My favourite road trip: Julia Deans and Fur Patrol

Thursday, 24 December 2015

Singer-songwriter Julia Deans recalls a slice of life on the road, from her days with Fur Patrol.

**Where is your favourite road trip?

Singer Julia Deans recalls life on the road.

**I don't know about favourite, but probably most frequently travelled for a while there … the route from Melbourne to Sydney and on up to Brisbane and then back again, between the years of about 2000-2006-ish.

**What makes it so special?

**It was such a formative time for me … for us. We (Fur Patrol) were working our butts off.

Who did you go with?

Simon Braxton, Andrew Bain, Steve Wells (aka Fur Patrol), and Andrew Downes (our soundie).

**READ MORE

*[A new dialogue

](http://www.stuff.co.nz/the-press/entertainment/nz-music-month/3651425/A-new-dialogue)*[Q&A: Singer, songwriter and musician Julia Deans

](http://www.stuff.co.nz/dominion-post/culture/72924390/Q-A-Singer-songwriter-and-musician-Julia-Deans)*Going her own way**

What makes the road trip appealing, compared with other forms of travel?

This wasn't really so much appealing as a necessity. Transporting our entire backline back and forth across the Hume Highway in our Toyota HiAce was far more fiscally responsible than flying, then hiring vehicles and amps etc. We just kinda got into a rhythm with it.

I didn't drive at the time (conveniently!), and there's not really much variation in the landscape on that trip, so I read a loy of books. And thanked my genetic makeup for not having the travel-sickness gene.

What form of sustenance do you require while on this trip - picnic, or service station meat pie?

We ate a lot of Hungry Jacks/Burger King vege burgers. they were cheap as hell, and really filling. And by filling, I mean they would sit in your gut like a lump of concrete and take about three days to digest, so you didn't need to eat anything else. which was perfect for our meagre budgets – probably not so great for our digestive systems.

What was playing on the stereo?

To be honest, I usually preferred the engine drone – made it easier for reading, less distracting. selfish, right? Usually Simon would take charge of the stereo. I seem to remember a lot of Yo La Tengo. And Mos Def. it was good.