Kirk Pengilly on the future of INXS following manager Chris Murphy’s death

Following the shock death of INXS manager Chris Murphy, Kirk Pengilly reveals the future of, and new direction, of the iconic rock band.

INXS may have lost the man who turned them from band to brand, but it’s business as usual.

Manager Chris Murphy died in January aged just 66, after a battle with cancer.

He’d spent over a decade returning the band’s music to prominence – including the TV miniseries, several of the band’s hit songs being used on TV advertising campaigns and the compilation The Very Best which has now spent a remarkable 334 weeks in the chart, selling over 500,000 copies.

He’d done a deal with Lego for a new video-based app called Vidiyo which allows the user to access artists from the Universal Music Group and create their own visuals.

INXS feature on Vidiyo – there’s a video with Indigenous artist Baker Boy dancing to New Sensation across Sydney – band members Kirk Pengilly and Jon Farriss make a cameo in the clip.

“Baker Boy has a great vibe and he’s a lovely man,” Pengilly tells SMARTDaily.

“We were grateful he was willing to be involved with a bunch of old fart musicians!

“But this was one of Chris Murphy’s visions before he passed away and hopefully it puts our music in front of a younger audience.”

INXS members Kirk Pengilly and Jon Farriss with Baker Boy. Pic: Supplied

NEW SENSATIONS

Tellingly, most of the artists on the app are modern pop stars like Taylor Swift, Sam Smith, Billie Eilish and Lady Gaga.

“Apart from Diana Ross I think we’re the second oldest artist on there,” Pengilly says. “I don’t think we realised when New Sensation was recorded, that 35 years later you’d still hear it on the radio and have it included on an app with today’s pop stars, it’s pretty astounding.”

Murphy had been working on both an INXS interactive museum in Ballina as well as a musical based on the band’s back catalogue.

“There’ll be announcements later in the year on some of the things occurring,” Pengilly says.

“We’re still signed to Petrol, which is Chris’s label, and Universal. They’re still working on a bunch of projects Chris was championing before he passed away. It’s business as usual, it’s exactly as Chris would have wanted.

“The INXS musical has gone through innumerable changes along the way. At the later stages, that’s when we come in and interfere.

“We’re going to be more actively involved in things without Chris being there, at least to help get some of the projects off the ground. But I’m retired! I don’t want to do too much, but INXS is a thing that won’t go away. Until I pass away myself there’ll always be something about INXS going on that needs to be worked on or discussed. Which in itself is amazing.

“It’s testament to the songwriting, mostly of Andrew (Farriss) and Michael (Hutchence), but also to the way we recorded things and the people we worked with, Believe it or not we must have known what we were doing!”

INXS members Kirk Pengilly and Jon Farriss pic supplied

SHINE LIKE IT DOES

INXS podcast Access All Areas has dedicated episodes to each member of the band, including Pengilly and his creative input, especially on their earlier albums.

Jon Farriss has “pestered” Pengilly to be a guest on the podcast, run by INXS fans Bee and Haydn who are now 67 episodes deep.

“The great thing with INXS was there was a lot of co-writing went on during recordings, for example, no one wrote my saxophone parts,” Pengilly said. “It was a very creative workplace. Part of that was because we had a very fair split with the publishing between the whole band and the writers, it made everyone feel like a part of it. It was very democratic.”

The recent Richard Lowenstein documentary on Michael Hutchence, Mystify, was hailed for showing a different side of the late singer.

Pengilly said he enjoyed the film, but unlike some, didn’t have his mind changed in regards to Hutchence’s death.

“Some of it was hard to watch, a lot of it was great. I don’t think it gave me any new insights, I don’t know if I altogether agree with the theme as far as what caused Michael’s death.

“No one was there, I don’t know if it was suicide or accident or whatever else. I know he was obviously very affected by the bang on the head and the loss of taste and smell, but to us he seemed pretty OK, he certainly didn’t seem in the last few weeks suicidal or anything. I don’t know, the fact of the matter is he’s gone and no one else was in the room so we won’t know what happened. The movie’s very good, very sensitive and because a lot of it is home movies it’ll give an insight into what a beautiful man Michael was.”

INXS at the MTV Video Music Awards in LA in 1990. Pic: AP Photo/Kevork Djansezian