THE SUITCASE ROYALE

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Melbourne-based three-piece The Suitcase Royale bring their off-kilter and theatrical brand of musical comedy to the Festival Gardens on Thursday, February 16, as part of the Perth International Arts Festival. Drummer Joseph O’Farrell talks to TRAVIS JOHNSON.

Sometimes, a signature style doesn’t develop out of artistic exploration, but from more practical considerations.
The Suitcase Royale’s penchant for building instruments out of any old thing that happens to be lying around, for example, comes at least partly from a desire to avoid the exorbitant shipping fees that can accompany international touring.
As Joseph O’Farrell explains, “It mostly happened when we started to tour the UK a lot, and it was too expensive to keep on hiring double basses, so Glen learned how to make one from scratch. He built one out of an old trunk, and that lives over in the UK now so we don’t have to pay for excess baggage. He’s also made ukuleles out of cigar boxes.”
It’s typical for an act that started out so young that they never really had the chance to fall into the comfortable groove of old habits and easy repetition, instead following a path of experimentation and discovery right out of the gate, having first collaborated at Deakin University.
“Glen (Walton) and Miles (O’Neil) came into class and asked if anyone played drums,” O’Farrell explains. “And I put up my hand. We started playing music together and making theatre. Our first show won best show at the Melbourne Fringe Festival, and we toured that across North America in our first year out of uni. We toured for about three months, playing music and doing shows and almost getting killed, and from then on the rest was history, really. We’ve been playing shows and making music ever since.”
It’s the sort of early success story that can be mistaken for sheer luck by the ignorant, while those in the know realise that such a quick rise can only be driven be hard work and commitment, coupled with a determination not to be constrained by genre or form. While the three are certainly musicians - O’Farrell cites Paul Kelly as an influence, as well as  “anything with a bit of banjo” - they see their primary role as storytellers.
“We’re always trying to tell stories in the most interesting way possible, so we always think, ‘What would be the coolest and most interesting thing to see on stage?’. And also, what do we want to see on stage that not necessarily anyone else does. It’s such a great advantage to be able to play music to assist in telling stories on stage, but also kind of inventing stuff from junk and putting a whole heap of junk onstage is fun as well. So we try to find the best, most effective way to tell a story that can also keep things interesting for us, because we’re always on the road. And we’re also thinking of the audience - how can the audience have the most fun that they can have? That’s what inspires us the most - to create an event that the audience can be a part of as much as us.”