“There’s a fair bit about sex in there,” says Cameron James of his new show, the mysteriously titled Sha Na Na Na Na Na. “It’s one of the things that unite us as humans; we agree that sex is great and something we should do for the survival of the species. I’ve also got some stories in there about knife fights.”
Whenever you talk to James, you know that shit is about to get real, not to mention hilarious. The fresh-faced comedian will be bringing his unique brand of humour to Bondi Feast this month, blending comedy and music to talk about growing up, the idiocy of youth, and those two things it’s hard to gloss over – sex and knife fights. I even suggest that perhaps the two occurred simultaneously to inspire James’ material.
“Thank God those were at different times, that would have been crazy… actually, maybe that would have been fun,” he says. “Maybe that’s what I’m into and never found out that was my fetish until right now. It’s totally your fault, Tegan. If you read about me going down in a blaze of sex and razors, I want you to know that it’s your fault.”
Having served his time as a teenage boy, James unsurprisingly grew up with the dream of becoming a rock star. That may not have panned out, but Bondi Feast is a close second, and his show will feature a fair slab of music.
“I would say that it’s largely a stand-up show, but I’ve been a half-arsed, shitty musician for most of my life,” he explains. “I’ve been trying to find a way to justify the countless hours and money I’ve spent on guitars since I was 12, and actually use those skills so I’m not just pretending to be a rock star in front of my mirror.”
James’ musical past also plays a part in the stand-up portion of his show, as do his previous attempts at being both a thug and an artiste. “[My friends and I] tried to be a gang, but I went to a Catholic school, so how bad could we have been?” he laughs. “We definitely tried to be real bad-arses; shoplifting and attempts at violence and all that kind of stuff. So I’ve been digging up the past trying to remember all the misinformed shit I did, all the times I tried to be more tough or artistic than I actually was, and all the times I took myself too seriously.
“Looking over it, there’s definitely recurring themes like the idiotic shit you do as a teenager and the way you try to pretend to be someone you’re not. So I guess the material I cover is mostly about memory, youth, mistakes, sex, love and that kind of stuff.”
Some of the funniest chapters in James’ past involve his trying to find out who he was, and those times yielded some interesting results that he discusses in the show.
“Every teenager who picks up a guitar tries to be Jeff Buckley at some point. I wrote songs for girls with titles such as ‘A Love That Makes The Roses Cry’. You learn a few chords that are jazzy and have sevenths in them and you think you’re the sex god artist who can communicate the deep things that the plebs out there need. But you’ve also never lived and haven’t done anything worth talking about. It’s so embarrassing.
“When you’re young and trying to figure out who you are, you try on all of these disguises and a lot of different masks. People who don’t know who they are yet but are trying to figure it out – that’s instantly funny to me.”
Cameron James’ Sha Na Na Na Na Na, as part of Bondi Feast 2015, runsThursday July 16 – Saturday July 18 at Mini Theatre, Bondi Pavilion.
