The Church launch a U.S. tour in support of their new album, Forget Yourself, tonight in Atlanta. Once the hottest buzz band from Down Under, the psychedelic alterna-rockers have now been together twenty-four years and have released a dizzying fourteen albums.

"This band hates apathy," says guitarist Marty Wilson-Piper on the Church's impressive productivity. "We're always trying to figure out how to do things better and believing in the muse."

"There's an incredible realization that a band can last so long and still feel to its members like it's always just beginning," adds drummer Tim Powles, who joined founding members Steve Kilbey (bass, vocals), Peter Koppes (guitar) and Wilson-Piper eleven years ago. "I think we feel it's all a bit too special to let go -- even when the chips are down."

And the chips have been down, at least commercially, over the past decade, but the magical, timeless sounding Forget Yourself -- which is being heralded by critics and longtime fans alike as among the band's masterworks -- should erode some of the stateside indifference.

"Like most things, you get better with practice and experience," says Powles, who also produced the new record. "But a lot of reinvention went on."

"We're a lot looser on this album," Wilson-Piper explains. "We managed to get a lot of things down live. You know, if it sounds good, keep it."

Following Forget Yourself's predecessor, 2002's After Everything Now This -- which, according to Powles, was "written and tracked across different time and space zones" -- the drummer/producer insisted that the quartet come together in one small room. They also traded instruments and wrote songs on the spot.

"There was very little sonic separation," Powles says. "We divided the recording room into quarters -- a bit like a pigsty with bits of wood, Perspex and carpet everywhere. We were playing right on top of each other -- it was very natural, connected and fluent."

That feel translates to the sparkling guitar roar of "Sealine," the dreamy "Song in Space" and the lush, ethereal "Telepath," a few of the album's standouts. Powles, however, counts the experimental "The Theatre and Its Double" as his personal favorite.

"What an original blend of everything normally not found together in a contemporary rock song!" he declares. "And the guitar sounds -- I mean, who gets guitar sounds like we do? There's not a keyboard in sight!"

Unusual guitar sounds were of course partly responsible for the band's signature hit, "Under the Milky Way," which climbed to Number Twenty-four in the U.S. in 1988.

"I'm sick of it as a 'hit,' but not as a cool song," Wilson-Piper says. "We have a lot of cool songs. People told us at one point that we were important because we had a hit, but it's irrelevant to us if something gets successful. I mean, just because Friends is the most popular show, doesn't mean it's the best."

The Church's U.S. tour dates:

3/3: Atlanta, Variety
3/5: Washington, DC, Birchmere
3/6: Philadelphia, Trocadero
3/7: Baltimore, Rams Head
3/8: New York, Bowery Ballroom
3/9: Boston, Paradise
3/11: Detroit, Magic Stick
3/12: Chicago, House of Blues
3/13: Milwaukee, Shank Hall
3/14: Minneapolis, First Avenue
3/19: Denver, Bluebird Theatre
3/20: Salt Lake City, DV8
3/22: Seattle, Crocodile
3/23: Portland, OR, Dantes
3/26: San Francisco, Slim's
3/27: Los Angeles, House of Blues
3/28: San Juan Capistrano, CA, The Coach House
3/30: San Diego, Canes

JOHN D. LUERSSEN
(March 3, 2004)