Hoodoo Gurus - Chariot Of The Gods

 

One of my favourite memories of my first year at university, no scrub that, my whole lifetime, was related to this band. I was sat in my room on university accomodation with Ben and James, two of the three best friends that I made during that year. We were listening to Stoneage Romeos, the fairly recently released debut album from Australian Garage Rockers Hoodoo Gurus.

It was altogether an excellent record, but its standout track was quite clearly second track I Want You Back. Daft stuff but a chorus to die for. I remember clearly Ben, James and I harmonising on it. Sadly the friendships didn't endure as they should have done but the memory certainly has. Youth. It doesn't last for long.

Hoodoo Gurus were never the coolest band, not even the coolest Austalian band. The Triffids and The Go Betweens and probably several others effortlessly trumped them in this respect. But they always won hands down in the fun respect. There's was the Trash Aesthetic, the one that The Cramps and The B52's had traded on. Trashy music, trashy looks, trashy films and trashy TV programmes comics and food and drink. And for the course of  Stoneage Romeos they held their best with both of the Trash bands.

Their debut was as good as they gave. In retrospect it was impossible to beat, but Hoodoo Gurus endured as an Australian institution. And now they're back. With a new album called  Chariot Of The Gods with a picture of Aztec Temples and UFOs which fits their aesthetic on the cover.

They haven't grown up. They would be betraying an essential principle. if they had. Lead singer Dave Faulkner has lost his mane of glorious mane of hair but I've lost a great head of hair since then so I can empathise. Their sound is pretty much the same, perhaps a little more mainstream but just as twangy and just as likeable. It's overlong, they might have pruned a couple of tracks, but I'd forgive them pretty much anything, they're responsible for a particularly memorable and treasurable moment of my youth. Anyhow, Chariot Of The Gods is perfectly servicable so happy to endorse it on its own merits, rather than just as a stroll down Memory Lane.