Jebediah: Still Writing Their Own Story

Jebediah: Are We OK? is set to screen at Palace Nova Eastend on Friday 9 October with an exclusive Q&A session with writer and director Arlo Dean Cook and, appearing via Zoom, Jebediah vocalist Kevin Mitchell. The feature documentary explores the Australian alt-rock quartet's 30-year career. It's the story of a band uniquely made up of four members who have stuck together since they were teenagers. Created over 11 years, the film combines 30 years of unseen personal archives and home videos with intimate present-day access. 

The documentary wasn't always the end product in mind. Cook first came on tour with the band for their 20th anniversary, and Mitchell remembers that from that moment he was constantly filming them. This was all part of the journey to discover the final story they have now. However, Mitchell was unsure if the filming was ever going to stop. 

'There was always more, for a while I was just thinking, 'God, at what point do we finish?' Mitchell laughs from his home in Ocean Grove, Victoria.

"I don't know at what point in time he mentioned the word documentary, but I think we all kind of just went 'oh yeah, sure, whatever'. At that point in time the idea of him making a documentary about us, we thought it'd kind of be like a thing for fans. Just the story of the band and all that kind of stuff, so we were like, 'yeah, okay, we can do that'. It didn’t seem like a big deal. 

"But then as the years went by and the story evolved, the nature of the documentary started to change. We'd already kind of said yes to it. So you're in it then, you know? I mean, at any time somebody could have put their hand up and said, 'I don't want to do this anymore'. But I think we're also sort of aware that if Arlo’s gonna make this documentary and we're gonna be the subject of it. Well, we want it to be good."

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One of the most prominent themes of the film is the fact that Jebediah succeeded in weathering any storm and being able to stay together while their counterparts broke up, had internal drama or faded away. 

"I noticed over the years when bands around us were breaking up. Sometimes I'd be shocked that it would happen so quickly after they started to experience a bit of a plateau in their careers. I think for a lot of times, it's because the glue holding the band together was based on material success and as soon as that started to go away - even if there was still some success there - as soon as some things started to kind of go off course a little bit, the whole thing fell apart. So much of it was being held together by this idea of material success. 

"Now, interestingly, I find years later, a lot of those bands have got back together and had reunion things or whatever," Mitchell muses. 

"I suspect that in many cases years go by and people grow up, they mature, they look back and go, 'oh, geez, maybe we were kind of young and stupid and maybe life was actually pretty good, we just didn't realise'. Or 'we took ourselves too seriously', and you look back and go, 'oh, it was actually kind of fun, just like hanging out with your mates and making noise. Maybe we shouldn't have taken things so seriously, and I want to do that again, because I realise now that I miss it'."

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Throughout their 30-year career, Jebediah did have a number of informal breaks so the band could focus on other aspects of their life. The documentary explores these moments as some of the band members get 'normal' day jobs, spend time with family, play in other bands or for Mitchell, create an extremely successful solo project in the form of the pseudonym, Bob Evans. 

Mitchell's solo folk-pop project saw him propelled into the spotlight with the release of his 2006 ARIA Award-winning album, Suburban Songbook. To celebrate two decades of this album, Mitchell will be touring the country and playing Suburban Songbook front to back. 

When other bands explore side projects, it can be due to a hiatus and can come with internal tension within the original band. Although the Bob Evans project didn't seem to cause too much drama on screen in the documentary, Mitchell explains that it definitely had its moments at the time. 

"There were definitely moments there where it did sort of raise some questions and threaten things a little bit. But it goes back to what I was saying before again. I mean, it's another good example of lead singer goes solo, band breaks up. Because it's just like as soon as the material success of something is threatened, even just a little bit, the whole thing often falls apart. I think when I went off and did the solo thing, we did need to take a break and we all kind of agreed that a bit of a break after 10 years would be a good idea. Bob Evans, in that time, achieving a little bit of success in its own right, could easily have ended things there. 

At the end of the day, we all enjoyed what we had. In a lot of ways actually, as the Bob Evans thing became successful and it was really becoming my full-time gig there for a few years. I would read reviews, I'd hear people say, 'well, that's the end of Jebediah' and all that kind of stuff. Really, that just kind of fueled my determination not just for Jebediah to come back together, but to really come back strong. I really wanted that to happen, because you don't like it when other people write your own future. It's like, 'No, hang on, this is my career, I'll decide when something's gonna end or when something's gonna start, and I'll decide how things are gonna go'. That's how I responded to that; it was kind of like, 'don't be writing the obituary of something. It's my thing, man, I'll tell you when it's finished'."

Jebediah: Are We OK? is screening at Palace Nova Eastend on Friday 9 October. Tickets on sale at palacenova.com.au. Catch Bob Evans performing at Lion Arts Factory on Thursday 22 October. Tickets on sale at moshtix.com.au