Andrew Guirguis commented about the size of his band. “It takes a lot of organising, he said. "But the good thing is we travel as a ten piece and we have a stage manager who comes everywhere with us.  I guess it gets to a point where each person in the band carries out a role.  When we are on tour it actually doesn’t feel any harder than it would be if we were a three piece band because each person is pulling his weight.”  Andrew went on to explain, “It’s a real team effort, but of course the hardest part about it is the financial part.  Each time the band leaves Sydney it needs ten plane tickets, gear hire for nine musicians and so everything is multiplied.”  Kid Confucius has become such a professional band that they do not have replacements if one of the members cannot perform.  “It’s at that point now where we can’t play at all with any of our band members absent,” says Andrew.

So how did Kid Confucius get their name?  “Myself (Andrew Guirguis), with the keyboardist (James Branson), the drummer (Bart Denaro) and the bass player (Nathan Murray) were the original four members.  We all went to University together.  We were all arts media students, so we had plenty of free time on our hands.  We were sitting around the Uni bar one day, just throwing words at each other and this went on for a few weeks.  I think it started with the creative writing class that the drummer (Bart Denaro) and I had taken.  We were doing exercises in word association by throwing random words together and seeing what resulted from it.  Then we thought, why don’t we use the same process to come up with a band name?  The names ‘Kid’ and ‘Confucius’ were the two words that were left over.  We got used to the name and now we just can’t shake it, even if we wanted to.” 

The whole ‘Confucius’ name was purely the sound of the word rather than the any quotations of the word.   When asked how the group evolved to what it is today Andrew explains, “Four of us met one day at University, early on with the whole of making friends process.  You go through first at Uni trying to find out who your kind of person is and who’s not.  We all just met one day at a cafeteria and decided to start jamming and seeing what would come out of it.” 

Andrew and Robert (Robert Hezkial, lead singer) grew up together as members of the same church during their childhood years, and they met again later at University.  “Robert told me he was looking for a band," Andrew continued.  "I said, 'Well, I have a band so come and have a bit of a sing.’  I think it wasn’t until he came in with his kind of soulful voice that we all really thought, 'Wow', this is the kind of the direction we should go in! And so we did our first gig with him.  He didn’t know any of our songs, he didn’t have any lyrics, he basically just got up and sang over whatever we played, and just made melodies and lyrics up on the spot.  Everyone absolutely loved it and was asking us where they could buy our CD.  We thought ‘Wow!’  but we weren’t taking it very seriously and it was just something to do to keep us amused at Uni.  I think it was just after that day that we all sat around in silence, a bit dazed, and thought maybe this is something we should pursue.  We soon started adding members in order to make the kind of sound that we wanted to make.”

Since then Kid Confucius has released an album.  “While doing the album we had the luxury of doing live string arrangements and bringing in some extra horns. We have two sax players in the band but we brought in extra trumpets.  I guess that was the kind of sound we always had in our heads and where we were going with the album.  It’s a bit hard to travel with a string cortex but I’m sure we could do it one day if we ever make a stack of money,” Andrew laughs.  “We are definitely into that old soul Marvin Gaye sound.  Those guys use to play with orchestra, you know, so we do what we can.”  Kid Confucius is also a fan of D’Angelo’s Voodoo album.  Other musicians admired by the band members include Marvin Gaye, Spearhead and Australian Andy Bull.

Kid Confucius has been performing at gigs in Sydney and nearby places and the band has already visited Brisbane three times.  The first time was for the Valley Fiesta in 2003, the second trip was for Kid Confucius National Album Tour earlier this year (2005), and they also played at The Zoo with some local bands.  Most recently Kid Confucius has played in Brisbane at this year’s Valley Fiesta (2005).

Article and above photo by Chrissy Layton, AusNotebook Music & Creative (7/11/05)

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