From humble beginnings in his hometown of Armidale NSW, to touring nationally and internationally, Pat Harris tells us how he followed his lifetime passion for playing the bass guitar right around the globe – eventually finding his way back home with a fresh perspective and young family in tow.

Let’s start at the beginning – where did you grow up and what do you treasure most about your upbringing?

I was born in Armidale, NSW and grew up in my childhood home on Taylor Street, leaving for the big city right out of high school. Looking back, I’m grateful for the feeling of a close-knit community that growing up in Armidale gave me. There’s a subtle fabric of familiarity with everybody – you see people down the street whose faces you’ve known your whole life and you don’t even know their names. It makes you feel like you are a part of a place – like you belong.

When did you start playing music?

My dad started teaching me the drums when I was 10 and for my 12th birthday my parents bought me a bass guitar – I got hooked and have been playing ever since. I’m fairly Darwinian about music; I believe that if you want to do it then you will do it – and if you do it, you will get good at it. Throughout my teenage years, playing music was a constant – I spent a lot of time in my room obsessively learning the Jamiroquai and Red Hot Chili Peppers songs I loved, note for note. After moving to Sydney, I joined as many bands as I could, eventually touring overseas with the Colombian/Australian band Watussi. We went to Japan, South America, Malaysia and New Zealand and I got to hoon around and do that whole thing. Since then, I’ve done a fair bit of touring within Australia with different acts like Dustin Tebbutt, Hermitude and Wes Carr. I also filled in for Sampa the Great once which was really fun.

How much touring do you do these days?

Once our second child came along, I started to think about what sort of living there was to be made touring and decided that a life on the road wasn’t a great idea. We made the move from Wollongong back to Armidale to give ourselves a break from the high-cost, high-pressure of city living. I still tour with bands up and down the east coast a couple of times a year and that’s enough to make me feel like I’m still a part of it – I can blow off a little steam and catch up with friends, then come back to the easy lifestyle that country living offers.

How do you navigate the challenges of being a musician and working in a different industry?

One thing I’ve been reflecting on lately is the fact that music can really spoil you – it can become a way of following your passion while socialising with friends and making money. You start to think that if you want to hang out with someone, you should put on a gig, or if you want to express yourself through your music, then you should go and make money from it, or if you want to make money, then it has to be interesting. The challenge for me as I’ve been focusing on work outside of music over the last few years is that I’ve had to learn to separate those things and be okay with that. I’ve learned that it’s okay to have a job that doesn’t necessarily tick all of my creative boxes and it’s okay to hang out with people just because I want to hang out with them – there doesn’t have to be a creative project underpinning the interaction.

What has been your biggest lesson?

Something that has pleasantly surprised me lately is that I can make music and follow my passion without having to make any money. They always say to do what you love, but I think the implication of that aphorism is that you should do what you love for money. Lately, I’ve been thinking that you should just do what you love because you want to do it. Loving it is enough, you don’t need a reason beyond that.

What are you working on now?

Right now, I’m working on some new recordings with my band The Tambourine Girls who played at The Big Chill this year. We all live in different regional areas – the drummer lives in Fingal Head near Byron, the singer and guitarist live in Robertson in the Southern Highlands, and I live here in Armidale. Now that I’ve got the studio up and running, we get together here every now and again and spend the weekend eating, drinking and hanging out while we record. We’ve been doing this a bit more over the past year or so and I think it’s becoming a key part of who we are as a band. Something about the pace and surroundings in the country encourages you to slow down and enjoy what you’re doing – hopefully the new music reflects that.

Listen to the latest from The Tambourine Girls on Spotify

Different Streets – released March 2023 | Waiting for Pleasure – released 2018 | The Tambourine Girls – released 2016

Instagram – The Tambourine Girls | Instagram – Pat Harris | Photography Clara Adolphs