The Superjesus’ Sarah McLeod says music industry sexism hasn’t improved in 30 years

The Superjesus are riding high with their first new music in 20 years as frontwoman Sarah McLeod tackles music industry sexism with new role.

The last thing Sarah McLeod had on her bingo card when her alt-rock band The Superjesus returned to the top 10 with their first new music in 20 years was a dance hit.

The Adelaide rockers have been holding sway in the ARIA Club chart for the past three months with the Paul Mac remix of their single Something Good.

The song featured on their comeback self-titled record which also debuted in the top 10 on the ARIA Australian Album chart when it was released in March.

“I used to do dance music years ago for my solo stuff and I wrote Something Good as a club track but decided to make it into a Superjesus song,” McLeod said.

“In the back of my mind we should get a remix done of it one of these days. And now we’re in the clubs.”

Rockers the Superjesus have landed in the club charts with their comeback record. Picture: Liam Somerville / Supplied.

The Superjesus kick off their national tour this weekend, playing the new album in full as a greatest hits set, with only a handful of tickets remaining for most shows.

McLeod said the flood of goodwill that has greeted the band’s return was unexpected and a relief as the Australian music industry struggles to engage local audiences with new homegrown music.

“I kind of assume I’m screaming into the ether and I just scream louder and just try different things,” she said.

“I’m a total hustler, I even manage the band now with Ruddy (bassist Stuart Rudd) and there’s no blueprint for how to do this so we’re doing a lot of YouTube tutorials.”

Sarah McLeod and Stuart Rudd rock out in their happy place. Picture: NCA.

Back in the late 1990s, The Superjesus was all over the altrock airwaves, in the top 5 of the album charts and picking up ARIA awards, with songs including Gravity, Down Again and Now and Then generating millions of streams as the band reconnects with fans in the digital era.

As much as streaming has dramatically changed the music landscape, McLeod said she has discovered many things remain the same and that includes discrimination and lack of opportunities for female and non-binary artists, particularly on festival line-ups.

McLeod said back in the day she thought the band missed out on coveted festival slots because “we weren’t good enough.”

Now as the new chair of the Australian Women in Music advocacy group, McLeod is studying statistics from across the decades which show there has been little improvement in rectifying inequality in the industry.

The band were altrock darlings in the late 90s. Picture: Supplied.

“Things have changed marginally but since I took on this role and I’m looking at the statistics, I see total imbalance everywhere,” she said.

“I get reports about how many women are on festivals and it’s one per cent or five per cent or 10 per cent and then it’s male, male, male.

“I used to think we didn’t get chosen for festivals, or another female-fronted band didn’t get picked, because we weren’t good enough.

“But over the years I’ve realised that it is still very much a blokes’ game, and we play it the best we can.”

The Superjesus record also proved popular with fans of old school music formats and featured in the top 10 of the ARIA Vinyl Chart.

McLeod and Rudd are YouTube tutorial masters when it comes to managing the band. Picture: NCA NewsWire / Naomi Jellicoe

But McLeod was shocked when fans started petitioning them on social media to also release in on CD.

The singer loves the idea that vinyl and CD versions of records are now considered “merchandise” souvenirs in the same way fans collect T-shirts and stickers.

“It’s exciting in an industry that you work so hard to make a product and give it away for free (on streaming) that people are into vinyl and CD again,” she said.

“My mum asked me how we make money from a new record and I told her we don’t, it’s a marketing tool. We put out new music so that people will come to the show and if they buy a ticket to the shows, that’s when we make money. But we don’t make money from the actual record.”

Tickets to the Superjesus album tour opens in Sydney this weekend, with tickets to all shows via https://www.thesuperjesus.com/