A SAVAGE AFFAIR - The Philisteins (Off the Hip)
One of the joys of the Digital Age is the opportunity to discover lost or forgotten gems. Sure, there's a lot of shit sitting in the bottom of the barrel but there's also bejewelled stuff like The Philisteins.I'm not being mean-spirited here but how many times do you see the words "seminal" and "Tasmanian band" in the same sentence? Tassie's just too tiny a place to sustain this sort of music and many a band's sprouted and died on that fact alone. The Philisteins saw the light early and left. They just couldn't decide which Australian state to call home after that, moving to Adelaide, Melbourne and then Sydney on some nomadic journey of misadventure, all the time not giving a fuck about the "industry".
To be blunt, their stellar brand of psychedelic garage punk ended up being born slightly out of time when they could have been our own version of, say, DMZ. Of course grunge then came along and made the task of being a genuine rock and roll band, not just a trend-follower, doubly-hard.
Off the Hip's exhumed the entire contents of the family crypt for this long-lost Australian band of the late '80s and early '90s and have put it into a double CD package that's a fitting legacy. Disc one brings together the debut "Bloody Convicts" mini-album, the "Some Kind" EP and various tribute album tracks, while the second instalment couples '91's "Lifestyles of The Wretched and Forgettable" debut album (Dog Meat) with a 1989 rehearsal tape.
The first disc is the one to dwell on. The songs are rock solid and Guy Lucas' talent as a vocalist and distinctive guitar player is well evident. I reckon that for once leading edge label Dog Meat got out of the gate late and signed The Philisteins when they were past their prime, with most members already primed to go separate ways. There are some good moments but disc two is really lifted by the 11-track rehearsal tape, whose audio quality is great and contents even better. The choice of covers (Pretty Things, Electric Prunes, Raw Power-era Stooges) gives a good clue as to where The Philisteins were coming from, and the songs that made it to the album are in rawer, more focussed form.
Guy Lucas led fractured and fractious line-ups, moving through The Freeloaders fore a while and passing away unexpectedly in '98. There's stuff in this collection that only hardcore fans knew or would remember existed. Guy's brother Adam (who co-compiled this with bassist Ian Wettenhall) has done a great job with the liners where the band's flawed and often funny story is recounted with warmth and honesty. - The Barman
