LOS ANGELES, Aug. 15 (UPI) -- The Wiggles founder, Anthony Field, said the band's 100th album, Wiggle and Learn, to be released Friday, shows no limits exist on entertaining children.
"It's endless possibilities," Field told UPI in a recent Zoom interview. "You can go off on anything about anything as long as children can relate to it and it's in their language."
Wiggle and Learn has 100 songs and runs 2 1/2 hours. Songs like "Bin Night," about separating garbage and recycling into appropriate bins, have already appeared on The Wiggles' YouTube show, also called Wiggle and Learn.
Field said "Bin Night" could educate adults, too.
"You see guys going out with their bins," he said. "Then they check and they go, 'Oh, hang on. It's not bin night tonight."
Field formed The Wiggles in Australia in 1991 with Murray Cook, Jeff Fatt, Greg Page and Phillip Wilcher. Field said the original members settled on the band name after writing their first song, "Get Ready to Wiggle" and realizing that's what kids do.
"They wiggle," Field said. "Also, as Murray once succinctly put it, we'll never get confused with a heavy metal group."
As the other founders departed over the years, Field now sings with his daughter, Lucia, Lachlan Gillespie, Simon Pryce, Tsehay Hawkins, Evie Ferris, John Pearce and Caterina Mete.
The band had a TV series in the late '90s, which the Disney Channel began to air in the United States in the early 2000s. Field said the COVID-19 pandemic showed how children could find content on YouTube, so he wanted The Wiggles to have a presence on the streaming service.
New episodes of Wiggle and Learn premiere every second Friday, which Field says is rebuilding The Wiggles audience in the United States The Wiggles are on tour in Australia, and Field said he hopes they can do a U.S. tour again.
With so many albums, there is no way to include every album in a live show, let alone every Wiggles song. Field said Wiggles concerts always include songs "Rock-A-Bye Your Bear," "Hot Potato," "Toot Toot, Chugga Chugga, Big Red Car," "Do the Monkey," "Can You," "Do the Propeller" and "Say the Dance, Do the Dance."
The Wiggles vary the rest of the set list every few tours, but Field said they take requests too.
"The children might ask for a song, yell out a song and you just do it," he said.
Some of the Wiggles songs teach children about responsibilities like sorting refuse bins, washing their hands or using the toilet. "The Toilet Song" is a recent Wiggles composition.
Field said he resisted parents' requests for a toilet training song for years out of concern it could turn crass. Now, Field and his fans' parents are happy with the final product, which asks kids to sit and do their business for the duration of the song.
"They're very grateful when you've got a song that encourages children to sit on what we call the throne for the two minutes [the song lasts] at least," he said. "We say, 'You're like a king or a queen' so we hope they feel majestic while they're on the toilet."
Other Wiggles songs teach kids about basics like colors. Field used his own hair to illustrate the color gray.
"A lot of people out there have gray hair," he said. "One thing about the Wiggles, I think we've always been honest about who we are."
Not all Wiggles songs are educational. Some can be silly fun, but the common thread is that each one is musically strong.
Wiggles songs incorporate instruments as varied as the mandolin, bagpipe, violin, banjo, trumpet and French horn. Field said he hopes The Wiggles also exposes children to different genres of music, and that pleases their parents.
"Quality for children should be quality for adults," he said. "Mom and dad can listen to the singing, listen to the instrumentation and enjoy that."
Field learned the bagpipes during his tour in the Australian Army from 1982 to 1985. He enlisted because, as a fan of Elvis Pressley, he wanted to serve in the armed forces like his idol.
Coincidentally, Field also ended up stationed in Germany, where Pressley was when he met Priscilla. Field said Elvis's influence extends to The Wiggles music too.
"We've got a song called 'Hey There, Shaky Shaky,'" Field said. "You could put that in [the Elvis movie] G.I. Blues."
He said other Wiggles songwriters Gillespie and Pearce are influenced by The Beatles, Elton John and Motown. Pryce comes from the stage and adds his baritone to Wiggles' tracks, using his experience playing The Phantom of the Opera.
"He sings opera in a way that children can relate to it," Field said. "So [it has] a little bit of comedy, but children really love hearing that big voice singing."
The current lineup is also the Wiggle's most diverse with an equal number of women and men. Hawkins is Ethiopian, Ferris is Indigenous Australian, Mete is Italian, Pearce is Filipino and Lucia is part Greek.
Lucia also came out of the Australian Ballet School when an opening in her father's band in 2021.
"She had to think about it for a day or two," Field said. "The children have warmed to her and the parents have warmed to her. She's a very accomplished dancer and a beautiful singer."
With all the albums, a YouTube series and more live shows planned, he sees no end to The Wiggles' potential.
"It's just great to make music your life and hopefully inspire children and families," Field said.
