Spencer P. Jones leaves a lasting musical legacy

Although not quite a household name, Spencer P. Jones’ influence on the nation’s rock music scene was significant.

Spencer P. Jones plays in Melbourne in 2014. Picture: Eugene Hyland

The Australian music community lost a great artist this week, when Spencer P. Jones died from liver cancer, aged 62. Although not quite a household name, his influence on the nation’s rock music scene was significant. After moving across from New Zealand in his late teens, he established himself as a formidable guitarist in The Johnnys and Beasts of Bourbon. He also played in Paul Kelly’s band for several years from the mid-1990s, as well as leading a range of bands while performing his own songs.

In 2012, he released an album under the band name Spencer P. Jones and the Nothing Butts, which featured his former Beasts of Bourbon bandmate James Baker on drums, while on guitar and bass, respectively, were Gareth Liddiard and Fiona Kitschin, two members of Melbourne rock band The Drones. While that release turned out to be a one-off, it remains a stirring listen that comes highly recommended — “an absorbing and cathartic collection of songs performed by four accomplished musicians”, I wrote in a 4½ star review on this page. “Not to be missed.”

When we spoke on Wednesday, Liddiard reflected on the outsized influence Jones had on his own songwriting and playing. “I learned heaps from him, guitar-wise,” he told me. “It’s mainly about feel and understatement, which I was never a huge ambassador for. He would always lay back, and just cruise; he was never showy, and never lost anything for it.

“If you try too hard, that comes across — and if you’re labouring the music, it’s laborious to listen to. He never did that. He could play all day, and people would be digging it. And then with a good lyric, it doesn’t have to be over the top. As a songwriter, he’s underrated as. There isn’t a song of his I don’t like.”

To Liddiard, Jones’s body of work is among the most important contributions that an individual has made to Australian music. “He’s sort of the first Renaissance Man, I guess, in a really gnarly, garage-rock way,” he said. “He was well-read, and he knew all about all the great songwriters, whether they were men or women. He was a great guitar player; he wasn’t schooled, but he knew what he was doing. None of it was a fluke — it was all knowledge.

“He’s criminally underrated, and I think part of that was his fault, too. He didn’t look after that side of stuff; he just couldn’t be f..ked. He was a big deal, and a lot of people didn’t notice.”

If you’re unfamiliar with Jones’s work, Liddiard — who currently plays in a rock band named Tropical F..k Storm — recommends the compilation album Immolation & Ameliorations (1995-2005) as an ideal place to start. For mine, that 2012 album with the Nothing Butts is a wonderful showcase of his songwriting, and it also contains an especially pretty song named (She Walks) Between The Raindrops.

“For my money, that’s the best thing he ever did,” said Liddiard. “You know Walk on the Wild Side, that Lou Reed song? If you were in the studio that day, and at the end of the day they finished that, they would have gone: ‘That’s a f..kin’ masterpiece’.

“Everything about that is right, from the initial chords, to the lyrics, to the tones of all the instruments, to the instrumentation itself. (She Walks) Between the Raindrops is a song like that. It’s a really sensitive and beautiful song about something really f..ked. It’s just magnificent.”