Over the years the boys from Powderfinger have said some pritty funny stuff. They have also said alot of crap and that's what this page is about. The very best to come out of Powderfinger, so to speak.

If you know of anything that you think should be up here let us know.

What do they say?

Bern

Ian

Dz

Cogsy

JC

Band

BERNARD SAYS

"We talked about it before we started and tried to work out what the strengths were. We realised that one of the weaknesses of Internationalist was that it was really up and down, all over the place. We wanted this one to sit together more, that was our main goal."
Bernard Fanning on Odyssey Number Five

"We set a pretty high standard this time. We didn't go on finishing songs that we didn't think were going to make it. In the past we've gone into the studio with 35 songs, this time we had 15. We had much more control of what the album was going to sound like when we went in."
Bernard Fanning on Odyssey Number Five

"That song (Like A Dog) has an overt political message, but it didn't have to be on the album for that reason. I probably just went home after a band session and read the paper and they denied the existence of the stolen generation. It was just the snowball effect of what arseholes they are, this Government. I'm just saying what I think. It's just a point of view like all the other songs are. It's just a bit sad for Australia, the opportunity we missed by getting rid of [Paul] Keating and we could've made Australia one of the most tolerant and best places to live for everybody. It's going to be another 15 years at least before that can even begin."
Bernard Fanning on Australia's political situation in 2000.

"Our music isn't really dependant on fashion or trends. It's pretty traditional. In America they want the new Limp Bizkit now, they don't want some band that writes traditional songs. The UK has its favourite band that no one hears of six weeks later."
Bernard Fanning

"We don't think we've ever made a really good album before. Here we wanted to make an album where you enjoy the whole thing and, hopefully, at the end you'll feel a tiny bit unsatisfied and you'll want to hear it again."
Bernard Fanning on Odyssey Number Five

'Sometimes I'd generate an idea at home and I'd see if the band liked it. There's a lot of rejection in Powderfinger. There's never any malice. It's just a matter of saying 'That's not going to work.' Darren would often bring melodies in and I'd try and rewrite them or improve them. It seems to work really well. I did say to the band that I would like the opportunity to write over things that were pretty much there [this time]. I wanted to know what I could do. That's what happened with The Day You Come on the last record. That was a new place for us to go. I didn't want to come up with that type of song again but I wanted to move to another place writing-wise. The thing I love most is writing songs. I love sitting in my room and doing that. It's the best feeling there is. That's why these songs have an emotional draw, because that's how it affects me. That's a barometer. If it feels throwaway...well, there's no point pretending for people."
Bernard Fanning (surprise surprise) on Odyssey Number Five

"We just want to improve, and we want to keep improving. That's the real focus for us. We've been touring for a long time. We're really good at getting pissed and staying out all night. That's great fun but it's not as much fun the 400th time you do it as the first 40."
Bernard Fanning again.

"I want the songs to have an emotional draw. The idea of the lyrics is that they are specific enough to let people get the gist of a story, and obtuse enough for them to apply is to themselves. I don't want our audience to think about me skipping along the street holding hands with someone. My ideas aren't that important and I want to keep my relationships private."
Bernard Fanning AGAIN.

DARREN SAYS

"I think you'll be pretty hard pressed to get Hoggy off that little X he marks on the ground"
Darren Middleton when asked if Ian is going to move at all on this tour

"Sometimes in the studio we had ideas, like for 'My Kind Of Scene' I had a tremolo idea for the versus. But what I did was to plug my guitar into a Leslie Cabinet, which turned out amazing! Far better than my little korg unit could come up with. So there was still room for spontaneity in the studio."
Darren Middleton getting all technical

"I don't know about you guys, but I've got this thing with my eyes where what may probably read bad to most people, I just don't see it. The words kind of blur."
Darren Middleton's reaction to bad review.

IAN SAYS

"I don't really like blue guitars. Green's alright, but blue's out."
Ian Haug

"I was playing and my guitar was in tune with the tuner and we had everything set up properly and we re-did the bass and it was in tune and it (the guitar) still sounded out of tune. And no one could work out why. And I think it was you [Darren] who said, 'what amp are you using? Try a different amp!' and that solved the problem. It was the amp that was out of tune. One of the tech guys at the studio kind of explained it to me - it has something to do with the transformer."
Ian Haug getting a little too excited about the 'story about the out of tune amp'

THEY ALL SAY

"There's more important things in life. I think a lot of people forget that music is about life. It's not about music. When musicians write a song they're not writing about music, they're writing about life. Whereas a lot of music fans get into music and they think life is about music. And when I get pissed off is when for some people music is just about fashion." Jon Coghill
"I think for those people who love what they're doing, its not a job, psychologically, and it's got nothing to do with fashion or anything else. You just do it, and it takes up so many hours of your life." Darren Middleton
"Probably because you can't do anything else" John Collins
"Yeah. People are made for different reasons." Darren Middleton
"Whereas we were made for a few things. We were either going to be really good models on the catwalk, or athletes, or members of the Australian cricket team." Jon Coghill
"You can sense he still wants to do the modeling. He takes his pants off a lot." John Collins

"We're never going to write stuff just to satisfy people. We're not going to go oh that's a cool chorus because I'm sure all these people will like it. We're always going for the shivers down our spines." Darren Middleton
"And because we're a democracy we end up lobbying each other a lot! You talk to one of the others on the way to practice, and you go, what do you think about this? Back me up when we go in there! It can get pretty physical too..." John Collins
"That's no shit. We get some really bad shouting matches." Jon Coghill
"Usually we end up going out and having a few drinks and then coming home and talking about it...If someone's fighting the others will try and settle it down. Unless it's entertaining, then we just let it go, sit back and smile" John Collins
"Haug rarely fights. He can't fight actually, he's pretty soft. He's a pushover. So we always lobby Haug first. We just beat him down psychologically." Jon Coghill

"We are the best band in the world....modestly the best band in the world. (laughs)"
Darren Middleton's trademark modesty.

OLD QUOTES