Jimmy Barnes is a bit of everything for everyone. A rhythm and blues man, soul man, front man, father, brother, son, grandfather, friend…hero.
But to his army of fans, he will always be a rock singer. Indeed, the most recognisable rock singer this country has produced.
With his suit neatly packed away, ‘Barnesy’ has slipped back into some denim and a tee with no alterations required. He’s stomping around like a caged warrior and letting rip with a new album titled Rage And Ruin, a collection of songs that rock in all the right places or roll smoothly with a couple of ballads gently tugging at the heartstrings.
“One of the album’s songs is called I’ve Seen It All (Rage & Ruin), which starts with the line, ‘As I look back on my days of rage and ruin…’. And basically most of the lyrics on this album came from a book I’ve had all my life which has lyrics, phrases and notes I’ve penned over the years from when I’d get inspired to write something, Barnes explains. “A lot of the lyrics come from that book, which is mainly from around the time I was in my own rage and ruin, when I was hitting it pretty hard, drinking hard etc.”
“It was about looking back on my days of rage and ruin, but having the benefit of 20-20 hindsight to get through it,” he explains. “So although the lyrics are fairly dark and meaningful, they’re also very positive. That’s the crux of what this whole album is about.”
Barnes also joined forces with some talented co-writers from different ends of the music spectrum. The first being Mike Daly, a guitar slinger from Ryan Adams’ band Whiskeytown – “an excellent young guy and writer from LA” – and his son Jackie’s former teacher at Berklee College Of Music in Boston, Mark Simos – “an amazing bluegrass fiddle and guitar player” who has written for Alison Krauss. All camps gelled, and both those talents followed Barnes back to Australia to set about helping the legend rocker construct the material on Rage And Ruin.
Barnesy, the rocker is back, folks. It’s time to surrender to his world of Rage And Ruin.
