When Redd Kross hits the stage at Crowbar Brisbane this March, they won’t be arriving alone.
The LA cult legends are co-headlining an Australian tour with none other than Sydney punks The Hard-Ons, fronted by Tim Rogers – a pairing that seems less like a gig booking and more like a reunion of kindred spirits.
Redd Kross vocalist-guitarist Jeff McDonald said the connection between the bands is deep.
“It’s the tenacity,” he says of Victoria’s The Hard-Ons. “They just do it no matter what, for all these years. Same age group, same freaky pop-culture stuff. When I met those guys, they were like soul brothers.”
Redd Kross’s punk energy, power-pop melodies and an irreverent sense of humour has defined them for more than 45 years, and helped shape the sound of bands that followed, including Green Day.
Green Day’s Billie Joe Armstrong has long cited Redd Kross as a key influence, thanking Jeff and Steve McDonald in the liner notes to their Kerplunk! album.
But for Jeff McDonald, it was never about legacy. “We make music and perform music because we want to do what we want to see,” he says. “We want to play what we want to hear.”
Growing up in Southern California in the mid-’70s, McDonald describes discovering punk, glam and pop as an act of devotion.
“A lot of the music I listened to as a kid wasn’t commercially available,” he says. “All the British glam stuff – you really had to go out and look for it. When punk first started in America in ’76 or ’77, it was just a handful of people into it. It was like collecting rare comic books.”
That obsession fed into Redd Kross’s sound. “We didn’t shy away from it,” McDonald says. “Big harmonies, Rickenbackers – that stuff just felt right to us.”
Despite being cited by artists such as Nirvana, McDonald remains pragmatic. “It’s all about timing,” he says. “When we started, there was no mainstream audience. The clubs held maybe 150 people. Anyone who came after us was lucky because that’s when the rest of the world started catching up.”
He said Australia, however, has always felt like home.
“Australia is a rock’n’roll country,” McDonald says. “There’s such a strong DIY music ethic. If you’re into weird stuff, you kind of have to do everything yourself – and that gives you the power to be yourself.”
Brisbane, in particular, stands out. “I’m always in a state of fun and relaxation playing Brisbane,” he says. “It’s refreshing. You don’t feel burnt out there.”
With Redd Kross and The Hard-Ons sharing the bill – and decades of shared history behind them – McDonald says Brisbane audiences can expect something special.
“We’re not selling a product. We’re just going to have fun. Brisbane’s definitely in for a treat,” McDonald says.
