It’s mid-afternoon in the Queen Street Mall and Kasey Chambers is backstage
strumming her acoustic guitar. In half an hour she’ll play a short set to the
assembled masses and afterwards she’ll sign her new memoir and accompanying
album for any fan that wants one. As she’s jotting down what songs to play there’s
an unexpected knock at the door and an office worker enquires if he can have a
book signed for his wife ‘now’.
The man is on his lunch break and he won’t be around by the time Kasey finishes
her set. He explains that his wife, who is currently working away couldn’t be there
and she’s one of Kasey’s biggest fans. Kasey obliges, poses for a selfie and
assures the man she’ll play ‘The Captain’ two songs in so the gent in question can
film his partner’s favourite tune and get back to work.
“He’s a good husband doing that for his wife” Kasey assures me as the fan heads
off into the crowd. “He’ll get lucky tonight.”
That’s what Kasey Chambers has been doing for a very long time, she brings joy
into people’s lives through her songs.
Now, twenty five years since her breakthrough album The Captain was released,
Kasey has ‘listened to her inner foghorn’ and written a book, ‘Just Don’t Be A
Dickhead and Other Profound Things I’ve Learnt’. The book details Kasey’s loves –
both won and lost. Highs. Lows. Children. Growing up in the outback. And then
there’s her career.
“I had a book out years ago that was written with Jeff Apter,” she explains of the
new tome’s inception. “Jeff’s a great friend of mine and a great journalist, but I felt
like that book was more him helping me to tell my story through interviews. This
latest book feels a lot more like it’s mine. Writing it felt like it does when I write
songs. It came from this real deep creative place inside me.”
Not owning a laptop or a computer, Kasey started compiling her ideas into the
notes app on her phone. As time moved on she ended up writing the entire volume
on that same device. And she’s right, the book, like her music, captures Kasey’s
authentic voice.
“When I first started writing it, it actually wasn't even a book. I didn’t set out to write
one. I have all these things to say and share, and it was more like I was writing for
myself. Again, like when I’m writing songs, I don’t really think about what’s going to
happen with them down the track. They’re written in the moment and they capture
whatever I have to say or feel and they just come out. And that’s really how the
book works for me.
The title came from her Dad, Bill Chambers, a one time professional fox hunter and
patriarch of the Dead Ringer Band.
“That phrase, ‘Just Don’t Be A Dickhead’, it's really become this thing that I try to
live by,” Kasey explains. “ My Dad would just say that … ‘just don’t be a dickhead’.
Sometimes he’d say it really specifically if we were doing something stupid. And
then sometimes it would honestly be his advice to people, ‘just don’t be a dickhead’,
you know, like, it’s pretty much that simple.
“At the end of the day, I look back on certain decisions I’ve made in my life where I
feel like, if I had honestly just said that to myself and listened to my own advice, I
wouldn’t have made that dumb decision.
“I made a list of things saying, be brave enough to be vulnerable. Keep your tribe
close. Little things like that evolved into a story of why I’d learnt that particular
lesson, or how I’d learnt that lesson. At times, I’ve been through really hard things
that feel like it’s the worst thing in the world, and then you learn something really
poignant out of that.
“And part of it also, is the general thing of ‘just try and be a decent human’. I think a
lot of this book is a bit of tongue in cheek by me saying ‘and other profound things
I've learnt’ because these things in the book, they're not said in very profound ways,
but they have been profound to me. They've been profound moments in my life
where I’ve learnt lessons.”
Throughout the book you’ll find QR codes that lead to songs Kasey has written for
the companion album, Backbone. Recorded at her own Rabbit Hole Studios in five
days, the songs were culled from seven years of writing. The album features Sam
Tesky on backing vocals, Bill Chambers, her partner Brandon Dodd and American
drummer Brady Blade who has played with everyone from Emmylou Harris to the
late Steve Earle.
“I got to work with my favourite musicians,” Kasey says’s of the Backbone
experience. “I wanted to capture the songs with us playing as live as we could in
the studio. And the record, for good or bad, reflects who I am. Just like the book, I
sang about every beautiful, joyous, embarrassing and tough thing I’ve been
through”.
Sean Sennett
Kasey Chambers ‘Backbone’ is out now on LP and CD. Kasey Chambers “Just
Don’t Be A Dickhead” is out now through Hardie Grant in paperback, e-book and
audiobook or $34.99, $16.99 and $39.99 respectively.
Kasey Chambers is on tour from now until June 2025. Tour dates are here:
