Why Their Final Tour Isn't Really Goodbye

After 10 years on the road, The Beards have decided they need to spend more time in their hometown of Adelaide. But before that, to pay tribute to their legion of facial hair growing fans, the band is about to embark on a 50-date tour of Australia and New Zealand.

"To get ready for the tour we are just stroking our beards and being really self indulgent of late and looking at what we have created," says guitarist, Facey McStubblington. "We are not only stroking our beards, but also stroking our backs and fronts and really appreciating each other.

"The official line about our farewell tour is that we feel we have achieved all we can through live musical performances and we know there are still people out there without beards so our job is not done yet.

"We need to move into phase two of our operation and we cannot talk too much about that, but it may involve an official cult while we chant our way to a higher plain of consciousness."

While many fans of The Beards may be disappointed this will be the last time they can see their hairy heroes live, McStubblington says it does not necessarily mean the end, but a new beginning.

"As a live performing band it does mean the end, but we feel like we have achieved all we can through that medium. As The Beards we are still hanging out together and hang out for breakie, lunch and dinner and we are going to recruit people for a cult, but it does mean the end of The Beards as we currently know it. The Beards, as an entity, as a social movement will never die!"

The Beards are set to undergo a transformation after this final tour, but bristled lips are sealed when it comes to any details about future plans.

"I can't really tell you more about our future projects and I have said enough by saying the word 'cult' - or 'indoctrinating the youth' so we may move into a children's band with our beards and we need to step up our operations.

"Creating a world in which every man woman and child has a beard is still our 'MO' as The Beards Pty Ltd, we just need to step it up a level as part of the indoctrination.

"That's why we are doing a final tour because people who have come out and supported us and people who started coming to see us 10 years ago didn't have beards and now they do!

"So we need to do one more lap to say not only thank you but we know where you live and if you don't have a beard we are coming to get you!

After the success of their latest albums, including having the hit song, You Should Consider Having Sex with a Bearded Man, included in triple j's Hottest 100, the group is not ruling out going back into the studio.

"We have thought about a couple more albums and this tour is signifying the end of our hard touring commitments because the last six or seven years we have been away from home for half the time,' Facey says.

"It is too much for relationships at home and all the men and women we suck face with, it is too long to be away. We only have to look in the mirror to write another song about beards so we have plenty of material to write more songs."

Originally published in X-Press Magazine