Before late ‘70s punks The Chosen Few (the Australian version - not the Michigan band containing Ron Asheton and James Williamson) there was Deathwish, a party band that festered in a barn on a family farm on Victoria’s Mornington Peninsular. The Chosen Few would go on to make a mark on the Melbourne underground scene, releasing a particularly collectable EP, but here’s where it all began.

The album's named for the beer that fuled the band and these are rehearsal tapes from 1976-77. No polish, lots of covers and some amateurishly played. But for all the rough edges, you can hear there was certainly something there. The back story’s also pretty good and is told in guitarist Ian Cunningham’s liners.

This is the last musical will and testament of Stiv Bator. Let’s talk about who’s not on this album.

Dee Dee Ramone and Johnny Thunders had convened at Stiv’s Paris flat in 1990 to work up a supergroup, The Whores of Babylon, with the ex-Dead Boys frontman. Contrary to widespread belief, neither of them made it onto the album.

It would be the ultimate irony if Johnny Thunders’ most consistent album came out 24 years after he died. Any sober assessment of his post-Heartbreakers output would deem it erratic but speckled with explosions of brilliance that outshone the lesser moments.

And so it is with “In Cold Blood”, a double CD package from UK label Easy Action that brings together a number of lost threads. It’s not Thunders’ most well-rounded effort - that’s probably still his first solo LP “So Alone” – but it’s still a significant addition to the JT canon.

The original “In Cold Blood” was a double vinyl affair that came out in 1983 while the outlaw guitarist was still breathing. It paired bare bones studio recordings by ex-Stones producer Jimmy Miller to a disc taken from a 1982 UK gig.

If 1977 was the year Iggy Pop presented his professional face to the American public, it was really by a matter of degrees. Think about what constituted Mainstream USA back then and ask if it was ready for Iggy, even in the guise of a clean-living and professional working stiff? The question’s rhetorical so don’t bother answering.

The Iggy that Americans saw (those who took notice) is captured on “Shot Myself Up”, a made-for-radio recording captured live in a studio on Pop’s ’77 tour of his homeland.

There’s something reassuring about a new Cosmic Psychos record. It’s about ageing disgracefully and all that. The fuzz bass, careering guitar lines and shout-spoken – no, drawled – vocals about beer, drinking and other everyday pursuits wrap themselves around you like a favourite blue singlet on a sweltering December day.

No Psychos record is radically different from another and therein lies the comfort factor. If you’ve been paying attention, by now you know exactly what you’re going to get. There’s more verbal abuse here than Caitlin Jenner taking a post-operative vacation at an ISIS-controlled holiday resort.

What with them scheduled to support Chris Masuak (“The Australian Rock Festival - The Legacy of Radio Birdman In Spain”) for a show in Spain being filmed for a documentary, I suppose it would be polite to review the Sonic Race’s CD.

The Sonic Race are from Spain and play high-energy, exuberant rock that keeps rocking. They don’t stop for no-one and you need this album in your house - and on your car stereo - right now. Oh yes, magic phrase:”Twin guitar assault”.

I got mine through their Australian representative Axelle Dee on Facebook. She may have a few left and they also have a Bandcamp.