One thing you want for your kids is good taste in music. I’ve been stuck in the car subjected to the crap that my kids like. All that smooth easy-radio shit, gangsta rap, and worse, dance music. I stood at Falls Festival and watched the kids going off to Peking Duk and I thought I can wear a white tracksuit and play Whitney Houston too, kids. This ain’t music. Whitney is music. Playing Whitney is playing Whitney. So what happened to rock? We’ve got to get our kids back onto good old-fashioned rock values, otherwise the world is doomed! Doomed to shit remixes of songs we never even liked the first time round.
The world has put out the call and the answer has come: Bunny Racket. Proper rock’n’roll for kids, inspired by the shit that inspired us. The Ramones, ACDC, Kiss, Guns N Roses, Black Sabbath, Devo! Don’t patronise your kids with soppy songs about brushing your teeth by people who look like Neighbours rejects – give them the real thing! Bunny Racket is rock music for kids that parents are going to totally dig, because all the players aren’t rejects from acting school. They’re not people waiting for a spot on Playschool. They’re musicians.
So who are Bunny Racket? Bunny Racket is Andy Walker of Fort. He is King Bunny, and he’s joined by his wild bunny band: Hamish Rosser from Wolf Mother (he’s also played in the Vines). Killer from the Goons of Dooms on bass, and Drew Montgomery from Sour Cream (a heavy metal Cream band). Now that’s a band.
Bunny Racket isn’t just a band though; for the last few years Walker has been working on a series, travelling between Australia and LA working with series co-producer/director Richard Farmer.
‘We have written 20 episodes at around seven minutes each,’ says Walker, who has been honing the series with the creative support of Will Gammon and his team at Cumulus at the new Byron Habitat.
The first pilot is ready and will be shown at the upcoming live shows at the Brunswick Picture House. Shot in Death Valley, it introduces us to King Bunny and his plight when he runs out of rock’n’roll. Shot with three cameras and a drone, a crew of 20, there is an impressive cinematic feel, reflecting back to Road Runner and Fear and Loathing all at the same time.
‘The cool thing about these episodes is that I have been pulling ideas from everything we loved as a kid. It’s like a big nostalgia trip. Similar to how Stranger Things is working for the teenage market,’ says Andy.
The creative alliance with Farmer gives the project a very international feel. ‘Richard has an encyclopaedic knowledge of everything I saw as a kid – he grew up in Oklahoma with not much to do – so he watched a lot of TV! He sees King Bunny as Fonzie. The cool dude who can fix anything.’
Andy Walker, aka King Bunny’s muse and artistic barometer, is his three-and-a-half-year-old son Wolfgang.
‘I was playing Neal Young’s Rocking in the Real World in the car, and Wolfgang asked, “Dad! Is that Bunny Racket?” I said, “No, son, that’s Neal Young”.
Now that’s good parenting! Teaching kids about Neal Young.
Catch the full-hour Bunny Racket Live Rock experience, with a premiere screening of the Bunny Racket series (has cameos by rockers!) at 12pm at the Brunswick Picture House this Saturday, and then again on 20 and 27 January.
All $15 | Family of 4 $55 | For tickets go to brunswickpicturehouse.com
