Kev’s bawdy brew

Hamish Heard
Twenty minutes on the phone with Kevin Bloody Wilson delivers remarkably little in the way of printable material.
With a sense of humour as dry as his outback heritage, a razorsharp wit and a vocabulary that would have made his grandmother’s blood run cold, it’s hard to distinguish between the performer’s on and offstage personas.
Wilson’s musical brand of toilet humour hits Geelong on Sunday as part of a monthlong tour of regional Victoria promoting his latest album, DILLIGAF.
“DILLIGAF is an acronym that came from the Australian military which actually means ‘do I look like I give a f—,” Wilson explains.
“It’s a word that sort of encompasses my lifestyle. I haven’t given a f— pretty much at all.”
Somehow that philosophy has been kind to Wilson who has sold millions of albums since discovering a knack for telling stories of Australiana with the aid of rhyming expletives and his trusty Maton guitar.
The former electrician now spends a third of his time performing to packed auditoriums throughout the world.
“It’s strange how I was sort of catapulted into the mainstream,” he ponders.
“I went from mucking around with a few mates in a bar at Kalgoorlie to playing at the London Palladium.
“I believe if my sons wanted to buy a burnt pirate copy of one of my CDs in the schoolyard they’d have to cough up a quarter of an ounce of dope, so I guess that’s some sort of measure of success.”
The artist’s contempt for phone companies has seemingly grown since he penned the famous lyrics for a song directing an unhelpful operator to stick her phone where the sun refused to shine.
“Nowadays just getting through to an operator is a nightmare – they just put you on hold with some recorded message speaking s—,” he complains.
“I reckon if I did rewrite it would be ‘Hello, operator, I’m sort of sad to see you go’.”
Wilson also jokingly laments not following his own advice and marrying the daughter of a brewery owner.
“But I do have a brother who brews his own, which is pretty f untidy,” he says.
“He strains it through his wife’s pantyhose, so it has a salty taste that makes you want to drink more.”
Wilson plays at Geelong Performing Arts Centre on Sunday and Torquay’s The Rose on May 23.