- Stoneage Romeos · 1984
- Blow Your Cool · 1987
- Electric Soup · 1985
- Magnum Cum Louder · 1989
- Electric Soup · 1985
- Kinky · 1991
- Electric Soup · 1985
- Kinky · 1991
- Stoneage Romeos · 1982
- Stoneage Romeos · 1984
- Stoneage Romeos · 1983
- Stoneage Romeos · 1983
- Blow Your Cool · 1987
Essential Albums
- While synth-pop groups, hair metal bands, over-the-top divas, American heartland rock, Prince, and Madonna dominated mainstream music in the '80s, left-of-the-dial college radio stations gorged on underground groups that—like R.E.M., their most famous brethren—immersed themselves in the guitar rock 'n' pop of the '60s and '70s. Australia's Hoodoo Gurus were among them and were simply brilliant. Singer/guitarist Dave Faulkner had a knack for catchy melodies that were never cloying. Each of Hoodoo Gurus' early albums featured enough highlights to make them essential listening for anyone curious about the mid-'80s underground/alternative scene. Their debut album, Stoneage Romeos, had featured the U.S. college radio hit "I Want You Back." Mars Needs Guitars, the follow-up, went even deeper, with the sterling "Bittersweet," the cow-punk "Hayride to Hell," and the gorgeously jangly "Show Some Emotion" and "The Other Side of Paradise." The title track is great B-movie fun. "She" turns the sound darker and more psychedelic. A classic.
- The cover of Hoodoo Gurus’ debut album perfectly encapsulates its audio treasures. With its Day-Glo colours and schlock B-movie image of a Tyrannosaurus rex towering over a terrified woman, it suggests a band from another time—which, in some ways, they were. While many of their contemporaries in 1984 were concerned with aping New Romantic acts like Duran Duran and Spandau Ballet, Hoodoo Gurus were more focused on creating a sonic cocktail of stomping glam rock à la The Sweet and T. Rex and the gritty guitar histrionics of ’50s rockers like Chuck Berry and Eddie Cochran, with a dose of Hank Williams thrown in for good measure. Death is a recurring theme, albeit with a knowing wink—“Dig It Up” finds its bereaved protagonist considering exhuming his partner’s remains; “Leilani” is about the daughter of a Pacific Island chief sacrificed to the gods—and humour is never far away. Witness the lyrics to the bombastic “I Was a Kamikaze Pilot”: “I was a kamikaze pilot/They gave me a plane, I couldn’t fly it/Taught how to take off, I don’t know how to land...”. A new force in Australian music had arrived.
Artist Playlists
- Mine the band's shiniest nuggets of garage grunt and power pop.
- Hear the wild Aussie rockers walking in the band's bootsteps.
Singles & EPs
About Hoodoo Gurus
Before forming in Sydney in 1981, the members of Hoodoo Gurus had cut their teeth in the Aussie punk trenches, a pedigree that can be felt in the caveman stomp and streetwise swagger of their 1982 debut single, “Leilani.” But just a year later, frontman Dave Faulkner discovered the sweet spot between brooding post-punk and winsome ‘60s-inspired pop on the breakthrough single “My Girl.” That song would form the the centerpiece of the Gurus’ 1984 debut, Stoneage Romeos, which kicked off a stellar four-album run (including Mars Needs Guitars!, Blow Your Cool!, and Magnum Cum Louder) that made them the Kinks of the ’80s college-radio scene, deftly balancing smart, sardonic songwriting with primal jangle-punk thrills. They continued to log Top 20 albums in Australia up to their 1998 dissolution, though that proved to be more a breather than a breakup. Since 2003, Faulkner and guitarist Brad Shepherd have overseen sporadic reunions and releases, and in 2020, the group dropped their first new music in a decade with the deliciously nasty garage-psych groover “Hung Out to Dry.”
- FROM
- Sydney, Australia
- FORMED
- 1982
- GENRE
- Rock