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Interview with Robert Forster

Irish Times June 7, 1997

If anyone has a right to be bitter and twisted and full of ''it should have been me'' stories, it's Robert Forster of the Go-Betweens, an Australian band which during the 1980s was acclaimed as packing more songwriting punch than their close friends and touring partners, REM, but which somehow never made it into multi-platinum, front cover of Rolling Stone land. Between 1983 and 1989 they released six of the best albums ever recorded in that decade and while they may never have bothered the compilers of the charts, those people who did hear them were invariably inspired to form their own band.

''I do try to be resentful, I really do, but I just can't bring myself to do it,'' says Forster who played the Lennon to his song-writing partner's Grant McLennan's McCartney in the band. '

'People often ask me would I swap the artistic reputation of a top 20 hit but I wouldn't and that comes down to how we feel about the music. Even in the early days when we formed in Brisbane we were always shocked after playing a gig that people we had never met before would come up to us and congratulate us on the songs and in a sense we've kept that naive sort of innocence about us. I never have that 'we were robbed' feeling when looking around now at where some of our contemporaries are.''

If ever a band epitomised the cliche of ''critical acclaim but commercial indifference'' it is the Go-Betweens. Salivated over by critics and the more discerning end of the musical fan spectrum, they never compromised their superb melodies and bitter-sweet lyrics. ''There really is no need to sell 10 million copies of your album and while that situation would certainly have helped us, it's not what we're about. Looking back now I'm sort of glad that I never ended up being a rock star and standing on a PA stack in a stadium waving a white flag round, if you know what I mean.''

Robert grew up on a diet of Lovin' Spoonful, Creedence Clearwater Revival and Jonathan Richman, while today he listens a lot to Stereolab, Tindersticks, Radiohead and Beck: ''People say the art of songwriting is dead what with pub rockers stealing the headlines and all of that, but there are still great songs around, maybe just a bit more disguised these days.''

The current reunion tour (the band broke up at the start of the decade to pursue solo careers) is an organic affair and not motivated by financial reasons he says. ''We started playing again, just for a laugh, back in Australia and then last year the French magazine Les Inrockuptibles were celebrating their 10th anniversary and they judged our last album 16 Lovers Lane to be one of the three best albums recorded between 1986-96. Then we got asked to do a few more gigs in Europe and we were pleasantly surprised that (a) people still remembered us and (b) they still hold the songs in such affection. And I'm not just saying this, but we've always had a very devoted following in Ireland which I'm grateful for.

''The other thing about this reunion tour is that we're not all being represented by different lawyers and travelling in different tour buses and there are no rows about who gets to walk onstage first each nights — the sort of situation that we know exists on other reunion tours. We're doing it as friends.''

Any chance of a new Go-Betweens album? ''I really think we've done enough with the six albums so I don't think so. And it was good to go out on 16 Lovers Lane which will feature prominently in our live act. Also, I don't think there'll be more albums because our work has yet to be put into the right context. People go on about REM and U2 and stuff but the race hasn't been run yet. One day people will see the Go-Betweens for what they really were. Of that I'm sure.'' Too right.