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Australia/NZ LP Reviews H-L
Australian lps A - G
Australian lps M - S
Australian lps T - Z
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THE HAIRS
Subcutaneous (Zero Hour)
They're from Perth and on Zero Hour, so there was never any question they'd be a power pop band. But they sure don't appear likely to fill the bill from the credits. The guitar player has a beard and wears the Aussie equivalent of a cowboy hat and looks like he'd be listening to the Grateful Dead, and the drummer is the lead singer. But power pop it is. It relies heavily on vocal harmonies, which are done well and are rough enough to convey some energy. But the instruments lag behind...the guitar is real thin and punchless, the bass sounds like it's played through a 10 watt practice amp, and there's a couple tracks with guest keyboard noodling that doesn't help at all. And everything's mixed way too far below the singing, which is how radio wants it but not how the best power pop is done. Despite all this, the record nearly makes it on the virtues of the songwriting and the strong singing.

THE HANDMEDOWNS
Back To Yourself (Greasy Pop)
Another classy Adelaide power pop outfit in the tradition of the Mad Turks From Istanbul or The Garden Path (bass player Rohan Belton used to play for them), the Handmedowns have a winner with this six track mini-lp. Lots of jangly guitar and catchy tunes, with vocals and harmonies that punch through well enough to keep things from getting wimpy, always the danger in this sort of sound. The Handmedowns cross this tightrope with no problems. The best tracks are probably the title track (which has some of the tougher guitar on the record) and "Home", which closes side one, but this is a record that is impressive more through its consistency than the ascendancy of any one track. Production is sharp as a tack; you can hear everything in the mix perfectly. The result sounds good at low volumes and even better loud.

THE HANGOVERS
You're Not So Bad Yourself (Greasy Pop)
Quite a surprise for a Greasy Pop record, and not necessarily a pleasant one. These guys have none of the adventurous feel of other Greasy bands like the Lizard Train, Exploding White Mice or Twenty Second Sect...these guys are pretty much FM radio oriented hard rock with a bar band twist. It's definitely an industry sounding band, and the only reason I can think of that Greasy Pop would have anything to do with them is that they might have got a lucrative licensing deal through Festival that will provide money that can be used to finance some really good records. Certainly not something I'll be listening to much.

HAPPY HATE ME NOTS
Scrap (Waterfront)
When the Hate Me Nots lost their original drummer, Mark Nicholson, to Toys Went Berserk after the "You're An Angel" single, they considered packing it in because fast drums were such a crucial part of their sound and they didn't see how they could ever replace Mark. But Mick Searson not only replaces him, he outplays him totally on this record. This is great speed pop of the highest water. Distinctive Rickenbacher guitars, drums that would make the Buzzcock's John Maher jealous and great tunes to boot. There are all kinds of stops and starts, sudden changes of directions and really cool song arrangements; not the standard two times through the verse, chorus, bridge, chorus type stuff at all; in fact you get quite confused trying to anticipate what's coming next. There's only one change of pace song; "Blue Afternoon", which includes an introspective thunder and rain intro before the song builds into what for most bands would be a pretty hot tempo, but for the Hate Me Nots is a ballad pace. This over, the band hammers right back into overdrive with the fabulous "Nothing Short Of Paradise" (apt title!). The amazing thing about all this is that despite the pace, the band sounds totally in control the entire time.

This record is an all out classic, one which the Hate Me Nots will do well just to approach on subsequent releases.

HAPPY HATE ME NOTS
Out (Waterfront or Rough Trade)
If you've read past issues of this magazine, you know what I'm going to say already. This album is great, and you have no excuse to not buy it since it's out in the US on Rough Trade and you can probably get it more places than you can get this magazine. So move it, because you'll be kicking yourself for every day that passed when you weren't listening to Mick Searson's smashing drumwork, those cool, cool guitars, and Paul Berwick's spit-em-out vocals. For those new to the band, imagine if Pete Townshend bit off his words like Paul Weller on "In The Street, Today", and fill the sound in with the guitar player from the Chords, and then propel it with some of the tightest speed-pop drumming you've ever heard. The Happy Hate Me Nots are too hard and fast to be called pop, they're too tight and melodic to be punk, but they've got passion, heart, heat, and great songs from the start of side one to the end of side two, and to me, that's what it's all about. The songs are all really well thought out, with lots of stops, starts, tempo changes, and all the tricks that make for great pop. Most (there are a couple of slower ones) of them have the drive and power that makes for great punk. It's a killer blend.

Picking favorites is hard on a record this consistently good, but I'd have to go with the driving "Things Wearing Thin", "Best Of Intentions", "Think About Tomorrow", "Soul Rejection", "Pride Is Burning" and "All Right At Home" (so I picked half the album...hey, I'm the editor of this magazine and you're not, so pthhhhuttt!). "Think About Tomorrow" has this incredible drum bit in the intro and just goes from start to end. "Soul Rejection" is a misnomer; it's one of the most soulful songs in this or any other year. "Pride Is Burning" is a typically pounding Hate Me Nots rocker. And "All Right At Home" well just level you.

This is a record that appeals on several levels, a feature that makes it especially good, because if you feel like being quiet you can play it soft and listen to Paul Berwick lay his emotions out, and if you feel like tearing around the house you can crank it and this amazing blast of rock'n'roll comes out. For the Happy Hate Me Nots, world domination can only be just around the corner; music this awesome can't be kept hidden. It's easy to get carried away throwing around superlatives when you write reviews, but I've been listening to this for 4 months now and I feel pretty confident saying it's my favorite lp of the last several years, and if I am able to convince you to buy only one lp with this issue, let it be this one.

HAPPY HATE ME NOTS
A Place To Live (Waterfront)
A reader from Canada wrote me and asked how I liked the new HHMNs record. He said "Out was awesome because they used their musicianship and pop songwriting to make loud, fast ripping tunes (most of the time) but it seems with this new one they're going for college airplay. Songwriting and ability still make this worth having, though. Besides, I guess it's foolish for me to think they (or anyone else) could surpass Out." That's a pretty apt summary...I was initially disappointed that the music wasn't the same 100 miles an hour power house that it had been, but even when the HHMNs slow it down and get "mature" there's no hiding the crackle of their playing; there's never been a track from these guys that didn't merge power and passion, and even though it shows more clearly on faster tunes, there's no question of the quality on this record. Compared to the vinyl mini-lp the CD adds the acoustic b-sides from the last two singles and that tends to tip the balance too far from the rocking sound I love best out of this band. The vinyl is much stronger as a result, but even there the two best songs are the two songs that were single A sides. On the others the song writing is maybe a little too complex and some of the lyric parts are too wordy. Well, they're gone now, and almost nobody noticed, again. A great band streaks across the firmament and everybody's looking at the ground. Fuck 'em.

HARD-ONS
Smell My Finger (Waterfront)
Sydney's lords of the gross out come hard with their first 12 incher. As fast as any hardcore band can be, the Hard-ons still manage a good bit of pop flavor and melody into their offerings. With their mixed racial lineup (Indian drummer, Oriental bassist and English descent guitar player), the Hard-ons can tackle almost anything without being labeled insensitive. Except sex, for which they get tagged a lot, and fairly, since these guys are about as heavily into penile fixation as you can get on vinyl. Sex or no sex, top cut here is the hysterical "Wog Food", one of the strangest tales of romantic breakup you are ever likely to hear with lyrics that go "You couldn't stand my breath/I knew you hated it/You couldn't stand taboulli..." and a tune that matches as well. "Squat House", first heard on the Aberrant compilation "Why March When You Can Riot" appears here rerecorded with a lot more punch. "Buddies" and "Lollipop" are both really hot; in fact there is no room for any complaint at all with the first side of this ep. On side two, the cover of "Then I Kissed Her" is a bit obvious, although they do make us wait for the ending that we know is (smirk) coming by playing straight until the very last line. A million bands have covered this song, though, and I'd prefer an original in its place. Also, "Think About Her Everyday", despite protestation from the band that it's meant to be sarcastic in its flagrant sexism, fails to make the sarcastic intent clear and thus is a loser in my book. If you're gonna couch your message in these terms, you'd better make the message damn clear! Overall, though, this record is lots of fun and kicks butt, and is a great starting point for getting into the band. (There's also a US release that has a bunch of songs from this plus some 7" sides through Bigtime...strangely enough, RCA, who distributes Bigtime, took offense not at the band's name, but at the record title! So they have renamed it, and it has different cover art, but I can't recall what it's called now.)

HARD-ONS
The Worst Of The Hard-ons (Vinyl Solution)
Dick Cheese (Waterfront)
History bit: the Hard-ons are a Sydney based three piece including an Oriental bass player, Indian (or Pakistani?) drummer and a white Australian guitar player. They've been around since 1984, and after initial difficulties getting shows for somewhat obvious reasons, they have become Australia's best known hardcore band. Notorious for their bathroom humor lyrics (they claim the lyrics are satirical when accused of writing sexist material, which is certainly the reaction most people would have on first listen), the Hard-ons began by writing songs with an early Ramones musical style, and have subsequently become harder, faster, and more metallic sounding. Their shows are wild, thrashing affairs the equal of any slam-show in LA in the early 80s. This summer they finally brought their act to the US for a handful of dates, and seem on the verge of making an international name for themselves with the Dick Cheese lp out on TAANG! in the US and releases in the UK and Europe as well. The band are also known for their self produced and controversial record sleeve artwork, which can be seen on their batch of singles and their previous 12" ep (see NFH #13) and on the two lps under consideration here.

The Worst Of... lp is a retrospective batch of previously-unavailable-on-lp tracks released in at least two versions that I know of; this one licensed to the UK Vinyl Solution includes one extra track (the single "All Set To Go") and a different cover from the Waterfront release, which has the title Hot For Your Love, Baby and features a great cover with the band members lying on the sand at the beach looking lustfully (but not hopefully) at a bikini-clad young thing walking by. For my money it's a better record than the band's new lp (see below), as the songs are simpler and have less of the feedback-guitar-wanking bits that have dominated a lot of their recent material. Given the various times at which all these songs were recorded it's a remarkably coherent lp as well.

A lot of my all time fave Hard-ons tracks are here, including two of the 3 from the Why March When You Can Riot compilation lp, "Coffs Harbour Blues" with the great line "Went to a disco on Saturday night/I couldn't dance cos my pants were too tight" and "School Days", which would've made the movie Rock'n'Roll High School if it had been out in time. "Squat House" got left out, apparently because it was on the "Smell My Finger" ep, albeit re-recorded. There's also some things that aren't available anywhere else, like "I'll Come Again", with some great "oh-oh" backing vocals, a superb speeded-up cover of the 60's track "It's Cold Outside" (originally by the Choir; Stiv Bators did a good version a few years back...this is better). Closing things off is an absolute smashing version of "Rock'n'Roll All Nite", the old Kiss track. Despite whatever else one might say about Kiss (and one might certainly say a lot with no defense from me!), they did manage one classic in this song, and the Hard-ons are up to acknowledging it.

There's so many times a band throws together a collection of B-sides and previously unreleased stuff that turns out to have been rightfully relegated to the dumpster first time around; it sure is nice to get one of these records where the material is up to par (and arguably better than) the meant for prime-time consumption releases of the band. Great job!

Now for the new one, Dick Cheese (wasn't there an old detective comic of that name?)...to start with it's a pain in the butt figuring out which is side one and which is side two from the labels; it seems the big-label company that presses Waterfront's records for them refused to handle labels with titles like "Every Time I Do A Fart", "Yuppies Suck", and "Fuck Society". This disc seems to split about equally between wild thrashing songs with millions of tempo changes, lots of nearly metallic feedback solos, and a high noise level to songs with great pop hooks and a more Ramones-like feel. To my way of thinking these latter songs make the album. For example "What Am I Supposed To Do" sounds like a revved-up 60's pop lament. Or "Get Away", which features exactly one lyric line "Sometimes, I just gotta get away from you" because that's all the song needs to say what it has to say. Or "There Was A Time". Or "Something About You". On material like this, the band show that they can write some really great, basic pop-punk songs in the early Ramones vein. And there's some of the slammers that work, too; for example, "Got A Baby" is a really cool two chord blast with some hot stop-start drum breaks.

But I've got two complaints for the band; first off, the thrashy metal solos ain't working guys. It's cool to play fast, don't get me wrong, but a couple feedback sessions are enough for one record. Second, the naughty little boy act of writing songs with nasty words in them is starting to get a little dull. It's time for the Hard-ons to decide if they want to make records because they want to make teenagers happy or teenagers' moms mad. I've got nothing against pissing off conservative people, but it isn't an adequate reason for existence in my book, and shouldn't be such a significant portion of the band's music. The people these songs are meant to offend aren't going to sit and figure out the words once they've heard the band name anyway. For me, I must confess that I am barely more interested in songs about Keish's farts than I am about how that guy in Whitesnake is making out with his girlfriend. And besides, guys, the concept will never work as a video! Let's get with the program on lyric topics, eh!

My advice is buy this lp (it's got enough good tracks to be worth getting) and dub it onto a tape, eliminating the dross. You'll end up with the equivalent of a great ep. It's a little expensive that way, but worth it.

HARD-ONS/STUPIDS
No Cheese (Waterfront)
This 6 track 10" record is the result of a tour of Australia by the Hard-ons and UK hardcore band the Stupids. At the tours conclusion they went into the studio and made this record, which mixes and matches band members from song to song. There's four covers and the Hard-ons do the Stupids' "This Is The Norm?", while the Stupids do the Hard-ons "All Set To Go". The result is surprisingly consistent and is at times hysterical, especially with all the between song conversations, like the introduction about the Australian outback with one voice trying to do a serious National Geographic style narrative while others are making snuffling animal noises around him. As for the music, it's mostly really cool stuff. I'm particularly shocked by how well the Stupids did "All Set To Go"; except for the vocals it's better than the Hard-ons original with some really amazing drumming. The Hard-ons bash AC/DC's "Walk All Over You" into a solid piece of hardcore pop, and really only the Stupids' cover of Minor Threat's "No Reason" falls into the pedestrian hardcore category. Not the most important record in the world, but a good time can be had by all.

HARD ONS
Love Is A Battlefield Of Wounded Hearts (Waterfront)
Quite a switch from Dickcheese, and it turns out that despite my suspicions in NFH #16 that Ray had sent me the more poppy tracks from the new lp on tape (since that's what I always rave about), the vinyl turns out to be pretty much like the tape...there's lots less of the sort of metal wanking type stuff that Dickcheese had and in it's place are melodies that, although they bristle with energy, also are loaded with hooks. There's no lyric sheet for a change, but the words seem to be much more straightahead stuff with less of the kind of pre-school smut jokes I used to find a bit tiring. Overall the record reminds me a lot of the Ramones of the era of, say, "Sheena Is A Punk Rocker" with most of the songs being tales of teen-angst as the lp title suggests. The guitar work is kept really simple and relies on some great riffs (check out "Chitty Chitty Bang Bang"). Things aren't as high paced as earlier classics like "Girl In The Sweater" or "All Set To Go", but the extra room to move in the songs gives them more character. I'd be hard pressed to say whether they're better or worse, but they're different and they work equally well, and that seems to make this record more interesting than if they had just come out with Dickcheese - The Second Day or something like that. More eye-popping artwork by Ray on the cover, too...some of his best. Taang! is likely to put this out in the US, and Stop It Baby is doing it in France.

HARD-ONS
Yummy (Waterfront)
Absolutely the right title for this one; it's chock full of tasty punk-pop classics. As with their last one, Love Is A Battlefield Of Wounded Hearts, this record concentrates on the sort of thing the Hard-ons do best, and leaves the thrashier, metally side of some of their earlier stuff behind. There's about nine songs on here that would have made me delighted to have as a single A side...brilliant, optimistic sounding hook filled stuff that rocks mercilessly at the same time. The lyrics are all killer boy/girl pop stuff that if I was a teenager (and I just might decide to be one some day soon) I'd be grooving on mightily. "Where Did She Come From", "Raining", "Sit Beside You", "On And On", "Ain't Gonna Let You Go", "Fade Away"...I started listing all the tracks with particularly great hooks and I find I'm naming almost all of them. If that's not enough, wait'll you hear the hilarious spoof with Blackie stumbling through "Stairway To Heaven" at the end. What a laugh! Production is a little murky compared to some of their other records, but that's not remotely a good enough excuse to not have this record on your turntable.

HARD-ONS
1984-1987 (Teichiku)
Here's a cool package from Japan; a CD that loads up a batch of the early Hard-ons stuff. All of it has been released before in various forms, much of it on the Smell My Finger ep and a lot of the rest on The Worst Of The Hard-ons lp. But this thing loads up 20 songs with all new packaging, so if you're a real fan it's a pretty fun thing to have. Playing it made me realize how much the Hard-ons have picked up speed and punch; those early songs are equally catchy to the recent stuff, but what used to seem incredibly fast and tight now sounds a little primitive by comparison. Not that it hurts; stuff like "Coff's Harbor Blues" still rates with their best as far as I'm concerned, but it's just interesting to notice the progression. My only complaint is that there's no "Girl In The Sweater", which is definitely a track that shouldn't be missing.

HARD-ONS
1988-1989 (Teichiku)
In my continuing effort to further upset the US balance of trade with Japan, here's a review of yet another Hard-ons compilation from the Orient, this time covering the Dickcheese and Love Is A Battlefield lps. This one has 30 cuts to keep you occupied for well over an hour. During Dickcheese the band had a number of really great songs but also had a lot of wanky metal pieces that didn't hold up too well, but Battlefield was probably their best ever with an emphasis on their classic high speed hardcore punk/pop style and more of those great teen lyrics. Overall you get about 3/4 great stuff with this one.

HARD-ONS
She's A Dish (Waterfront)
This one's really a CD single, and it only cost $6 Australian (or about $4.50 US), which makes you wonder why a CD lp costs $28 in Australia since the bands aren't getting much in royalties and the manufacturing costs are the same for a CD single as for an lp. "Dish" almost sounds more like a Celibate Rifles song than a Hard-ons track, mainly because of the guitar playing, which reminds me a lot of Kent Steedman's stuff on later Rifles records. The flip is a sort of typical crashing pop/love song of theirs. It's a good one, but these guys are now hitting the point where for people who have followed them for a while things are starting to sound the same. What to do? I dunno...

HAREM SCAREM
Dogman (Augogo)
You like this stuff or you don't. It's bluesy, it's got strange things like harmonicas that I haven't listened to since punk took off in 1977, and it's generally not the sort of stuff I normally listen to. I like the singles better, maybe because one track of this stuff serves as a nice diversion, whereas a 6 track ep feels more like a career change. The vocalist definitely has the voice for this, and it for sure fits into the spirit of non-commercial, non-mainstream, do-what-you-wanna-do rock (probably more so than many other bands I've praised here), and there's no arguing that the band plays the stuff with conviction. If those are your primary criteria for liking a band, you're in business here, Jack. Me, I'm still trying to decide if I like blues.

HAREM SCAREM
Lo And Behold (Citadel)
Harem Scarem broke up last year, and this resurrected version is drastically altered from that band; the only common member is vocalist/guitar player Charles Marshall. And Marshall didn't sing in the original Harem Scarem; his brother did. Given the seemingly unique style that Christopher Marshall's bluesy singing lent to the band you'd think that there might be no resemblance at all between these two aggregations. But Charles turns out to be able to put out a very similar vocal style; not quite as potent as his brother did on things like "Hard Rain" or "Miracle Mile", but enough to bring out a similar feeling. Throughout this record the sound is far more commercial than anything the original Harem Scarem did; while the old band tried to faithfully create new blues music with a blend of punk spirit, on this new lp the band are clearly creating pop music with a blues spirit. The result sounds at times like a mid-70's Rolling Stones record. But I suspect the real story is that the old Harem Scarem couldn't pull an audience, and that this version is trying to walk the line between playing what they want to play and playing what crowds want so that they can at least continue to do something close to what they are interested in. It's a tough problem, and I wish 'em luck. But I think they need to manage something that sounds like less of a compromise.

THE HEADSTONES
Lover's Web (Waterfront)
Well, yes and no. There's some pretty decent stuff on this record...I'm particularly hot about "Maharji Baby", which is a good ole rave-up with the kind of gritty vocals that turned me on to this band when I first heard them go "Oooo YEAH!" on the "When You're Down" single. And if you crank the volume on the title track it also sounds punchy (if you play it soft it tends to sound like loungy jazz, though, as there's a strong jazz influence in it). But this record only has four tracks and one is their third recording of "Just Another Name For Rock and Roll", which although decent enough doesn't have the spunk of the versions on the Above Ground cassette or the On The Waterfront Vol III compilation. And "Low Down Dirty Man" is good sweaty rocking blues, but I had more in mind. Guess they've got the curse of trying to live up to a great debut single, 'cos from most new bands I'd say this is pretty cool.

THE HEALERS
Secret Show (Survival)
The Healers are a band I've been wanting to hear for a while based on the ravings of the Kryptonic's Ian Underwood. Haling from Perth, the Healers are fronted by Craig Hallsworth, the former lead singer for the Bamboos, a very good, somewhat countrified rock band who released a few records in the mid to late 80s. Hallsworth's fairly unique voice makes for an obvious tie from the Bamboos to the Healers; at times he reminds me of Rob Younger but his voice has more of a lazy kind of feel to it that floats along with the music instead of driving it the way Younger does. But the Healers themselves are quite different from the Bamboos; there's no particular country influence in any of this; it's much more straight ahead rock and roll. Without Hallsworth's singing it might be fairly unremarkable, but with him it's very good. They're at their best on songs like "You're In My Blood" or "Ghosts" where things are moving pretty well; when they slow it down like on "Margaret", things feel kind of draggy. There's also a neatly rocking cover of Bob Dylan's "It Ain't Me Babe" that's pretty fun. I think Ian has overrated this band a bit, but they still are OK.

THE HEALERS
Wildfire (Rattlesnake)
This one's really a 12" single with one track from the Secret Show lp and two others that are non-lp. "Wildfire" is definitely one of the stronger songs of the lp and worth a listen. As for the two other non-lp tracks, "Giants" is a sort of adequate rocker, while "Everytime I Die" is really odd...I wish I could remember the name of that stupid, ultra dramatic dance where the couple dances cheek to cheek, usually just prior to a duel with some Spanish gunman in a low budget 50s movie, 'cos that's the feel this evokes. Kind of hokey.

THE HEALERS
Dark Country (Rattlesnake)
I guess this rates as a mini-lp; it's got 4 tracks on it and it's the first Healers record. Recorded live to a two track recorder, it's a surprisingly professional sounding result. The first two tracks, "Dark Country" and "No Good For You" are as good as any of the best Healers rock songs; the first track might be their best altogether. On the second side, things start with the epic "Gutterward Angel", which is built up a lot like a Bamboos song and spreads out over many changes from quiet to loud and back again. It works well. But then comes the embarrassingly chauvinistic "Girl, You'll Be A Woman Soon", which follows the title line with the phrase "Girl, you'll need a man", sung in a way as to make little doubt who the singer is implying the man will be. The women's lib element, if they paid any attention to bands like the Healers at all, would go totally non-linear.

HELLMENN
Herbal Lunacy (Waterfront)
For those of you who thought surf bands played stuff like "Little Deuce Coupe", we bring you the Hellmen, some serious competition for the Hard-ons in the Aussie hardcore arena. This record, their first other than a track on a Waterfront compilation, is a blazing 6 tracks of surf/skate-punk good enough to saw you in half. It seems preposterously unfair that one city can have as many good bands as Sydney and more new ones on the way all the time, but so it goes. The Hellmen have a five man, two guitars, bass, drums line-up that produces a wickedly intense sound with as much energy as the fastest thrash stuff, while maintaining a real sense of music like the best punk records do. The opening "So Bad" starts with a powerhouse guitar line, and the vocals remind me a bit of Jimmy Pursey (Sham 69) only without the Cockney accent, of course. The lyrics for the most part are fairly standard skate/surf/brain failure stuff (from what I can make out); the liner notes even proclaim "None of this strait edge shit...get damaged", and the sound here says these guys are following their own advice. After "So Bad", the highlight is the closing "Bobby's Butcher Boys", with a classic stop/start guitar line and a reasonably good anti-government rant lyric, but in between are four other thrash specials to please any palate. Bon appetite!

HELLMENN
Bastard Sons Of 10,000,000 Maniacs (Waterfront)
Last year's Herbal Lunacy mini-lp was a classic, with some really great thrash-punk tracks that managed to keep a pop side. This record turns pretty strongly from that. "Lost" and "Tomorrow" almost sound like early Lime Spiders songs. They're the best songs on the record, but neither are as good as two thirds of Herbal Lunacy. "Dawn Patrol" is a sluggish, metallic thing with a ranting vocal, "Sluggo" is more metal, and the closing "Tripping Priest" is just dull. As for "Foxy Lady", there's no use repeating what I said about Hendrix in the A-10 review.

HELLMENN
Mourning Of The Earth (Waterfront)
I've listened to this one quite a bit now, and I'm still not sure I'm onto it. The thrashy brilliance of Herbal Lunacy is well behind them now, and this record instead is a fairly unusual sounding thing. Imagine you were running a lab experiment to study the effects of hallucinogenic drugs on hardcore punk bands. You'd expect to see diminished aggressiveness and increased mellowness, but still find some ragged edges. That's about what we've got here. The songs are pretty good, but the performances are a little too casual and sloppy and the mix is pretty muddy. The guitar is about as fuzzed out as you can get without being total noise, and the leads are totally incoherent; on "$6.80" the lead manages to sound like what Bryan Gregory did on the Cramps' "Garbageman", though the music is nothing like the Cramps. In fact, a lot of it reminds me of Bored, but the vocals aren't as good and the playing not as tight. This is especially true on songs like "Trip" or "Alarm" that rock a bit more, but on songs like "Gyration" the Hellmenn don't seem to maintain their impact when they really slow down in the middle parts the way Bored can. Still the record's a grower and there's more to sink into each time you play it, and it's got the single "Daydreaming", which is a big plus for sure.

HELLMENN
Electric Crazyland (Waterfront)
When the Hellmenn first surfaced (1986 or 1987?) I thought they had the potential to become a great band. They were a hard and nasty group that blended hardcore punk and Detroit metal in a powerful way. But each release they've done seems to have gotten worse as they seem to try for murkier and murkier production, more wah-wah'ed guitar, and spacier singing all the time. Now and then a song shines out, but most of it just doesn't work too well. That message becomes really apparent on this CD, which has their newest mini-lp, the Bastard Sons mini-lp, and the Herbal Lunacy mini-lp all on one. All that's missing for completeness is the Mourning Of The Earth lp, which wouldn't have fit. What you find is that this thing drags until it hits the tracks from Herbal Lunacy, at which point it roars into high gear and rips off into the night with killer tracks like "So Bad"...where did those brilliant guitar riffs disappear to when they got older? Or how 'bout the chugging beat of "Bobby's Butcher Boys"? That was great stuff...they haven't touched it since.

HITMEN
Tora Tora DTK (ABC)
This is a live lp of a reunion tour by the band after Johnny Kannis (legendary figure on the Australian scene) had recovered from a near-fatal car wreck. People have told me that he used to be a really dynamic vocalist before the wreck and that he got fat and out of shape after the wreck, but you don't have to look at him while you listen to this record, and he sure sounds great here. In fact, I much prefer this lp to their 1981 lp "The Hitmen"...this one has a real punchy sound and it seems like the band was really into playing this tour. The Hitmen lineup shifted a lot during their career (in fact a new incarnation is supposedly starting up now), but this one has a truly all-star lineup, with Kannis, Chris Masuak (Radio Birdman, New Christs, Screaming Tribesmen) and Richard Jakimyszyn (Lime Spiders, New Christs) on guitar, Tony Robertson (Naked Lunch, New Christs) on bass, and Mark Kingsmill (Victims, New Christs, Hoodoo Gurus) on drums.

If you haven't heard the Hitmen, their sound is pretty much mainstream guitar rock/pop; they manage to avoid sounding like a metal band without being a punk group either. They keep the tempo up but not outrageously fast, and their songs all have good hooks that keep them whirling around your head long after the record's off the turntable. The best examples here are "Rock'n'Roll Soldiers", which despite the totally worn out topic, still makes a good impression, "Everybody Knows" and "Didn't Tell The Man", but the record is pretty consistent throughout; there are no klunkers at all and the worst song is not all that far from the best. There's no ground being broken here for sure, but the band is having a good time and the tunes are solid; there are lots worse ways to spend your money.

HITMEN
78-82 (Survival)
I always think of the Hitmen (and as always, I have to warn you about the American band called the Hitmen who are totally unrelated!) as a sort of sideshow to Radio Birdman; Johnny Kannis, their lead singer, started out as a Birdman fan, became their "MC" (whatever that function entailed), and ultimately ended up fronting the Hitmen, a band that made use of the talents of many former Birdmen (as well as just about three quarters of the rest of the people in Australia that have ever plucked a guitar string or tapped on a table top). This lp gets most of their material back in print again...it includes all the tracks from their self-titled first lp plus four extra tracks: "I Am The Man", "Rock'n'Roll Soldiers", "Didn't Tell The Man" and "Tell Tale Heart". These four were all single sides in Australia. (There was also another lp called "It Is What It Is", but I have no idea what tracks were on it, and then of course there's the live lp reviewed in NFH#13)

Most of the material here will be most interesting to those who want to have the roots material that helped build the Aussie scene that exists today. The songs for the most part are more of a pop-metal sort of thing than having much to do with punk, and they certainly don't have a feel very similar to the Birdmen (primarily because Dennis Tek and Rob Younger were in the 1/4 of Australia's populace not to play in the Hitmen). On the live lp, the rawness of the performances coupled with some sloppy moments caused by the fact that it was a reunion tour after a long layoff due to Kannis' injuries suffered in a car wreck made the sound lean more toward a punk feel, but here the sterility of the studio works to a big disadvantage. The songs are consistent, and there are good hooks, but it's not enough. People I know who saw the Hitmen in their prime swear by them, but I can't in conscience recommend them above a lot of the other records here.

THE HORNY TOADS
Con Anima Con Forza (Green Fez)
Citadel spin-off label Green Fez hasn't done as good a job of holding up the quality level as Citadel did, but this record is not the one to blame, that's for damn sure. I think this group is from Brisbane and all I can say is there must be something in the air there, since there can be no other reason for so many smoking hot guitar bands to come out of there. Although not all six of these tracks are full speed punk/metal bashers like you'd find on, say, an Asylum record, the guitar quality is in that league throughout, making even the couple of slower songs sound really tough with loads of tasty riffs. And the fast songs crunch with a hard, sharp sound similar to (though not as good as) the New Christs. The songwriting lags a little behind the development of the band's sound, but this is the sort of sound that can make you forgive many sins.

THE HORNY TOADS
Wired (Amplexus)
The second mini-lp by these Australian (natch) Detroit metal fiends (what else?) is a whole lot more consistently crunching than their first one. Whyizzat? Smells like Rob Younger...yep, he's producing. Dunno what he does to make bands come across like this, but I hope he keeps doing it. The sound now slots them exactly midway between God and Bored...not that there's a whole hell of a lot of room in between there, but the band isn't quite as heavy as Bored while the singer is a bit tougher than either Tim or Joel in God. The guitars are huge and the songs are almost irresistibly catchy. Why is it that so many Aussie bands seem to be able to effortlessly crank this kind of stuff out while everywhere else most people are struggling to attain even a moderate level of crunch and it's only the rare exception that can power? I dunno, but this Horny Toads record is one you ought to be looking for.

HOSS
Guzzle (Augogo)
This is what I hope for from Aussie bands...lots of loud, hook filled Detroit rock influenced guitar mania. Hoss is the new band for ex-God member Joel Silbersher, and in it he's corrected all the faults God had. Each God record had a batch of cool tunes on it, but also had a number that were either really stupid lyrically or worse yet sounded like Bad Company. A quick look at God song writing credits shows the noticeable absence of Joel's name from any of the klunkers. So one could rightfully hope for great things from Hoss, and behold, one gets great things from Hoss. There's just bucketfuls of great tracks here; of the originals I especially love "Ark" and "Green" (which was also a single), but there's piles of other good ones, too. Silbersher has a great voice for this kind of stuff...an indecipherable whiskey flavored sort of sound a little like early Rod Stewart but with a much lower tone and words slurred to the point of intelligibility. The guitars are huge and play off each other as nicely as is possible. The band covers two Rolling Stones songs in great style...both are improvements on the originals; their rocking version of "Bitch" has some of the tastiest dual guitar dueling I've heard in a while and the vocal harmonies are killer; it was a good song to begin with and they've made it a rocking monster. "Soul Survivor" from the Exile On Main Street lp is more melancholy but also a treat. At the end of the year this one will be in my top ten for sure.

HOSS
You Get Nothing (DogMeat)
I thought the debut Hoss lp Guzzle was nothing short of phenomenal and ticketed them as one of the bright hopes for the future of Australian rock and roll, a sign that the whole scene hadn't descended into a pit of mediocre grunge metal bands. So there was a lot of expectation for this record mixed with a little fear that my hopes might not be confirmed. As usual in these cases what's delivered falls somewhat in between. When Hoss play upbeat rock and roll things are fantastic; stuff like "It's Everywhere", "Bile" or "Three In The Morning" sound pretty hot in the Detroit metal sweepstakes. But there's a number of sludgers that weren't there for the first lp and some of these are pretty dreadful..."Too Much Sugar" in particular is a song worth going out of your way to avoid with it's mainstream heavy rock bludgeon. Joel Silbersher has a great hoarse voice and he brings the level of any material up several notches, and these guys can play a catchy blues-based brand of rock and roll (reminds me a lot of the Stones circa Exile On Main Street) when they put their minds to it. Not the wonder I hoped for, but not the disappointment I feared, either.

HOT TOMATOES
With A Pinch Of Salt (Dominator)
Dominator represents Adelaide's other soft underbelly, and they're starting to build up a pretty large list of releases of their own. This entry by Hot Tomatoes works in a fairly unpromising field...in a lot of places the sound isn't too different from mid-80s British hardcore bands like Anti-Pasti, but in other spots they manage enough interesting differences in their song styles to grab your attention. The vocals are a little flat, but on the other hand it's nice to listen to a record in this style that doesn't have anything other than screaming. However that may be, it's clear that Hot Tomatoes aren't in step with the new trends in hardcore as taught by the Hard-ons or Hellmenn...these songs are rooted in the old guard. Which means lots of energy but few hooks.

HUXTON CREEPERS
Keep To The Beat (Polydor)
I believe this is the lp that was released in Australia as So This Is Paris, although it's likely Polydor has booted a couple of tracks and replaced them with single A sides, an especially likely scenario as the lp leads with a hefty 1-2 punch of "Skin Of My Teeth" and "Rack My Brains", both ace pop tracks chock-a-block with hooks. From there on things get a little weaker, though. "Edge of Darkness" has a cool bass line, "Visually" has a pretty driving chorus, and "Better Days" is pretty punchy, but where the hooks on 12 Days To Paris tended to hit their mark with good consistency, here they are all just missing. The result is that other than the two singles the rest of this is, although pleasant, fairly non-memorable. That's always the trouble with ultra-accessible pop. If it hits, it joins a small select group of treasured records, if it misses, even by just a little, it joins a massive heap of other releases that are all forgotten. Well, into the big pile you go.

I SPIT ON YOUR GRAVY
Fruit Loop City (Virgin)
The Gravies come from St. Kilda outside of Melbourne and generally seem to be accorded the sort of disrespect in the Aussie scene that would be expected for a band with such roots (i.e. not from Sydney, no Birdman connections). But this is really unfair because their lp is a hell of a lot of fun, and I'd say they're every bit as relevant to what's going on in Australia now as the Rezillos were for the British punk scene. As the lp title indicates, this is an album of lunatic cartoon punk featuring songs like the instrumental "Batman vs. Godzilla", "Pickled Fish Lips" and "Burger Shop Slaughter". It also includes both sides of the "Piranha" single, so if you're feeling bullish about my recommendations, skip the 45 and go straight to this disc.

The band features a good, tough 70's punk sound fronted by vocals that swap between Fred (last name not given) and Di Jones, giving a male/female pairing just like Fay Fife and Eugene Reynolds for the Rezillos. The pace is not quite as fast as the Scottish wunderkinder, but still is hot enough to satisfy me plenty. And the lyrics are a total riot...every time I play this I hear a little more and I find myself noticing lines that I'd missed before like: "I'm going to buy a fishtank/And fill it full of fruit loops". Really weird stuff, this. But lots of fun and worth getting.

ICE CREAM HANDS
Traveling...Made Easy (Rubber Records)
People who know anything about Australian bands are used to thinking of them as being ignored or underappreciated. But compared even to the normal level of acceptance accorded the underground bands from down under, the efforts of Chuck Skatt and Dom Larizza have gone completely unnoticed. And that’s an incredible injustice, since their prior band the Mad Turks were one of the all time great power pop bands of anytime, anywhere. I saw them in Melbourne in 1990 playing in a mostly empty club with only about four friends watching...an incredible squandering of talent. Since then the Turks have split up, but Dom and Chuck have put together this new band (new as of 1993, anyway), and pushed on. Ice Cream Hands are a little softer than the Turks were, but they’ve still got Skatt’s fabulous voice and his great tunes to work with. Skatt has a vocal quality that’s perfect for this sort of heartbreaking jangle pop, playing the perfect loser who can’t even get organized enough to vacuum his dusty house..."I suppose I wear men’s clothes, and I should prove my worth" he sings on "The Study Of Her". I’d prefer a Turks record for its more rocking approach, but for as skilled a songwriter as Skatt I’m glad to have him still recording in any capacity. This CD probably will do even less to make Skatt and Larizza a known commodity than the Mad Turks records...your loss more than his.

ICE CREAM HANDS
Memory Lane Traffic Jam (Not Lame)
In my book, Adelaide band The Mad Turks were one of the finest power pop bands ever to grace this earth. Their "Temper’s Fire" is every bit a match for classics like The Plimsoul’s "Million Miles Away", and they had several others as good. The Turks are gone now, but key members Charles Jenkins and Dom Larizza carry on with the Ice Cream Hands making more of the same tasty pop songs. This is their second full length lp, and the first to be released in the US. One listen to the opening "Is It Your Electric Chair" with its dizzying key changes ought to quickly rope you in; theirs is a brand of power pop that is low on sugar glaze but instead satisfies with strong harmonies, clever lyric phrases, well built tunes and punchy playing. The band is rocking much more than they did on the understated debut CD Traveling Made Easy, and this CD is pretty much a match for any Mad Turks CD as a result. Sadly, Dom has apparently left the band just recently.

THE IMPERIAL DOGS
Unchained Maladies Live 1974-75 (Dog Meat)
If you've already read the Dog Meat records feature, you'll have gotten some of the background on this record...recorded on cassette (4 songs at a live show and the others at practices in a garage), marginal sound quality, not marginal energy and spirit...Dave Laing thinks of this in the same vein as the Survivor's lp that he also was responsible for releasing. But there's a big difference to me, and that's that while the Survivors did covers of cool songs that they pumped up the way they thought they should be played, the Imperial Dogs record is mostly their own material and a lot of it is really good, too. It's easier to forgive bootleg sound quality when it's coming with music that you can't get in any other way. One of the fun things about listening to this is the way the songs sound like they fit in with some of today's ideas about what should be in music, but there are other influences in them that just feel totally alien, like "13 Sons Of Satan", which sounds like an early Deep Purple song. I can't say this is essential, since the Dogs were heard by few and influenced only a handful, but it's an interesting document and I'm glad that it's been made available.

INSANE HOMBRES
To The Core (LHF)
The plot: young band of Australians sets out to prove that it is possible for an Aussie band to put out a record of hardcore that's every bit as obsolete sounding as their US counterparts. You've heard all this a million times by now...the changes of tempo, the thrashing, frantic beats, the feedback intros and breaks, and the vocals shouted from the back of the throat. The problem is the same as it usually is with hardcore...the band can't find any room for melody, so it's just speed, speed, speed. The result is as interesting musically as rap. Deathly boring.

INTERSTELLAR VILLAINS
Right Out In The Lobster Quadrille (Timberyard)
Another ex-Scientist starts a band. But it's not very good, this time. Tony Thewlis has a whiny, flat voice that's fairly annoying, and the guitar sound is dominated by undistorted jangly chords. It sounds like they couldn't decide whether to be a bubblegum pop band or a noise band, and the result is an awkward hybrid that doesn't work at all. The mix is muddy as hell, too. Back of the closet, and be quiet.

THE IRON SHEIKS
Do You Sell Beer Here? (Greasy Pop)
More metal/punk/hardcore from Australia...it's getting harder and harder for these kinds of bands to come up with something that makes them stand above the crowd, even though a couple years ago I'd have killed for a record like this from anybody. The Sheiks' biggest drawback is that their vocals are pretty non-descript talk/rant type stuff. They balance this with a real strong guitar sound that's long on tasty leads and hooks. The hooks are strongest on side two, which has the three best of the six tracks here. The solo in "Too Fast To Live" is really hot, but the rest of the song gives a clue as to why the overall record isn't too satisfying; the entire lyric sounds like something I've heard a million times before. "S.S.M.C." is the best all 'round effort with a much more interesting song structure than the rest of the stuff here, the one song that I can really come back to many times. There's energy here, but there's not enough more than that.

THE IRON SHEIKS
Do You Fancy Me? (Greasy Pop)
The second record from these Adelaide boozers is harder and a little more metally than their first one. Singer BB Daddyman has improved quite a bit from Do You Sell Beer Here?, to the point where these guys almost sound like an Australian Loveslug. This especially rings true on the less thrashy cuts..."Acid House" could be slipped in on a Loveslug master tape and nobody would even blink; from lyric content to singing style to playing it's a perfect match. But a lot of the other Iron Sheiks songs venture into hardcore thrashland, which the Slugs tend to avoid. I find the thrash stuff better than most bands can manage, but it's hard to overcome the fundamentally boring nature of the style. One thing that helps is the strong production which makes the guitars pack a hard punch and make the drums sound sharp and solid. If you're a thrasher at heart, this will send you into orbit.

IRON SHEIKS
Absolutely Sheik (Bastard)
The Sheiks weren’t the greatest band on the Adelaide scene during their heyday, but they were good for a loud and rowdy time, and for those who missed them back in the days of vinyl, here’s your chance to get everything Sheik on one very long playing CD. Packed into these grooves are their Do You Sell Beer Here? and Do You Fancy Me? mini-lps (in two titles they’ve succinctly summarized their two main concerns; getting drunk and getting laid), plus there’s still room for 11 more tracks seeing the light of day for the first time. The Sheiks remind me of nothing so much as the Dutch band Loveslug, but that won’t mean much to most people, so I’ve just gotta say that they play a really high speed Detroit metal sort of style that also cops bits from thrash punk. Their lyrics have no redeeming value whatever, but it doesn’t seem to matter. Brainless fun.

THE JACKSON CODE
del Musical del Mismo Nombre (Waterfront)
I'm surprised the British didn't think of this first...they're the ones that are always plundering somebody else's folk music and winding up on the cover of NME for the next six weeks until the punters realize that Norwegian carpentry tunes are not really what they were looking for. This band is the project of a batch of people from bands as diverse as Chad's Tree, Wet Taxis, the Widdershins, and the New Christs. The press release says that it's a strange mixture of tango, lullabies, torch songs, country blues, and Elvis-in-Hollywood pop, and I guess I can't do much more than add Spanish flamenco music to the list. People with a greater level of musical sophistication than this writer might like this a lot. I don't know what to make of it.

JOHNNY DOLE AND THE SCABS
Scab Animal (Brain Salad Surgery)
Other than 3 tracks on the impossible to find Aberrant compilation Why March When You Can Riot? (now itself reissued and reviewed elsewhere on these pages), until now this late 70s Sydney punk band hasn’t had anything on record for the masses to consume. But given the craze for genuine artifacts of the punk heyday, someone finally got the thought that this collection would be a welcome addition. Johnny Dole and the Scabs played around the same time as Radio Birdman, but their style is much closer to that of the b-grade yobbish London punk bands like the Nosebleeds or some of the groups on the UK Raw label. The sound quality of this isn’t great; about 8 of the songs were recorded at an 8 track studio, but the masters were lost and the source tape used for this CD was a cassette copy that leaves a fairly flat sound. The other songs are substantially worse audience tapes of live gigs, both in sound quality and in performance. For my money only the studio stuff is worth listening to, and the best cuts are clearly the three that Aberrant chose for their comp. "Living Like An Animal" and "Psychoanalyst" are very good and stand up to Brits like the Drones or like the Members first recording "Fear On The Streets" from the Beggars Banquet Streets compilation, where any of the Johnny Dole studio tracks would have fit comfortably. "Stuff Your Rules" is pretty much punk-by-numbers stuff. Of the songs I hadn’t heard, "Aggro" is the best…it’s slower and gives more room for some interesting guitar riffs to help things out. Fans of first generation obscure punk bands will enjoy this quite a bit, but others probably ought to steer clear.

KELPIES
The Dungeon Tapes (Aberrant)
Last night I wrote a review of the Survivors lp (look a little further below) and said that it would only appeal to people who were there at the time. But this record seemingly has all the same faults...it's from a 2nd generation copy of a dodgy cassette tape of a practice in 1981. The band never made a name for themselves beyond Sydney. So who cares? Well this stuff is incredibly vital and is played with an intensity that only comes from playing your own songs and saying what you personally think and care about. And there's some great material here, too; it's basic late 70's style punk with simple but potent guitar lines and some strong and creative drumming. Lyrics aren't quite what I'd call political; more like sociological, but there's a lot of pointed stuff. And the band doesn't lack a sense of humor, like on "I Don't Know Why I'm Here", where after singing the title about six times to close out, when the music stops, the singer goes: "Actually...I do!" and they rip into "Dead Meat". You probably won't find this in your local shop, but I bought mine through Augogo just this January, so it isn't impossible to get. I rate it another jewel in Aberrant's crown.

KING SNAKE ROOST
From Barbarism To Christian Manhood (Amphetamine Reptile)
Really an Aberrant Record licensed a couple years later for US consumption, this record is living proof of something that's been proven to me time and again; namely, if someone has a proven track record of good taste in music (such as, in this particular case, Bruce Griffiths, who is reputed to have told KSR after hearing only the first two tracks of this record: "If you don't let me release this I'll kill you") and he says something is good, you ought to believe him enough to go get the record. I didn't think that much of the Things That Play Themselves lp (also now out on Amphetamine Reptile), so I never went back to buy this one. I see now why Bruce feels so strongly about this band, because this record reminds me a lot of a clumpier and ruder feedtime...not pretty, but intriguing and captivating especially after repeated listenings. In a recent issue of Harry Butler's DNA fanzine, Charles Tolnay says that he wasn't very happy with this record, and the reason he gives is that "we had a ball and chain in the band that held the rest back", and he goes on to make it quite clear that the "ball and chain" was in his opinion bass player Michael Raymond, who subsequently (and not surprisingly given sentiments like these), was replaced for the second lp. All I've got to say is I'm terribly sorry, but my view is that although Raymond may not be the world's most technically correct bassist, it's exactly his chunky, bottom ended bass that catches me on most of this stuff, and it's the lack of that style of bass playing that makes me find less to latch on to on Things. The pieces seem to mesh flawlessly on this record, while the newer one never seems to really come together. But for lovers of noisy, disjointed bands like feedtime, Killdozer, or the Cows, this is one of the first echelon records.

KING SNAKE ROOST
things that play themselves (Aberrant)
This sure is an ugly sore of a record. Makes feedtime sound like a nice pop band by comparison. Repetitive grinding rhythm lines underneath scratching, clawing masses of guitar, sax, piano and tortured vocals. Ugly music. Lyrics like "I said it's fried, mister. Those brains are burnt" or "Nothing could be worse than the rotting head of a man three bottles old". Ugly words.

Australia's King Snake Roost are a noise band of the purest kind; there's only one or two tracks that rise out of the mire with anything resembling a rock'n'roll hook. It's not really minimalism in the sense that feedtime are; the rhythms are simple, but the guitar is doing a lot of complex (albeit unmusical) things, where feedtime's approach strips everything down to basics. Most of it doesn't connect well with me, but there are many who swear that these guys are the real thing. I'm not gonna argue; I don't want to end up as a song topic. Not with these kinds of songs.

KING SNAKE ROOST
Ground Into The Dirt (Amphetamine Reptile)
While on their tour through the US last fall, KSR wheeled into a studio in Madison, Wisconsin with much praised US noise band producer Butch Vig and came out with this new lp, which is available only on Amphetamine Reptile, and not on Aberrant in Australia. This seems kind of odd on the surface, but actually says more about KSRs lack of acceptance at home...Aberrant was selling KSR records mostly for import, and given a US deal, the import market is gone. As for this record, it's more of the same stuff you've heard from them in the past...I still prefer From Barbarism To Christian Manhood over either this or their last one, but if you like the tortured vocals, the clotty bass, the strangled guitar and disjointed drumming of their other records, you'll like this as well. It's music for the totally disenfranchised...all the music covered in NFH is for people who don't feel adequately represented by what goes on in the mainstream, but KSR is for those who feel inadequately represented even by most of that. Personally I don't feel that desperately far out of the mainstream most of the time, and I usually find this stuff depressing. I prefer a more positive approach to things, but, hey, you need all angles for a well rounded perspective.

KNIEVEL
Something Good Must Come CDEP
Steep Hill Climb CD (Treadmill)
More Australians, but Knievel aren’t your prototypical blast of Birdman laced Detroit metal. They play a sort of relaxed style of melodic pop that rocks along in a very laid back kind of way and exhibits a nice touch with songs that lay back in the verses and then blossom into bold choruses with lush harmony vocals. The title track of the CDEP, which is the first track on both of these discs, is an especially good piece of neurotic pop.

KRYPTONICS
69 (Waterfront)
Say hey, what's this? A new lineup including ex-Bamboos Greg Hitchcock and Russell Hopkinson and with only Ian Underwood left from the Perth crew that cut two cool but flawed singles a couple years back, and these guys have got all the burners going now. Underwood has been quoted as saying that he "picked this band with the intention of us being pop stars. I thought the Kryptonics should be, like, a mega power pop band". But he has apparently fucked up totally and accidentally put out one of the best records of Detroit-tasting punk in recent memory. The recording is hot as a pistol with smoldering guitars and a sharp snare sound. The vocals are tough sounding, but there's harmonies in key places to keep some melody in there. The five songs are all keepers. I think I like "Love Crusade" best because of the cool drums breaks (of course), but we're talking wall-to-wall quality here.

KRYPTONICS
Tonka Tuff (Zero Hour)
There's something really screwed up down under that this band hasn't gotten to the top of the heap among the indies. If I had to pick my faves still going down there it'd be the Mice, Died Pretty, the Rifles, and this lot. Yet they got dropped by Waterfront despite putting out consistently great records because they didn't sell. Thank god Zero Hour had the sense to pick 'em up and thank god that Ian Underwood has a strong enough sense of what he wants to do that he doesn't back down and cater to the slimy masses. This is only a mini-lp with 6 tracks, but it's better than not getting anything by 'em. It's every bit a match for the fabulous 69 mini-lp they did on Waterfront a little bit back...the same sort of hard edged crackling Detroit-ish rock and roll with pop hooks. This band has everything going for it...the songs are great, the guitars are solid, the drumming is powerful, hard hitting, and precise, and Ian's singing is fine. "Rejectionville" is the box office smash here; it measures with their great "Bad September" single as about the best thing they've done.

LA SECT ROUGE
Viva La Sect Rouge (B.H.P.)
In B-Side #22, Rick of feedtime paid La Sect Rouge's work on this record the somewhat backhand compliment: "They've decided to toughen up instead of being a bunch of pussies, and it worked". Can't say that I have an easy time imagining what this music sounded like when it wasn't toughened up; as is it's a solid batch of noise that isn't easily categorized. The songs aren't all that fast, and they have a bluesy-punk feel that to me defines the essence of what people mean when they call music "swampy". Lots of the lyrics are political slams leveled (deservedly, I might add) against America. "Saigon To El Salvador" and "God Bless America" are my favorite in this mode, since one of my non-musical interests is reading about the shit our government pulls off in the name of "freedom" and writing letters to congressmen...maybe I should send 'em a copy of this...nah, with a red jacket and a name like La Sect Rouge, it's a dead giveaway commie conspiracy and they won't listen. Rouge, blanc et blu next time, boys; subterfuge always works best.

Anyway, despite the general left field approach of La Sect, their lp works great; the songs are memorable and Tony "Shakin" Bones has this cool dry as dust delivery that can only be compared to Tom Waits, and the music he's singing in front of beats anything I've ever heard by Waits. The guitar and bass work is uniformly nifty; best example is probably "Prisoner", which doesn't have quite as pointed a lyric as some of the others, but has a great guitar hook and a bass riff that beats against the grain really nicely, along with some spacey effects that make it sound like half the band is on the wing of a moving airplane while they're playing. But the one I keep coming back for is "God Bless America", where the lyric is pretty much a talk-over, but hits with some real bitterness:

Ronald Reagan is an ancient puppet actor
He's looking for a part in World War 3
You might be dead but you be free
Now don't you worry about those commies
We're gonna keep them in line
Don't you worry son, cos we're doin' fine
All them little Marxist governments
Won't pay us rent so our armies are sent down there
Just to advise and help
We can't help it if we happen to overthrow
A few little governments here and there
I mean, we don't want terrorists killing people, do we?
It's better if we do it, I mean we're fucking EXPERTS, man
We've been killing people all over the place for years
But it's all in the name of freedom
Freedom and the American way of life
It sucks

These guys hit a lot deeper than your standard punk anti-government rant; it's clear these guys have read a bit and have been doing some real thinking about; they see the connection between hamburgers and the exploitation of third world countries. To me that's a real plus. La Sect Rouge aren't a band for mindless partying or thrashing, but they've got an interesting musical style and a compelling statement to make if your mind is open enough to listen.

LA SECT ROUGE
Frank (LSR)
The red bastards from Sydney bear the mantle of being my favorite Aussie noise band now that feedtime are no more. Never mind that neither feedtime or LSR ever were really noise bands in the sense that Killdozer or King Snake Roost are. feedtime definitely played tunes; they were just kind of mumbly and...well, I never could describe 'em, but nobody thought they were Olivia Newton John, OK? Anyway, La Sect Rouge are even more like that, except less so in some ways, if you catch my drift. I mean, they're very definitely playing a lot of slide guitar, which feedtime used to do a little, and they've got lots of bluesy sounding songs as well...really swampy sounding things, like something that crawled out of the bayou in the world's northernmost banana republic, Louisiana, way in the backwoods where people are inbred. The singer is much more understandable and he's got a cool voice for this sort of thing. Everything about this band is pretty different from what you're used to, and it's a good kind of different. These guys are in the spirit of King Snake Roost or Lubricated Goat, even though they don't sound like either, and to my ear they sound like this is what comes naturally...they don't have to force it. "Frank" is the best...some totally chaotic thing written about one of their fans that lasts about 30 seconds.

LIME SPIDERS
The Cave Comes Alive (Virgin)
After a pile of singles the Spiders finally come out with the slab of vinyl that some of us at least have waited for with high expectations. They deliver with a massively accessible album of 60's influenced garage rock. And when I say 60's influenced I'm not talking about Sgt. Pepper or any of that ilk, but of the underground grungers like the Strawberry Alarm Clock.

The first side is the knockout punch...every track on it sounds like a 45 A-side. I'm particularly flipped out over the cover of Cream's "NSU" with its stunning drum parts, but there's no denying the fabulousity of "Just One Solution" or "Ignormy" either. These songs have blasting guitar, pummeling bass, searing vocals and punishing drums, and they hit one right after the other.

Turn it over and there are still some gems. The reprise of "Just One Solution" mellows things a little, but the pace returns with "Action Woman" and "Rock Star", neither of which has a hook of the side one material. "Jessica" is a slower song and not the sort of stuff this band really does well, but the record finishes in a blaze with "Space Cadet" and "Theory Of Thira".

The only complaint anyone could make about this record is that it plays its whole hand at once; the material is a little too accessible and doesn't grow on you at all. If you like it the first time you hear it, you'll keep liking it about as well. If you don't like it first listen, I doubt you'll change your mind. However, the same comment could be made about the Ramones, and they have made god knows how many classic albums now, so don't let this sort of talk scare you too much.

LIME SPIDERS
Volatile (Virgin)
The Lime Spiders were one of the bands that got me all turned on to the Australian underground scene in the first place, but it's starting to look like the rest of the scene is overtaking them now. The Cave Comes Alive lp had a fairly strong metal taste to it, but was saved by the fact that about 70% of the songs were so damn good that the production couldn't do anything to hurt them. On this lp, unfortunately, that isn't the case. There's 12 songs here, a lot to digest in any case, but they don't have the distinctiveness of the stuff on "Cave" and they tend to all run together a bit.

But before we go too much further, let me say that this isn't a flat out dud; it's just not the top drawer stuff I'd been hoping for. Although it doesn't always seem to have a lot of direction, the lp rocks pretty hard from start to finish. It leads strongly enough with the chunky riffing of the title track, and the second song, "Can't Hear You Any More" is pretty good, too, but on "The Odyssey" the lyrics get really banal, and the band sounds like they are trying to be melodic and mellow, which is NOT what I'm here for. "My Main Attraction" has some really stupid lyrics...this band does a lot better with the loony stuff like "The Captive and The Captive One" (lines like "How could you take this gruesome paramedic for a wife?") than on straight ahead boy/girl things. There's a couple of shouters in the older style ("Strange Kind Of Love" and "Won't Fall In Love" for example) that shake things up a little, but the flair of the earlier stuff is missing.

Well, I shouldn't pan it too badly, because without prior expectations I'd have been pretty happy with this. It's just hard to be looking for another "Out Of Control" or "Just One Solution" and not get it.

LIME SPIDERS
EP (Virgin)
This four track ep is the Lime Spider's parting shot on Virgin. Like their last lp, it's not as exciting as you might hope for, and at first it's hard to put a finger on why, because there's a lot of interesting guitar parts. But if you play their Slave Girl mini-lp back to back with this, you'll suddenly notice that there's a whole lot of polish now that wasn't there before...most noticeable in Mick Blood's vocals, which are going towards a straight pop sound that is certainly not a strength for him. Also, Richard Lawson, who is a fantastic drummer when he cuts loose, plays mostly just straight and monotonous beats that add nothing. This puts the whole burden onto Gerard Corben's guitar, and he puts out a good effort, but he can't overcome the fact that this stuff sounds like it's meant to be rock that your average FM listener can think is radical. The exception is the live version of "When I Was Young", where the band's instinct to bust it up seems to take hold. I'll reserve judgment until the next lp, but I'm afraid we might be seeing the death throes of a once-great band.

LIPSTICK KILLERS
Mesmerizer (Citadel)
The Lipstick Killers are one of the bands from the dark ages of Australian rock between the flameouts of the Birdmen and the Saints (1st time) and the renaissance that began to flower after 1982. Formed out of the ashes of the Psychosurgeons and a even more minor band called Filth, they had one 45, "Hindu Gods Of Love"/"Shakedown Street" before folding up, and this lp is a posthumous live recording from a show in Los Angeles made during a catastrophic attempt to hit the big time in the US. The recording was made on a cassette, and has been equalized into surprisingly listenable condition. The performance is really sharp and the overall result is a lot of fun.

The band's sound draws heavily on the New York Dolls and Johnny Thunders vein of rock, although it doesn't feature the sort of scorching guitar work that Thunders is known for, and the lyric content is heavily into mind altering substance use/abuse. But there are some really good tunes here; "Hindu Gods" is better than the single, and "Driving The Special Dead" has a really cool stuttering guitar/drum interplay that knocks me out. "Liquor Fit" is the other ace cut. There's four or five covers, including a hot romp through the Chocolate Watchband's "Let's Talk About Girls". The vocal performance is great, too, with Peter Tillman putting in great yelps and howls in all the right spots.

By the way, this is as good a time to say it as any: if you are into trying to sort out all the interconnections and history associated with all these early Sydney bands, there's a great typewritten xerox fanzine called "DNA" that had a whole issue devoted to this very topic in April 86. Augogo may be able to help you track it down. The fanzine is actually out of Adelaide, but it is the best single source for all this kind of stuff I know of and I rate it essential for anyone who really wants to make some sense of Aussie rock.

THE LIZARD TRAIN
Thirteen Hour Daydream (Greasy Pop)
The cover depicts the four band members out in the tall grass in front of a big tree. So it'll be nice quiet pop music, right? NO! There's stuff on here that'll destroy entire cities, like "Explosion In A Room", which has a doomsday guitar riff and roaring vocals that seem inspired by the Doors' Jim Morrison. "That Chain Lightning" continues the meteorological bent that the band started on "The Day The Sky Went Black", and is equally compelling. Both these first two are moody and intense; the sort of rock that doesn't have to play fast to crackle with energy. "Seventh Heaven" totally changes the outlook and is a fabulous slab of bright pop, brilliant in a completely different way. "When The Acid Drops", the last track, is back to the threatening psychedelia of the first two tracks, with buckets of wah-wah guitar. Oh yeah, this came out in 1986, and there's an lp out since that I'm trying to lay hands on (and have...see below). Don't worry about the date; it's a stunner and worth looking for.

THE LIZARD TRAIN
Slippery (Greasy Pop)
Quite a switch, this one. It actually does sound a fair bit like it goes with the picture on the front of Thirteen Hour Daydream. The music still has a fair amount of topspin on it, but it certainly doesn't reach the extremes of the first record. It reminds me more of Died Pretty circa the Next To Nothing ep...lots of mild sounding songs that take a while to grow into. Vocals will definitely be reminding you of Neil Young a lot more than Jim Morrison. There are some cool songs on it; "Swallow Your Tongue" has the rumble and darkness of some of their best, and so does "Silence Is". "Death Hangs Heavy On My Mind" is a slab of manic-depressive stuff with some good dissonant guitar parts, but on a lot of the rest of this the sound has turned to an almost fluffy pop ballad sound with lots of skillfully strummed guitar chords, and there's nothing at all that could beat out any of the four cuts on the first record.

THE LIZARD TRAIN
The Ride (Greasy Pop)
What the hell took so long, Doug? It's more than a year since Adelaide's Lizard Train were featured in these pages talking about how their new lp, The Ride, was shaping up, and they sent me a batch of rough mixes of it. But no record. And no record. And still no record. And now, here it is, and damn! it was worth the wait. Stripped down to a three piece, these guys prove that smaller is better. This record blows the doors off their Slippery lp, a record that was good, but just a little too mellow and introspective. I've often compared them to Died Pretty, but it appears that the Lizard Train have passed Died Pretty on another set of rails going at one hell of a clip. The Lizard Train aren't becoming progressively calmer; this is their wildest record by far...a psychotic, dark, and barbaric sort of lp. There's some fucking furious stuff on here with a crazed live recording sound. Best of the batch is the frantic "Love At Light Speed", which hammers and pounds away, using a simple but irresistible riff in dozens of different and equally tasty ways, peeling out of both bass and guitar amps. But they haven't lost the knack of writing slower songs that can still knock you ought like they did on their brilliant 13 Hour Daydream record. "Nirvana" comes close to matching "Heaven Again". "Bodyguard" is another one that just begs for you to turn it up and let the music bludgeon you...this bashing, pounding, Excedrin headache of a drumbeat from David Creese crashes wildly along with huge expressive vocals from Chris Willard. Then a song later we're doing this really moody, quiet, psychotic thing about suicide called "L.I.P." that blows up into another piece of rage...a most disturbing song. I barely survive that and then get run over by this freight train of a drum bit on "Jesus Christ The Monkey". I could go on for ever...suffice to say, there's no two songs that sound alike on this lp, yet they all sound alike. There's slow songs and fast songs and songs with rhythms you've never heard before, but it all has a feeling of tension, passion and life (a frightening sort of life) that comes with the greatest lps. This is stuff that'll go straight to your brain AND straight to your gut...it appeals at all levels. For everybody who says the Aussie scene is thinning out, put this thing on your turntable and try to say it again. Go on, try it. Your tongue won't even move, I guarantee it.

THE LIZARD TRAIN
She Gets Me (Greasy Pop)
Didn't get enough of the lp? No worries, mate. Here's a four song ep with more for you to contemplate. The title song is on the lp...it's a pop love song that has a bit more punch than pop. "Like Quicksand" is more mutant Motor City stuff with psychedelic guitar ravings over the top. "The Author" is an odd one...starts out like some country western happy trails thing and then gets real Credencey. Pretty different from the rest of it. But then it's back to the dark side with "Two Hour Hole", a track that was on their Sympathy ep but benefits greatly from not being crammed into that little vinyl space. It's a huge song. I pity the next record I review tonight.

THE LIZARD TRAIN
The Ride (Greasy Pop CD)
I already reviewed this last time, but that was vinyl and this is the CD. It's worth mentioning separately because it's got 17 songs including the whole "She Gets Me" ep and three other songs that haven't been out before. This makes it a long listening experience, but a worthwhile one, since it shows the Lizard Train at their hardest and most inventive. Totally different from the subdued sound of their previous album Slippery, The Ride has a wide mix of powerful songs with the common trait of a dark and moody feel. I'm still knocked out by songs like "Love At Light Speed", and there's several of that caliber on here. As for the three new cuts, "My Future" is a ballad that sounds like their Slippery era stuff, but "Smashing and Twisting" is a pounding slugfest that measures up to the quality of most of the rest, and their cover of "Strange Fruit" has a fittingly mystical sound. This is hard stuff to describe, but it's adventurous enough for people looking for something different and rocking enough for people who just want a quick rush. I've seen some duff reviews of this, and all I can say is there's some cloth-eared people out there not listening before they put pen to paper. Don't be misled!

THE LIZARD TRAIN
Get Yer Wah Wahs Out (Shagpile)
I used to think of Adelaide's Lizard Train in similar terms as Died Pretty. Well, Died Pretty went north and the Lizard Train when south and it's hard to see any common ground anymore... where Died Pretty seem to get smoother and more accessible, the Lizard Train have produced a nasty, dirty sounding record. As the title suggests, Chris Willard has discovered the wah-wah pedal and he is not shy about using it. Underneath there's the same structures I've always liked in their songs...a really excellent sense of how and when to make chord changes, when to be repetitive, when to change, and how to do it when you're going to do it. My favorite here is "Nervous", which has an intro a minute and a half long that takes the song through about 5 different moods, most of which never come back again. In that sense it reminds me of early Wire songs, where song parts were rarely reused once left behind. This record is loaded with long and slow songs, and though my first impression was that they'd gone Seattle, I realize now that that's not the case...it's an extension of what they've been doing right along. This one will grow on you and it won't be for everybody, but it's a strong record as usual for these guys. One similarity to Died Pretty remains...they've got a song on this album with the same name as their last album, something that was standard procedure on the first several Died Pretty records.

LOMPOC COUNTY SPLATTERHEADS
The Filthy Mile (Waterfront)
More metal/punk from Australia...and also in the minor leagues. There's seven songs here that roar away with lots of energy and the production is as sharp as any Waterfront record. This music probably sounds pretty cool in a club on a Friday night, but I've just got this huge pile of records that sound like this now, and I've got my set of favorites for when I need a taste of this stuff. And this one isn't among them. There aren't the hooks to pull the Splatterheads over the top and the lyrics are pretty standard unenlightened rock'n'roll rubbish: about parties, women and rock and roll. There's gotta be more to it than this.

LUBRICATED GOAT
The Devil's Music (Black Eye)
Black Eye is the dark side to Red Eye records; where Red Eye specializes in accessible pop like the Crystal Set, Black Eye is dedicated to really way out noisy stuff such, well, such as this lp, for one. How to describe this? Well, let's begin with the beginning. "Jason The Unpopular" sounds like early Killing Joke with a really industrial pounding rhythm, and the first lines go "When Jason wiped snot on a mod's jacket in the kitchen/His conscience was watching from behind the fridge". And then it starts to get really weird! "Beyond The Grave" has some good monster-movie guitar parts and some cool Vincent Price-like vocals, but it also has some boring art damage guitar noise parts. "Guttersnipe" is back to the Killing Joke sound despite the drum intro nicked from "Wipe Out". The vocal sound keeps changing from song to song even though it's always the same guy; on "Nervequake" he manages to sound like a punk Popeye. A hard album to listen to, but there's some growers here. There are also some klunkers. If you like your music to break rules, this one is a step in that direction.

LUBRICATED GOAT
Paddock Of Love (Amphetamine Reptile)
Let's be up front about this. These guys are sick, and they probably ought to be locked up somewhere. Their records ought to be covered with PMRC stickers, and mothers ought to be petitioning all the chain record shops to stop carrying it. They clearly meant it to be that way, and they succeeded. They meant it to be that way on their first record, The Devil's Music (also just released domestically through AmRept but not reviewed here since I covered the Aussie pressing a while back), but not much happened in response to that one, largely because the music didn't grab enough people to get it into many homes. That may change now; Paddock is heaps better...it still isn't pretty, or tuneful, or hook laden, or any of those things, but it's got some grade-A noise tracks on it...the kind of stuff you can listen too over and over again while the look of puzzlement on your face grows and you keep asking yourself: "what is it inside me that responds to music this horrible?". Better worry, it's probably the same thing that responded inside Gary Gilmore. "Funeral On A Spit" is my personal favorite...the composer offers his dead body as food for the starving in Kampuchea. "Gargoyles" is another cool one...sort of a discordant horror flick kind of thing. "He Moves In Mysterious Ways" and "Promised Land" are also drivers, the latter with its encouraging pledge that "the promised land is six feet deep". There are some duffs, too, but when you try as many new things as Lubricated Goat do here, anything better than a 50% kill rate is acceptable. Just another indication of why even though people in Sydney say the scene there is turning lousy it's enough to make the music-minded denizens of any other town on the planet green with envy.

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