Defamer Australia Versus Australian Idol Winner Wes Carr

I don’t know how I pulled it off, but I managed to trick the good folk from Sony BMG into letting me interview Wes Carr today. He was a very nice young man, and we talked about loads of things including religion, Ben Gillies, Ricki-Lee’s love life, and other stuff I can’t be bothered remembering because you’ll find out soon enough.

I’ve transcribed the first part of my interview for you (you’ll have to wait for the rest, I’m afraid. I’m a woman on the go! Time is valuable! I really need some sort of work experience kid to treat as a slave, then I could force them to sit down with a recording of an interview and write out the scintillating conversation…) and you can read it after the jump.

Defamer Australia Versus Australian Idol Winner Wes Carr

DA: I guess the first thing I should ask is how are you enjoying your time as the Australian Idol?

WES: It’s unbelievable experience, I never really thought I would get this far. I sort of entered with an open mind and took the risk, and here I am! It’s unbelievable. Very overwhelming.

DA: Had you watched the other series? Be honest – had you?

WES: Look, I saw snippets here and there, but I’d never really watched a whole show because I’d always been doing other things like being in bands or working in a bar at night. So I never really saw it too much.

DA: Did you ever have a favourite Idol anyway? I mean, who would you say – other than the folks from this series who are now your best mates – who would have been your favourite Idol in a previous series?

WES: In a previous series? Well, I’m good mates with Dan Mifsud. He’s a cool guy and really talented sort of guy, but I’d probably have to say that Matt Corby was a very talented young kid for his age. So I’d have to say my favourite Idol of last year was probably Matt.

DA: Was it because he dressed so well? Was that appealing?

WES: Yeah, well, you know – he’s just a talented young kid, I suppose. I thought “Wow, he can play!” He’s got some good chops on the guitar and he can sing well, so I thought that was pretty cool. But you can’t go past the original though, Guy Sebastian, cos he comes from exactly the same spot where I come from in Adelaide.

DA: So it’s a toss up between the two?

WES: Yeah.

DA: Now one thing I wanted to ask you… you had a very distinct look for Idol, I would say. A very rock and roll kind of look.

WES: Yeah, right.

DA: Not in a bad way! I just mean you’ve got long hair, you’re kind of scruffy – but put together very well! Don’t worry, this is not an insult, this is not building up to an insult.

WES: No worries… thank you!

DA: There’s been a lot of talk about the Assemblies Of God people in previous years having a lot of voting power. Which is fine, any religion is allowed to get involved in Idol… my question is… did you try to trick them by looking like Jesus?

WES: (laughs)

DA: Is that how you tried to get the Assemblies Of God vote? IS THAT WHAT YOU DID?

WES: (laughing) A very interesting concept you’ve got there, but I’ve got no idea. I wake up and this is how I look, this is just pure laziness really. But that’s quite an interesting concept, I like that.

DA: The Jesus Conspiracy Theory: How you reached out to the Assemblies Of God massive.

WES: Well I’ve heard just about everything, but I haven’t heard any of that, so that’s a very clever take on things. Well done.

DA: Why, thank you very much Wes. Another thing I guess I have to ask you because every week there’s a new person in the paper linked with her and they have to issue a denial… are you dating Ricki-Lee?

WES: No, I’m not dating Ricki-Lee. I can safely say that.

DA: I got a little lift out with the Herald Sun, I get to cross out an Idol every week as the denials come out. So it’s not you, it’s not Teale, and it’s not Mark Spano. Good to know. Who’s next? Is it Thanh Bui?

WES: (laughs) It could be Thanh! Dunno! No idea!

DA: We had a little bit of a hero on our website just based on that ad campaign for Idol before we knew who any of you were. Did you get to know James Spargo well? He became a bit of a weird cult figure on Defamer Australia based on the way he sang the line “Lovin’ each other wholeheartedly” in Can You Feel It. We were right into him. Did you get to know him well?

WES: (giggles) Ah, yeah I did. He was, ahh… he’s a nice bloke. Yeah. He comes from a musical theatre background.

DA: Ooohhhh! Say no more! You’re not going to be catching up for beers, are you?

WES: Probably not, no.

DA: But no offence to him.

WES: No, no offence to good old James, he’s a lovely bloke. But yeah… he’s definitely the musical theatre type. And I think he’d be an amazing singer on stage, definitely.

DA: In The Lion King, he has a place.

WES: Yeah, well maybe I do too! I could play Mustafa.

DA: You’d be great at that!

WES: (chuckles all round)

DA: Wes, a friend of mine named Gen had a bit of an issue with you. She loved you, she loved you more than anyone I know.

WES: Yeah, right!

DA: She sent you a message on Facebook a couple of weeks before rock week, I want to know if you got it. It was very polite – I made her send me a copy after I finished pissing myself at the fact she’d contacted you – and she was advising you to sing Sex On Fire.

WES: (sounding guilty) Oh, right…

DA: Did you get that?

WES: No, I didn’t, I’m sorry! I had about a thousand messages on Facebook, and then all of a sudden I had this Facebook melt down and deleted my Facebook because it was just too much. But I did get a few people saying “Sing Sex On Fire, sing Sex On Fire!” but to be honest, I thought it would be… I dunno… I just… Kings Of Leon are just such a great band, very distinct voice, very distinct song. And I thought, I wanna whip the harmonica out on rock night just for something different. So I thought I might choose Desire instead and do like a bluesy kind of number. It worked out in the end…

DA: Well, you won, dude. At this point – any decision that you made? You won. So you were fine.But that woman was distraught when Mark Spano got up there and began singing Sex On Fire. It was like, THE MESSAGE WENT THE WRONG WAY!

WES: Oh no! Sorry I disappointed her. And hopefully she likes my new song, and hopefully she can come along to a show and I’ll buy her a beer and say “Sorry about that”

DA: I think you’ve just pretty much made her life. That will be awesome for her. Did you watch Mark do it and kind of go “Yeah, I could have done that. I’m just too multi-talented really, Mark, so I’m just gonna stick with the harmonica and the guitar and sing U2, but hey – you go ahead and do Kings Of Leon. That’s fine.”

WES: I thought he did it really well! I thought it was a great thing! And after his performance, there were so many banners of Spano On Fire and all that sort of stuff. So it went well for him, I’m happy for him.

AND THAT’S PART ONE OF DEFAMER AUSTRALIA’S INTERVIEW WITH WES CARR. THANK YOU WES! THANK YOU SONY-BMG! I’LL PUT MORE OF THE INTERVIEW UP SOON ONCE I DOWN A COUPLE OF STRONG COFFEES/GET MY HANDS ON SOME RITALIN.