Song of the month: "By My Side"/ The Elois (April 1967)

Sitting somewhere alongside ‘I Want, Need, Love You’ by The Black Diamonds and The Missing Links’ ‘You’re Driving Me Insane’* on the wigged-out wild-o-meter of Aussie garage punk, ‘By My Side’ by The Elois is the subject of today’s Melbourne song of the month segment. Over and out in under two-and-a-quarter minutes, this radioactive scorcher of a track leaves a trail of aural destruction in its wake that even repeated listens can’t diminish. The fact that it’s the work of a bunch of clean-cut country teenagers simply defies all logic. 

Blasting off with a stinging, sustained guitar note that’s soon joined by bass and drums in one of the most raucous intros ever to be committed to tape, the song gets even more intense when the snarling vocals of Alan Rowe kick in. Belting out the repetitive lyrics like some kind of desperate mantra, he sounds like a man possessed: howling, growling, a slave to his hormones as he informs the object of his affections in no uncertain terms how badly he wants her. There’s a similar sense of, ahem, urgency about the backing vocals.


(This is not the original music video, but it's super-cool nonetheless!)

About 30 seconds in, a series of drum rolls signal a change of pace, and the band flips from full-throttle into thumping, grinding mode (punctuated by some cool sliding bass), gradually building up into a cacophony of voices that’s almost unbearable – then bam! That fuzzed-out guitar is back, even more blistering than before. And just when you think things can’t get any more insane…they do. 

The song ends with an extended rave-up that makes The Yardbirds seem refined, all unhinged drums, guitar as deadly feedback weapon, relentless bass and an almost chanted refrain, ‘I can’t get enough from you, girl’. (Ah, so the truth is out: she’s not putting out as much as he’d like.) And suddenly it’s all over. 
Holy wham-bam-thank-you-ma’am, Batman!  

No country bumpkins

So who the hell were The Elois, to release this one dynamite 45 (‘By My Side’ is on the B-side; a hum-dingin’ take of ‘I’m a Man’ is the A-side) and then slip into obscurity?

Formed in 1964 by school friends Michael Dzuriek (bass) Dennis Fiorini (lead guitar, vocals), Doug Blair (rhythm guitar, vocals) and drummer Ian Chettle (who was replaced a few months later by Bill Van Berkel), The Elois were from the small historic gold-rush town of Maryborough. Wondering how to say the name? I always thought it was pronounced ‘Eloyze’ but while researching this post, I discovered that it’s ‘Eel-eye’ (with a silent ‘s’, no less). 

The Elois: no idea which members these are!
Photo taken from The Livin' End, issue 3 (which wasn't captioned)

As most readers would know, Elois were the dainty little peace-loving peeps preyed upon by the creepy subterranean Morlochs in HG Wells’s sci-fi classic, The Time Machine. Intriguingly, the rock’n’roll Elois were called The Morlochs for a short while – which, to me, seems a more fitting name, given the savagery of ‘By My Side’. But then, maybe they were going for some kind of cognitive dissonance effect?

Like so many bands of the era, The Elois started out playing mainly instrumentals such as The Thunderbirds’ version of ‘Wild Weekend’, before adding some early Beatles-style numbers to the mix. In their matching grey suits and pink shirts, they built up a following (their fan club numbered in the thousands, apparently) by playing at big dances in the region, prompting the decision to recruit a dedicated singer.  

Downtown Maryborough, Photo: copyright Peter Maltezos (2013)

Enter Alan Rowe, another buddy from school. “He had a good voice, a bit like Eric Burdon,” Fiorini remarked decades later in that bible of 60s Antipodean garage and beat music Wild About You! by Ian D. Marks and Iain McIntyre. (Indeed, the interview with Fiorini in that book covers The Elois’ career in more detail than I could hope to here, and is well worth reading.)

Relieved of his vocal duties, Fiorini was free to concentrate on lead guitar, and gradually, the group developed a tougher sound, influenced by wilder proponents of the British invasion such as The Who, The Yardbirds and The Stones, which earned them the title of the ‘feedback kings of north-east Victoria’.

List of Victorian Battle of the Sounds heats, 1965,
taken from this informative downloadable booklet

Word gets around

Around this time The Elois caught the attention of one Graham Lever, a flashy, smooth-talking 3AK radio DJ who’d moved to the area. He became their manager, not only encouraging their penchant for distortion and raw r’n’b sounds, but trying to persuade them to relocate to the Big Smoke. 

Not yet ready for the Melbourne move, they entered a Maryborough heat of Hoadley’s famous Battle of the Sounds (coming second to Bendigo combo, The Emeralds), before trying again in the Ballarat round – and winning. This qualified them to compete in Melbourne against other heat-winners, but as far as I can tell, they didn’t get anywhere. 

Still, they must have enjoyed the change of scene, because it was after this that they decided to move to Melbourne with Lever. Unfortunately, Dzuriek couldn’t join them, having been conscripted for the Vietnam War (he was replaced by Greg Heenan), although they’d managed to lay down some demos with him before parting ways. In an article about the band published in Dean Mittelhauser's legendary fanzine The Livin’ End back in 1984, mention is made of some eight hours’ worth of recording, spanning ‘original material and covers, all absolutely dripping with their fuzz-laden style.’ Sadly, the master tapes have long since vanished. 

It seems that Blair had dropped out at some point before the Melbourne move too, being unwilling to buy his own amp, but I don’t think he was replaced. To be honest, information about The Elois is scarce (and photos even more so), making it hard to ascertain the chronology of their career and line-up changes. 

Article about The Elois in The Livin' End, issue 3

Melbourne-bound

So anyway, off they went to Batmania, where they ended up at the newly opened Armstrong Studios in South Melbourne. Under the expert guidance of sound engineer Roger Savage (who else?) they recorded their one-and-only single, 'I’m A Man/By My Side'. With 80 minutes at their disposal (at the princely rate of a dollar per minute), they knocked the two tracks out with just a couple of takes each. 

Bill Armstrong outside his Albert Rd studio soon after opening.

The results, as we know, were magic: rough, ready, undiluted, and positively crackling with energy. No wonder local label W & G were quick to sign The Elois to their subsidiary In Records, best known for being The Loved Ones’ label. In fact, the one time The Elois appeared on popular teen TV show, Kommotion (performing/miming ‘I’m a Man’), their illustrious label mates also featured.

While the single wasn’t a hit, it did make the lower echelons of the Melbourne charts, helped along no doubt by the band’s growing reputation as a killer live act. Playing venues such as Pinocchio’s, 5-4-3-2-1 and the Thumpin’ Tum, they blew audiences’ minds (and ear drums) with their fast, loud and feedback-heavy shows. So much so that they ended up blacklisted by the Tum! 

‘I remember I used to have my amp full-chat and my distortion pedal full-packet and just go right off,’ Fiorini recounts in Wild About You. ‘We must’ve blown the whole place apart! I suppose it was loud in those days. I upset somebody, but it went over pretty well’. 

Exterior of the Thumpin' Tum, photo courtesy Miles Ago.

Although they were signed for a three-year contract, The Elois only lasted a year in Melbourne. ‘We’d just about had enough by then,’ Fiorini continues. ‘We were battling. And the biggest problem was, our sound was too radical. You had Johnny Young [singing] “Step back a little, you’re falling in love” – tutty-tutty-tut stuff – and then we’d come along and just blow things away.’ 

They may have been square-lookin' short-hairs from rural Victoria, but it sure sounds like they showed the city slickers a thing or two about rock’n’roll.

Another pic taken from The Livin' End article (without which, this post would've been a bit screwed!):
L-R Greg Heenan, Alan Rowe (crouching), Bill Van Berkel, Dennis Fiorini

* Footnote: funnily enough, when I wrote that first line, I had forgotten that ‘By My Side’ follows ‘You’re Driving Me Insane’ and ‘I Want, Need, Love You’ on Side A of seminal Aussie 60s punk comp, Ugly Things.

Melbourne song of the month: “Witch Girl”/The Mystrys (June 1966)

Australia’s one-hit wonder tradition is not what you’d call illustrious. Think about it: “Nice Legs, Shame About the Face” by Dave & the Derros … “Bop Girl” by Pat Wilson … “I’m an Individual” by Mark Jacko Jackson … Countless singles by former soap stars. But there is one exception to this rule: the magical and mind-bending “Witch Girl” by The Mystrys. 

This is one one-hit wonder that makes you wonder what might have been.

Sure, it bears all the hallmarks of a novelty record — bursts of spacey keyboard, eerie female backing vocals, burbling cauldron effects, Hammer-Horror lyrics — but “Witch Girl,” transcends these details with some fine musicianship and an atmospheric production Joe Meek would’ve been proud of.

Mysterious, masked and mind-blowing: The Mystrys. Photo: http://www.ziggy.com.au/mystrys.htm

After a crazy intro that conjures up images of dank basement torture chambers, the song hits a cracking stride, propelled along by rollicking drums, chugging guitar and impassioned vocals, until it ends suddenly around the two-minute mark. 

Those of you paying attention might’ve noticed that the lead break is a bit anti-climactic compared to the song’s otherwise lavish, multifaceted sound —  this was an unfortunate case of songwriter Bob King Crawford's ambitions out-stripping the technical possibilities of the day. Even in South Melbourne’s state-of-the-art Armstrong Studios, with renowned recording engineer Roger Savage at the controls, Crawford's vision was simply too far out… 

Interviewed for The Mystrys' chapter in Wild About You! lead guitarist Ziggy Zapata recalls:

"I was extremely fast on guitar even in those days and I was going to go crazy [in the solo] and do 98 notes to the bar, but Bob said, 'Keep the guitar really simple because we're going to add some special effects [over it] afterwards.' ...a lot of the effects I expected didn't happen because they had a few studio glitches. So the guitar solo's not very inspiring at all."

“Witch Girl” was supposed to be the first of many Mystrys singles penned by Bob King Crawford, a well-known local music industry identity of the time. Apparently he had a whole suite of songs ready for the group to record, all similarly weird and whacky in theme — but all now lost in the mists of time. If “Witch Girl” is anything to go by, we’ve missed out big time.

The Mystrys: truth is stranger than fiction

So why were The Mystrys so short-lived? That certainly wasn't the intention of their manager Michael Kopp, a dodgy impresario type who conceived the band as an Australian rival to The Beatles and The Stones, destined for superstardom. Like one of those cartoon characters with dollar bills flashing in his eyes, Kopp was itching to cash in on the booming pop music scene.

After catching singing bass-player Charlie Bayliss performing in St Kilda with his group The Untouchables, Kopp approached him with his big idea; Bayliss then recruited the rest of the band, including the aforementioned Zapata, who was also in The Untouchables.

A promo shot of The Mystrys striking fear into the hearts of songwriter Bob King Crawford, manager Michael Kopp and financial backer Buff Parry. Taken from http://www.ziggy.com.au/showbiz.htm

As the photos in this post attest, The Mystrys weren’t like other bands. Preceding Los Straitjackets and The Mummies by decades, they disguised their identities by wearing creepy green velvet hoods over their heads, adopting outlandish alien names and claiming to be from another galaxy. LOVE IT!!!

If that weren’t enough, Kopp also dreamed up the notion of a fifth, invisible member. Yep, he’s the one you can’t see in any of the photos.

While Zapata considers the whole gimmick to be “really stupid”, he found the hoods to be particularly irritating. He writes on his website:

“Apart from being extremely uncomfortable, these hoods totally negated any chance of rock fans being attracted by the looks of the band members, which was the most important factor for anybody wishing to achieve pop stardom.”

A shame, really, as they weren’t bad-looking boys (OK, so they weren't heart-stopping spunks either):

Kevin, Ziggy and Charlie,with some of the girls from The Kontacts, the band they toured with.

Check out Zapata’s website for a far more in-depth — and often hilarious! —history of the band than I’m able to give here.

A premature end

Released first as a preview copy for media through Michael Kopp’s Orbit label, and then more widely on Leedon, “Witch Girl” was a hit, just like Kopp planned. But before The Mystrys could capitalise on the single's success, Kopp vanished off the face of the earth. Turns out he had a nasty habit of writing bouncy cheques, and since he’d paid for most of the band’s expenses by cheque, things eventually got too hot for him.

The Mystrys, on tour in Adelaide at the time, decided it was time to pull the plug. As Zapata explains sadly, “There did not seem to be much of a future for a band that was a complete mystery to its targeted fan base.”  

Melbourne song of the month: 'Chicago'/The Purple Hearts (April 1967)

Here’s a challenge for you: whack this baby on your car stereo and try to stick within the speed limit. Released in April 1967, three months after they’d broken up, The Purple Hearts’ version of “Born in Chicago” (under the abbreviated title “Chicago”) is a rip-roaring, faith-restoring joyride that leaves The Paul Butterfield Blues Band’s original pirouetting in the dust. Goddamn, I love it!

Unfortunately, I can’t find an online link to include in this post, so unless you’re lucky to own the original 7” (on Sunshine Records - anyone have a copy they want to sell me?), your best bet is the brilliant Half A Cow anthology, Benzedrine Beat.

Originally from Brisbane, The Purple Hearts relocated to swinging Melbourne in early 1966. Their second and third singles, “Early in the Morning” and “Of Hopes and Dreams and Tombstones” (killers in their own right) were recorded at the popular Armstrong’s Studio in South Melbourne, so I’m making an educated guess and assuming “Chicago” was too. 


 
The Purple Heart’s reputation as one of Melbourne’s most dynamic live bands comes across loud and clear in this recording. Frenetic but full of swaggering groove, totally unhinged but perfectly tight, its only fault is that it leaves you gagging for more after a measly 2:21 minutes. Sure, a short song is a good song, but this takes the whole ‘treat ‘em mean, keep ‘em keen’ ethos to another, altogether sadistic level!

Like so many Aussie bands of the 1960s, The Purple Hearts didn’t write their own material, opting instead to cover the r’n’b and blues classics they dug so much. But their creative take on these tracks ensured they ended up with a totally different beast at the end of the process. 

“Chicago” is way tougher-sounding than the original; faster and wilder. Swinging between a soulful falsetto and a deep throaty growl, Mick Hadley’s vocals are impassioned (to say the least) and his harmonica brutal; Lobby Loyde’s guitar, meanwhile, prowls around in the background like a tiger waiting to pounce – which it eventually does, in a lead break so freakin’ cool it hurts. Meanwhile, the turbo-charged rhythm section of Tony Cahill, Rob Dames and Fred Pickard doesn’t let up for a millisecond. If this isn’t a band at the peak of its powers, I don’t know what is.

Here’s the band playing it at a reunion gig in 2006 (I was there! Great gig, so much love in the room – I even managed to give Lobby a hug afterwards). It’s not quite the original line-up, but it’s still got that joyous energy….“Lobby, give it to me!”

RIP Lobby Loyde and Mick Hadley 

Related post:
Melbourne song of the month: 'The Real Thing'/Russell Morris