Saturday 11 June 2011

Buddies - Some Pop People / A Silly Song 7" Bestival Rochords 13291, 1981


Remember Mighty Little's showdown between the primate (and his amps) and technology? Brisbane's Buddies perhaps had similar ideas but scaled them back big time, leaving just a schoolpad sketch of a cheeky schoolboy with just a single speaker/amp, over what we think is an extremely early (for Australia) representation of a bar-code!

As well as the artwork, just about everything else is scaled back on this release - the sleeve is just a one sided insert, and the songs (two self-referential pop songs about pop) and production (thankfully with no '80s 'frills') are rudimentary. The performance though is pretty good. We've labelled it pop, rather than powerpop, due to the lack of any powerful guitar - we're kind of hardarses that way. Still, the propulsion of A Silly Song by the bass riff is more than enough to get us excited. Then there's the handclaps - you do realise that nearly every Brisbane punk record features handclaps, don't you?

Los hermanos Wackley, Bob (bass) and Greg (drums), are the ace rhythm section on everybody's none-more-fine, high water marks of Australian punk - the Razar 45 and EP. Bob (as Bob Hood) later continued down a pop path in Grooveyard before turning to the mersh hard rock of the later Screaming Tribesmen. As far as we know Greg's only other appearance was in the Hostages (no way we're linking to that video - reputations must be preserved).

Then there's A Wyatt on guitar - enquiries are out for more info on Mr Wyatt's ID.

The Buddies also released a cassette, which from memory was called Three Kings, before disappearing down the memory hole.

Some Pop People


A Silly Song

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