For those of you of a certain age, you might think that Australian songwriting begins and ends with Nick Cave, Colin Hay (Men At Work), Andrew Farriss / Michael Hutchence and Neil Finn (yes, I know he is a Kiwi, but Crowded House have always been labelled as an Australian band). But, scratch only a little beneath the surface and there is so much more to discover.
Here is the low down on some of these 'hidden' treasures. These are all artists who cut their songwriting teeth in the 70s and 80s, but none of them and their associated bands have ever had more than a fleeting glimpse of chart success (certainly outside Oz) - but hopefully you will find something cool here that you didn't know before.
Steve Kilbey
Steve Kilbey was born in 1954, not in Australia but Welwyn Garden City, in the English home counties, but his family moved to Australia when he was five, so he grew up in Canberra.
At the age of 17 he became a professional musician, joining the cabaret band Saga. In 1974, he founded Precious Little with Peter Koppes, a future band mate in The Church. His next band, Baby Grande, produced demos in 77, but did not get picked up. The Church finally came into existence at the end of the decade, with Kilbey, Koppes and Nick Ward, who were joined in 1980 by Marty Wilson-Piper (himself newly arrived from England).
The Church have racked up an impressive 26 albums over the ensuing years. Their brand of psychedelic rock saw them get five albums in Australia's Top20 and four singles in that Top40. Bigger, and broader, success has largely bypassed them though, except for their one brief moment in the sun, with 1988s Under The Milky Way (from Starfish), which got them noticed elsewhere and a few lower end chart placings around the world.
Kilbey has always been the predominant writer in the band, although he did allow greater musical contribution from other band members over time. He explained a bit about his process when talking to American Songwriter in a 2019 interview:
When I encounter music that I really love, I analyse it and try and figure out what it is that I like and I take it apart and then I go, ‘I’m going to recreate that, but not in the way they did it. I’m going to take the very essence of how that blossomed in my heart or in my mind, and I’m going to do it my own way.
Despite many personal battles - he spent much of the 90s hooked on heroin culminating in getting arrested in New York City in 1999 - he is still going and writing, and the latest album from The Church, Hypnogogue, was released earlier this year to rave reviews.
He has also put out many solo albums and other projects over the years. He formed Hex with Donette Thayer, and Jack Frost with Grant McLennan, both of which yielded two albums. He is also a noted artist and writer. In 2012, The Church were inducted into the ARIA Hall of Fame (Australian Recording Industry Association); the year before Kilbey had also been inducted into the Australian Songwriters Hall of Fame.
Almost With You https://youtu.be/JSD9LwojYo8?si=V5WrIfnnbG9nABTI
(1982 on tv show Countdown - demonstrates that very Byrds-y late 60s psych-rock feel)
(1990 official music video - more of a classic rock track, with a slightly dreamy feel)
Unguarded Moment https://youtu.be/dg5DI5yCUZc?si=MZx3AABCgviwfY21
(1981 music video - an early single and a great psych-post punk foot stomper)
Under The Milky Way https://youtu.be/pWxJEIz7sSA?si=vQMXZQsAfc3y6NH_
(1988 official music video - the big one; an ethereal pop gem)
Iva Davies
Ivor Davies was born in 1955 and grew up in Sydney, where he was a classically trained musician. He played oboe with the Sydney Youth Orchestra and studied at the New South Wales Conservatorium of Music, although he dropped out aged 21.
In 1977, he was in the Sydney band Flowers, along with his friend Keith Welsh on bass. Flowers would eventually morph into Icehouse by 1980. They did actually get a good degree of success on home soil, with eight Top10 albums and twenty Top40 singles over the years, most notably 1987s Man Of Colours, which spent eleven weeks atop the Australian album charts, eventually racking up over 700,000 sales and containing five Top40 singles.
Elsewhere though, impacts were much lower, although early single Hey Little Girl did briefly trouble the UK charts. The band has always primarily been a vehicle for Davies and his songwriting, with a revolving cast of band members joining him along the way. They were noted for their quite adventurous use of synths and drum machines - at least by early 80s Australian standards - and of course, Davies' occasional use of the oboe too!
To exemplify that, 1982s Primitive Man was essentially an Iva Davies solo project, with him writing everything and playing guitar, bass, keyboards and programming the drum machine (and producer Keith Forsey covering any other musical duties).
Outside of Icehouse, Davies has also developed a reputation for film and tv scores, perhaps most famously producing the music for Peter Weir's 2003 film Master & Commander (Russell Crowe). He also scored the 1986 film Razorback and the tv series The Incredible Journey Of Mary Bryant in 2006. Interestingly, he has also dabbled in the world of ballet scores too. Working with the Sydney Dance Company, he helped write the ballet Boxes in 1985, and in the early 90s another one called Berlin.
His songwriting craft has been well rewarded over the years. He has five awards from the Australian Performing Rights Association for his music; in 2006 Icehouse were inducted into the ARIA Hall of Fame, and then in 2018, Davies joined the Australian Songwriters Hall of Fame.
Great Southern Land https://youtu.be/3mkidP2OUCk?si=XNUHkd2ssSbpt91D
(1982 music video - considered by many Australians as one of the best alternative
anthems of the 1980s. It is very much of its time, but a beautiful tune nonetheless)
(1987 official music video - proper 80s power pop)
Electric Blue https://youtu.be/dgfR3AKCAQI?si=HeJ1MZXd2GJavXmP
(1987 official music video - more power pop, this one was co-written with John Oates
- yes, that one!)
Hey Little Girl https://youtu.be/YZQWTnrJMS0?si=3Jqfxw_WAk0whnKc
(1982 official music video - a great atmospheric bit of early 80s synth pop)
(2012 live in Sydney - this is another moody and evocative synth classic - maybe a bit
Gary Numan-esque?)
Grant McLellan & Robert Forster
They are both great songwriters in their own right, but their legacy is so wrapped up in their work with The Go-Betweens, they have to be dealt with as a bit of a double act.
McLellan had been born in 1958 in Rocksville, before growing up in Cairns, while Forster was born in Brisbane the year before.
The two met at the University of Queensland in Brisbane, where they bonded over literature and a love of Dylan and the New York scene of Patti Smith and Velvet Underground. Forster persuaded McLellan to learn how to play bass and the Go-Betweens were born.
It would become something of a hard to swallow running joke over the next decade, as they became one of the most critically acclaimed bands ever to come out of Australia, and yet they could never quite transform that into commercial success. Robert Christgau, the noted music critic from Village Voice, once called them, "the greatest songwriting partnership working today."
Forster would do most of the heavy lifting in the first year or so of the band, writing and singing on their early singles like Lee Remick. But, by the time they had returned from a stay in the UK, McLellan was beginning to develop his own songwriting style. And when their first album, Send Me A Lullaby, came out in 1982, the writing (and singing) duties were split fairly evenly between them. Lindy Morrison had joined as the permanent drummer, and when Robert Vickers joined in 1983 on bass, Grant was able to switch over to guitar.
By the time the band dissolved the first time, in 1989, Forster had built a reputation for spiky, angular songs full of angst and oblique literary references, while McLellan provided the softer, warmer tones.
The next decade saw the two of them branch out into their own projects, both producing four solo albums and both getting involved in other projects.
McLellan's first solo effort Watershed in 1991, was, as Australian music historian Ian McFarlane notes, "[an] ambitious and highly personalised collection of songs that charted McLellan's emotions in the wake of The Go-Betweens break up." Norm Elrod, in AllMusic, while noting that McLellan was neither a great guitarist or singer, said, "He is a truly exceptional artist who, in the spirit of Lloyd Cole, crafts moments of brilliance to fit his limitations." He would also work on two albums with Steve Kilbey, as Jack Frost.
Forster meanwhile, had been in Germany, and got his debut solo album, Danger In The Past, out in 1990. He would give an insight into his songwriting, in a 2013 interview with Time Out Barcelona.
"My work is very autobiographical - I'm a singer-songwriter..... My songs talk about my life and how I've lived it. But I'm not one of those lyricists who explains everything. My stories aren't too obvious. There are some singer-songwriters who say too much."
Forster and McLellan reunited in 2000, putting a new Go-Betweens together (with Glenn Thompson and Adele Pickvance) - and produce three more well received albums. It all finished in 2006, when McLellan suffered a fatal heart attack at his Brisbane home. Forster continues his solo work and writing, with his most recent record The Candle And The Flame coming out in 2023.
As noted, they never got the chart success their talent deserved, but they have been recognised by their peers. The band were a big inspiration for Scottish indie legends Teenage Fanclub and also apparently, Washington riot grrrl band Sleater-Kinney. Most of Belle & Sebastian's song, Shoot The Sexual Athlete is about the Go-Betweens - "Cause I'm a fan of the Go-Betweens, A fan of Robert, and I always have been, But I like Grant, now that I've met him, Because he's charming." Their songs have been covered by many, live and on record, including by Nada Surf and Franz Ferdinand.
Cattle And Cane https://youtu.be/ZCbyByY-A6w?si=XoK8sKrxDkvP9dFN
(1983 official music video - a tender, nostalgic song, selected as one of APRA's Top 30
Australian songs of all time)
Streets Of Your Town https://youtu.be/8M_P_xX9Cmw?si=IjazdKhdtcJ3g_R_
(1988 official music video - this was perhaps the one that should have broken it open for
them - a shimmeringly great and underrated song)
Easy Come, Easy Go https://youtu.be/sJ9096U897k?si=akrPjHXPUBi1_1_Q
(1991 official music video - a perfect pop gem from Grant's debut solo album)
Let Me Imagine You https://youtu.be/fZ8Vy8FqnKs?si=te99uaLToyq987UN
(2015 official music video - catchy acoustic number from Robert's Songs To Play album)
Spring Rain https://youtu.be/9OFkyyzUOZQ?si=NwJ4kofb9wBpKO-C
( 1986 official music video - Forster's greatest Go-Betweens single? A jangly indie classic
- how was this not a hit?)
Bye Bye Pride https://youtu.be/bBDe9BGNBnM?si=Gmhm0OVQAgozZNlK
(1987 official music video - I think this is gorgeous - one of my favourite all time songs)
David McComb
David McComb was born in Perth in 1962, and although his life was far too short, from occasional appearances with The Blackeyed Susans, and more notably as leader of The Triffids - his work would perhaps represent the vast space of Australia more than anyone else.
He was a student of journalism and literature at the Western Australia Institute of Technology, but by then had already formed the band Dalsy with his high school friend Alan 'Alsy' MacDonald (the band name a portmanteau of their first names). They put together various cassettes of their work in the late 70s. The band revolved around McComb, with numerous line-up changes, he being the only ever-present. They morphed into The Triffids and in 1980 won a band demo competition, which allowed them to release their first single, Stand Up.
Debut album Treeless Plain came soon after, and a move to Sydney via Melbourne followed that - and many thousands of miles racked up traversing the vastness between there and their home in Western Australia, perhaps providing the imagery that he would use to great effect later. The miles increased, when they moved to London - on a tight budget and timeline, they recorded what would become Born Sandy Devotional.
This is seen as an Australian classic by many, and two albums later came Calenture (1988), another one deemed among the national greats. It was lush and melancholic, but not a success - and by the time they put out Black Swan in 1989, they were done.
Two highly revered albums and some epic singles had bought them, and McComb's songwriting, much acclaim but little reward - other than the song Goodbye Little Boy featuring in an episode of Neighbours in 1989!
McComb returned to his studies, this time doing Art History at the University of Melbourne. He delved into another band - The Blackeyed Susans, with Phil Kakulas, Rob Snarski (who has also worked a lot with Lindy Morrison over the years) and old pal Alsy MacDonald. The band, both in the studio and live, would always (and still does) consist of a revolving line up of musicians. McComb appears on the first two albums, Welcome Stranger (1992) and All Souls Alive (1993). He also had an occasional backing band for his solo work, The Red Ponies, that would include such luminaries as Warren Ellis (The Bad Seeds).
McComb struggled with alcoholism, heroin and amphetamine use over the years, he also suffered from chronic back pain for many years. In 1996 he had a successful heart transplant (from a condition common with alcoholism), but continued with his drug and alcohol use. He was injured in a car accident in early 1999, but released from hospital after a day. He died a few days later, the coroner concluding it was actually due to his heroin addiction and a rejection of his heart transplant.
The Triffids were inducted into ARIA Hall of Fame in 2008. Historian Ian McFarlane said that McComb "infused his melancholic songs with stark yet beautiful and uniquely Australian imagery. Few songwriters managed to capture this feeling of isolation and fatalistic sense of despair of the Australian countryside." He singled out his work on Born Sandy Devotional, as it was "full of some of the most lonely, spacious songs ever written."
A Trick Of The Light https://youtu.be/XgtRBLIMntA?si=JgkDU_4g14CgpjZG
(1987 official music video - a shimmering track showing off McComb's deep, silky voice)
Bury Me Deep In Love https://youtu.be/h0OwLIY9moA?si=OfAGTOTPDuwnScoS
(1987 official music video - a big, resonant tune - with a hint of those epic 60s ballads)
Beautiful Waste https://youtu.be/Q78EWGqDPT8?si=lmztF7ODG4e56KXx
(1984 official music video - a much simpler and sparser arrangement than their later
work, but still sounds great)
Don't Call Yourself An Angel https://youtu.be/WyVqP4VlCno?si=m1cJM_K-swtGwfdy
(1991 audio - from The Blackeyed Susans first album. A nice mash up of 50s and 60s
sounds - almost goes a bit do-wop in places)
Wide Open Road https://youtu.be/CiLlRXUU3DE?si=r5JJOOsMome3FOa8
(1986 official music video - this is the one that has it all; the feeling of that vast open
space, isolation and of course, McComb's voice at its very best)