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Invertigo have just returned from New York where they played a show and shot a new video. Their single ‘Desensitized’, which broke them in Australia, is out there in later August, and Invertigo are heading back later in the year to play more shows. “We played at a club called the Mercury Lounge, right in the heart of the city”, says drummer and songwriter Vincent Leigh. “It was open to the public, but it was basically for executives in our American record company (Atlantic) who hadn’t seen us live before.” Their new album Forum took almost three years to make because the band are such perfectionists. “Chances Are” and “Typical” were written at a low point. “ We realised that our first singer wasn’t fitting in, musically or personally,” Vince remembers. “We auditioned 100 new singers, then finally found Christian (Argenti). Then we lost our record deal. We hoped to find hope through a bad situation by writing that song.” Did they think of splitting up? “It’s hard to split up with your brothers!” (laughs) Forum is an unpredictable record that shows off many facets of the band. There are soft-pop anthems like “Chances Are” and “Say You Do”, the harder live numbers like “Man Enough” and “It’s Getting Personal” and the freak-out stuff. One of these is “Slave”, which goes down a storm live. “That one almost didn’t make it on to the album,” says the drummer. “We were looking at it as a B-Side but live we got such a good response from it. It’s the oldest song we have. I’ve forgotten what feel we were going for! It’s a fairly dark song; we were aiming for some menacing sounds. My brothers and I grew up listening to hard rock bands like Led Zeppelin and Van Halen. So when you’re in the rehearsal room, that stuff just comes out of you.” Another menacing track is “Damage Control” which Vincent says, “Was inspired by watching TV and seeing how the celebrity factor is taken to such extremes. Things in society are more desperate and life changing, yet people are consumed by celebrity. We’re trying to comment on the negative side of that.” Vincent laughs and says he can’t really talk: when Kiss arrived in Australia on there farewell tour, he tried to gatecrash their party! Mind you, Vincent and James had a touch of pop celeb some years ago when they played in Pseudo Echo. “But we didn’t see any of the negative side of fan obsession. We had great fans. We still see some from those days. Whom we adore and treasure.” Ironically, their singer Christian seems to have bought “Funky Town” when he was living in Queensland singing in bands. Then he returned to Melbourne and hooked up with Invertigo. They had auditioned 100 singers with little luck. “We needed someone who was flexible because of our different styles. The Leigh brothers come from a pop rock background, yet Christian is into soul and R&B. He adores Stevie Wonder. It made a good mix for us. We needed someone who’d fit in with three brothers, and would be easy going. Our dad was a jazz drummer and he taught us rules about being musicians – respect the music, never blow out shows and play for anyone and everyone.”
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