spencer p jones

In April 2007 I sat opposite Spencer Jones and Greg ‘Tex’ Perkins in a booth downstairs at the Prince of Wales Hotel in St Kilda. The occasion was an interview to promote the release of the Beasts of Bourbon’s first studio album in 10 years, "Little Animals". Having recently arrived back from a short tour of the United States, Spencer and Perkins were weary from the long-haul flight.

Perkins was in Beasts mode – cocky, enigmatic, and just prickly enough to remind you who was the tough guy here. Spencer was, as he always was, just Spencer – the cowboy hat, a faint smile, and a reassuring honesty that defied his decades of service in the duplicitous, ego-obsessed world of rock’n’roll.

A fraught fraternal atmosphere hung over the interview. Spencer and Perkins had been friends, band mates, fellow reprobates and occasional antagonists for the past 25 years. They were like brothers, Perkins once mused, and like brothers they loved and fought. And Spencer and Perkins were the only remaining links to the genesis of the Beasts of Bourbon, an irreverent make-shift band thrown together to fulfil Perkins’ gig commitments at the Southern Cross Hotel, way back in June 1983.

After an extremely emotional final performance with the Beasts of Bourbon, Tex Perkins hit upon the idea of getting all of the band’s members, past and present into a recording studio with no particular agenda other than to do just that.

It was more of a celebratory thing he had in mind than anything. Sadly, bassist Brian Hooper didn’t make it along as he passed away a week after the Beasts’ last show.

Assembled in Melbourne's Soundpark Studio a couple of weeks later were, Charlie Owen, Boris Sujdovic, Tony Pola, Spencer Jones, Kim Salmon and Tex Perkins. They were unprepared, save for some some sketchy ideas, loose ends and a couple of covers. With limited time the band knocked together a collection of jams pretty much true to the crazy modus operandi employed back when “The Axeman’s Jazz” got laid down in that fateful eight-hour session in 1983.

Sydney’s music community is rallying to get behind much-loved rocker Spencer P Jones in an hour of need.

Spencer is battling serious illness and fund-raisers have been popping up all over Australia. Sydney is responding with its own show, The Axeman’s Benefit, on Friday, June 24 at The Factory Theatre in Marrickville.

Died Pretty is headlining a heavyweight bill which will include Spencer’s old band The Johnnys (with guest vocalists), the Hoodoo Gurus (playing a mini-set), home-grown garage up-starts Straight Arrows and psych-punk veterans Young Docteurs.  The Johnnys will close the night.

The killer line-up will be augmented by a bevy of guest musicians including Jim Moginie (Midnight Oil), Simon Day (Ratcat), Jack Ladder, Murray Cook, MC Anthony Morgan, Jason Walker, Peter Fenton (Crow) and Kane Dyson (Spurs For Jesus.) FBi’s Jack Shit will be lending his DJ talents.

All of the acts have played alongside or recorded with Spencer in some capacity.  Died Pretty is fresh from a summer of sold-out A Day On The Green and club shows and is re-convening especially for Spencer.

Although his career has been mainly under the mainstream music radar, Spencer P Jones has been a tremendously influential figure in Australia.

Arriving in Australia from New Zealand in 1976, Spencer came to prominence with hard-drinking cowpunks the Johnnys and then inner-Sydney swamp supergroup the Beasts of Bourbon, he’s also played with the Gun Club, Renee Geyer, Chris Bailey, Rowland S Howard, Nick Cave and Paul Kelly.

In recent years he’s been recording and playing with his own solo bands as well as members of The Scientists and The Drones.

Tickets for The Axeman’s Benefit went on sale last  night and are here. A substantial number have gone already so don't delay.

Execution Days: The Life and Times of Spencer P. Jones
By Patrick Emery (Love Police)

Perhaps the most surprising thing about Melbourne writer Patrick Emery’s exhaustively researched and engrossing biography of the late Spencer P. Jones is that it found a publisher.

Thanks to the internet, book publishing is a low-margin crap shoot. But Aussie publishing houses were already renowned for their lack of imagination and reluctance to take risks on books about anyone who’s not mainstream, middle-of-the-road or, ahem, National Living Treasures. Even those imprints that are outgrowths of universities, our bastions of free thought.

If you haven’t received a formal rejection letter from a friendly Aussie publisher after shopping a musician’s autobiography, you haven’t lived. The stupidity of not keeping and framing a letter that read, in part, “there is no market for this because Radio Birdman fans can’t read” is regrettable in hindsight – it should have gone straight to the pool room - but, fuck you, anyway, self-important publisher twat. You deserve to be shot by a ball of your own shit.  

Patrick Emery suffered his share of similar fools while trying to place “Execution Days”.

SPENCER P. JONES
1956-2018

In "Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance", Robert Pirsig interrogates the very nature of quality through the lens of motor mechanics. Care and Quality are internal and external aspects of the same thing. A person who sees Quality and feels it as he works is a person who cares. A person who cares about what he sees and does is a person who’s bound to have some characteristic of quality.

Spencer Jones knew a thing or two about quality - especially musical quality. Born in 1956, the Year of Elvis, Spencer wanted to be a working musician as long as he could remember. Spencer’s family moved from the regional town of Te Awamutu to Auckland in 1965, the same year the British invasion swept through New Zealand, with tours by The Rolling Stones and, infamously, The Pretty Things.

Spencer’s grandfather was a gifted musician; his mother, too, was born with a natural ear. Recognising Spencer’s musical abilities, Spencer’s elder brother Ashley recommended his parents buy Spencer a guitar.

Carbie Warbie photo

_{Joey Pinter, Walter L:ure and Daniel Rey.}

When we were young and skinny and fearless, it was easier to celebrate the ch-cha-cha-changes, than it is now, when so many of our favorite places, people, bands, and way of life are just vanishing a little more each day. I can't keep up with all these changes.

In my head, I'm still a new wave kid with a Walkman. Probably listening to the Cult"Love", on 10, right? Making rehearsal tapes on a boombox in the basement. You could save 20 or 30 dollars, and come home from the big city record store with a new t shirt, some little buttons, a copy of "Flipside" or "Maxiumum Rock And Roll", some Jesus & the Mary Chain and Bauhaus postcards to send to your goth girlfriends in far away cities, a Gene Loves Jezebel or Flesh For Lulu promotional poster the nose-ringed death rocker cashier gave you for free, and a whole stack of winning indie punk $1 vinyl from the cut out bin. Those were different times.

For most of us, there ain't no rock ‘n’ roll no more, just the ludicrous worship of bullshit do nothing politicians, media monopoly lies and propaganda, and cos-play lab-coated scientific astronaut rich people on TV, and/or, always more blandly insufferably mediocre and meaningless mainstream garbage like the Foo Fighters - there's nowhere to go, no more basement shows. No real underground bands or real underground rock press in Amerikkka.

We were in a diner eating breakfast in downtown New Orleans about 25 years ago, labouring through the aptly-named "Hungry Man’s Special" (eggs, toast, links, bacon, and enough salt to saturate the Mississippi Delta), when a couple of locals at an adjacent table heard our accents and started up a conversation.

“Where y’all from?” they asked. Geo-cultural introductions completed, the discussion strayed onto the social, economic and political idiosyncrasies of New Orleans.

“Y’all know why the roads are all so bad ‘round here,” we were asked rhetorically. “It’s ‘cause Washington said we couldn’t have any money for roads until we raised the drinking age to 21! So we said ‘Fuck you! We’d rather have our beer than decent roads!”

Another year with nothin' to do....!! No gigs to speak of though we did manage to fit in one Black Bombersshow just before the years end to blow away the cobwebs..!! Top Ten? Mostly reissues but here goes...

Bored – “Back For More” (Bang!)
A UK Record Store Day release. R.I.P. John Nolan

Endless Boogie- “Admonitions”
The Boogie is indeed endless.

 _{Josie Jose photo}

Best Albums of 2021 (not in order)

Blowers – “Blowers”  
In the tradition of Jay Reatard and the Oblivions, Blowersare a band that proves less is more. Killer bare basics, as well as plenty of humour. One take, if there’s a mistake, fuck it, that’s the take. This LP is prime example of garage rock at its purists and best.

Civic – “Future Forecast”
After a few brilliant EPs it’s great to finally get a full Civicrelease. Combining elements of ‘90s Melbourne rock and US 2000s gunk rock, this stayed on the turntable for a good fortnight.

Cutters – “Australian War Crimes”
Six tracks clocking in at 10 minutes, including a diss on Rye, a suburb I don’t care for, and the title track, a reaction to revelations of Australian SAS soldiers’ behaviour in Afghanistan. Brutal and superb.

 

PATRICK EMERY'S TOP 10

Nudity – Nudity Is God’s Creation– I ordered this through Richie Ramone’s Strangeworld Records on the basis of the name and a brief musical snippet alone. A re-release of a double album of choice cuts from 2005-2010, a smattering of Pagans-ish punk rock, Detroit garage, fuzzed out psychedelia and raga frenzies. My favourite vinyl purchase for 2021. The neighbours are still processing it.

Foggy Notion –great live band, great songs, talented players. By my count, we’ve seen them 10 times this year, with at least four shows cancelled due to you-know-what. New album out digitally, physical copy due March 2022.

_{Simon Chainsaw with The Liberators at Frankies Pizza in Sydney. Anthony Mitchell photo.}

2021 was a bit of a re-run of 2020.. lockdowns, gigs cancelled, industries decimated. While in 2020 I was inspired to create and consume, 2021 left me fatigued, lethargic and generally disinterested. Let’s hope 2022 too is not a rerun! However, there were some bright spots that come to mind.

_{Patrick couldn't make the photo session so he sent Halfrid.} 

1. Spencer P Jones tribute night, Tote Hotel, 16 April.
Everything I’d hoped from that gig, and more. Foggy Notion, James McCann, Digger and the Pussycats and the Escape Committee led by the incomparable, indefatigable Helen Cattanach. The opening three song salvo – “Terrorise Your Friends”, “What’s Got Into Him” and “Your Pretty Face is Going to Waukeegan” – with Sly Faulkner on vocals and The Last Gasp horns, was as powerful a start to a set that I can remember. So much love in the air. Spencer would’ve loved it.

Much-loved Australian rocker Spencer P Jones is terminally ill and may have months to live.

Spencer’s wife, Angie, confirmed the news on Facebook about 5.30 this afternoon. In a statement, she wrote:

First of all Spencer & myself would like to thank everyone in the community for all the love & support since Spencer was struck down with illness in 2015, rendering him unable to pursue his creative musical career.

For the past two years, we have been under the wing of the wonderful peeps at Royal Melbourne Hospital. Unfortunately after another scan in March this year the doctors found a cancer tumour in Spencer's liver. 

In short , as a result Spencer has now been diagnosed with inoperable liver cancer.

Rumours that Spencer’s health had hit a new hurdle had been circulating for weeks. His Beasts of Bourbon bandmate, Brian Henry Hooper, passed away on April 20, just days after a benefit show for him while he fought cancer. 

Australian musical legend Spencer P Jones has passed away in Melbourne following a long fight against cancer.

The news broke tonight with outpourinfs of grief breaking out all over social media. Spencer is survived by his wife, Angie. 

A member of Beasts of Bourbon, The Johnnys, Paul Kelly and The Coloured Girls, Hell To Pay, Chris Bailey and The General Dog, Maurice Frawley and The Working Class Ringos, and Sacred Cowboys and a solo artist with 10 albums to his own name. Spencer was one of the Australian underground music scenes's leading lights.

Born in Te Awamutu, New Zealand, in 1956, Spencer moved to Melbourne in the mid-'70s and played with Cuban Heels among others before a shift to Sydney where he joined cow punks The Johnnys.

Carbie Warbie Photo

Celibate Rifles singer Damien Lovelock once said to me that the Sydney music scene between 1978 and 1985 was as strong as anywhere in world, at any time.

When a city’s musically on fire, it becomes the rock capital of the world…especially for the people that live there. It could been New York City in the mid-’70s, London in 1966 or San Francisco in the late ’60s. Sydney was right up there with them.

I remember I was out seeing bands every night of week. It could be every Wednesday with the Triffids’ residency at the Strawberry Hills Hotel, upstairs at the Trade Union Club for the Laughing Clowns, or some punk band down at French’s Tavern. You could finish with Paris Green at 3am in Kings Cross.

There were so many gigs that stood out: the Birthday Party, Scientists and X at the University of NSW Roundhouse, the amazing New Year’s Eve gig with the Celibate Rifles at the Trade Union…and The Gun Club at the Southern Cross, later re-named the Strawberry Hills Hotel.

The Strawberry Hills Hotel in Surry Hills was OUR pub. We were still aged in our late teens and we virtually lived there. There was cheap (or feree) beer and amazing music every night of week. I actually lived in a cheap shared house, a few blocks down the road.

One night in 1983, the publican told me to turn up on Monday. He said that “a Yankee band, The Gun Club, are playing.”

Ribspreader
Written, directed and produced by Dick Dale
Starring Tommy Darwin
Adelaide Nova Cinemas
Saturday, October 22, 2022

Would you go to see a slash 'n' splatter flick made in ‘Straya's Murder Capital of Adelaide with guest appearances by Chad Morgan, Chantal Contouri, Fred Negro, Spencer P. Jones, and Rat Scabies?

Do bears shit on the Pope?

Do excuse me, it's the morning after the night before and I'm mangling my metaphors. Anyway, last night I went to see one of the films at the Adelaide Film Festival. The world premiere of “Ribspreader”.

About a week-and-a-half prior, I'd tried booking online; after selecting two tickets, I was asked my email... and then, nothing happened. Maybe it didn't work. I tried again, found that their system now had me down for four tickets, asked me for my email and again, nothing happened. No email. After the second day of no email from the AFF I figured, I'll have to use “other sources”.

"Yesterday’s Town" is huge. You think you know where she’s going, but she doesn’t take you there. The lyrics are like a stripped-back novella. Suzie really nails the slow/uptempo dynamic with her romantic guitar and sweet and smoky (by turns) voice.

Suzie’s been going about her career the right way (photos, film clips  bios and downloads

). She's moved from Melbourne to London and is building a profile. Her production on "Yesterday’s Town" is superb, and the song itself begs for mainstream airplay, and I can only assume the majors are scampering with intent toward her right now.