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Robbie Austin: 'Overkill' by Men At Work
109 Plays10 months ago
‘I would’ve been twelve. And I was holding on to the ladder, there was this little radio with the antennae up, tin foil on it…’ Grab a cuppa and let Robbie tell you a story. This is a great conversation about a song that’s endured with a fella who notices the details. We hope you love it as much as we do.
Robbie Austin is an artist, a teacher, a father, and a husband – though that order fluctuates regularly. He lives in a 112-year-old house, in the town he was born in Louisiana, half a mile from his former high school where he has taught for the last 18 years.
Robbie has exhibited from Los Angeles to New York, Houston to Frankfurt, and several places in between. Robbie’s artistic voice finds the positive and possibilities in all things. He draws from, on, and in collaboration with timeworn materials: maps, postcards, diaries, tablecloths - anything with an inherent story. “Whether labeling my voice and method naïve, hopeful, elating, or suspicious,” explains Robbie, “all harmonies are essential and lead the charge both in weighing choices and encouraging chances.”
Show notes:
Robbie’s website: robbieaustin.com
Instagram: @robbieaustinstudio
Help us a grow a community of survival song listeners by joining us on over on Substack:
https://survivalsongs.substack.com/
'Overkill' by Men At Work can be found on our community playlist on Spotify along with our listener’s Survival Songs. Check it out and add your own!
This episode contains small portions of ’'Overkill' by Men At Work. Survival Songs claims no copyright of this work. This is included as a form of music review and criticism and as a way to celebrate, promote and encourage the listener to seek out the artists work.
Find out more about Men At Work here:
https://open.spotify.com/artist/0f3EsoviYnRKTkmayI3cux?si=VbE82oYvRSK4Ss9jEmh4Ow
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Transcript
Introduction to Survival Songs
00:00:01
Speaker
I'm Lydia. I'm Ed. We're friends with a playlist for everything. And it turns out, we both have one called Survival Songs. And he got us thinking, what are other people's Survival Songs? So we thought we'd find out. Welcome to Survival Songs. A podcast where each episode our guest tells us about a song that gets them through the best and worst of times. Sensitive topics might be discussed. So look after yourself. The show contains portions of copyrighted material. We'd love for you to support and celebrate the artists by streaming, downloading and buying their brilliant music. And go give our guests a follow on social media.
00:00:38
Speaker
Help us grow the community of Survival Song listeners by joining us over on Substack and add to our public playlist on Spotify.
Community Engagement and Guest Introduction
00:00:45
Speaker
Links are in the show notes. We hope you enjoy the show. Welcome back to Survival Songs. It's Lydia here again this week. And as always, I can't wait for you to listen to this conversation. Ed and I are ah blown away every week at how different the same question can show up in different conversations with different people. And this was just not a conversation I was expecting to have.
00:01:13
Speaker
It's with the artist, Robbie Austin, who describes himself as an artist, a teacher, a father, and a husband, though that order fluctuates regularly. He lives in a 112-year-old house in the town that he was born in, in Louisiana, half a mile from his former high school, where he has taught for the last 18 years. Robbie has exhibited from Los Angeles to New York, Houston to Frankfurt, and several places in between. It's clearly a visual artist where music is at the core, so I can't wait for you to hear this.
First Encounter with 'Overkill'
00:01:48
Speaker
Robbie talks about the song Overkill by Men at Work. I can get you sleep Now think about the implications Of diving into deep And possibly the complications Especially at night
00:02:16
Speaker
All right, so that was a clip of Overkill by Men at Work, which is the survival song of today's guest, Robbie Austin. I always full name you Robbie Austin. It's so good to have you here. Yes, it is Robbie Austin. Whenever you gave me the invitation to to to to join this and I said, what is your name? And I'm like, oh, that's appropriate because I always introduce myself with you regardless of You do. yeah yeah we should We should say that you and I are friends and you begin every message you send me with, hi, it's Robbie Austin and I can see it's Robbie Austin.
00:02:50
Speaker
but suggested I am so glad that you're doing this and you're also our first overseas guest, which I think is very exciting. So thank you for taking up that role in this project. You've chosen a classic song here. I love this song choice. Can you tell me how you first met this song or or where you first came across this
The Impact and Resonance of 'Overkill'
00:03:11
Speaker
song? Yes. Summer, 1983, deep end of the swimming pool, at this racket club that I used to hang out because I played tennis a lot whenever I was a kid. And I was holding on to the ladder. And this was this this I would have been 12. And I looked up and there was the lifeguard station and behind the lifeguard station was a radio.
00:03:44
Speaker
And that's what we would listen to. It would come from the radio. It was this little bitty portable radio with the antenna up, tin foil at the end of it so that we can you know you can hear it. And we were playing Marco Polo in the pool. And I heard this song. And it it it just absolutely overtook me. You stopped swimming. was that a we you Were you mid-crawl or something? I probably got um got got got got ah um hit, slapped, whatever. I became it in Marco Polo that bit that time because it didn't matter. It wasn't about the game anymore. It was about what is this
00:04:29
Speaker
What are these sounds that are coming out of this this radio? you know This was the time of ah but photograph by Def Leppard, which is like, even though it came out in February of 83, I had to look this up, it was a quintessential summer song. ah But then Fascination by Human League came out in May of 83 of that year, and then wishing If I had a photograph of you by Flocka Seagulls, the album came out that summer of 83, and then Overkill by Minute at Work. Overkill just killed me. Are you able to say what it was? Was there something about the musicality of it or the voice? What what hit you so hard? Well, i had I had liked Minute Work already because of of you know their hits, Overkill and Who Can It Be Now, and you know this was this was the same. so i
00:05:21
Speaker
and and Frankly, ah Colin Hay ah had these, his incisors kind of stuck out a little bit. And my incisors at the time stuck out a little bit. And so I had this, ah you know, this this this affinity and this connection with this man ah just because of our... Dental brotherhood, yeah. Right, right, right. And so so just hearing his voice already kind of ah got my attention. um it's it it wast I can't say that it was the lyrics. It was not the lyrics when I was 12. It was the mood of of the song. It was the blue sky. It was the white clouds. It was the shimmer of the water. It was the red of the lifeguard station. It was the green of the trees and the grass and the feel of the rough concrete on my hands as I'm holding on to the cold of the metal. it was
00:06:18
Speaker
My senses, the sensory override was there and it it made me just pay attention to it because of the of the beautiful music. Yeah, and we wonder why you've turned into a visual artist. and seed The seed was truly planted, wasn't it? Yes. so yeah so If it first met you when you were 12, you're not 12 anymore. how is it How has it traveled with you? and I guess related to that, why have you chosen it as your survival song of all the music there is? It's been with me for 40 years, but it's going to be with me for 42 more. you know I love listening to your podcast because music has so much to do with my work.
00:06:59
Speaker
um Survival songs, you know, the my first thought whenever you know a survival song was, yeah the you know, the initial thought was, oh, a song that would like pull me out of rough times or or that got me back on track or or something that, you know you know, along those lines that would help me to survive. But that's not where I went there for maybe five seconds. And then I was like, no, no, my survival song is Overkill. I can say that I can say without a doubt that Overkill is my favorite song.
00:07:35
Speaker
ever. No, no, not ever up to this date. Now, could I have said that when I was 15 or 16 years old? No, because it would have only been something that I had been aware of for about four years. I think if a song sticks with you for 40 years and maintains its importance and doesn't fade in the musicality of it, and it still brings you joy or whatever emotions, like that song has proven that it is a survivor in your life. And it's up to you to figure out why. What is it about this song that has allowed it to survive with me for so long? From adolescence to teenage years to to my you know getting married to having children. I'm going see Minute Work for the first time in October. Now it's just Colin Hay um and and a band he's put together, but he's touring as Minute Work. And who's going? My family, because they know, all they have to hear is the beginning notes of that song. And they know that I'm going to go, oh, because it's like this immediate joy but just that just exudes existence.
Lyrics and Survival Themes
00:08:51
Speaker
ah yeah I think you're the first person to assign the context of survival to the song and say, well, this song has survived. it yeah It's written every wave, high, low, and it's still here, and now I've got to work out why, and that's my job because the song's doing its thing by itself. Do do you know why? ah this Do the colors still come out of the radio player when you hear it? Is that there? Yeah, the colors are there now, but I pay more attention to the lyrics. Now, because I can, because I'm not 12. But that really didn't happen until probably the last 10 years. And that's because, whenever I went, 10 or 12 years,
00:09:30
Speaker
um my kids and I like to sing in the car or I sing and I make them sing along with me. and my daughter ah One of my daughters would always you know the line, you know at least there's pretty lights. She didn't know why she was singing that part of it, but that became her part of the song. and So when we're singing it, and I'd stop and then she would sing from the backseat, at least there's pretty lights. and I'm like, oh yeah, that's her part. you know and And so then I started to think more about the the the the lyrics. and When I first heard, at least there's pretty light, my first thought was you know like and nuclear war or something. you know because Because minute work, does it's a mistake. It's like the the Cold War and stuff like that. But no, I don't think that's it at all. i don't it's you know Because the line goes, smell that.
00:10:25
Speaker
desperation. And there's a pause there. There's a pause. It says, smell the desperation. At least there's pretty light.
00:10:43
Speaker
And I think the p song, the song is the answer to the desperation. like the song it has it it's it like the other The other choice beautiful thing is ghosts appear and fade away.
00:11:01
Speaker
That comes over and over throughout the song and it's like I can't get to sleep. I think about the implications of diving into deep. I can't rest because I'm worried about something. And if I worry more about it, I'm going to get way too deep into it. and But I've got to let that go because those ghosts are going to show up. But then they fade away. I mean, I just think that's kind of poetic. Do you really see ghosts? Are they just kind of hovering there? Do you just see something move so ghosts appear and fade away? What are they really doing? Are they really showing up? Are you imagining them coming?
Inspiration in Art and Music
00:11:41
Speaker
And at the end of it all, it doesn't matter because at least there's pretty lights.
00:11:48
Speaker
You alluded to it earlier, and and I also think it's evident in the way that you're talking about it, but you're you're a visual artist, you're a map maker in my mind, and and I know you've worked with this song and other songs. you know Whenever you post a picture of your work on Instagram, it always comes with a song. I'm really interested in how your visual practice work works with music. How do they talk to each other? So these maps, these things that I paint on, they already have a language of their own. theyre there they There's an inherent quality to them. I'm not just taking a blank canvas or something. There is something there that I'm reacting to. And often it's either it's either you know maps or are field books that are that are quite old, that they're handwritten notes or something on it. And so somebody's already already done something here.
00:12:34
Speaker
And I react to the composition that's in front of me. And, um you know, sometimes I follow it properly and the piece works out. Sometimes I don't. And it gets tossed into into two the, I'm going to call it rubbish because that sounds properly good. Now let's go international. You call it trash. That's fine. It just gets yeah it's tossed away. um But whenever i'm whenever I'm happy with the composition, and I feel as though my mind and my my eyes have gotten in harmony with the language that's already inherent to the piece in front of me, and my mark-making is making a joyful, or you know no, it's making a proper noise, um then,
00:13:25
Speaker
Depending on the colors that are on the piece, I step back and it's it's inevitable. I step back and I think, oh, that's ah that's tears for fears. Oh, that's a simple minds piece right there. you know Oh, lately, lately it's been, oh, that's a Tom Waits composition right there. like Where did that come from? I don't listen to Tom Waits, but I have been lately because I've got the These things that have been, and that to me was proof that it's that's something that's coming from the outside. I'm not projecting my music onto it. um It's coming at me. and and and Again, that's that might be the same process that that overkill. you know The music came and then I started thinking about the lyrics. But I only thought about the lyrics because it was through the eyes of the ears of of a child and and that it was brought to me. so
00:14:15
Speaker
you know i I wish I was a musician, I think, um but I'm not. I'm a visual artist who listens deeply to music and tries to allow that music to intervene with my mark making. And I'm so glad you do. I love the work you make, and I hope you keep making it. Thank you. and it's said It's that bit of the interview where I ask people where
Connect with Robbie Austin
00:14:43
Speaker
they can follow you. so Where can people see all this amazing ah visual art influenced by the music? Yeah. Instagram is at Robby Austin Studio, or you can go to simply RobbyAustin.com. Thanks so much for doing this, Robby. I've really, really enjoyed this conversation. Likewise. Thank you, Lydia.
00:15:12
Speaker
We really hope you enjoyed the episode. If you want to support the podcast further you can choose to upgrade your subscription on Substack, but most of all we'd just love it if you told your friends about what we're up to. Thanks for listening.