Outlandish costumes, goofy pseudonyms, cheesy dance choreography, adrenalised club bangers, and music videos featuring naked helicopter rides over London: everything about Confidence Man is deliciously larger than life.
Also getting considerably larger is the UK fanbase of the Brisbane four-piece consisting of singer-dancers Janet Planet and Sugar Bones and the black veil-wearing production duo of Clarence McGuffie and Reggie Goodchild. Case in point: the enormous crowd Confidence Man pulled at Glastonbury Festival in June, where they generated considerable buzz with a blistering live set.
“It was the most turbo version of a Con Man show that there has ever been — we worked with [lighting and production designer] Rob Sinclair who does all the Madonna stuff,” says Janet from the Dalston flat she shares with her bandmates after a relocation to London in mid-2023.
“We put more time and money into that show and just went bigger and weirder and better,” adds Sugar.
The rave reviews from Glastonbury are the kind of warm embrace that the group don’t always receive, especially at home in Australia. Confidence Man’s notorious Sydney New Year’s Eve 2023 performance on the ABC managed to draw the ire of several outraged viewers, with comments including, “It’s like a year six talent quest performance,”; “This techno, synth, prancing, fake, lip syncing, narcissistic, vacuous crap is fkn dreadful!!! Throw them in the harbour!”; and “Anyone else wondering what drugs these two are on?”
“I saw that and was like, ‘Mate, you can’t do this and be completely off your nut.’ Like, you’d fucking die,” says Janet.
“We’re very aware [we piss people off], exactly why, we’re not 100% sure, but it’s great because it’s so easy to cause a stir,” says Sugar. “We literally go on stage, sing three songs and the entire nation is outraged for no clear reason, but we love it.”
“Our whole career had been like that, but we’ve embraced it to the point now where if there isn’t a stir, we’re offended, like, ‘Fuck, we’re not doing our job right if we’re not pissing people off,’” says Janet. “If you’re sitting nice and comfortable in your art and aren’t pushing any buttons, you probably need to take a good, hard look at yourself.”
A lot of confusion around the band seems to be whether they’re being serious or if it’s all an elaborate put-on, and it’s something the pair say even they’re not sure of.
“We don’t even define ourselves really, so it must be hard for other people to, because half the time, I don’t know if we’re joking either,” explains Janet. “We’re definitely not fully joking, but we’re also definitely not fully serious, either. The fact that the line is blurred for us too must be confusing for people.”
Someone who wasn’t confused by Confidence Man’s blend of dance music, striking visuals and subversive humour was, unsurprisingly, Jimmy Cauty, one half of legendary UK dance music/art-pranksters The KLF, who infamously burned a million pounds in 1994 and fired blanks from a machine gun into the crowd at the 1992 BRIT Awards. Cauty saw Confidence Man live two years ago and has been a champion for the group ever since, even producing remixes for a couple of new songs.
“We met him and he said he thought we were great, and from there he showed us his studio and we just kind of became mates and he’s been mentoring us a little bit and giving us advice. It’s been pretty amazing,” says Janet.
“It’s funny because we were about to tell him the name of the new album was 3AM (LA LA LA), which is obviously a bit of a reference to ‘3 a.m. Eternal,’ the old KLF track,” says Sugar. “Then we were like, ‘Oh shit, I hope he doesn’t get annoyed about it!’ We hadn’t really asked him, we just kind of did it. And then Janet was chatting to him and dropped that in and thankfully he was like, ‘I’m so excited about it and maybe I can do a remix!’”
The original versions of those remixed songs were created in London over several hard-partying months with one guiding principle for the group: no sobriety allowed.
“During lockdown, we discovered that the way we write the best is drunk in the kitchen, not sitting in the studio and taking things too seriously,” says Janet. “So on this record, we made a decision that the only way that we’re gonna write this record is wasted and that was gonna be the theme of this record. It’s about freedom and not worrying and not overthinking — it’s just gonna be spur-of-the-moment vibes.”
A typical Confidence Man recording session would start with margaritas at lunch, heading to a studio afterwards and “getting blasted” writing and recording all night before finishing up at 9am the next day.
“We’d get home and re-listen to the songs till 10am and the neighbours would yell at us,” says Janet. “I remember hearing them being like, ‘Shut the fuck up!’ and we’d listen to the same song over and over again for 40 minutes.”
“We would be the worst neighbours in the world, with the sound of us making a song,” laughs Sugar. “I’d rather shoot myself in the foot.”
With the “deeper and harder and more clubby” 3AM (LA LA LA) now set for release, the group are focusing on gearing up for an Australian tour in October and November before a run of UK shows that will take them through to the end of the year.
“We don’t stop at the moment — it’s no days off, every day on,” says Sugar. “So we’re pretty haggard, but we’re alive.”
“We’re definitely big workout people. You have to be because you can’t sing and do that kind of shit otherwise, especially when you’re doing 20 shows a month and you’re touring constantly — you need to be able to sustain and not fall apart,” says Janet.
“And if you want to party, you need to work twice as hard — then you can party as well.”
Confidence Man’s 3AM (LA LA LA) is out Friday, October 18th via I OH YOU (pre-save/pre-order here).
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