Saturday, April 11, 2009

Rocks - 1995 - You'r So Boring (AUD)

Rocks - 1995 - You'r So Boring (AUD)
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ROCKS (Never put a "THE" in front) started out as a three piece in late 1976 with Bill Webb (a.k.a. Bill Posters) on Drums/Lead Vocals, Peter Davies on Guitar/Vocals & Steve Vanderschoot on Bass/Lead Vocals. Doing what came naturally, it was a combination of original songs and covers (Ramones, Sex Pistols, Dead Boys Etc.) that made Rocks what they were to become, one of Australia's best Punk bands. Their first gig was at the legendary Grand Hotel on Broadway in Sydney... the bands at The Grand Hotel were booked by Johnny Dole And The Scabs, this was in November of 1977. How Rocks got this first gig would be the catalyst for them becoming a four piece, I was to join soon after.
We were always looking for new bands to play at The Grand Hotel, so I started to look for bands around the area where I lived, this was in the southern suburbs of Sydney. I decided to give Bill a call to see if he was still playing, we had started playing together while still at school, playing in my mum and dad's garage (how unique). I figured if anyone was going to be into punk it would be Bill. Of course, I wasn't wrong. When I went down to see them rehearse who would be there with him but Peter & Steve, also from the early days of jamming in my mum and dad's garage. So it was inevitable that I would not only give them gigs at The Grand Hotel but also if the opportunity arose I would join the band. This was to happen sooner than I thought as I was to get kicked out of Johnny Dole And The Scabs not long after Rocks' first gig at The Grand Hotel, so I got straight on the phone and within two weeks of rehearsal I made my debut with Rocks supporting of all bands Johnny Dole And The Scabs.
The lineup now was Bill Webb on Lead Vocals, Peter Davies on Guitar/Vocals, Steve Vanderschoot on Bass/Lead Vocals and Greg Morris on Drums/Vocals.
We had employed the services of a manager by the name of Lorry Brown, he was a nice guy and to my recollection the best thing he managed to do was misspell the title of our EP we had just recorded. This EP should have been called "YOU'RE SO BORING" not "YOU'R SO BORING". We recorded at Axcent Recording Studios at Kogarah NSW and was engineered by Ross Mcgregor. Ross was blind, and he made his way around a desk better than most. It took about eight hours to record and we came back the following week to mix it down; that took about four hours. Our manager financed the pressing. The EP was received OK, though we weren't around much longer after it was released so that didn't help. Most bands didn't last very long in those days, there weren't many places to play and not many people coming along to see the bands. So bands tended to play, record, split up. If you were lucky enough to release a record then it seems to go on and become a collectible no matter how good or bad it was.
Rocks played all the popular venues of the time and some not so popular, some of these were "Blondies" in Bondi Junction "The Last Resort" in Taylor Square and the biggest one was "The Paris Theatre" in Sydney supporting JAB and The Boys Next Door, both from Melbourne.
Everything was going along nicely until one particularly unsavory bust-up between some band members. We decided not to continue. Some time later, Bill called me and we got together and formed another band called The Prisoners, however this later folded and since then we have gone our separate ways musically.
Over the years Bill has kept Rocks going with Peter with different drummers but that's his story.
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In the face of the recent spate of 7" bootlegs of the awesome "You'r so boring" six-song 7"EP, we got in touch with the band - via Sydney's garage-punk renaissance intermediary Steven Danno - to do it legit. This LP contains the enitre EP on side A. The flip contains as assortment of songs from '80s comps. "Not so Humdrum" (Aberrant) and "Swingin' from the trees" (Au-go-go), and some raw 1978 demos. New insert features a stack of never-published pics.
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source Greg Morris at Break my Face (link)

4 comments:

topper said...

as usual..............thanks for the postings

dz said...

Thank You, this is really good stuff.

Anonymous said...

I was about to post this exact same ep on my blog.
So I'm goin with the Rocks - Final Assault 12" instead!

isksp said...

this's a killer too

i'll be waiting for the post!