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When Alan agreed, the bass-guitarless Hamburg Power Trio was born (this
was a nickname the Kim/Tony/Nick era Scientists had for themselves during
a residency up the road from the Kaiserkeller). This mutated into the
Hamburg Villains, which seemed a bit too specific and so the Interstellar
Villains was dreamed up at the Norfolk Hotel during a marathon session
of speaking only in joke punchlines.
When
Rod Radalj left the Dubrovniks (who also featured ex-Scientists Boris
& James) , Timberyard Records, who had hoped to release a version of the
Dubrovniks covering the Bay City Rollers' "Rock & Roll Love Letter" got
Rod to form a one-off studio band to record this on his own.
Tony
benefited from this split by:
a)
betraying Boris by accompanying Rod on this dreadfully-mixed travesty
b)
betraying Rod by temporarily replacing him in the Dubrovniks
c)
pointing at Rod & Boris arguing whilst telling Timberyard boss, Mick
Danias, that if the new Timberyard label wanted to get their debut record
out soon, with as little resultant violence as possible, his best bet
was to fund an Interstellar Villains session.
So,
before they had stepped out of their practice room, the Villains were
sent to Electric Avenue to record "Right Out In The Lobster Quadrille".
They "toured" Sydney and Melbourne to promote this, supported Dinosaur
Jnr and, when a sound-man refused to take his fee (insisting they keep
it and spend it on a rehearsal room) they instinctively waited politely
until he had left and took it straight to the bar.
The
Villains continued to gig and recorded from 1988 - 1992, performing spacey
pop tunes assembled from Beatles, Shaggs, Steve Bent and Quo covers, Human
Jukebox out-takes and songs from the Scoundrels demos.
They
broke up in 1992 after they were dropped and left stranded in Spain by
Munster records and their agents for performing I Wanna Be Your Dog whilst
hurling their guitars at poles and breaking a wine glass.
In
2001 they reformed for a one-off gig in Sydney on the condition that there
was no advance publicity. They recreated their glory days magnificently,
by blowing up amplifiers, breaking guitars and being generally misunderstood
by everybody except Phil and Stephen.
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