Stoneage Scomeos - The BotBots (Outtaspace/Wreckless Enterprises)
This really shouldn’t work. A couple of rehearsals and one gig that was truncated for excessive swearing. A by-the-seat-of-the-pants recording session fuelled by beer in a terrace house-cum-studio, four months later. Seven songs in nine minutes. Punk rock, eh?
The buzz of blowflies announces “Engadine Maccas”, a 52-second treatise about an alleged bout of Prime Ministerial diarrhoea in a southern Sydney fast food joint. Apocryphal or not, you don't need to wear brown corduroys to know the song's as funny as fuck. The makers of Imodium need to license it for an ad.
Hypocrisy gets a call-out on “The Pillars of Society” and "The Idiots Are Running The Village" takes a similar lyrical standpoint. Neither are power ballads. Did we mention The BotBots are an unholy marriage of The Space Boozzies from the New South Wales Central Coast and Wollongong's Leftards? Vocalist Sean has a touch of the Jellos about him - especially on "It Don't Mean Nothing To Me", which at 1min35sec is almost a prog rock song compared to most anything else here - and it does the job.
"Pez Beach Keg Party" is the most fully-realised song and it's where (Australian) X and the Dead Kennedys meet over a kazoo solo. Props to bassist Spewy and drummer G.Ardia who lock into a furious groove, while Ronny Wreckless wanders all over his fretboard to great effect.
Yes, there are no prizes for working out the inspiration for the cover art. Pana Damo Watson captured the session well and Mikey Young mastered it so you know it sounds good. It's a seven-inch vinyl EP pressed in limited numbers so go get yours here. You might want to pick up a second copy for Jenny and the girls.