Fuel: All tanked up and ready to roll

A quick word ...

... with Brett Scallion, bottle-blond vocalist with Tennessee-bred rock band Fuel who, having sold a million or so copies of their debut album Sunburn, head to Auckland on the eve of the release of their follow-up, Something Like Human, to play at the Powerstation on Friday.

What's Fuel's position in the scheme of things now?

The first record had really good success. It was platinum here, which is a million records, and it's platinum in Australia. So we definitely laid some good ground to walk on. Things are going great - here in the States we're the number one most-added on radio stations throughout the country, so everyone is picking it up like hotcakes. I think we're in a great position as a band.

How would you describe the sound of the band to someone who had never heard you?

That's such a tough thing. We're a rock'n'roll band but there are so many different categories these days and it drives me crazy. Now if you're a rock band you're either aggressive rock or modern rock or alternative rock or hard rock. I don't know where we fit in there.

So you're you're an aggressive, modern, alternative hard rock band ... ?

Yeah, take 'em all and put them in there. We're a rock'n'roll band as far as I know.

Country music never tempted you, considering where you're from?

I hate country music. It's just always been too twangy for me. I can't stand it really, with the exception of a few country stars out there that I don't mind, like the Charlie Daniels band, but all those guys were country artists that were right there on the cuff of being a rock'n'roll group. They wanted to be rock'n'roll guys, they just didn't have the hair for it ...

And of course you do. It appears you're doing your bit for the peroxide revival in rock'n'roll ...

The peroxide revival? Yeah the bleached-out look. Totally.

The easy comparisons for Fuel are bands like Creed and Live. Consider them contemporaries?

I've never really heard that. If that is what you need to do to try to connect to us a little more, whatever. Those are two very credible bands in my mind, it's never going to bother me if anybody says we sound like certain bands.

So to a political question: Bush or Gore?

I haven't really had a chance to sit down and think about it too much. I would probably have to go with Bush because he's a Republican. He's got a good track record, too. His Dad was in there and everything.