Too Far Gone – Hard-Ons (Citadel)
This lavish double CD package closes the lid on the first life of the Hard-Ons, nicely. Not in the literal sense of the term. Far from it. It's like a skateboard ride down a very rough track, a mix of disparate hardcore and metal songs that sits at odds with much of what came before.
When the original album came out in mid-1993, nobody knew (but band members could sense) that it was the last recording by the Hard-Ons with their original line-up. That's the context and it now makes sense.
It’s funny how records released in the past evoke specific memories when revisited years later. For me, this one doesn’t throw up much. I think I bought it well after it came out. It seems lots of fans shared that indifference.
From 1970-76, Buffalo were undoubtedly one of Australia’s greatest high-energy, rock and roll bands. They were a great example of four musicians whose combined musical chemistry created devastating results.
This album’s the second and final chapter for a project that had modest enough aspirations. Jim Keays just wanted to strip things back and rock out on covers of obscure and semi-obscure songs.
We don’t have pop stars in Australia any more. In their place, we have reality TV-manufactured, milksop product whose fame is carefully designed to meet a demographical need and is disposable as the songs somebody else writes for them. Just as the tag “R & B” has been diluted beyond recognition, these people aren’t pop stars in the true sense of the term.
There are few survivors from when New York City’s rock and roll world revolved around a few seedy nightspots in a now unrecognisably gentrified district called The Lower East Side who are still musically active. Joey Pinter is one of them, making spirited, raw guitar music on their own terms, and this is his debut solo album.
Before late ‘70s punks The Chosen Few (the Australian version - not the Michigan band containing Ron Asheton and James Williamson) there was Deathwish, a party band that festered in a barn on a family farm on Victoria’s Mornington Peninsular. The Chosen Few would go on to make a mark on the Melbourne underground scene, releasing a particularly collectable EP, but here’s where it all began.
There’s a fair chance I’m not the only one who lost track of the Dee Rangers, a Swedish band who swept through the late ‘90s and early part of the 21st century with a slew of singles and half a dozen albums of infectious garage pop-rock. They and The Strollers were two of the I-94 Bar favourites from the revival of the garage sounds in Scandinavia back then. This four-track vinyl EP is a reminder of their greatness.
This is the last musical will and testament of Stiv Bator. Let’s talk about who’s not on this album.
It would be the ultimate irony if Johnny Thunders’ most consistent album came out 24 years after he died. Any sober assessment of his post-Heartbreakers output would deem it erratic but speckled with explosions of brilliance that outshone the lesser moments.
A couple of listens in and it’s evident why Paul Collins recruited the core of this band to back him on his Australian tours. The On and Ons play classic guitar pop in the mould of The Plimsouls, the Flamin’ Groovies in their Beatles-besotted era and Collins’ own The Beat.
If there was a formula for a famous rock musician, it sorta goes like this: “An outsider kid, akin to the Holden Caulfield character with a copy of "Catcher in the Rye" in his hip pocket. With either a military father, or better still a clergyman.
This single from a Brisbane trio is saying something: "If you don’t like homemade fuzz pedals you can fuck right off." Like their entomological namesakes, Stink Bugs aren’t pretty but once their smell gets in your nostrils they’re pretty hard to ignore.
The fifth and final chapter of the Hard-Ons re-issues of all their pre-sabbatical releases on Citadel Records is upon us and it’s a bumper crop.
Aussie stoner favourites and Wollongong’s proudest exports, Tumbleweed, are off on a national Australian tour in August and September, playing the “Galactaphonic” LP in full for the first time, as well as a slew of favourites.