.

.

DAVE GRANEY AND THE CORAL SNAKES @ Factory Theatre, Sydney, 3rd October 2025 / Photo – @robmezzphoto

.

Interview with
DAVE GRANEY

(8th December 2025)

Interview by Dave Bruce

.

Watch the whole interview below:

.

Dave Graney – Still Riding the Groove, Still Wearing the Boots

Dave Graney has long been regarded as one of Australia’s most distinctive musical figures—sharp-witted, fiercely individual, endlessly curious, and relentlessly productive. With around 40 albums under his belt, an ARIA Award, and a lifetime carved out in Australia’s musical underground and overground, he remains a creative force who shows no signs of slowing down.

I had the pleasure of sitting down with the “big” Dave Graney—legend, songwriter, storyteller, and self-proclaimed blue-collar outsider—to talk about his remarkable career, life with his long-time musical partner Clare Moore, the upcoming Lou Reed / Velvet Underground & Nico celebration, and of course, a few delightfully ridiculous final questions.

From Mount Gambier to the World

Graney’s origin story is not the typical Australian music tale.
He grew up one of six boys in a Catholic, working-class family in Mount Gambier, South Australia. No silver spoons. No private schools. No industry connections. His father painted public buildings, his mother held a bustling household together, and young Dave obsessed not over music at first—but football.

.

DAVE GRANEY AND THE CORAL SNAKES @ Factory Theatre, Sydney, 3rd October 2025 / Photo – @robmezzphoto

.

Then came the teenage switch.

“Around 14 or 15, football became music, and I just consumed rock culture in the classic 70s period,” Graney recalls. Punk rock opened the door from fandom to creation, eventually leading to The Moodists and a move to London alongside contemporaries like The Scientists, The Triffids, The Go-Betweens and The Birthday Party.

Later came Dave Graney & The Coral Snakes, a band that captured the era of record stores, magazines, and music TV—an era Graney lived fully, scoring a Gold record and winning Best Male Artist at the 1996 ARIAs.

And through it all, despite the collapse and rebirth of the music industry many times over, Graney continues to release an album nearly every year.

The Clare Moore Question

Every musician has a partner. Dave Graney has a partner in life and in music—the formidable Clare Moore, drummer, songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, producer and long-time collaborator.

How do you survive—let alone thrive—working so closely with your spouse for decades?

Graney laughs.
“It’s harder if your partner isn’t in music. You go out into that irrational rock world and then you come home and try to explain it. You can’t. You eventually stop doing it. Clare and I never had to explain it.”

It’s a beautiful truth: some partnerships are built for the circus, the chaos, the long highways, and the late-night load-outs.

“We’d be like show people—carny people,” he says. “Not like normal people.”

.

DAVE GRANEY AND THE CORAL SNAKES @ Factory Theatre, Sydney, 3rd October 2025 / Photo – @robmezzphoto

.

Celebrating Lou Reed & The Velvet Underground

Graney is one of four lead vocalists heading up the upcoming Australian tour celebrating Lou Reed, The Velvet Underground and Nico, performing next month across Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane and Adelaide.

Sharing the mic with Robert Forster (The Go-Betweens), Mick Harvey (Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds, The Birthday Party) and Rob Snarski (The Blackeyed Susans), Graney promises an eclectic, powerful homage.

“Don’t hang it all on me—there are four of us,” he jokes.

He’s chosen tracks from Lou Reed’s 1973–79 period—up-tempo grooves, no guitar, just voice and movement.

Lou Reed, as for many musicians, was a profound influence.

“Every Velvet Underground album spawned a dozen indie bands. They’re glamorous, dangerous, poetic—peak New York. Then Lou’s solo career, with the Bowie/Ronson magic, the genius of Herbie Flowers… I came to it as a teenager.”

The show is produced by Metropolis Touring—experts in assembling all-star tributes—and the response has been strong enough that new dates are already being added.

.

.

Celebrating Lou Reed,
The Velvet Underground
& Nico!
January 2026
Australian Tour Dates

Saturday 24th January SYDNEY, The Metro
Sunday 25th January BRISBANE, The Triffid
Friday 30th January MELBOURNE, 170 Russell
Saturday 31st January ADELAIDE, The Gov

Tickets

.

.

The Sound of Dave Graney

Trying to define Dave Graney’s music is like trying to catch smoke. He’s part glam, part R&B, part punk attitude, part beat-poet philosopher, part cosmic troubadour.

He puts it more simply: “I like grooves. I like street language. I like drama. I’m more R&B than Beatles. I want things to stay a bit goofy.”

Despite being asked for decades how he “evolves,” Graney says the mission remains the same: “You’re usually just trying to do one thing—and do it better.”

.

DAVE GRANEY AND THE CORAL SNAKES @ Factory Theatre, Sydney, 3rd October 2025 / Photo – @robmezzphoto

.

The Flow Never Stops

Despite 40 albums, global tours, industry chaos, streaming revolutions and technological upheavals, Graney is still writing. Still recording. Still planning the next album with Clare Moore for next year.

Does it still come naturally? “If you’re lucky, you get a tone and a flow. You tap it. Hold on and ride it all the way home.”

It’s that flow that keeps him releasing nearly an album every year, and keeps him performing with the same fire he had in the Moodists days.

And how long will he keep going?“Ross Wilson said of Bob Starkey: ‘He died with his boots on.’ I want to die with my boots on too.”

Advice for New Musicians

Graney’s description of the modern industry—streaming economics, social media expectations, TikTok culture—is frank, funny and painfully accurate.

His advice?

“Make sure you like what you’re doing. Play a lot. And remember Samuel Beckett: ‘Try again. Fail better.’”

.

DAVE GRANEY AND THE CORAL SNAKES @ Factory Theatre, Sydney, 3rd October 2025 / Photo – @robmezzphoto

.

The Lightning Round (a.k.a. “The Shit Questions”)

A few gems from the rapid-fire finale:

Craziest thing you’ve done?
“Something illegal.” (Declined to elaborate—probably wise.)

Topic you could talk about for hours?
“60s and 70s South Australian and Victorian football.”

Favourite album? Something by Duke Ellington, Richard Hell, jazz or country.
Favourite artist? Steely Dan.
Favourite film? Chinatown, Big Wednesday, or A Matter of Life and Death (Powell & Pressburger).
Favourite food? Porridge, Vietnamese or Mexican.
Favourite drink? Ginger beer, preferably Bundaberg.
Any tattoos? Yes—one from the early 80s near the old waterside workers’ pub. Still happy with it.

Final Thoughts

Dave Graney is a rare breed—authentic, articulate, funny, tough, thoughtful, and deeply devoted to the craft of music. He’s lived through every iteration of the industry and somehow remains both grounded and stylishly strange, a man who works constantly yet takes none of it too seriously.

Most of all, he remains Dave Graney—boots on, groove rolling, one album a year, and still riding that wild tone wherever it takes him.

.

.

Follow DAVE GRANEY
Website – Instagram – Facebook
Spotify – Bandcamp

.

Watch the whole interview below:

.

Press Release 22nd May 2025 (below) HERE

Celebrating LOU REED,
THE VELVET UNDERGROUND
& NICO
January 2026
Australian Tour Dates

.

.

AMNPLIFY – DB