Hitting the Jukebox with Regurgitator

Australian alt-rock veterans Regurgitator are hitting the road for their most ambitious tour yet—a sprawling two-hour celebration of 33 years’ worth of singles that promises to test everyone’s endurance. Regurgitator’s Retrospective of Singles/Jukeboxxin’ Tour hits Port Beach Garden Bar on Friday, March 6; Dunsborough Tavern on Saturday, March 7; and The Carine on Sunday, March 8, 2026, with tickets on sale now. KAREN LOWE spoke to Regurgitator frontman Quan Yeomans about googling his own song lyrics and chord progressions, their infamous Band in a Bubble experiment and the absurd but energising moments of hearing the crowd singing their lyrics back to them.

You guys are heading out on tour again soon. Is there anywhere you are going where you haven’t played before?

On this leg? I’m not sure. There have been a couple of places already we played in Sale, which we’d never played before. I’d have to look at the list. Sorry. I’ve been on holiday for the last six weeks, so I haven’t even looked at the band itinerary stuff, but I’m sure there is. We’re going back to Mount Gambier to start it, though, which is cool. We’ve only been there once before, and yeah, there are lots of different places, so it’s really great.

This tour is to celebrate the singles over the past 33 years. Are there any songs on the list that you guys haven’t played live before? And is Miffy’s Simplicity on the list?

Miffy’s Simplicity is on the list. It’s one of the tougher ones to play actually at that speed. It’s such a weird one. At the start of a tour, I always Google stuff because I’ve forgotten how to play it and I’ve forgotten the lyrics, so I’ve Googled that one before, and some people have incorrectly put down the chords as being way simpler than they actually are. I just want to put it out there; I can actually write a complicated song, and this one is quite complicated.

It’s got a really bizarre chord progression, and it’s quite weird to play and sing at the same time, but we definitely do it… and it’s got the weirdest rhythm as well. But I think we’ve played most of them at least once before. There’s a couple like My Ego that we dropped very quickly or may not have played that many times live ever when it was first released, but there are a couple of songs that we’ve never really played with two guitarists before, which has made the dynamic a lot more different and kind of cool. 

Regurgitator has been around for 33 years. What are some of the biggest changes that you have seen in the industry? And what challenges or improvements have those changes brought?

Well, I think, first of all, let me say that all art and music is very subjective. Whether it’s improved the lives or improved the quality of music is another question. I have no idea. To be honest, I can’t really say. I know for a fact that the way that I produce music has changed so dramatically that I can do so much in the box on my computer. It’s a fully fledged studio now. I can pretty much get any sound I want at my fingertips. Having said that, it’s not necessarily better or worse. It’s just different.

The way that music is consumed is obviously a little different. Now, playlists are king, and people don’t really listen to albums in the same way they used to. There are still some people who really love albums, and that’s great, and that’ll always be there. Vinyl had a resurgence, obviously, over the last ten years, and I even have a collection now. I never used to be into it, but it’s nice to be able to put on a piece of music from start to finish and really listen to what the artists intended to do when it comes to albums. I think kids are way more… I think they feel a responsibility to really promote themselves a lot more on the internet, which I never had.

There are a lot of process videos—creative process videos that are just completely alien to me. I can never imagine opening myself up like that, but they kind of need to do that, and that’s the way that people find them, and there’s an interest in seeing those things. So I totally get it. It’s very alien to me and to the rest of the band as well, I think.

I feel like there’s a definite struggle with mid-level venues now for bands—young bands to play at—and insurance… cost of living stuff. It’s difficult. It’s hard to get audiences if you don’t have an internet following, so it’s a bit of a difficult cycle for a lot of young bands. I think good stuff still rises to the top eventually. You just have to work at it, and it is harder in lots of ways, but it’s also so much easier to produce music that there’s a lot more competition, but you can always just do it. If you’ve got your voice and it’s authentic and you really, really have the passion for it… then you do break through eventually. It just takes work. It takes a long time.

Yeah, I’ve heard people say that it takes ten years to actually start really getting that audience together.

Yeah, and a lot of it’s luck as well. The way that we happened was pure who you meet at the right time: whether a person is perfect for the band, what connections they have, and whether you can get in front of people and really wow them quickly or not. There’s a lot of luck involved as well as skill and dedication, absolutely.

You mentioned that you can make any sound on your computer, but what is the strangest piece of gear, toy, or software that has ever made its way into a Regurgitator track?

We did things so differently back in the day. I mean, that whole Unit record was recorded on this really interim technology called ADATs, which is digital tape, and it sounds really, really harsh, but it’s got a particular sound to it, and I think Lachlan Goold really worked with it well, and it has this kind of timeless quality to it as well. At the moment, one of my favourite esoteric things is that I don’t collect a lot of gear. I only have a few guitars, and I only have one keyboard that I really like playing with, and that’s this Swedish design OP-1, and it’s really fun.

I dunno if it’s ever made it onto a Regurgitator record, but I did use it on the Pogogo record, the kids’ record, which is really fun. I also have their drum machine, the KO II, which is fun as well. Like I said, I don’t really collect a lot of esoteric gear like some musicians do, so I dunno. I do believe that every instrument you do get has songs within it, so buying a new piece of gear often does spark something that you would never ever get from an old piece of gear. So a little bit superstitious, maybe, in that regard.

Which unexpected genre mashup have you always wanted to attempt but haven’t pulled the trigger on yet?

I think some kind of white reggae. I’ve been trying to convince the guys to do a full white reggae record. No one’s really into it, strangely enough.

You guys have played some of the largest stages in Australia over the years. How does it feel when you see a sea of people singing your lyrics back at you—especially certain songs?

It’s really invigorating. I love the fact that… our stuff is so absurdist. Every time we play, I Will Lick Your Asshole, and having people sing that back at you is so funny. It’s so absurd and so weird, and that’s kind of what I do it for. I do it for that energy exchange that makes no sense at the time but just feels right. And yeah, we’ve been very fortunate to have that aspect of the band cut through and reach so many people and have that response as well. It’s so funny.

I love nothing more than being in those crowds and just having a whole sea of guys around me just singing those lyrics back.

Yeah, it’s pretty bizarre.

You guys would have seen a lot of things over the years and met a lot of fans. Are there any crazy stories that you have that stick out in your mind?

Crazy stories. I’m not the one that really attracts the stalkers. Ben’s had a few in his younger days, not so much now; it’s very much like a family event now. We kind of just go out, and we have fun bonding together. We’re like siblings now, so it’s really lovely on tour. Sarah, the new keyboardist/guitarist, is really lovely as well and just makes the band so pleasant to be around.

Back in the day, I do miss the fan letters from before the pre-internet days. Some of the fan letters were really cute and really out there. There was one girl who went under the name of Keith McKickass Oath, I think her name was, and she would just write us the weirdest fan mail. It was always interesting to see what she’d come up with next.

Then you get to meet them as well, and it’s really like “Oh!”—completely unexpected. So that’s one part of it I kind of miss. The way that you connect with fans now is somewhat different—obviously with the internet and stuff, but you meet some tweakers after the show for sure. It’s always fun. 

What’s a creative risk you took that felt terrifying at the time but now defines part of your identity as a band?

I think the whole first couple of records were kind of like that. When you’re young, you’re less risk averse than when you get to this age. You’ve got different priorities, and the way that you interact with music and your art is very different. It’s much more integrated into your ego and much more integrated into your life, and the way you present yourself and you write differently as a result. I look back at some of those songs and think, “How the hell… why did I go in those directions that I went?” It doesn’t make sense to me now as an older creative person.

I do miss it. I do miss not taking as many risks as I used to. I look at a song like I Piss Alone, for example, and the progressions and the way that we manage that and the way that I sang it—it just doesn’t make any sense at all. And the fact that people listen to it, and it’s on a kind of record that a lot of people like. It’s really weird to me to think like that.

A part of me does miss having that kind of naivety and that risk—that love of just doing whatever. It’s a very difficult thing, and I think a lot of artists struggle to get that back. The good ones kind of recreate themselves every few years. People like David Bowie or people like that, they can get that. They like taking risks, and they do it.

I went and saw David Byrne the other night. Incredible show! One of the best things I’ve seen in so many years. And the guy, he’s just living moment to moment, and it’s a really great way of doing it.

Speaking of risks, you guys did the Band in a Bubble back in 04. Did the constant visibility inside the bubble reshape your sense of ‘private creativity’, and did you discover any ideas you would never have written in a normal studio?

I think what it really hammered home was that creativity is much better done in private for me, anyway.

I think maybe someone who’s grown up with the internet would have a different feel for that actually. It would be very interesting to see what it would be like as a young band doing that sort of thing now in front of everyone. It’s sort of like a simulation of what goes on now in a weird way.

It was kind of a precursor to the creative process videos that are just commonplace now in a weird way. But I think more than anything, we just… I think you realise how boring it is in a studio. There’s not a lot going on. There’s a lot of waiting around. There’s a lot of just sitting around playing video games and waiting for your part to come up. It is incredibly difficult to be spontaneous and be yourself and be relaxed when there are thousands of eyes on you.

What was the first moment inside the bubble when you realised the experiment was affecting your behaviour in ways you didn’t expect?

I think it was when we woke up and there were high school girl netball teams just staring at us in our underpants, getting up in the morning and then meeting people after the experiment that had watched; they’d been working for Channel V and had to sit there and watch/man the webcams and knew where you had moles that you had no idea you had on your body. So it was stuff like that that really made me go, “Whoa! This is one of the weirdest things I’ve ever done.”

Also just the power differentiation—being able to talk to people through the glass versus speakers and not being able to hear them having conversations that were one-sided—was really interesting as well.

If you were to repeat the experiment today with modern streaming culture, what boundaries would you insist on that you wouldn’t have thought of back then?

I would remove boundaries, to be honest. The next thing I offered, I said, was doing it in Tokyo with no places you could hide, so see-through toilets and all that sort of stuff, and just really going balls out. But of course there was no way that my band was going to do that, and I probably would’ve backed away at the last minute anyway.

But I feel like the limits are just, I don’t know. No one seems to approve of limits these days when it comes to social interactions and creative interactions. So I think removing limits would’ve been more of the approach.

As a fan, it’s often quite hard to go up to your idols and say hello for fear of being turned away or fear of seizing up and sounding like an idiot. As a musician, how do you go about meeting your idols? Have you ever gone to speak to someone and just seized up?

It’s very rare that I meet someone that would make me so starstruck that I wouldn’t be able to speak properly. Prince is probably the only one that I would have problems with, and I did. He walked past me at one of his after-show parties, and someone else touched his ass. That was not me. Even though there was a bit of a rumour saying that I had done it, I would never do that. I would never encroach on his space. But apart from that, I’ve met people that I’ve really admired and been disappointed, which is kind of a sadder thing, unfortunately.

And you can’t expect stars that have lived their lives in the spotlight. People that are full-on people, like Bjork and stuff, are going to have off days. They’re not going to want to talk to everyone. Even if you say the nicest thing, they can react in ways that you don’t like. I’ve had that happen to me a few times and met people whose music I’ve really loved and have kind of not liked them or connected with them as people, and that’s kind of turned me off their music a little bit.

So that can be a little bit more disappointing than being starstruck. I feel like that’s just going, ‘Oh yeah, okay.’ They’re human beings, and they’re not perfect. This is what they do for a living, and they’re good at it, but they may not be similar to me, in other words.

I did also have Prince walk past me and had that intrusive thought where I wanted to pat him on the head. I didn’t do that, though.

You like to think you can control yourself. I think one of the weirdest interactions I’ve ever had recently, though, was with River from Weezer. It was the most awkward interaction I’ve ever had with a rockstar before. He was so awkward, just saying, just the simplest thing; I could see him kind of dying a little bit inside. I felt so bad for the guy. I wanted to end that interaction as soon as I possibly could, and I just wanted to thank him for having us on the show and just leave him alone. But it was just really hard. Very strange and super, super awkward.

What bands do you currently have on rotation in your CD player? And are there any bands that you just didn’t get until you saw them live?

I was really, really into Turnstile’s new record and their last one as well, which is kind of surprising because I’ve never really gone into that kind of hardcore slash emo or whatever you want to call it. But I really appreciate their diversity now, and I really love the way they use the ambient synth to break up the hardcore stuff. I wanted to see them at New Year’s, but I had the kids, so I couldn’t really go out and see them. But I listened to that record quite a bit.

I’ve actually started enjoying that Fred Again record, which I never really thought I’d get into, but listening to the production on that is really cool. I can see why he’s so popular. I listen to random kinds of K-Pop stuff for my own production tips, and so I listen to music for different reasons than just to relax a lot of the time. My partner recently got me a copy of the ambient record that I loved in the nineties called Sakura by a Japanese ambient dude, Susumu Yokota, which is an incredible record. I love it. It’s great to have it on vinyl.

Apart from that, I’ve really enjoyed listening to The Bad Nerves as well. That was a punk band that I really thought had something special, and I’m really surprised they’re not bigger. Really great, fast, melodic punk. And I’ve really liked the new Tyler, the Creator record, which I didn’t really expect to like, and that was the one that he recorded in hotel rooms. I think it’s one of his better records. I think it’s really cool. And yeah, those are the records that I’ve been listening to a bit lately. Nothing much else springs to mind.

Before we go, is there anything else that you’d like to mention as well about the upcoming tour?

No, I mean, I feel like just warning people that it’s quite a long show, so they should do their stretches beforehand and kind of take it easy. This is definitely the longest show we’ve ever played. It’s close to two hours, which is quite a strange thing for us considering it’s so up and down and all over the place.

But yeah, they’ve been going really well. It’s really fun, and we love playing. We love playing to our crowds. They’re just the loveliest people usually, and it’s just a real privilege to be able to do it. So yeah, we’re happy. We like going to all these different places that we’d never been before, and we’re really looking forward to it.

Regurgitator’s Retrospective of Singles/Jukeboxxin’ Tour hits Port Beach Garden Bar on Friday, March 6; Dunsborough Tavern on Saturday, March 7; and The Carine on Sunday, March 8, 2026. Tickets are on sale now from oztix.com.au