Still Rockin' It - Cheryl Lee
Still Rockin' It - Cheryl Lee
What has Mahalia Barnes been up to lately OR Trapped on a tropical island with rock royalty!!
Join Cheryl Lee - That Radio Chick on STILL ROCKIN' IT for news, reviews, music and interviews with some of our favourite Australian musicians.
Today we chat with one of Australia's best female vocalists, a member of Australia’s rock royal family, lead singer of the Soul Mates, Mahalia Barnes.
Mahalia was caught in traffic at our scheduled meet time, so pulled over to chat from her car, such is her dedication, so please forgive the occasional little zoom blip.
From member of The Tin Lids to having her own tin lids with band member and husband, Ben, Mahalia is really one of the great voices to come out of our country.
We talk about family, about music and about the future. The Barnes Family is Australia's rock 'n' roll royal family and with their next generations of music talent, their heritage is in good hands.
Eldest daughter of Cold Chisel's Jimmy and wife Jane, niece of both John 'Swanee' Swan and Mark 'Diesel' Lizotte, sister of David Campbell, Mahalia Barnes well and deserves to take on the royal crown.
If you’d like to read the review I wrote for the Toorak Times of the “Jimmy Barnes & Ian Moss Rock The Maldives Trip” log onto the website “ThatRadioChick.com.au” and click on the “Toorak Times” link, there’s some great photos and videos there.
Also, if you click on the Podcast link you can listen back to the chats with Diesel and Swanee.
Includes Songs:
The Tin Lids - Octopus's Garden (Beatles Cover)
Mahalia Barnes - Proud Mary
Jimmy Barnes - Lover Lover
Mahalia Barnes & The Soul Mates - Little Light
Mahalia Barnes & The Soul Mates (featuring Joe Bonamassa) - If I'm In Luck I Might Get Picked Up
Mahalia Barnes & The Soul Mates - I'm On Fire
What has Mahalia Barnes and her Soul Mates been up to lately … let’s find out!
Get out when you can, support local music and I'll see you down the front!!
Visit: ThatRadioChick.com.au
That Radio Chick, cheryl Lee, here with you. Welcome to the Still Rocking it podcast, where we'll have music news, reviews and interviews with some of our favourite Australian musicians and artists. Today we chat with one of Australia's best female vocalists, a member of Australia's rock royal family, lead singer of the Soulmates, mahalia Barnes. Mahalia was caught in traffic at our scheduled meet time so pulled over to chat from her car, such is her dedication. So please forgive the occasional little zoom blip. Mahalia is really one of the great voices to come out of our country. We talk about family, about music and about the future, and the future of Australian music is definitely in very capable hands.
Speaker 2:Daughter of Jimmy from Cold Chisel and Jane from the Jane Farns Band, niece of both John Swanney Swan and Diesel, sister of David Campbell, mahalia Barnes, in my opinion, well and truly deserves the Royal Crown. Campbell. Mahalia Barnes, in my opinion, well and truly deserves the Royal Crown. I'd like to welcome into the Zoom room today a beautiful Australian female voice, such a talented lady, mahalia Barnes. Thank you, mahalia, for joining me today. Hi there, thanks for having me. Lead singer of Mahalia Barnes and the Soulmates. I followed this lady halfway around the world. She's coming to our beautiful town very soon, which we'll talk about. I just wanted to ask you about your first band, which was when you were nine years old, with a couple of siblings.
Speaker 3:We had a lot of fun. I mean, you know we were no Jackson 5, that's for sure, but we were certainly having a good time and you know it was a really amazing opportunity to be given as kids. You know, I mean growing up in the family that I did. It sort of felt like everybody we knew made music. So it was kind of like for us. We were like, well, when do we get to make an album, when do we get to go and do a show? And so we just thought everybody did that and so it was great fun for us to get to do it. I mean, obviously I was the older of the four kids and I probably took myself a little more seriously or took it all a little more seriously than the others did, especially Ellie. She was very tiny, but you know we had a good time together and you know we were lucky enough to go and play lots of shows and, you know, meet a lot of people, and it was really good experience.
Speaker 2:Great success too, really Three albums between 91 and 94, all achieving platinum sales and an ARIA nomination for Snakes and Ladders. So you could have been happy. No-transcript so you could have been happy. I know we're starting to get all that now, still rocking the podcast with that radio chick, cheryl Lee.
Speaker 2:Let's have a quick listen now to one of the songs from the Aria-nominated album Snakes and Ladders from 1992 by the Tin Lids. It's a cover of the Beatles song Octopus's Garden, written by Ringo Starr, released originally in 1969 by the Beatles. They are so cute. Mahalia is joined by her sister EJ, brother Jackie, who is now a very, very sought-after and proficient drummer, and youngest sister Ellie May. Ej and Ellie are both very talented singers and, as I say, all four of these siblings now have tin lids of their own running around. Back to speak to Mahalia Barnes again very soon. I remember the day you were born and the day that all your siblings were born and have watched you grow up really in the limelight, and now you've got a couple of gorgeous tin lids of your own and they too are growing into not just beautiful young women but beautiful performers as well, yeah, it's really interesting.
Speaker 3:I mean, they're really really different both of them from each other, but they both definitely have musical ability and they're into it. They like performing. You know, ruby is not tall anymore. She's suddenly like a couple of inches taller than me. I mean it's no great achievement, I'm very small, but you know, it's quite confronting as a mom suddenly that my kid, my eldest girl, is so much bigger than me. Um, but yeah, she's got a beautiful, sweet, gentle voice, you know, really sort of very similar to her personality actually, you know she's. She's quite a, you know, sensitive and gentle girl. And then Rosie's just this little firecracker, she's wild, um, she's, you know she's. She's very sweet as well, very, um, very caring and very, um, aware of you know, caring, and very aware of you know, empathetic and aware of other people and their feelings, you know. But she's loud and she's funny and she's hilarious. Actually she's a lot like Dad. So we'll see what happens there. She's learning drums, which seems appropriate for her.
Speaker 2:As I say, following you around the country, around the world. We saw you guys in the Sundays, which was marvellous, but the last time we saw you was when we were trapped on a desert island with you no.
Speaker 3:no, that was tough, wasn't it? It was really tough. Oh you poor thing. Yeah, I felt really bad for all of us. You know we were all really struggling over there. It's such a beautiful spot.
Speaker 2:That's when I really noticed the girls and their personalities, the little one just dancing around on and off the stage sitting next to you singing with you. As a mum, I've got five. Well, none of us can sing, unfortunately, but as a mum I just thought you are so, so blessed. You know you're doing what you love entertaining singing. Your girls are joining you on stage and they're dancing around entertaining everybody. You must feel, really, that you are a blessed mum.
Speaker 3:I really do. I feel incredibly lucky. You know I'm very grateful for what we get to do and the fact that you know I get to do what I love, that you know I get to do what I love and show my girls how important it is, one, to work really hard, but two, that it is possible to really love what you do as well, you know, and that it's worth the work. It's not an easy lifestyle and, you know, sometimes I mean being on the, you know, in the Maldives, performing like that it would seem that it's, quite know, the opposite of a difficult lifestyle, but it can be really challenging. You know, I mean I've spent a lot of time on the road and I miss a lot with the, with the kids.
Speaker 3:You know I'm very fortunate to have a very supportive husband who also plays in the band but who, you know, we sort of try to alternate a little bit and have a bit of time. So one of us is home with the kids and you know we're constantly juggling who's going to look after them and who's where. Oh, you're staying here tonight and then you'll go with Nanny tomorrow and then you'll be with Mum and Dad tomorrow. It's sort of a constant juggle just so we can make all the shows work. And for me, especially with Ruby's younger years, I missed a lot of time at home, and so when I do have the opportunity to take them with me, I always seize that opportunity because I think that, you know, it is really special to get to share those sort of moments with them.
Speaker 2:It is a trade-off and it is a balance, because I think in the Maldives you had just returned from seven weeks in the US with Joe Bossa and Anna.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I was away with Joe for like, yeah, seven weeks and so I hadn't seen the kids. I hadn't seen Ruby because I'd been, I'd gone straight from the New Zealand Soul Deep shows to America and so Ruby had gone back to school. So I hadn't seen Ruby for nine weeks at that point. So it's, you know it's a long time and I mean I can't complain because I am literally living the dream. You know, I get to travel around and sing. You know like what could be better than that? But it is, you know, like sometimes I love just getting to be at home. It's just finding the balance, you know.
Speaker 2:Yes, If you'd like to read the review I wrote for the Tour Act Times of the Jimmy Barnes and Ian Moss Rock the Maldives trip, featuring Mahalia Barnes, log on to the website thatradiochipcomau and click on the Tour Act Times link. There's some great photos and videos there. Oh and while you're there, if you'd like to click on the Still Rockin' it podcast link, you can listen back to the chats with Mahalia's Uncle Diesel and Uncle Swanee.
Speaker 1:You are listening to Still Rockin' it, the podcast with Cheryl Lee.
Speaker 2:We're going to play a song now, one that I consider to be one of Mahalia's signature songs Proud Mary, written by John Fogarty of Credence Clearwater Revival and made famous by Tina Turner. There's no doubt that Mahalia has made this her own. In fact, in 2012, on the first season of Australians the Voice, she sang Proud Mary and all the coaches turned around keith urban first she went with joel madden. In the end, delta goodrum and seal both turned around. How she didn't win, that is still beyond me. Do yourself a favor. Just looking at this now makes my spine tingle. Have a little look on youtube it's amazing and then get onto your usual suspects and get yourself a copy and, when you can do, see it live. We'll be back to speak more with mahalia after this you mentioned Ben.
Speaker 2:Can we touch on that love story? Was it hard because you met Ben?
Speaker 3:I met him before he was in Dad's Band. I met him he was actually working with my friend, jade Jade McRae and I'm with Darren Percival and he was coming up from Canberra while he was still at uni and driving up to Sydney and playing gigs local gigs and so we met through music. But it's yeah. I mean, look well, we've been married for almost 13 years this year. 13 years this year. I think we've probably been together for about 16, maybe 17. It's yeah, and it's I'm very lucky. You know, we get to share a lot of amazing adventures. We get to share a lot of music. Yeah, we're very happy. I feel very lucky with Ben.
Speaker 2:You mentioned growing up around music and this is going to probably be a stupid question and I'll probably know the answer but was there ever, any time, an inkling of a plan B, or were you always going to be in the family business of entertainment?
Speaker 3:uh look I think that, you know, music was always there and that was probably always what I was gonna do. But I do remember thinking at one point that I was gonna, you know, be an olympic swimmer or something like that, and then I didn't grow past five foot, you know, um, I did swim for my whole of like primary school and high school, I trained, I was a state swimmer, I worked really hard at it. But, you know, when I started, when I got to about 12 and I stayed at five foot, you know, and and the girls that I was racing sort of started getting to six foot, you know, and I was like maybe this isn't for me, you know, um, but I still loved it, you know, and I and I swam a lot just for my mental health, my well-being and, you know, fitness, and it was I enjoyed it.
Speaker 2:But, yeah, I don't think that that was a very short speaking of the family business, you've got a new member in your family entertainment conglomerate, another very strong woman, your mum, jane.
Speaker 3:Now, during COVID, she learned to play the guitar she picked up the guitar before COVID, you know, here and there played a chord here or there, but she'd never really. I mean she'd written songs, she'd she'd done it just enough to sort of get around the guitar, but I wouldn't say she could play. She was always trying to ask, you know, someone to teach her a chord or show her how to do something. And you know she had shown, obviously, like ability and understanding of music. You know, I mean, she wrote love a lover, you know Lover, you know so, one of dad's biggest songs. You know she's been involved in that respect and she's obviously been around it, but she's never been a performer.
Speaker 3:And yeah, through COVID she literally just played Like all day she would set her goal, like mum is very, very good at deciding she's going to do something and then just doing it. You know she doesn't mess around to do something and then just doing it. You know she doesn't mess around, she doesn't build barriers for herself, she just goes. Well, why can't I do it? I could do that and you know she would just take a song and practice it all day and then they'd perform it at night, and every day there was a different song and it's like it's remarkable. It kept us busy too. It kept us entertained and busy.
Speaker 2:But you reckon, is surrounding yourself with very smart, intelligent people and he's got two really smart and intelligent women on his team. So good on him Still rocking the podcast with that radio chick, cheryl Lee. I've always recognized that Jane Barnes is an amazing woman, raising well-balanced, talented children in the spotlight, within the dangers of the rock and roll industry, then opening her heart and her home to an extended family. We know she's self-taught on the guitar and she also does play a little bit of the bagpipes on tour with husband Jimmy. And now we know she's also a talented songwriter. So let's hear one song from Jimmy Barnes, written by his beautifully talented wife, jane Barnes, from from the hits anthology album Lover, lover. Back to speak more with Mahalia very shortly. You've been named after Mahalia Jackson. Yeah, it's like it was a prophecy.
Speaker 3:I mean, obviously I'm not a gospel singer, but I obviously am a fan of her work and her amazing voice and just how moving she was as a singer. I think a big thing for me with singing is how important it is to connect and to feel, whatever you sing, whenever. Whatever you sing you know, whatever genre, whatever style you know like, for me I think I'm primarily a soul singer, but you know, I mean, I think, all sorts of genres it's just that for me, a soul singer, it is about just that connecting to the lyric and connecting to the emotion and the feeling of what you're singing and what the audience is feeling. And you know, going deep into that, that's what I love. And I think that she was certainly a soul singer. You know she sang from her heart all the time.
Speaker 2:You can sing anything. I think you've inherited that your whole family is musical. Did you ever have to work at all on your singing voice? Is it just in your DNA? And you just naturally fabulous.
Speaker 3:Oh look, I feel like you know I work every day on it. You know I mean I've not really done a lot of formal training or anything like that, but I sing all the time and I'm forever trying to be better. You know, like I mean I have my sort of attitude is that, you know, if I've recorded something or I've performed something, if I can't do it better, if I can't learn from that and take something more and grow, then what am I doing? And I think that the biggest part of that is allowing myself to be vulnerable on stage, allowing to go.
Speaker 3:I haven't really been writing set lists anymore. I just sort of go with the flow and see how we feel. And part of that is me really enjoying just being present and connecting with the audience and the people there. And you know, when you are singing from a place of emotion and feeling, you know it's really important to be aware and present in what is around you and what the energy is around you. And you know that has made it really a big learning curve for me to not be too rigid or worried or stuck in any sort of in anything, just sort of being a little bit more free with it and that's something that I think I've learned in the last couple of years. You know, and I think vocally, it is a muscle, so you've got to use it, you've got to train it, you've got to work it. You know there are better days than there are.
Speaker 2:you know, harder days you don't use it, you lose it. And I did notice that in the Maldives most bands that I go and see, they do have set lists, and I did notice that you didn't have one. You didn't have a real plan and you took requests from the audience and you know you could just sing anything. It was amazing. Look, you know.
Speaker 3:I mean, I think that I know what works with my band. I know they all know me well enough that we are able to be that flexible. You know, after this many years of us all working together, I would like to think that, with the amount of shows that I've done, I have quite a good understanding of how to create a set, you know, and I just find that at the moment I'm quite comfortable doing that in the moment, live as we go. I mean, obviously, if I've got a 20-minute set at a festival and I've got to be very strict to the time or whatever, I'd probably go okay, make at least a roadmap in my mind of what the set's going to be and go okay.
Speaker 3:This is the like. I really enjoy that freedom and so and it feels like you know, especially in the more intimate acoustic setup the audience seems to really respond to that at the moment too. So it's good. It's a bit different. My show is not a super polished bells and whistles Like. It really is quite an organic show. So there's a place for that in what I do.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I was going to use the word organic because it's really natural and it just it flows and the audience gets involved.
Speaker 1:It's really a very refreshing change. Also, you are listening to Still Rocking it, the podcast with Cheryl.
Speaker 2:Lee Speaking to Mahalia about soul music and connecting to the lyrics and being present, I have to play you the song that Mahalia and her husband Ben wrote for their daughter, and it's called Little Light. Let you in on a little secret there wasn't a dry eye in the house when she sang it at the Maldives with her daughter on stage. Talk about connecting to lyrics. I Ugly Cried Like a Baby. I'm playing you the version from Mahalia Barnes and the Soulmates Volume 2 EP. Do yourselves a favour and pop onto the Giggle-O-Meter. Have a look on YouTube and watch Mahalia singing it with the daughter now that she's growing up. But you'll need to grab your tissues. Do stay tuned. We're going to talk all things albums and tours with mahalia next, and we've got a scoop for you you lay there sleeping like an angel.
Speaker 2:Let's talk about some albums and then about coming to our great town. If anybody wants to have a little look at the albums, they can go to website. Yeah, if you go to mahaliabarnescomau.
Speaker 3:There's a whole, there's everything on there. You know we've got a store, we've got all our gigs up, but there's also, you know, a description and a little blurb about all of the records that I've released and all the things I've featured on and all that sort of stuff, because there's a whole heap of different things there, obviously. You know all of the music is out there on digital platforms as well, all the usual suspects.
Speaker 2:So you have your debut album, volume 1, was in 2008. You did an album in 2012 with Prinny, one of your best friends yeah, and I didn't know this. One In 2015, the Betty Davis songbook which drove Bossom out. I haven't heard that one.
Speaker 3:Yeah, it's good fun, cheryl, it's really it's. Bette Davis was an amazing artist who I was always quite a fan of growing up. I listened to her. She's sort of a real pioneer for women in the 70s, like a funk, nasty, dirty, heavy sort of singer. It was a lot of fun and I always really liked it.
Speaker 3:And I played a song to Joe when we were in a session in Europe and I was saying, oh, I want it to sound a bit more like this, and I was trying to give him an example of like to get him to understand where I was coming from. And he was like what is this? This I've never heard of this before. And what amazed me, because Joe's like an encyclopedia of music. Like both him and Kevin Shirley, the producer, like they know so much about music they really do, and and it blew my mind that neither of them had actually heard her stuff before. And so for the next couple of months I was sort of sending them records of Betty Davis going you should listen to this, check this song out. Hey, what do you think of that? And Joe actually called me and said would you like to make an album of this stuff? And I was like, yeah, sure, why not? And so he goes great, I've got like a few days off in July and I can fly straight from London and I can come and do the record down in Sydney with you guys. And I was like, okay, great.
Speaker 3:And so it just sort of happened really spontaneously and we got into the studio. We literally recorded the album live in a couple of days like three days I think. We spent in there and I sang all the vocals while the band were playing live and we used the soulmates, but with, you know, the addition of Joe. Yeah, it was an amazing opportunity to do something really fun and different. Yeah, I still sing some of the songs. You know, depending on the gigs, we got to do two shows. When the album came out, joe flew back out to do like just a show in Sydney and a show in Melbourne and that was all we could squeeze in in between his busy schedule. But it was, you know, it was great fun because it's really very different and it's very unique.
Speaker 2:I'm going to track it down, and this is another tricky question. It's maybe like asking you to pick a favourite child, but do you have a favourite song off that album? Because I'll get you to intro it.
Speaker 3:Hmm, let me think. I mean, betty Davis is not your, she's not your nice, polite lady. You know, some of the songs that are my favourites are like songs like he Was A Big Freak. I Used To Beat Him With A Turquoise Chain, I think. Probably Nasty Gal is one of my favourites, but also, if I'm in Luck, I Might Get Picked Up is a favourite, and I play that a lot on gigs that sounds interesting.
Speaker 2:Would you like to?
Speaker 3:intro. That Sure, hi, I'm Mahalia Barnes and this is a song from my album, the Betty Davis album. Oh yeah, it's called. If I'm in Luck, I Might Get Picked Up.
Speaker 2:Still off my podcast with that radio chick, Cheryl Lee, and 2018 was Hard Expectations album. That was a little while ago now. Is there anything else Like have you got a scoop?
Speaker 3:for us Scoop for a new record. I've been getting a bit of a hard time from my band and my husband going. Come on now, I suppose during COVID. You know, a lot of people sort of use the time to knuckle down and be creative and write a lot of music, and I actually saw the opportunity of being at home and I just hung out with my kids and so I didn't really write or do a whole lot. So I have just been saying to the boys that we're just going to sort of gather our songs and get into the studio very soon. We have got a bunch of stuff recorded that we haven't released, but I think that I just want to get in and do a fresh new record. So yeah, we're in the process of gathering our thoughts and the thing is like some artists take years in the studio, take months in the studio, much to my band's dismay. Sometimes.
Speaker 3:I'm a live singer. I like the audience, I like the connection, I like the rawness, I like the excitement of not you know nothing being too over rehearsed or you know like. I like that energy For me. That's what inspires me as well. So I'm not very good at spending time in the studio.
Speaker 3:So what tends to happen is I go, okay, guys, we've got to get in and we'll record, we'll start recording and then, um, we usually do it in in about two or three days and it's done, and that they're like what is that? All yep, that's it. I don't like to give everyone more than a couple of takes of each song, because I feel like then if people start thinking, then, uh, you lose. I mean, look, there's a place for everything. It's very different if you're doing orchestration, like you know, like the Beatles, for example, is a very different world than what I'm operating in. But what I'm capturing, is trying to capture, is essentially like a moment, like a photograph, I would say, you know, of something a bit pure and raucous and fun, and you know so.
Speaker 2:so, yes, so when we do get to it, it won't be long you're pretty efficient and you heard it first here there's the scoop, there's something, something coming. You guys are going to be pretty busy for the next few months. In February, off to Bird's Basement, meredith Barrel Bowling. On the Friday, the 10th, you're here at the Trinity Sessions in Adelaide we are.
Speaker 3:We had such a great time. We played a little sideshow at the Trinity Sessions when we were there last year for the Soul Deep Tour. It sold out really quickly and it was such a fun gig. I really enjoyed it. I really enjoyed the space. It was a really nice intimate little gig. And so I'm coming back and I'm bringing two Adelaide legends Clayton and Lockie Doley will be with me and I'll have my guitarist, franco, with me and we're just going to do sort of a little bit more of a sort of stripped back adventure, I suppose. So yeah, hopefully it'll be a great night again. I think there's only a few tickets left. So if anyone's wanting to come, they better get in quick tickets left. So if anyone's wanting to come, they better get in quick. It's going to be a great night. I'm really glad to be back in Adelaide. I was actually trying to get back and do a few more and I do plan to come back later in the year as well, if I can, and get out a little bit more regionally as well. So excellent.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that'll be great. It is a. It is a fabulous little funky spot, isn't it down there?
Speaker 3:it's beautiful like, and it actually sounds really nice in there. Yeah, I liked it.
Speaker 2:And then you're off to Brisbane and Sydney and well, all over the place. That is available too on the mahaliabarnescomau website. Thank you so much. I really enjoyed having a chat with you this morning. I hope your dad's feeling a bit better and on the bend.
Speaker 3:He's recovering well. Actually he's taking it slow, which is good. It's hard for him to not just power through, so we're just keeping him taking it easy, but he's doing well Send him our love, and love to the rest of the family as well, and we'll see you when you get here.
Speaker 2:Bye, bye, alia.
Speaker 1:You are listening to Still Rocking it. The podcast with Cheryl Lee.
Speaker 2:I'm going to leave you with an amazing version of the Bruce Springsteen hit I'm On Fire by Mahalia Barnes and the Soulmate. They're single from 2021. I love the original and I think this one is just as good. Let me know your thoughts. Hey little girl, is your daddy home, did he go?
Speaker 3:and leave you all alone. I got a bad desire.
Speaker 2:You're with Cheryl Lee that radio chick. Thank you so much for joining me on the Still Rocking it podcast. Hope to catch you again next time. Get out when you can support Aussie music and I'll see you down the front.