Positive positive review of the debut album.

Author: Simon Goss, Juke Magazine.

Date: 21 August 1982.

Original URL: N/A.

Article Text

In case you have not run across them in your travels the Hunters and Collectors are, alphabetically John Archer (bass), Geoff Crosby (keyboards), Doug Falconer (drums), Martin Lubran (guitar), Robert Miles (live sound), Greg Perano (percussion), and Mark Seymour (guitar and vocals). Note the egalitarian credit of the mixer as a fully fledged band persona.

They tend to present a unified front, producing covers and songwriting as a unit. This debut untitled album was seven months in the making, partly due to the logistical hassles of an unsatisfactory mastering cut. The songs are a fair document of where the band was at six months ago.

The mix is a fuller and fatter sound than the debut untitled EP which charted last year. The packaging is innovative. You get two 12 inch discs. One 45 rpm and the other a 33 1/3 with two and six tracks respectively.

The Hunters and Collectors have never really paid much credence to the idea that a commercial release should really clock in at the three minute mark or less, and under no circumstances exceed four. At times live you sometimes get the idea that they don’t pay much attention to their crowd either and would prefer to be unintelligible to the great unwashed. A few leaping sycophants leaping around in general time to the music providing percussive support with whatever they can grab from Greg Perano’s arsenal are tolerated.

Still that is personal opinion and I’m reviewing a record here. On vinyl you (or at least I) can not fault them. This disc is a landmark in Australian music. It also reiterates an object lesson presented by several bands since the New Wave broke (so to speak).

It is not necessary to work yourself to death on the pub circuit. Particularly if you can find a decent day gig. You can record and press whatever you like independent of record companies without it costing the earth, particularly if you have your sound well thought out and use simple arrangements that do not require extensive overdubs. Most working bands have to think out and simplify arrangements anyway to reduce the logistics of travel and to ensure that their set is roadworthy. If you put your money where your mouth is, and have a product that is ultimately saleable you can step in the back door.

On the 33 1/3 disc the tracks are “Talking to A Strange”, “Skin Of Our Teeth” and “Alligator” with “Scream Who”, “Junket Head” and “Boo Boo Kiss” on the reverse. The bonus single has “Tender Kinder Baby” and “Run, Run, Run”.

All members hang together around the simple, mechanical and extremely effective drumming and bass. The percussionist is not a luxury. He allows the hypnotic effectiveness of the drumming to achieve the manic quality that you get with a drum machine, alternating rhythmic reinforcement with the tricky bits. The guitar gets good mileage from single lines bases around the 7th and 8th. This is the source of the funk tag that has been bandied about in the rock press. When things get a bit repetitious, the Horns of Contempt are wheeled out and let trip.

Particularly recommended is “Skin Of Our Teeth”.

The well dressed will find this as necessary as a good stick of eye-liner and a decent black coat.

The rest of us will just want this album.

Comments

N/A.