Fasterlouder Interview Clare Bowditch

SYDNEY, AU. (EMI MUSIC AUSTRALIA)- Clare Bowditch is a pioneer of Australian music. Growing up as part of the Melbourne music scene, she's been singing and songwriting since she was a child, and is constantly on the road performing awesome live gigs with her band, The Feeding Set. Australians love Australian music. There seems to be a constant support base for it by anyone who calls themselves Australian. But why does it seem there's more men out there than women? 'Gosh I don't know, it's really hard for me to say. It's a pretty interesting situation isn't it? And I really don't know. I think the issue should be discussed and debated as to who chooses play lists for Australian radio because there is no shortage of powerful female performers.'

I mean, there's a lot of female artists starting to emerge and do great things for the Aussie music scene the aren't dominantly catering for the pop industry; Missy Higgins; Sarah Blasko; Sarah Mcleod, Mia Dyson, just to name some. But it's the males I've found in greater numbers. As both of us try to decipher a reason for this, Clare gives her suggestion, 'It's hard for me to say because I mostly listen to community radio and public broadcasting, so I don't have a great knowledge of what's being played on other stations … I think also mainly in order to get played on commercial radio you've almost always needed to be with a record company and there's been some limit to what they accept as marketable… I guess now we're in an age where that doesn't really stand in anyone's way any more, but yeah, I don't know.'

Well, no matter what the reason, you'd have to be a pretty damn proud Aussie, no matter what your gender, to have toured with the likes of whom Clare Bowditch has, Elvis Costello, Cat Power, Pete Murray, Xavier Rudd, The Waifs and most recently, Paul Kelly.