? Do they share a guitar? They come as a package deal?! With John? That’s three people for one guitar!
ML: (laughs) No, Karl-IN. Courtney is his last name! Karlin Courtney. Then we’ve also got John Lekias drumming, because he has to play in every band in Perth. If someone doesn’t include him in their band, he gets angry (both laugh)

DM: What is the tally now, like, five bands he plays in? Do you have to bribe him with things to get him to come to your band’s jams? Home cooking?
ML: I’m pretty sure Octopussy can’t provide him with the level of man love we can provide! (laughs) Pete Wallison plays drums, and Chris Watson who also plays in Runner, has been helping us out with drums.

DM: You played a gig at Ya Ya’s a few months ago and I saw someone wearing a cow costume and thought it was my pal Nicko, who wore when you played the SixThousand party -  went to give him a hug and then it was totally somebody different! I had to pull back from the hug!
ML: Usually one of our friends wears a cow suit and will jump up and play the cow bell. One of my favourite Cow memories is looking out into the crowd at that gig, and seeing the cow on someone’s shoulders, trying to grab the disco ball.

DM: Speaking of costumes, you have quite a collection of tropical shirts that you rotate on stage.
ML: They’re not costumes! (laughs)

DM: I know, it was a really vague segue. But still.
ML: They’re mostly women’s shirts from op-shops. Whenever I walk into an op-shop, the men’s shirts just get more and more boring. But women’s shirts get more colourful as the years go on! Before every CPC gig, there’s always talk of someone getting into a wetsuit costume. It hasn’t happened yet, but maybe soon.

DM: So what can we expect of Big Sky, your next album?
ML: With this album, as soon as I finished To The North, I started working on Big Sky. I hadn’t finished it, but was halfway there by the time we started playing live gigs.  When I was making all these songs, people didn’t know about CPC still. So it’s still sort of another bedroom effort, but it’s better recorded, I’ve done some of the vocals at friends’ studios. It’s a little more polished. A little more pop.

DM: You mentioned in a recent interview that your experience creating the Big Sky album was not too dissimilar to Brian Wilson’s isolation during the Smile sessions. You know he had a mental breakdown recording that right? There is a a track off Smile, called ‘Mrs O Leary’s Cow’, named after the cow that knocked over a lantern and started the Great Chicago Fire. It was this totally dark and twisted song and Wilson believed that he had caused a nearby building to burn down with the evil he conjured by making the song.

ML: That’s brilliant (laughs) I didn’t know that!  I think that’s one of those sessions where he did hundreds of takes of people saying the names of vegetables! (puts on American accent) Carrot…carrot…carrot…

DM: I also read he sat in a sandpit to gain inspiration (laughs). Do you ever do anything unusual to get inspiration for a CPC song?
ML: Hm, not really. Sometimes I drink some cider. I sit on rooves a bit to write lyrics, that’s not that odd though.

DM: And what music do you get into in your own personal listening? Afro-pop stuff?
ML: I’ve got a great double CD called Zulu: Indestructible Beats…it’s a collection of Southern African traditional music, which is pretty good, I listen to that once a day. I think the nature of the way I record, I’m forced to do each take of percussion separately, so I’m always coming out with some odd sounds. I’ll be hitting water bottles and rubbish bins in my room because I can’t record drums well enough, is the problem.

DM: That sounds pretty Brian Wilson you know. Rubbish bins in your bedroom.
ML: (laughs) I wanted to tee up a children’s choir for Laneway! But I don’t think I have time.

DM: How do you ‘tee up’ a children’s choir? Just ring around a few primary schools?
ML: Well Cam from Usurper of Modern Medicine is a school teacher, he’s also a whiz with recording. I was thinking of giving him some of the parts and he could take it into his music class and get the kids to sing and record it, you know, as part of the lesson.
DM: That would be cool. Little kids singing is cool. Like that Feist song, ’1234′, there’s kids clapping and singing in that.
ML: Yeah, maybe we could steal Feist’s children’s choir at Laneway.