WA reggae and roots artist Darren Guthrie is a big part of the local Oz cannabis scene. He’s also an exceptionally busy man, but still found the time to chat with us ahead of his upcoming national tour, which kicks off this April 1. Details of the tour below.
We last spoke almost exactly a year ago. What’ve you been up to since then?
It’s been a crazy year since we last chatted! Besides last year’s solo national tour there was three other tours – two trio tours and a duo tour along the WA coast.
I also released a tour video/music video from last years national tour to my track “Make Your Minutes Count”, which was well received. After that release we had an interview with the UK’s Weed World magazine… it was awesome to see a printed interview of ours on such a large platform being shared internationally!
As a solo act I performed a couple of festivals including Rum, Ribs & Reggae, and the trio played a couple of big festivals including Gidgestock Music Festival and Musical Fruits Festival. While performing at Gidgestock Music Festival, we recorded a live version of “In The End” from the Seeds of Change album. This live recording is being released alongside the tour and will be available from my website along with iTunes, Google, Spotify, Amazon & various other distributors from April 1 onwards. So be sure to check it out and grab yourself a copy.
You hit the East Coast last May for your massive Seeds Of Change tour. Are there any places you’re excited to visit / re-visit?
Absolutely! I can’t wait to play all the shows on the national tour but I am very excited to get back over to the east coast and share my music with some new venues and ears that haven’t heard me before. I am also excited to have been asked back to perform at this years Nimbin MardiGrass Protestival on the MainStage (Hash Bowl) on Saturday May 5 around 6pm. Its always great to share my music with such a large audience that has similar socio-political views.
Are you excited to play WA?
West Australia is where I reside these days and it’s where I probably perform most. Sadly a lot of musicians and touring acts forget about WA as its so far away from the rest of Australia. However, there is a very large music scene here in WA that is always developing. It is also always lovely to travel the WA coast just to visit all the gorgeous bays and beaches over here!
You have a busy 4/20 ahead of you with appearances at the 420 Freedom Rally and Chronicfeset III in Perth. Are you excited? Will you still find time to ‘chill’?
Yes it has eventuated to be quite a busy day this year, but I definitely will be chilling the whole way through it. I’m pretty sure the day will start with a grand wake and bake, then I’ll be performing the 420 Freedom Rally at Pioneer Park in Fremantle around 2pm.
I love the rallies as they are such a great opportunity to share my music with likeminded people and meet more of the local community.
I am also very excited for Chronicfest III at The Civic Hotel that evening too. This years Chronicfest is looking absolutely awesome, theres a large lineup of canna friendly musicians, artists and comedians, so I can’t wait to perform there too. After that I am pretty sure the after party/420 session will begin [laughs].
What can we look forward to from Guthrie for the rest of 2018?
Currently the rest of the year is looking pretty crazy for shows. I’m already filling dates six months in advance, which is great. I would love to come over to Melbourne to perform for the HHI Expo depending on where it falls in the year and my availability, so this is definitely a possibility. I also hope to release another song towards the end of the year or start of 2019 as I have been in the studio working on some originals lately. But for the moment I will be focusing on promoting the new release of “In The End” live at Gidgestock, available from April 1. Lastly, theres also the possibility of a new music video being released within the year so be sure to keep an eye out on GuthrieMusic.com and on Facebook and Instagram.
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If you want to read more about Guthrie, get in touch or download his song ‘We’ve Been Fighting’ for free, check out his website GuthrieMusic.com.
