[Interview] RUSSELL MORRIS

Australian rock veteran and singer songwriter, RUSSELL MORRIS, took a chance with his blues album, Sharkmouth, creating and funding it all himself, and now he takes on something more personal in a campaign to help de-stigmatize the negative stereotype surrounding Hepatitis C. COURTNEY LAURA caught up with Morris to discuss a campaign that he has lent one of his most famous tracks ‘The Real Thing’ to.

Hepatitis C is an infectious disease that can remain undetected for 10 to 20 years before any symptoms can become apparent. “A lot of people put it down to ‘it’ being a junkies disease,” commented Morris when describing the stereotype that hovers over the illness. “Because of this, people are ashamed to come forward and seek help, but it is curable.”

With medical advice readily available, Morris’ goal as part of the campaign is to ultimately change the image that surrounds the disease, to see it for what it is rather than looking at the person. “With about 220,000 people suffering from it at the moment, only 2% actually go out and seek medical advice.”

“I have known a couple of people in my career that have had it,” shares Morris when talking about his personal connection to this cause, “and it’s a bit of a drag. Untreated you can end up with really bad conditions like liver disease, cirrhosis, or esophageal and gastric problems which are all life threatening. Some of the early symptoms are feeling tired and washed out. There is currently a concern that the level of people that could become severely ill from this will increase exponentially over the next 10 years if you don’t get checked and treated.”

Morris really wanted to emphasise that the most crucial part of The Real Thing’s campaign message is that “having the disease is nothing to be ashamed of. You can’t be ashamed for catching a disease, it is just something that happens in life, and if you step forward and see your doctor now, you will improve your quality of life. Human pride can kill.”

The facebook page set up for the campaign, by Morris’ bass player has seen them get a “phenomenal reaction of support for standing up for this cause.”

In support of this campaign, there is a competition running where entrants create a short video where they are required to include; the lyrics, melody or the key idea ‘The Real Thing’, to get the message out that people need to come forward and not be ashamed. Morris will be one of four judges for this competition and will be looking for “something unique, the key message coming across in a unique way.” The winning video will be used in a short ad campaign to promote and encourage people to look at the disease and not the person who has it, with the winner also receiving $10,000.

Reflecting on his latest album, Sharkmouth, he reminisced how that early in his career, his bands were predominantly blues, and that he “always wanted to do another blues album.” Despite many people around him questioning this decision and telling him he was insane and that no one would buy it, he continued on “because I wanted to do it.” During the process Morris found that “no record companies were interested. I simply didn’t care, so I decided I would do it all, pay for it myself and take it with me to sell around at venues I played to make my money back, and for the last six months it has been the number one blues album.”

“I was four songs in and I wasn’t sure of the direction I was taking, and then I saw the photograph of Thomas Archer, which became the front cover of the album. He was known as ‘Shark Jaws’, and it was like he spoke to me and inspired me to write about his story and Australian history. I have always written about fantasy situations, and at this point it was like I was handed a set of keys and I opened the door to find significant stories such as ‘Squizzy Taylor’, ‘Phar Lap’, and ‘Mr Eternity’. It was like I had uncovered an Aladdin’s cave of stories.”

“It was just a real pleasure having people like Mark Lizotte, Renee Geyer, Troy Cassar-Daley, James Black and Chris Wilson all perform on the album, along with singers Steve Romig and Jerson Trinidad. The real pleasure was working with the basic band, which was Shannon Bourne on guitar, Mitch Cairns on bass, and Adrian Violi on drums. They were such great players and they listened to me and interpreted everything that I wanted.”

During the creation of the album, Morris described how he “would explain what each track was about, and each of the artists understood where I wanted it to go on the songs they were apart of. I think we captured the imagery of each track correctly.” ‘Sharkmouth’ was the track that started the journey, “I like the haunting creepiness of it,” Morris reflected. “You can almost see the narrow backstreets of Sydney with the fog laps and people’s shadows on the wall.”

\When performing live, Morris described the first moment stepping out on stage to be “like jumping into a pool and you don’t know if it is going to be warm or cold. I really don’t start to enjoy the show until about the third song when I get into the flow of the show. Initially I just don’t like it, walking out on stage is still so nerve racking. It takes a couple of songs to really get to know the audience and how they’re going to react throughout the show.” Morris also explained of his songs, “I love them all like my children, you don’t love one more than the other. They all have different personalities, and consequently I include most of them because they have their own personalities and there is none that I cherish more than the others.”

To get involved with the video competition visit http://www.seetherealthing.com.au

For more information on hepatitis you can visit http://www.hepatitisaustralia.com/