The Making of ‘Eyes Wide Open’
Gotye writes of this short documentary:
The intro and outro music for this doco is a remix of Eyes Wide Open I started, trying to use only the sounds I sampled from the Winton Music Fence and the Bush Drumkit. The end bit has some reversed vocals from the track, and also some splashy omnichord. I never finished it, but it worked well for this doco (when I hear it I sometimes think “I like this better than the actual track!”). Hope I’ll find the time to turn it into a finished piece.
Gotye, 2011
I first came across Wally de Backer (AKA Gotye) in 2009. He had returned to Melbourne from an outback tour with his band The Basics and he had discovered the Musical Fence in Winton. He was very taken by the instrument and had spent a lot of time making recordings of it. He rang me to ask permission to use the recordings, or samples, in his latest song that he was writing called ‘Eyes Wide Open’. Well, I said, it’s a public musical instrument; you are free to do what you like with it! (But I was chuffed that he asked).
The fence sound became the bass line in the song, and in the following months he mentioned the Fence, and Winton, and me, quite a bit in the media. It is an interesting angle for journalists and the public.
By 2010 Wally was a rapidly rising star. He invited me to his studio in Mornington to discuss the idea of making a version of the fence to use live on stage! We tossed around some possibilities but in the end decided it would be best to stick to triggering the recorded samples.
In July 2011 he released ‘Somebody That I Used To Know’ which became his most successful signature song and a global monster. It reached staggering heights and won not one but two prestigious Grammy awards: best pop/duo performance and record of the year. He won a third Grammy for best alternate album, Making Mirrors.
Wally is a generous, warm person and a consummate artist. I went to his 2013 show in Melbourne, one of 15,000 at the Myer Music Bowl. It was an awesome show.