The Church, Fortitude Valley, Brisbane, 1992

Band: Rubber Bug
Members: Gary (v), Ross (d), Big D (b), Carl (g)
Guitar Setup: Fender Stratocaster, Mesa Boogie Mark II+ combo, Marshall Gov'ner, Jim Dunlop Wah

Like any self respecting band we also practiced in a church.


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The church was shared by practitioners of Faith in the daytime, and Greenacres and Rubber Bug in the night.

Robbie had gone to Sydney to play with the Died Pretty, Mr Id has gone to the UK to hang out with Stewart from Reptile House.
Rubber Bug adopted the MLO mixer Big D on bass.

Big D always had the bass gear, it sounded loose, deep, distorted, rich. The Bowel Movement we called it.

MLO songs were ditched and new songs were written, much inspired by the pregrunge US indie sound. Misguided? No question.

Ross used to play tennis with the organizer of Brisbane's biggest music festival, Livid, and bingo, we got an opening spot.

As a minor support band we were scheduled to play as soon as the gates opened. It was so early, I remember the mixer eating cornflakes. I have been told this wasn't true, but I distinctly recall it.

Discerning critiques of rock will go to these festivals to see the early bands, because their appearance is rare and to witness their potential, and the late bands, because of their appearance is rare and to witness what was once their potential. I'm serious.

We performed, we packed down, and I think I had a bacon and egg roll. What seemed like 48 hours later I was hearing Nick and Kylie doing Wild Rose, from under a tonne of VBs in the prone position.

I thought I'd be better off buying a ticket next time. But we were on it again the following year.

Rubber Bug played for many years. Here's the only track that survived from MLO, written by Robbie and Gary. It's a great tune, the guitar line is a version of the scales in Joe Diorio's Intervallic Designs. The scratched record ending lost on generations.

If I can

The Castle Cawdor, Woolloongabba, Brisbane, 1992

Band: Slaughterhouse Joe
Members: Paul (d), Jim (b), Carl (v,g)

The Castle Cawdor had something strange about it. It had a corridor that led straight from the front door to the back door and eight rooms running off it, four a side. One room had a sink. We called this the kitchen. And that is also where we rehearsed.


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This was where SHJ played their last gig, a party in the kitchen. 60s all over it, oil lamp projectors, band equipment covered in al-foil, sandalwood incense. Paul was going to the UK to work, because SHJ weren't cutting it in the fashion scene, although the T-shirts were starting to make appearances on the fashionistas around town.


Paul also played in a band that actually paid him money - a cover band called Subway that had a regular Friday night gig entertaining the cops at the Police Headquarters Recreation Club. Eric, their bass player, wasn't available for a couple of weeks, so I filled in, and Castle Cawdor is where we rehearsed.

Playing at Police HQ was fun, and each time we lifted a carton at the end of the night, hidden inside the kick drum case. I really enjoyed playing bass for Subway, perhaps too much, as the more I drank at HQ, the longer and more obnoxious the bass solos became.

I vaguely recall Steve, the guitarist/singer, throwing money at me at the end of the night - not in an adulating way, but in mild disgust, as I was semiconscious on the floor.

Subway and SHJ folded after Paul left, although Jim claims we never did break up, we're just taking an extended break between gigs.

Salisbury, Brisbane, 1991

Band: Mona Lisa Overdrive
Members: Gary (v), Id (k), Robbie (b), Ross (d), Carl (g)

The room was a purpose built rehearsal room in Ross's parent's house.


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The room was dark and cramped. Perfect for generating a large sound with only small PA and amplification system.

The Reptile House that I had seen a week before were no more, they had changed into Mona Lisa Overdrive, and the guitarist Matthew had left the band. So I was told.

Robbie had done all the negotiating with me at the venue and over the phone up to now, I had known him as a friend of Lorenzo's at Griffith Uni. Robbie seemed to be the leader of the band and had very strong ideas about where and what the band should be playing. One thing is for sure, Robbie appeared very determined, and eventually his determination would score him the bass position in the Sydney band, The Died Pretty.

We jammed on a couple of old Dementia 13 songs like Mr Driftwood, as I believe Mr Id wrote the music to them. I thought that the guys might like a new song, so I had written a riff during the week and gave it a go. They seemed to like it, particularly Ross, the style seemed to agree with his drumming, and there were times even in the first rehearsal that he let us know that he thought the some of the other songs were pedestrian.

Then Matthew showed up. He hadn't left the band. Well, at least he didn't think he had left the band.

Awkward position to be in.

Figuring it had nothing to do with me, I just launched into another song.

I think Robbie gave him the news later that the band had a new guitarist.

Not long after that I become friends with Matthew, I bumped into him often at Ross's apartment at the Pink Palace in Spring Hill, he was a good guy and didn't seem to mind that he wasn't in the band anymore. Although I do suspect he was the one that slipped me a magic mushroom cocktail at a party at the Palace once.

There were a few gigs with this lineup, but we put on a particularly shambolic performance when we supported Concrete Blonde at Griffith University. The band communication was shattered as we were on a stage the size of a football field instead of the usual postage stamp. After the show we went backstage, to hang with the 'crete, and I was somewhat disappointed as I had neither envisaged an international rock band with a table of fruit as a rider, nor the sight of Paul Thompson from Roxy Music wearing a bumbag. Gary, the MLO singer, was catatonic, and when we were handed our payment for the show, he blurt out a series of expletives and tore up the check in some symbolic gesture.

Robbie handled all finance from then on.

Here's a few tracks from MLO's 6 track tape, Earthly Delights. Backing vocals on Rivers and Morella courtesy of Ann Della.

MLO covering Syd Barrett's Lucifer Sam. A most bizarre arrangement by Robbie, but it kind-of works.

MLO Rivers This song gave Mr Id the opportunity to wig out. I lifted the leitmotif for guitar in the end direct from a recording I had heard performed by Stewart from Reptile House.

MLO Morella This is the only song where I have ever used an e-bow. Ross excels on the triplet of cymbal pings and Mr Id's strings in the middle-eight is the wonkiest keyboard sound I've heard since While My Guitar Gently Weeps. It would have been entirely intentional by Mr Id, I'm sure.

The Country Homestead, Boggo Road, Brisbane, 1991

Band: Slaughterhouse Joe
Members: Paul (d), Jim (b), Carl (g,v)

The Country Homestead was a sharehouse, an old Queenslander, and SHJ practiced in the living room.


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There were all assortment of visitors at the Country Homestead, but Frank was the only one to bear witness to a SHJ practice there. That's if you call sleeping off a hangover, bearing witness.

All natural light, no PA.

There isn't a lot to blog on about with this room, but at this time we did support the punk band Nunbait, at an underground venue on Elizabeth St in the city. Nunbait's vocalist was Ivan, who used to vocalize in Dementia 13. They were a fantastic punk rock band and I found their stage show and lyrical content hysterically funny.

They played two nights at the venue, first night supported by Reptile House, and the second night supported by SHJ. The guys from Reptile House came to see Nunbait again the second night and saw SHJ, and asked us to play with them. It was later on that I realised that they were asking me to play in their band as the guitarist.

Why not have a look? So I agreed to meet them at their rehearsal room for a jam.

West End, Brisbane, 1990

Band: Slaughterhouse Joe
Members: Paul (d), Jim (b), Carl (v,g), Id (k)

SHJ never paid for a rehearsal room.


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This room was the first floor of the fashion label Tschico, where Paul worked as a pattern designer. It was a warehouse floor, and again, No PA.

Practice sessions with others bands were all in enclosed systems, which you entered and exited at night. The SHJ rehearsals were always during the day, in rooms with natural light, and I expect that had an influence on what we chose to play.

Jim was the guitarist for Dirt and The Rebels, and took Brendan's place on the bass when he left for Melbourne. We had lost a great character in Brendan, but his replacement had no less powerful effect.

Jim had a vision for music and he found his collaborators in SHJ. The vision was 1960s, and, hey, doesn't everyone want to go there? The band itself was different from other bands I played with, in that there was no menace in the music.

The only studio recording was made at Red Zeds in Red Hill, engineered by Jeff. He was sceptical at first, but he seemed to like some of our ideas, which included a Latin prayer that sampled Benedictine monks and a sample of Peter Fonda for the Wild Angels theme.

Today, sampling is a common term, but the parameters of rock music of 1991 dictated that using someone else's sound in your own recording was only acceptable if it was appropriated as an affect, or as a catalyst to an altogether different and original song. The technique of sampling became legitimized in the 90s through the success of hiphop, and since varying degrees of sampling have pervaded contemporary culture including songwriting - in some cases the sample is no longer a catalyst, but a foundation. Lifting someone else's riffs has almost become an advantage, because the public do not have to navigate a new terrain, they are already familiar with it.

Where was I? The Red Zed 6 track went to tape, Jeff played a solo on it, he was preceded with a reputation as a shredder, which he is, but I imagined Hendrix, and out popped Eddie Van Halen. Still, it worked a treat on the recording.

SHJ scored some gigs, and somehow we landed one at the Downs Hotel Drayton, west of Toowoomba. It was an afternoon show in the courtyard, we were the only band, $5 entry, lucky door prize, sausage sizzle and first keg free. We set up, had a beer off the keg, and then the doors opened at 12.30, and one beanie-clad dude who had been waiting outside for an hour, coughed up the $5, got himself a jug and sat in front of the stage. You beauty, I thought, the punters are going to be rocking up soon.

Sadly, no. This guy was the only punter to show up, and he drank there by himself enjoying the show. At about 3, when fan number 1 was fairly trashed, the licensee switched off the keg. Then this guy wants the lucky door prize. The manager reluctancly gave him a six-pack.

A few years later I saw the Drayton punter again. I got to know him as Geoff and he went on to sing for Greenacres and then Six Foot Hick.

Back in the rehearsal room we thought we'd wander further down 1960s lane, and there was no-one more qualified to enlist than Mr Id, who we knew from Dementia 13. Brendan played in D13 until he was thrown out for being too drunk, or some other unlikely excuse.

The band played around at UQ, QUT, Carseldine, St Paul's Tavern. There were original songs, inspired by Sonic Youth and Straightjacket Fits, but there was also The Beatles' She Said She Said, The Who's See Me Feel Me.

We wanted to be free to do what we wanted to do. We wanted to be free to ride. And we wanted to be free to ride our machines without being hassled by The Man. And we wanted to get loaded. And have a good time.

And, can't complain, it was a good time.

Wynnum, Brisbane, 1989

Band: Slaughterhouse Joe
Members: Paul (d), Brendan (b), Carl (g,v)
Guitar setup: Epiphone 335, Marshall Guv'ner, Fender 75

Some call it Wynnum, some call it Lose 'em.
This one was quite literally my bedroom. Talk about convenience.


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This was the lineup before Brendan went to Melbourne. I had met Paul through a friend, he was a drummer, surfer, skateboarder, fashion designer. Again, to consolidate this band at the start we relied on Joy Division and Wipers covers. The Colonies and Nothing Left To Lose appeared in every setlist until the band split in 1994.

There was no vocal mike or PA in this room, so when we played live it was the first time the band heard the lyrics. There was a performance, pictured below, at Wynnum, and another at a Sports Club in Wellington Point, where Brendan excelled in a particularly vitriolic white-noise bass solo to Booker T's Green Onions.

This picture was taken by Mr Id at a party in the garage - Note Queensland's finest in the background, they came to shut the party down. Brendan here has done his best impersonation of the distanced stare of the bass player from the Wipers featured on the back of the Rivers Edge soundtrack - He was always a great impersonator. Brendan was on fire at this stage, he was heavy on the bass and had extreme confidence. His stepping out style was JR Ewing.


Mr Id was later to play guest keyboard with Slaughterhouse Joe.

The Ballet School, Charlotte St, Brisbane, 1988

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

This was the last room for Hotel Breslin. First floor, underneath the Ballet School. God knows how they used to rehearse ballet at the same time we were practising. Although it was a bonus to see the girls leaving at end of class, we were upskirt connoisseurs before the information superhighway.


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The atmosphere in this room wasn't the cheeriest. We had our disagreeances, we had different ideas about the future. Brendan was going to leave to do a PhD in Philosophy in Melbourne, and the enthusiasm had fallen away.



We wanted to do something different for our last show, the Last Shout. Not down the Valley. Lorenzo booked the Boundary Hotel West End, around the corner from where we first rehearsed. Unintentional, but on reflection, poetic.

There was no stage in the joint. Lorenzo got one at the last minute, but once set up it was about twelve foot high, and the ceiling clearance was fifteen. Great stage for a group of smurfs. Somehow he exchanged for a lower one. The new one wasn't really secure and with the PA on it, it was a bit shakey.

The support band was Who's Gerald, and some of the guys in that band became Custard Gun, and then Custard. They all wore school uniforms on the night. Girls school uniforms. Nice touch.

We played, and it was good. Even the grim reaper showed up. There was extra tension in the band, as a result of the impending collapse of the stage, the PA falling onto the moshpit and/or spilling a beer. A good time was had by all.

The guys from Hotel Breslin kept in touch after that, but didn't all get together for about 15 years where they played a reunion show in 2003 for 4ZZZ. They are some of my closest friends.