Almanac Music: Reflections of an Australian cultural icon

 

 

‘They were always there, on the periphery. A few songs on AM or FM radio. ‘Khe Sahn’ blaring out one morning from my sisters room in the early eighties. I appreciated them, but they weren’t AC/DC. Shunning my sister’s enjoyment, I refused to listen to Breakfast at Sweethearts when she brought the record.

 

One afternoon in 1987 in the garage. My father Bill was repairing the Moke again. ‘Flame Trees’ played out on the old radio with a huge tuning dial. Bill sang along – who needs that sentimental bullshit anyway. Looking at me, he smirked. ‘I love that line. You need to appreciate music that isn’t AC/DC.’

 

It took me a while to do that.

 

Cold Chisel had split up long before I appreciated them. As the eighties moved on, radio kept playing them. At high school, teenaged boys and girls raved about Chisel. On free dress day, belligerent teenagers wore Cold Chisel t-shirts.

 

By 1988, their albums were sold as a duo on cassette. I bought East and Circus Animals for $8. After moving to Brisbane, that cassette went on high rotation. Each song was captivating, a complete lyrical story backed up by radio-friendly ditties, intelligent ballads or ballsy, blues rock.

 

Cold Chisel stood apart from the electronic guff of the eighties. They led a grand era of Australian rock, where bands like Australian Crawl, Mondo Rock and Midnight Oil wrote intelligent songs far beyond the accepted and expected booze, drugs and sex. They released three albums from 1978 to 1980 – Cold Chisel, Breakfast at Sweethearts and East. Their first two albums were raw and contained classics, but East forced Australian’s to take them seriously.

 

Listening to Cold Chisel put us in an airport lounge, a small town, inside unlawful activity, hospitals, tragic car crashes and pubs. We could immerse ourselves in those short stories, and embrace the sad, mad lives of the characters.

 

Following the commercial success of East, they went to America, and emerged shaken by their treatment from record company executives. No one in America could fit them into a slot. Their albums had intriguing depth and vast differences. Cold Chisel could be pop, pop rock, thrashing blues and introspective ballads on one side of a record. Unable to find that American airplay slot, the band found themselves back in Australia. Jimmy Barnes was so aggrieved with their treatment that he wrote a tune of simplistic honesty backed up by the slamming blues – ‘You got nothing I want’.

 

At first listen, most people thought Barnes had written about a woman, but it was a not-so-subtle dig at American record company executives who couldn’t or didn’t want to recognise the genius of Cold Chisel.

 

Their albums to that point surpassed their reputation of a wild group of alcoholics who didn’t take shit from anyone. Barnes certainly fit that bill, but he was the only band member fond of drinking a bottle of vodka during a gig. He looked more like a concreter than a singer.

 

The man who put the band together, Don Walker, looked like an accountant who played piano as a hobby. Phil Small on the bass appeared as his surname suggests. Steve Prestwich, with his long face and jovial smile, provided a rollicking beat around their riffs. And Ian Moss, the only member who actually looked like a rock star, possessed a superb voice and criminally underrated talent by guitar.

 

By 1984, after ten years together, constant touring and international ignorance manifested in arguments. Prestwich was briefly sacked during a tour of Germany. The band put themselves into several studios to fashion what was to be their last album – Twentieth Century – which went to number one and stayed in the Australian charts for 46 weeks.

 

 

 

 

The decline

 

As the chief songwriter, Don Walker reportedly gathered most of the royalties, but he encouraged the band to write their own songs and they obliged. Some of their most famous hits weren’t written by Walker. ‘Forever Now’, which I believe is the most complete love song ever written, was penned by Prestwich, and he also wrote ‘When the war is over’ and wrote the lyrics to ‘Flame Trees’. Moss wrote ‘Bow River’, his one grand achievement for the band. Barnes wrote ‘Goodbye (Astrid Goodbye)’ with Walker, ‘You got nothing I want’, ‘Rising Sun’ and ‘No Sense’. Phil Small wrote ‘My Baby’, which was sung by Moss and became a huge hit.

 

While recording Twentieth Century, Walker’s request that the band contribute their own songs caused issues. Disagreements forged about which songs would make the album, how they would be arranged and the production. Barnes argued that everyone should receive the same royalties, regardless of who composed the songs. He wanted a more polished sound. Moss wanted a rock and roll album. Prestwich refused to play a rock beat, and only recorded three songs. Kenny Arnott replaced him for the rest of the album.

 

Internal relationships disintegrated so badly that when they recorded the film clip for ‘Flame Trees’, Barnes wasn’t featured. He later said he didn’t know they were filming it. Despite their spite and bickering, they embarked on the Last Stand tour, and that was supposed to be it.

 

Cold Chisel couldn’t conquer the world. They quit on Australia by quitting on themselves.

 

 

 

 

The sideshows

 

A few months after the breakup, Barnes released Bodyswerve featuring ‘No Second Prise’, which was originally meant to be a Cold Chisel song. Of the eleven songs on Bodyswerve, Barnes wrote or cowrote eight, proving his ability with the pen. He embarked on a successful solo career, which included the interminable ‘Working Class Man’, cover albums and regular airplay. Across the years, I saw Barnes perform many times. He was great, by virtue of his boisterous personality, screaming vocals and a few Chisel songs for the traditionalists.

 

Moss’s solo career was more subdued. His debut album, Matchbook, won five ARIA awards, a remarkable achievement. I saw him play in Rockhampton and a few times in Brisbane. Always entertaining, always captivating, he never disappointed. Despite his talent with the guitar and at the microphone, he could fill pub and clubs, but never the arenas like Barnes did.

 

Don Walker fronted a band called Catfish and recorded his own solo album titled We’re all gunna die. He pressed several albums with Tex Perkins and Charlie Owen. Despite gushing critical reviews, Walker never enjoyed the chart success of Cold Chisel or his former bandmates.

 

During their tours of Australia, they passed like dismissive ships in the night. Though they collaborated on several songs and spent time in the recording studio, they shunned talk of a reunion.

 

I enjoyed their solo careers, but the sum of the parts never matched the machine they once created.

 

 

 

 

Never forgotten

 

Fourteen years after their much-publicised split, amid hopeful hype, they released a CD – The last wave of summer. The album went to number one and the band embarked on a national tour, packing out entertainment centres across the country. Rumours suggested Phil Small was driving a bobcat in a small country town before the reunion was arranged.

 

Although the album was a commercial and critical success, it was a rung below their early stuff. I thought the hiatus had been too long, and their creativity was too complicated. But their live performances reminded us of what we had been missing and the fans craved for more. Subsequent albums in the past ten years charted at number one or number two. Their gigs packed out entertainment centres and parklands, proving Australian’s insatiable desire for Cold Chisel.

 

I once described their music to a cynic as timeless. When he demurred I said he wasn’t listening intelligently enough. ‘Listen with your mind instead of your ears,’ I said. He frowned at me.

 

Cold Chisel are uniquely Australian, but they have a universal sound. Their lyrics, while they appear distinctly Australian, could be describing the lament of people in a small town in America’s Midwest, or a fishing village in England. They are timeless, placeless lyrics, self-contained stories of life most of us see and forget a few days later.

 

I admire one song more than any other – ‘Only One’, from Twentieth Century. Written by Barnes, the song is a frustrated tale of unrequited love, and Moss’s guitar solo on that album is the best I have ever heard. Starting off low, it middles out in a rumble and ends with screeching high notes. Moss never had a rhythm guitarist to back him up. He had to do it all.

 

 

 

 

Fifty years on…

 

Cold Chisel formed four years after I was born, in 1974. The only time I saw them live was at the Boondall Entertainment Centre in 1998. In November last year, there was much expectation and obvious excitement heading into Brisbane’s Victoria Park for the 50^th anniversary tour under the big tent. I was with two life-long mates – Adam and Andy. As Cold Chisel were about to do, we rolled back the years. Drinks in hand, we found our space, standing close, a mates embrace, watching in hope for those classic songs.

 

Two hours they played without a break. Singing and swaying, I was captivated. I knew there would be historical relics in their set from the opening track – ‘Wild Colonial Boy’. The words to each song came back to me in waves. People cheered and roared. The crowd sang along, the mingled voices echoing under the big tent.

 

Moss is 69. Walker is 72. Small is 70. Barnes is 68. They played without age, without a dip in energy and without any pretensions. Under the big tent, they were incredible. Midway through the concert I wondered if they’d ever been this good, and if they could ever be this good again.

 

Epilogue

 

During the taxi ride home, we described the highlights like teenagers, and I stared out the window wishing I could get those two hours back and watch the concert all over again. Our taxi driver, much younger than us and of a different nationality, had never heard of the band.

 

Back in the eighties, I often complained that I never saw them live. To compensate, I bought the Last Stand concert on video in 1988 and sat in the university library, watching on a small television with headphones on. I watched that video so many times until it had to be thrown out.

 

I was eighteen back then. I didn’t care why they broke up. I longed for more. Cold Chisel left a void that no other Australian band could fill, and none have done since. It’s unlikely any band can.

 

That Sunday night at the concert, I had the requisite wrinkles around my eyes. I was surrounded by older men than me with limps, huge beards, bald heads and a drink in hand. Older women than me in pub attire, with long hair, red lips and a drink in hand. I saw just one kid, who looked about twelve. People who weren’t born when Cold Chisel reunited in 1998 sang vociferously, word perfect, to each song. No doubt they were inspired by their parents.

 

The night after the concert, I told my boys I went to see Cold Chisel, and they gave me blank expressions. I almost asked if they wanted to listen to a couple of songs, but figured they would complain that Cold Chisel weren’t AC/DC.

 

Recently I watched Cold Chisel’s concert on television. They have remained relevant more than fifty years because their songs tug at our hearts and the music is pure genius…

 

 

 

 

To read more by Matt Watson click HERE.

 

To return to our Footy Almanac home page click HERE.

 

Our writers are independent contributors. The opinions expressed in their articles are their own. They are not the views, nor do they reflect the views, of Malarkey Publications.

 

Do you enjoy the Almanac concept?

And want to ensure it continues in its current form, and better? To help things keep ticking over please consider making your own contribution.

 

Become an Almanac (annual) member – click HERE.