New Christs - Dropping Like Flies EP (Double 7")

This little gem was originally posted on the first Ausrock blog, which was removed by blogger. It hasn't reappeared on the new blog, so I thought I would post it here as requested.

The New Christs were originally formed by Radio Birdman and New Race vocalist Rob Younger after he was offered the support spot on Iggy Pop's Australian tour of 1984. The other members had played in groups such as Celibate Rifles, Lime Spiders and Hoodoo Gurus. The tour proved a success and the band stayed together, recording the two singles Like A Curse and Born Out Of Time for Sydney independent label Citadel Records. These releases gained universal acclaim for their tough and uncompromising nature. With the prospect of an album deal and European tour, the other members instead chose to return to their former interests. Younger was left to pursue a career producing some of the finest upcoming Australian alternative bands.

In 1986 Barracudas bass player Jim Dickson returned to Australia from the UK and together with Younger started a new line-up. Featured were Charlie Owen, a gifted but as yet unknown guitarist and drummer Louis Burdett who soon left to be replaced by Nick Fisher who had played with Ed Kuepper and Wet Taxis. This line-up released a series of hard hitting singles Black Hole, Headin' South, Another Sin and the EP Dropping Like Flies. These tracks were compiled under the title Divine Rites, whose European release allowed the group to tour there for the first time.

Track List:
1. Dropping like Flies
2. Dead Girl
3. I Swear
4. You'll never catch my Wave

Download: New Christs - Dropping Like Flies EP
Download Size: 20MB

The Lime Spiders - 25th Hour EP

This was the debut release by the Lime Spiders, issued as a double 7" by Green Records in 1983, and produced by Rob Younger of Radio Birdman fame. The Lime Spiders were the wildest of the Australian garage and punk rock bands, which is no small claim. Jello Biafra once said they were a "psychedelic slime band more hardcore than the Green Fuz" (who I think you'll find on one of the Pebbles compilation). After the release of this album they signed with the Citadel label and released the monumental hit single "Slave Girl". There isn't a bad track on this EP. It's non-stop frenzied rock and roll from start to finish, reminiscent of the MC5, mixed with a small dose of psychedelia ala Chocolate Watch Band. This album comes highly recommended.

Track List:
1. 1-2-5
2. Can't Wait Long
3. That's How It Will Be
4. 25th Hour

Download: Lime Spiders 25th Hour EP
Download Size: 11.4MB

VA - Flattery - A Tribute to Radio Birdman Vol. 3

This is the last volume from the "Flattery - A Tribute to Radio Birdman" compilation series. Conceived in 1974, Radio Birdman were one of the first punk groups to form in Australia. Despite releasing only only one full length album and one EP before their breakup in 1978, they eventually gained a cult following, and their name has since become synonymous with Aussie rock. They have influenced a countless number of successful bands, All six members would go on to join other successful bands, including The Hitmen, The New Christs, The Visitors, and New Race. The group briefly reunited in 1996 for a small number of tours, and even released a new album, 'Zeno Beach', in 2006. The reunited Birdman called it quits once again in May of 2008, as lead-singer Rob Younger returned to work with the latest incarnation of The New Christs.

Year of Release: 2007
Label: Nomad
Genre: Garage, Punk, Garage Punk
Bitrate: 192kbps

Track List:
1. The Tip Toppers - Hanging On
2. The M-16s - Monday Morning Gunk
3. The Sacred Sailors - Non-Stop Girls
4. Holy Curse - Crying Sun
5. The Sewergrooves - Smith & Wesson Blues
6. The Flaming Sideburns - El Hombre del Casco Dorado (Man with Golden Helmet)
7. The Lucky Punch - Love Kills
8. Mean Idols - I-94
9. The Specimens - Death By The Gun
10. The Doits - Snake
11. Mustang - Anglo Girl Desire
12. The Trassels (Finland) - Burned My Eye
13. The Devilrock Four - Murder City Nights
14. American Ruse - Do the Pop
15. The Mutants - Alien Skies
16. The Deadbeats - Aloha Steve and Danno
17. The Lords of Gravity - More Fun
18. Bad Machine - What Gives?
19. Demons featuring Nicke Andersson - Living Eyes Medley

Download: Flattery - A Tribute to Radio Birdman Vol. 3
Download Size: 102MB

Do the Pop! The Australian Garage-Rock Sound 1976-1987

Re-Up - Originally Posted 10/24/06


Do The Pop!, a spectacular double CD collection of Australian garage-rock from the ‘70s and ‘80s - easily one of Oz's most exciting musical periods. Two decades before The White Stripes and The Hives made ‘garage-rock’ the new buzz-word, numerous Australian bands were cranking out a raw, high-energy music which had all the elements that people are hot for today.

Inspired by two legendary punk-era bands, The Saints and Radio Birdman, Australia exploded in the late ‘70s with literally scores of bands who melded the wild sounds of classic ‘60s garage-rock and the Detroit rock action of the Stooges and the MC5 into a raw and powerful sound that was unlike anything else in the world.

Starting with three tracks apiece from The Saints and Radio Birdman, Do The Pop! includes essential tracks – often two or three per band - from every key band that followed their path including The Hoodoo Gurus, Died Pretty, The Lipstick Killers, The Sunnyboys, The Scientists, The Lime Spiders, The Screaming Tribesmen, The Hard-Ons, The Celibate Rifles, The New Christs, The Eastern Dark, The Exploding White Mice, The Stems and more. Included also are tracks from The Victims, Hoodoo Guru Dave Faulkner’s band from ’77, and The Fun Things, Guru Brad Shepherd’s first band from 1980.

Track List:
CD 1
1. The Saints - (I'm) Stranded
2. Radio Birdman - New Race
3. The Psycho Surgeons - Wild Weekend
4. The Saints - One Way Street
5. The Victims - Television Addict
6. Radio Birdman - Aloha Steve and Danno
7. Johnny Kannis - King of the Surf
8. Radio Birdman - Crying Sun
9. The Hitmen - Didn't Tell The Man
10. The Lipstick Killers - Hindu Gods of Love
11. The Visitors - Living World
12. The Passengers - Face With No Name
13. The Saints - Simple Love
14. The Scientists - Last Night
15. The Fun Things - Savage
16. Sunnyboys - Alone With You
17. The New Christs - Face A New God
18. New Race - Alone in the Endzone
19. The Hitmen - I Don't Mind
20. The Celibate Rifles - 24 Hours (SOS)
21. Sunnyboys - Happy Man
22. The Lipstick Killers - Driving The Special Dead
23. The Hoodoo Gurus - Lellani
24. The Hitmen - Dwana Devil
25. Minutemen - Voodoo Slaves

CD2
26. The Scientists - Swampland
27. The Lime Spiders - 25th Hour
28. The Screaming Tribesmen - Igloo
29. The Hoodoo Gurus - Be My Cure
30. The Lime Spiders - Slave Girl
31. The New Christs - Like A Curse
32. Died Pretty - Mirror Blues Pt. 1
33. The Screaming Tribesmen - Ice
34. Decline of the Reptiles - Don't Look Down
35. The Eastern Dark - Johnny and Dee Dee
36. The Exploding White Mice - Burning Red
37. The Hard-Ons - Bye Bye Girl
38. The Psychotic Turnbuckles - Groove to the Eye
39. The Lime Spiders - Out of Control
40. The Scientists - Atom Bomb Baby
41. The Stems - Can't Resist
42. Died Pretty - Stoneage Cinderella
43. The Some Loves - Don't Talk About Us
44. The Hard-Ons - Girl In The Sweater
45. The Eastern Dark - Walking
46. The Celibate Rifles - Back In The Red
47. The Ohilistines - Early Morning Memory
48. The Headstones - When You're Down
49. The Stems - At First Sight
50. The New Christs - I Swear

Download: Do the Pop! CD1 (106MB)
Download: Do the Pop! CD2 (105MB)


Note: A few of you pointed out the fact that Disc 1 was missing tracks. I reuploaded it, along with Vol. 2, but for some odd reason blogger didn't save the changes I made to the post. I have reuploaded Disc 1 once again, and all of the tracks are intact. I apologize for the inconvenience.

VA - Ugly Things

This is an outstanding compilation of rare tracks from various Australian garage rock bands. After listening to several highly disappointing comps that I scored a few days ago, I didn't have high hopes for this one. However upon hearing this for the first time, I was very impressed to say the least. This is rare Australian garage rock at it's best, and in the same vein as the Nuggets compilations that I'm sure you are all familiar with. The front, back, and inside covers are included in the rar file, as are the liner notes. The following is an excerpt from the liner notes included with this release:

The first volume of Ugly Things was issued in 1980 and featured these introductory notes: The writing of liner notes for this album is a taste of relative ease. Though we are most desirous of conveying illuminating data and succint facts, there is really not a great deal that can be told about most of the Australian rock groups of the mid-60's in having this album. To be sure, this is not a greatest hits album. Nary a track contained within was ever in sneezing distance of any top 40. Rather, these tracks are the final remnant of a fast surging third-level of Australian beat groups. These are (in most cases) the garage and church hall bands who somehow wrangled a chance to cut a solitary single. When it went nowhere, so did they.

Recording was a much easier and cheaper process in the days before 24 track desks, $100 an hour studios, 'star' producers, and phasers, flangers, noise gates, aural excites and digital delays. In 1965, a record company or a studio could whip a new band in a 2 track studio with a resident engineer, cut a stack of tracks and stick a couple out in a single without expending a great deal of money, effort or concern at all. Chances could be taken. In a commercial sense, most of the chances taken on these artists were failures. In a musical sense, they render the financiers as patrons of the arts. For this is where the howling, seething, fang-bared face of Australian rock is to be found. Music which was executed with scant regard for the dictates of commerciality. Rock for the sake of rock itself, the only truly productive climate.

It seems that the further removed from the source 'beat' rock was, the more primal it emerged. New Zealand's R&B Chants probably represents the white r&b outfield, with the acts on this album skirting the same boundary. Despite Austalia's predilection for 'cover hits', only a fool would deny the existence of a truly unique indigenous antipodean rock sound. Less polished and harmonic that the US & UK strains, it was a gruffer, harsher, more working class handling of the basic rock principles.

So little seems to be known of the hundreds of non-hit Australian recording acts of the 60's, both in and out of the country. Our damned national inferiority complex led us to believe that it was all weak, derivative fluff.. until albums like Nuggets, Pebbles, Psychedelic Unknowns, Boulders, etc. left us smirking at the frankly unimpressive quality of so many tracks deemed as 'classics of their era' in foreign lands. The rock on this album can hold it's head loftily in the company of any non-hit English or American rock.

Year of Release: 1980
Label: Raven
Genre: Garage Rock
Bitrate: 160kbps

Track List:
1. Missing Links - You're Driving Me Insane
2. Atlantics - Come On
3. Machine Gun Kelly's Rejects - I'm Going Back
4. Creatures - Ugly Thing
5. Steve & The Board - Now I'm Older
6. Elois - By My Side
7. Others - Look Through My Window
8. Chants R&B - I'm Your Witchdoctor
9. Pink Finks - Louie Louie
10. Purple Hearts - Just A Little Bit
11. Movement - I Wanna Be Free
12. Modes - Baby Please Don't Go
13. Master's Apprentices - Poor Boy
14. Pleasers - Hurtin' All Over
15. Henchman - That's All I Want
16. Four Strangers - Sad & Lonely
17. The La De Das - How Is The Air Up There
18. Sunsets - I Want Love
19. Blue Stars - Social End Product
20. D-Coys - Bad Times
21. Derek's Accent - Ain't Got No Feeling
22. Blue Beats - She's Coming Home
23. Vince Maloney Sect - No Good Without You
24. Ray Columbus & The Art Collection
25. Lost Souls - This Life Of Mine
26. Black Diamonds - I Want, Need, Love You

Download: VA - Ugly Things
Download Track 17: The La De Das - How Is The Air Up There
Download Size: 76MB

Cosmic Psychos - Cosmic Psychos

Here's the Cosmic Psychos self-titled LP as requsted by an anonymous user. The Cosmic Psychos are a rock band based in Melbourne and rural Victoria in Australia. An underground band that has only ever achieved limited recognition, they were cited as a significant influence on the Seattle grunge scene of 90s. In particular they have been referenced by members of Mudhoney and Pearl Jam and have supported both bands. Known for their droning, fuzzed-out bass and wah-wah guitar with repetitive lyrics, the Cosmic Psychos have a simple sound that works well in context and remained largely untouched since they formed in 1982 when they evolved from the short lived Bum Steers and first achieved notoriety for their demo ‘Custom Credit’ which received enormous airplay on Melbourne public radio station 3PBS.

It was later released on the Down On The Farm mini LP for Mr Spaceman Records which also released their debut LP. The band later moved to Survival Records releasing Go The Hack which was later licensed to Sub Pop Records. They eventually signed to Amphetamine Reptile Records for the American market for the release of their 1991 album, Blokes You Can Trust. That album was produced by then little-known producer, Butch Vig and it produced a song that became an enduring fan favourite, "Dead Roo". A song about perils of Australian highway hazards.

The band went on to release Self Totalled and Oh What A Lovely Pie. In 2006, after a lengthy quiet period, the Psychos issued Off Ya Cruet on Sydney’s Timberyard Records.
(Year of Release: 1987)

Track List:
1. Decadence
2. Going Down
3. Lead Me Astray
4. No Complication
5. Rain On You
6. Quarter To Three
7. Tell Me That You Love Me
8. Jellyfish
9. Rambo
10. Can't Come In
11. 74 Seconds
12. David Lee Roth

Download: Cosmic Psychos - Cosmic Psychos (61.6MB)

The Victims - Television Addict (7" Single)

Television Addict was the A-side of the debut single by The Victims, an early punk rock band from Perth, Western Australia. The song is a mainstay of compilations of Australian punk from the 1970s, and has been recorded by the Hoodoo Gurus, You Am I, The Hellacopters and Teengenerate.

It was co-written by singer-guitarist Dave Faulkner (known at the time as Dave Flick) and drummer James Baker. The slow, menacing, bass line, played by Rudolph V (Dave Cardwell), is also a prominent feature of the recording. The Victims released the single independently in late 1977 or early 1978 (sources vary), with "I'm Flipped Out Over You" on the B-side.

Lyrically, "Television Addict" revolves around a youth "who went out and shot someone", and whose lawyer then attributes his actions to violence on television: "blame the ratings for his crime." The song is, in large part, a satirical comment on the tendency to blame popular culture for crime, rather than individuals, or broader social problems.

The band broke up in 1979. During the mid-1980s, Baker and Faulkner were briefly reunited in the Hoodoo Gurus, who sometimes performed "Television Addict" as an encore. The Hoodoo Gurus (without Baker) later recorded "Television Addict", and issued it as a bonus track.

Track List:
1. Television Addict
2. I'm Flipped Out Over You

Download: The Victims - Televison Addict (3.6MB)

VA - Storming The Citadel - Volumes I & II

In the 1980s, Australian independent music, especially the Detroit inspired, garage style guitar driven pop, attracted some fanatical attention in Europe. Music fans in countries like France, Holland, Belgium and Spain were rabid about some of our bands. As a result, many of them sold a lot more records over there than they did at home. And, with bands like our own DM3 and the Chevelles, that interest continues today.

One such fan was Divine Rites Webmaster, a 38-year old computer programmer from Strasbourg in France. He started his own label, Divine Rites Records, and his very first release was this double 10" vinyl job called Storming The Citadel, which was limited to just 700 copies. It is a tribute to John Needham's Sydney label that was the early home of the Died Pretty, the Stems, the Trilobites, the Lime Spiders, the Screaming Tribesmen, the Bamboos, the Dubrovniks, the Moffs, the New Christs, Wet Taxis and a bunch of others. Several current Australian bands like Challenger 7, Asteroid B-612, Indignation, the Panadolls, Sheek The Shayk and Perth's Jack & The Beanstalk (doing the Spiders' Slave Girl), along with a couple of European and US outfits, will each tackle a favorite song from the Citadel catalogue.

The tapes were mixed by Rob Younger who, as virtual house producer for Citadel in the '80s, oversaw most of those bands' early sessions. His own bands Radio Birdman and the New Christs are still with the label today, as are DM3 and the now returned Died Pretty. (Year of Release: 1998)

Track List:

Volume I:
1. Jack & the Beanstalk - Slave Girl (Lime Spiders)
2. Challenger 7 - Move A Little Closer (Screaming Tribesmen)
3. Hunchbacks - Virginia (Bamboos)
4. Sheek The Shayk and his Royal Camels - Liquor Fit (Lipstick Killers)
5. Mother Jones - Sad TV (The Visitors)
6. Indignation - Sister's Life (Porcelain Bus)
7. Tension - A Legacy Of Morons (Trilobites)

Volume II:
1. Panadolls - Voodoo Slaves (Minuteman)
2. Pyramidiacs - Don't Talk About Us (Someloves)
3. Backsliders - Savage (Fun Things)
4. Louis Tillett & Charlie Owen - Headin' South (New Christs)
5. Asteroid B-612 - Mirror Blues (Died Pretty)

*Original Artist In Parentheses

Download: Storming the Citadel - Volumes I & II
Download Size: 83.4MB

Radio Birdman - Radios Appear

Although the best-known band of the early Australian punk scene of the late '70s was the Saints, the first band to wave the punk rock flag in the land down under was Radio Birdman. Formed by Australian émigré Deniz Tek (originally from Ann Arbor, MI) and Aussie surfer-turned-vocalist Rob Younger in 1974, Radio Birdman's approach to rock & roll was rooted in the high-energy, apocalyptic guitar rant of the Stooges and MC5, sprinkled liberally with a little East Coast underground hard rock courtesy of Blue Öyster Cult. Their first EP, Burn My Eye, released in 1976, was a great record and still remains a seminal chunk of Aussie punk. Loud and snotty, with Younger bellowing his guts out and Tek on a search and destroy mission with his guitar, this was a great debut that set the stage for the impending deluge of Aussie punk bands waiting in the wings. After the release of their debut LP, Radios Appear (the title comes from a lyric in the Blue Öyster Cult song "Dominance and Submission"), in Australia a year later, Radio Birdman seemed poised to break Aussie punk worldwide. And although the American label Sire (then the home of the Ramones) was quick to sign them and distribute Radios Appear internationally in 1978, there was a gap of three years before they released a second album, Living Eyes. During that time, dozens of other Aussie punk bands stole their thunder, and Radio Birdman split up almost immediately after Living Eyes was released. Sire never released the record outside of Australia, and Radio Birdman, who should have been the biggest band in Aussie punk, were now highly regarded punk forefathers. (Year of Release: 1978)

Tracklist:
1. What Gives?
2. Non-Stop Girls
3. Do the Pop
4. Man With Golden Helmet
5. Descent Into the Maelstrom
6. New Race
7. Aloha Steve & Danno
8. Anglo Girl Desire
9. Murder City Nights
10. Your Gonna Miss Me
11. Hand of Law
12. Hit Them Again

Download: Radio Birdman - Radios Appear (38.6MB)

New Race - The First And The Last

An interesting one-time-only band, New Race was proof that good music can occur when "teachers" and "students" get together. In this instance, the "teachers" were ex-Stooges guitarist Ron Asheton and ex-MC5 drummer Dennis Thompson, who joined forces with "students" Deniz Tek, Rob Younger, and Warwick Gilbert, the latter three members of the seminal Australian punk band Radio Birdman. Tek was a Michigan native who'd emigrated to Australia in the early '70s, bringing his love of high-energy Detroit proto-punk with him. After Birdman's demise, he contacted Asheton and Thompson to come to Australia and form this ad-hoc touring outfit. New Race toured Australia once in 1981, playing mostly small halls and releasing one legit live LP and a few lo-fi bootlegs. While the resulting record, The First and the Last, benefits from a significant amount of in-studio sweetening (backing vocals are added, guitar solos overdubbed), it's still an exciting, guitar-fueled rave-up. Fans of the early-'70s Motor City sound or early Aussie punk wouldn't want to be without it. (Year of Release: 1981)

Track List:
1. Crying Sun
2. Haunted Road
3. Gotta Keep Movin'
4. Breaks My Heart
5. Sad TV
6. Loose
7. November 22, 1963
8. Love Kills
9. Alone In The Endzone
10. Looking At You
11. Columbia


Download The New Race - The First and the Last (78.7MB)