THEY served together in the SAS and have been on umpteen high-risk combat missions, but Harry and Matt External could be about to undertake their most dangerous assignment yet – playing a gig at the Leopold Hotel.
The raucous venue is not for the faint hearted and somedays the beer garden can be like Helmand province, but all jokes aside, it’s what makes the Leopold a classic rock ’n’ roll venue.
It’s a bit gritty and rough around the edges, just like Harry and Matt’s band – The Externals.
The rock outfit was formed in 1991 by mates serving together in the crack Special Air Service regiment in Perth.
Over the past 34 years, the line-up has chopped and changed, but co-founders Harry and Matt have been ever-present, like soldiers on a never-ending tour of duty.
• The Externals were originally borne out of the SAS regiment in Perth.
“Matt and I met for the first time on a ‘Resistance to Interrogation’ course in 1991,” Harry says.
“I had to get up and sing a song to the audience – I was naked with a pillowcase over my head and holding a toothbrush, and I sang the Hawthorn Football Club song. It’s fair to say I nailed it; even Sinatra hasn’t played a gig like that one.
“That is where the seed was first planted, I reckon, and since then I have written the songs and poured the beer, while Matt has built the relationships and managed the band.
“He is definitely the mature and grownup one of us both.”
Blasting out indie rock in the vein of Celibate Rifles, Cosmic Psychos, and The Oils, The Externals are know for their energetic live performances.
Frontman Harry says he still likes to write songs in his shed, strumming his guitar over a few beers.
One poignant number from their latest album, Back on the Cans, is The Hell Beyond.
“It is about ‘Rowdy’, a composite character of a few intense experiences from moments in combat, ending in him being killed in action during an assault,” Harry says.
“In my mind, the final act of the song, the final act of courage recalls the day Jason Brown was killed in Afghanistan and the bravery of his Team Commander to try to recover him whilst under fire.”
Another cracker from the new album is the title track Back on the Cans. A pulsating punk-rocker that socks you right in the guts.
“It was written in about 15 minutes,” Harry says.
“It was the post Covid-era, restrictions were still in place. Most of the band had travelled up from Melbourne to play a support show for the Cosmic Psychos at the Crowbar in Sydney.
“All afternoon together we were saying how good it was to be back together, how it was good to be ‘back on the cans’, a favourite saying in the band.”
So after nearly two dozen combat missions, 60 years of service, umpteen tours and thousands of cans of beer, are Harry and Matt the Rambo and General Patton of the rock world?
“Colonel External and The Beer Baron, that’s us,” laughs Harry.
“We are the best of friends, we’ve been though the good and hard times professionally and personally together.
“Personally, we gravitate around a common interest in the military, sports and music.
“Oh, and we both love drinking beer and playing punk rock.
“We both are lucky enough to have a strong family support and we love surfing and the salt water.”
The Externals are playing the Leopold Hotel in Bicton with special guests Black Buzzard on Friday May 2. Tix at oztix.com.au.
by STEPHEN POLLOCK