Hugo Race and the True Spirit

Hugo Race is a man constantly on the move, whether it’s moving to another country for a future collaboration, escaping the Melbourne cold or evolving as a musician, there is nothing about Hugo that is common. We had a chat to the musician ahead of his Australian tour with the True Spirit.
Hi Hugo, thanks for taking the time to chat with Forte Magazine, how are you and what are you up to at the moment?
Well, I just arrived back in Melbourne from Italy. I was touring there as a solo performer with a show that uses live sampling but is based in my solo work and the records I made with Fatalists. It’s a whole other proposition to the True Spirit and is a highly mobile way to tour. On this tour I played in far eastern Europe as well as Mediterranean islands, hard work but very inspiring on all kinds of levels. I had to get back to Melbourne to finish the soundtrack for George Gittoes’ new film Snow Monkey, which will premier at MIFF on August 3 – we are all very excited to see the final film, as it is still changing in these last weeks prior to the screening.
So you’re going to be leaving the lovely climate of Italy for the rainy bliss of Melbourne in your upcoming shows back in Australia, is it quite a big adjustment for you or do you slip straight back into it?
There’s always a period of acclimatisation particularly when you move between high summer and deep winter. I had to ask myself why I was doing this – wrenching myself off the beach in Sicily to get back to Melbourne’s arctic cold snap. But there are reasons – not only Snow Monkey, but the Australian tour of the True Spirit, which begins this week. It couldn’t wait any longer, I had to go, appointments to keep and planes to catch. Now I’m here I’m flat out catching up on everything after being away for six weeks. It’s hectic and I like it like that. Sometimes…
I know you’ve said in the past that you move from place to place to take up different opportunities that are thrown your way, how did working with The True Spirit come about?
Over the last five years I spent more time in Melbourne, moved back here and so started working more with my brothers here in the city. We started recording for our own diversion – we were playing live occasionally and building up an audience again after doing very little for several years since the release of 53rd State back in 2009. We wanted to perform new material – so I asked the band to cowrite with me, titles, riffs, anything to generate new songs. I felt that I already was releasing a solo or Fatalists record every year so the Spirit would have to be a collaboration between me and the band. And this worked out well, making the new album a communal record from the Spirit of the band – hence the title. We worked very slowly because there was no pressure and I was often away doing other things, and that slow process produced what I think is the most considered record we’ve ever done.
Given your new LP is called ‘The Spirit’, which has been getting incredible reviews, do you think as people now we really struggle to connect with our spirits?
I don’t know if we’re really struggling to connect with our spirits, but there is so much interference it feels that way. For a start, the media cycle with its focus on constant capitalist expansion in the face of a worldwide environmental meltdown has produced a harrowing psychic climate, particularly in Australia. People have become statistics, profit and loss entities to support predatory financial markets. If Google could rip out your soul and plant a chip in your brain legally, they would. The mainstream political establishment, the churches, I don’t recall any of this scenery looking quite so vile before as it does right now. We are connected with our spirits, with The Spirit, at all times – that’s the reality. The rest of it – the politics, the social degradation, the moral vacuum – is a fantasy expressing the emptiness of the agendas of the powerful, may they burn in hell.
I know you’ve said that you like to leave the meaning up to the listener to decipher, have you had many instances where their perception has fell in line with yours (whether that’s through a review or commentary somewhere)?
I actually think my song lyrics are fairly explicit – there’s no free association at all. I like free association in conversation, but choose not to use it when I’m writing. Yes, often people’s ideas about a song are similar to mine – and then again, sometimes not. I think one of my recurring themes is ambiguity and paradox – because a lot of our lives are mysteries about which we are never quite sure. As in, did that really happen or I did imagine the whole thing? That memory, was it a dream or an invention? Did she really say that? And then you look around and realise that everything you see is merely your own perception of events and none of it ever objectively happened. You just thought it did. But a little thought is a powerful thing, powerful enough to even make us think we’re real.
Thanks again for having a chat, any last words of wisdom you’d like to share with our readers?
I don’t know about wisdom, all I have are my opinions – one of which regards the True Spirit. The True Spirit is an amazing band of intuitive musicians playing together since 20 years in which time they’ve evolved a telepathic communication that leads to really startling live performances. So the last thing I’d like to say is get down to the shows on this Australian tour, it won’t happen again for a long time to come. It’s magic, mystery and chaos with a backbeat and it’s a music like no other. Don’t miss out, it is now.
When & Where: The Eastern, Ballarat – August 14, The Bridge Hotel, Castlemaine – August 15 & Flying Saucer Club, Melbourne – August 21
Photo by Wendy Morrissey