Buzz 3 : 1984
METALLIC MADNESS
About five years ago in the land of Skippy the Bush Kangaroo
and the outback, Graeme Revell got together with a patient in the
psychiatric unit in which Graeme worked.
That was 1978 and that was the beginning of a breath of fresh air
to Britains music through SPK. Over the last year the band have
been roped in with the metal bands but although SPK are not shy
about hitting metal on to metal they also play actual instruments.
Graeme doesn't rate many of the metal bands as he says "The
only metal bands that are any good are Einsturdnze Nienbaten, as
they were original, bands like Test Dept. have just jumped on the
bandwagon and are really crap. The most annoying group are
Depeche Mode, as on their tour this year Depeche have stolen our
whole stage show of last year".
When I asked graeme what he thought of the music scene at the
moment his answer was very abrupt "It's all so bland at the
moment though I am glad to see American musicians having chart
success over here as they have had to take a back seat for a long
time".
There, at the moment are a few things that Graeme is happy about,
one of these is the Aussie music scene. "It's really great
back home because there are so many bands playing the pubs and
clubs circuit and some of them are superb. The radio stations in
Australia have helped all bands as they are so liberal, I mean
SPK were getting daytime airplay but over here in Britain we are
lucky to get nightime from the BBC. The BBC is so bloody
conservative that we would have to turn commercial and put
something like 'Oooee' into the songs!".
Another thing that kept Graeme smiling is "That so many
people are coming to the gigs and also the crowd is changing from
20 year old inner city dwellers to any age and people travelling
distances to see us."
Lastly, the appearance of a new album 'Machine Age Voodoo'.
"The album will be out on November 9 and will include the
first single 'Metal Dance' and the single 'Junk Funk'. There will
also be an hour long video released very soon. With the album and
a trip them you should be able to notice the contrast between the
livework and record.
When the album comes out the band wil be going to Europe and
America to promote it. The band are on tour just now and are
looking forward to coming to Edinburgh as Graeme once had a
holiday here, also he likes Scotland because "All the bands
are great that come out of Scotland but England hasn't produced a
decent band for about four years."
Well gi'bye for now, I'm away back to watch the rest of Skippy.
Grant Campbell
