Obituary: Paul Hester

Paul Hester

Paul Hester will be best remembered as the funnybone of Crowded House. He was also a terrific drummer. But the manner of his passing this week contrasted cruelly with his exuberant public persona.

He was found dead last Saturday in Elsternwick Park, Melbourne, and is presumed to have taken his own life after suffering from bouts of depression for some years.

Back in the band's heyday, Hester saw that his position on the drummer's stool was no impediment to being part of the show. Crowded House performances often developed into shows-within-the-shows with Hester as the MC of the comedy which neatly complemented, or sometimes overwhelmed, the earnest ballads and breezy choruses.

Finn's songs might have brought the band a double helping of international success - in the US in the mid 1980s and in Britain in the early 1990s - but Hester's stage presence helped make them as entertaining as any other band of their era.

When the readers of Britain's music magazine Q voted Crowded House the best live act in the world in 1992, it was partly a reflection of the Hester-factor.

His exemplary drumming skills led him to to him being recruited by Split Enz in the early 1980s. His playing had an elegance and swing that elevated it into playing that did more that just keep the beat.

Hester's technique echoed those other underappreciated great pop sticksmen, Ringo Starr and Charlie Watts. But his greatest influence was his mother, Anne Hester, who played jazz drums in Melbourne in the 1950s and 1960s.

His partnership with Neil Finn, forged in the dying days of Split Enz was the foundation of Crowded House. He had also bonded with Tim as a Melbourne flatmate and shared stages with him again after Tim joined Crowded House in the wake of 1991's Woodface album that featured many Finn-Finn co-writes.

It also included a Hester composition, the jokey Italian Plastic, while the energetic This Is Massive featured on the final Enz album See Ya Round. But in the wake of 1993's Together Alone album, the recording that saw Hester conducting a crew of Cook Island log drummers for the title track during its recording at Karekare, the musician became increasingly disenchanted with the touring life. He spoke of a perceived pressure to play the class clown, and cracks began to appear in the relationship with Finn and the other band members.

He left Crowded House while on tour in the US in 1994, but rejoined the band when they played their final bow on the steps of the Sydney Opera House in 1996.
After his time on the drummer stool he returned to Melbourne and his young family, starting a career as a cafe owner and TV music show frontman and radio host, and played a one-off reunion with the Finns late last year.

He may have once been the drummer in Crowded House. But Paul Hester was nobody's sideman.