🟥 This article is translated from German.

Craig Nicholls of Australia's brilliant garage rockers The Vines teeters on Brian Wilson's footsteps on the edge of insanity.

Glasgow, Monday evening, 10:30 p.m.: While outside, kids without tickets wait in the rain by the tour bus for The Vines, things threaten to spiral out of control in the completely sold-out QMU Club. Just moments ago, the small, disheveled Craig Nicholls effortlessly performed splits with each chord, spun around with his guitar held high, and played wailing solos behind his head, while the excited crowd pushed, jumped, and raged. But now, it's all over. Condensation drips from the ceiling onto the young Scots in the audience, who hold their breath and crane their necks in anticipation. Craig has kicked over the microphone stand, kneels on the ground in front of his Marshall amplifier, and lights a cigarette, creating chest-rattling feedback. As his bandmates drive "1969" to a grand psychedelic finale, he stands up and staggers across the stage. With each beat that Hamish pounds on his drum set, Craig stumbles a few steps further until he suddenly takes a swing and plunges into the audience with his guitar. Roadies pull him back onto the stage, where he rips the Stratocaster from his body, carelessly slams the screeching instrument next to the stand, and sinks to his knees again. Lost in himself, he sways in the darkness, sticks out his tongue or rolls his eyes back until Patrick, Ryan, and Hamish nod at each other briefly and bring the song to a powerful end. The lights come on, and the four are gone. Gradually, everything awakens from a trance, until the tension finally erupts in thunderous applause.

"Don't worry, that's not me on stage," says Craig (24) as he throws himself onto the couch in the dressing room. He's a bit fidgety but clear and clean. "It's emotionally and physically exhausting; leaving the stage is like coming down from a spaceship. But it's also an incredibly rewarding experience. Everything is loud, the lyrics float in your head - you're transported to that place. It can be insanely powerful. And sometimes painful too. But hey, on stage, I have the freedom to reinvent myself at any moment! Whether I stay still, run around... I never know if I'll scream next or sing softly."

The outstanding debut LP "Highly Evolved" (page 51) had not yet been released when The Vines' explosive live shows already preceded their reputation. Numerous renowned musician colleagues have sought tickets to the sold-out concerts in recent weeks, including Albert Hammond Jr. of The Strokes and Manic Street Preachers' James Dean Bradfield, who congratulated Craig backstage in Bristol and repeatedly emphasized, shaking his head, that the gig was "absolutely fucking amazing." Even though it's nonsense that after The Hives, The White Stripes and The Doves, The Vines are now being dubbed "the new Strokes" and The Datsuns will be in four months' time, the Australian quartet is undoubtedly one of the best new bands of the last ten years. And by far - hype or not.

The miraculous story began in the mid-1990s in Sydney when Craig met Patrick while working at a McDonald's. At that time, Craig rarely left the house, much to the dismay of his parents, and spent his free time consistently in front of the TV, eventually leading to TV bans. It was Patrick, two years older, who reintroduced the peculiar and sometimes suicidal teenager to people, smoking pot with him and rehearsing Nirvana songs with the manic-depressive drummer David Olliffe - who suffered seizures during the debut recordings and extinguished cigarettes on his arm - until he was replaced by Hamish Rosser around the same time when guitarist Ryan Griffiths joined, completing the existing lineup.

"We started with music just because we were bored," Craig recalls. "We liked Nirvana and could play our instruments halfway. But then... I became curious. One day, I wondered if I could write a song myself. And after two or three years, we went to a studio with a few hundred dollars to record our own tracks." The three convinced a friendly radio host to play the songs on the radio. A manager listened, contacted the guys, and sent demos to various people in the industry. And then everything happened quickly: When an email from producer Rob Schnapf (Beck's "Mellow Gold" and "Odelay") arrived, containing only THE VINES! THE VINES! THE VINES! from the first to the last line, flights to L.A. were booked. "You can't just have five good ones! We didn't want to record an EP, we wanted to record an album straight away. I like albums. If for some reason the guitars all stopped working and the tour had to be cancelled, I would record the second LP straight away."

As much as Craig Nicholls tries to get used to the stage, touring isn't really his thing. He's afraid of planes and cars, is under a lot of tension before performances and can't shake the feeling that he's wasting valuable time. The new songs are already finished and Craig tested two of them live on stage in Glasgow. A poignantly fragile solo acoustic performance of "Autumn Shade Part Two" and the snotty and clever "Fuck The World" confirm his self-assessment: "We're constantly getting better."

"I feel that we still have a few good albums left in us," he says, rubbing his scalp vigorously. "And most artists did their best work when they were young." Many of them were as sensitive as Craig Nicholls: Kurt Cobain, Jimi Hendrix, Jim Morrison. And many of them didn't have much time. Craig spins the thread himself: "Yes, I know, there's this whole rock'n'roll myth. That it's glamorous to kill yourself or to coke your brains out. That's not for me. I'm not interested in these drugs. I have so many ideas for the next album, it's sure to be exciting. And I want to get even better. I also paint. I don't think I have to kill myself. I want to paint a picture next."

But as long as the guitars don't all stop working, the former art student won't find the time to paint a picture. A machine has long been set in motion around the Vines that threatens to crush the unstable boy. Capitol Records has made The Vines their top priority in the USA, EMI has done the same for Germany. Expectations are high at home too. After England, the quartet is now touring the USA before moving on to Down Under and then Germany in the autumn.

"I just want to record. I have all the songs in my head and will lose them if I'm not careful. Brian Wilson never had to go on tour and neither did the Beatles - because of all the shouting. I have to record, I have to do it now, but they won't let me," Craig said in April - on the day of his first major concert ever - in California. Then he hyperventilated and locked himself in the toilet for three hours. In the meantime, management and record companies are trying to minimize the media hype as much as possible without having to accept too much loss of profit. Please be careful with this young man. He wouldn't be the first talent...