Thursday, July 30, 2015

Antipodean space

















8 comments:

Tim 'Space Debris' said...

Reptile - noice!
That riff, uh!
Apparently Steve Kilbey was once dosed with LSD unawares at a David Bowie concert and he thought he was a Reptile. Hence this song.
Classic.

Matt said...

Cattle and Cane reminds me as much of early REM as much as it does Television or Talking Heads - bucolic/rural/oneiric memories filtered thru an arts schools / humanities education.

The House of Love were heavily, um, influcenced by these bands.

Doledrums by The Chills is also a song that has stuck in my head.

SIMON REYNOLDS said...

i think House of Love go straight to the source - Lou. But there's definitely a similarity - there was a lot of non-singers singing around in the 80s. the Children of Reed. orange juice, lloyd cole, the entire population of New Zealand.

i can see the parallel with REM but that's probably cos they are influenced by the same things - Stipe was obsessed with New York bands wasn't he/ Go Betweens would have been a full formed aesthetic entitity pretty much by the time of Murmur.

Reading up on the Go Betweens early days - there is a great tribute to Grant McL by Robert Forster out there, 'A True Hipster' it''s titled - i was amazed how super literary and liberal arts their background was - theatre, film studies etc. i knew they were very literate / poetic oriented but not that Grant's original ambition was to be a film director and he was this ultra cineaste. Yes definitely parallels with Stipe. Cinematic lyrics also.

Tim 'Space Debris' said...

"The entire population of New Zealand"
Haha.

While reading Steve Kilbey's memoir I noted he faced a similar comparison with REM but The Church had formed a good couple of years before that Athens band. The Byrds influence was the only part of the Church equation that they had in common with REM really. The Church were way more than mere Byrds acolytes. Kilbey has a classic jibe at music critic Matt Snow in the book. Very funny.

The Saints faced a similar thing when they reached the UK by being endlessly compared to The Ramones yet The Saints had been going since at least 1974. There were/are a lot of lazy music writers out there who don't do their homework. Sometimes you wonder if they're interested in music at all.

Matt said...

Reynolds/Debris - Yes, agree that Go-Betweens are drawing on a similar set of influences as REM rather directly copying them (or vice versa) - but also both bands choose to take them in similar directions. Altho the Go-Betweens were less averse to direct emotion.

Robert Forster has pitched out a role for himself as an aesthetic observer / journalist here in Australia. I wasn't really aware of the Go-Betweens until relatively recently (a few years too young to pick up on them in the UK).

As I recall, Guy Chadwick was quite vocal in his love of Flying Nun / the Dunedin Sound. What the House of Love shared with the Dunedin was a washing out of Lou - all the gritty stuff gets sidelined.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cPqZ4Nsvlr0

Tim 'Space Debris' said...

I always thought The House Of Love, who I liked, sounded like The Church.

Matt said...

Debris - There are some definite similarities...

Tim 'Space Debris' said...

....and Morrissey must have not only been a fan Of Orange Juice but surely he loved Robert Forster.....