You Am I - Sound As Ever

MINE

Ladies, may I present You Am I lead singer Tim Rogers, thinking woman's crumpet.  Especially when he takes his shirt off, as he is wont to do. (Check out the website for some confirmation of his lean, ripped, tattooed torso.  Hoo.)  This album - their debut - might tempt you think of them as just another Aussie pub rock band, You Am I have come leaps and bounds since it was recorded in '93.  Their following album, Hi Fi Way, is the one that got them the most acclaim and cemented their standing in Australia's hearts.

I've not had that much of a history with the band, coinciding as they did with my voyage into all that is dance.  Not that I was unaware of them, just that I didn't won their music.  But if I'd been paying attention, I might have.  As I recall I got this album and another as part of a chuckout at the company I worked for.  Score!

One performance of theirs I particularly enjoyed was at the Sydney section of the Sound Relief concert (sample here) where they joined many other acts, including my local MP and Midnight Oil frontman Peter Garrett, in raising funds for the victims of the Queensland floods and Victorian bushfires.  We love a sunburnt country, indeed.

VERDICT: TURN IT UP

YOURZ

I’ve been looking forward to writing about this band pretty much ever since we started this blog.  They are, without a doubt, one of Australia’s premier rock bands, one who I’ve seen live more than any other Aussie act, in their various guises, from the early full on rock shows to their more stately, but still sweaty, latter years.  They have a well-deserved reputation are renowned for their live shows and Tim Rogers is considered to be one of the best singer/songwriters Australia has ever produced.  Over the years, I've owned a lot of their albums but living in group houses has seen the collection drastically depleted.

Consistently cited by both fans, industry insiders and some of the biggest bands in the world as a favourite, it is a mystery as to why they’ve never been able to grow a decent following beyond our fair shores.  That they have been a constant in the hearts of the Australian music-loving public for nearly 20 years and are the only band to have 3 albums in a row debut at the number one spot on the ARIA charts only adds to this conundrum.

Sound As Ever, their debut album, was produced by Sonic Youth’s Lee Ranaldo who agreed to the job after he saw them perform at the Big Day Out in 1993 and was blown away by their presence and the songs they performed.  It is almost certainly because of his involvement at the early stages of You Am I’s career that gave the band the confidence they needed to continue.

There are so many good songs on this album, it is hard to pin down a single, defining track.  I really love their full on rock tracks like Off The Field, Corporalia and Berlin Chair but personally, the song that got inside  me the most was Jaimme’s Got A Girl, one of the more mellower tracks.  It not only highlighted Rogers sense of melody and his great voice but acts as a harbinger for the future sound of the band. 

Just about to release their 9^th studio album as a band (Tim Rogers has a well-established solo career as well), You Am I, while veterans of the Australian scene, are still as popular and probably more relevant now than they’ve ever been.  All they need is for the rest of the world to catch up.  And I need to add a few more to our list of must-haves.

VERDICT: TURN IT UP

For more information go to: http://www.youami.com.au/

In our collection we also have Hi Fi Way

Powderfinger - Double Allergic

MINE

And I thought I didn't know any songs on this album.  But that's the thing about Powderfinger - the songs are just there, under your subconscious, ready to be sung along to.

Double Allergic isn't their best-known album but it contains some damn fine songs.  While I was listening, I was pondering what makes the Finger stand out so - and it's not just the cut-through achieved by Bernard Fanning's vocals.  The songs are polished - but not so much they lose the essential rawness that often characterises Aussie pub rock.

There's variety on the CD, too - it's not all straight edged rock - and it's this melding of hard and soft that along with You Am I makes me wonder what it is that makes one rock band an international success - Jet? - and others not. (YourZ sez: probably because most of the decision makers are SOBs whose only real taste is on the end of their fingers after they scratch their sweaty fat arses).

VERDICT: TURN IT UP (tell your friends)

YOURZ

Here's another band I first met as a fellow musician, playing supports with them when they visited the town I was living in at the time.  But before I get to this, I have to rant.

When we employed the pointy stick to pick out this selection, it first landed on Powderfinger's debut album, Parables For Wooden Ears.  I was stoked because, while we have a number of their albums in our collection, this one was given to me by one of the members of the band after we supported them for the first time.

Upon opening the case to put the disc in and have a listen, I discovered that, at some point in the last number of years, somebody had either stolen the disc itself, or had neglected to put it back in the right case (despite my over-protective habits, this happens when living in group houses).  I can't begin to tell you how fucking annoyed I was and still am about this.  You see, I am anal about our discs - I treat them with respect, look after them, put them away properly and most certainly don't just chuck 'em in what ever case I find handy. Unfortunately, others (particularly some friends I used to share with) don't have the same respect.  Bastards! End result: we had to pick another Powderfinger album and Double Allergic was it.

Anyway, back to this mighty fine band.  Of all the bands I played with back in those days, apart from being articulate, passionate and intelligent musicians, Powderfinger were the nicest, most down to earth blokes one could hope to meet.  The first time I played with them was in a small club when the band was still relatively unknown.

The second time, however, was a much bigger gig.  Pre-show, they invited us to sit at a long table set up back stage and share a meal with them.  They were wonderful hosts who travelled with an entourage of equally down to earth and passionate people.  I think my band were all a little bit awed by how nice and welcoming they all were.  It was almost like being accosted by a hippy sect of some sort and we were waiting for them to either get nude and jump each other or bring out a sacrificial virgin or something similar.  But they didn't do anything of the sort.

What they did is go on to be one of the most loved Australian bands of the last 20 years, playing an updated cross between grunge and pub rock coupled with sensitive and intelligent lyrics, and hook-laden choruses.  Like the men themselves, their music is smart, fun, thoughful and honest.  Yeah, this isn't their 'best' album in terms of success.  But you know anything these guys release is going to be the best they could have done at the time.  And what more can a fan ask?

VERDICT: TURN IT UP

For more information: http://www.powderfinger.com/

In our collection we also have Internationalist and Odyessy Number Five