Friday, July 3, 2009

Woolsheds, Teneriffe, Brisbane, 1986

Band: Hotel Breslin
Members: Lorenzo (v), Brendan (b), Jim (d), Carl (g), Simon (k)

Hotel Breslin played the Bandshake at Queensland University the day after Lorenzo was out of plaster. He hopped on stage with his crutches, threw them aside, and staggered around the stage, maintaining a balance between his good leg, his withered leg and the microphone stand. A review in the Semper noted that the lead singers dancing was a unique take on post-punk.


Around this time Brendan scored a gig at UQ for the Government Students Association. $5 entry, all beer free. Half way through the gig the party was gatecrashed by a series of nudists, who obviously heard about the free beer. The audience was a curious sight, part fully clothed mod, part nude. One intoxicated mod became a converted nudist, and then went on the balcony and threatened to jump off. I don't recall how that ended up.

The band was starting to pick up more gigs, but through no end of hassling. Chasing up gigs and networking was fondly known as Licking The Shit, and none of us were particularly good at it. Management, we'd never heard of it, and I don't think Brendan's militant left stance would have tolerated it.

The extent of our touring was the Ann Street Shuffle in Fortitude Valley; The Love Inn, The Outpost, The Acherly, with luminaries like Victor and The Grasscatchers, Aloha Pussycats, Ceramic Eggplants, Sanity Assassins.


Simon joined on keyboard. No audition, he was a drinker and had a black sense of humour, he was in. At his first rehearsal we had to make space in the room for him. Four wheelie bins of stubbies later and his keyboard was setup and ready to go.

As anyone who has done their own roadying can testify, the drums are the hardest to move. There's a lot of pieces, most of them unwieldy. Jim had an idea of optimizing this.

His theory was simple. One box. One big box.

Jim made a box that could fit his entire Pearl 20 piece kit inside it - assembled. Appearing at gigs, it took the five of us to lift the behemoth from the back of his RX7. How it even fit in an RX7, I'm not sure.

Eventually, the Woolshed management caught us 'testing' the equipment, and we were evicted. Time to look for another room.

Here's an mp3 of Hotel Breslin's only anthem, inspired part by Joy Division's Wilderness, part Johnny Rotten/Richard Hell, but a whole lot by Constable Damien Hayden's tales of civil disobedience. This was recorded at Dooley's on the HEAD
Said the Magistrate

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