They’ve sold out in Wagga Wagga, they’ve added a new show in Fremantle and they’re soon coming to The Q – The Waifs are among the real stayers in Australia’s folk scene. 

Often styled avant-garde folk heroes and praised for their affable natures, the group got together in 1992 and it’s pretty much the same as it was from the outset, with Joshua Cunningham on lead guitar mandolin, ukulele and lead vocals, Donna Simpson on lead vocals and rhythm guitar and her sister Vikki Thorn on lead vocals, harmonica and rhythm guitar. 

For years The Waifs have been backed by David Ross Macdonald on drums and percussion and Ben Franz on bass and additional guitar, and are joined this time by Tony Bourke on keyboard.

The Waifs were formed in August 1992 in Albany, WA, as a folk-rock band when the Simpson sisters, Donna and Vikki, met then-18-year-old Cunningham, a Moruya farmer’s son who was playing bass guitar for a band in WA.

Their newly-styled “WAiFS” group then travelled the country in a Kombi van as their fame grew over the 1990s. 

The 2003 album, Up All Night, reached the top five of the Australian Albums Chart, winning four ARIA Awards. Two further top-five albums were issued. 

The Waifs have three top 50 singles – London Still, Bridal Train and Sun Dirt Water – and founded the independent label Jarrah Records in July 2002 with fellow musician John Butler and manager Phil Stevens. 

They supported Bob Dylan on his 2003 Australian tour and then his 2003 North American tour, including a gig at the Newport Folk Festival.

They’re all things to all fans. Writing of their Up All Night album tour to Canberra Theatre in 2023, CityNews reviewer and Waifs enthusiast Cassidy Richens described them as variously “masterful yet humble, tight yet spontaneous” and “distinctively different and remarkably clear and technically brilliant”. 

While the core trio originally met in WA, when I caught up with Cunningham by phone to Geelong en route home from performing in Tasmania with his partner, I learned that The Waifs are now scattered all over the country. 

“But we’ve always kept up the identity of the band over the years,” Cunningham boasts.

He couldn’t say precisely what they’ll be playing when they come to Queanbeyan because they hadn’t even started rehearsing when we talked and because they’ll be laying down a new record this year, so will be trying new songs.

“But we’ll also be returning to some favourites from the back catalogue, also looking at numbers and seeing if we can refine them.”

“Lately we’ve been doing a lot of songs with a reflective quality, more in the country vein, but songwriting is an ongoing process and you follow the inspiration wherever it leads you.”

And, no, he at least would never want to retire. 

“It’s the furthest thing from my mind, playing music is what I do…We love what we do and it hits the spot with a lot of people,” he says.

Cunningham believes that in part the secret of their success is actually that most of the time they are living apart. 

Although he and the sisters first worked in WA where they both now live, Cunningham lives on the central coast of NSW, Franz in Melbourne, and McDonald in Candelo near the south coast region, Cunningham’s old turf.

“We don’t get together as much as we would like, but we all play music that brings us close together,” he says. “The world has become very small these days.”

The Waifs, The B, Queanbeyan Performing Arts Centre, March 14.