Ushers to Ashes: Alternative 80s GDC and PJ

We look back on an album that turned 40 in July 2020: Joy Division's second album Closer is a wonder of durability, continuing to influence, continuing to inspire. It has even survived the evangel of its most worshipful fans and at this temporal distance remains strong, fresh ... and listenable.

Having reminisced about the impact and legacy of the Young Ones in the last episode, we turn our attention to Australian comedy in the 1980s. Sketch comedy dominated Australian television during this time; From the political satire of the Gillies Report to undergraduate shenanigans of the D-Generation, Australian comedy revelled in taking the piss out of cultural stereotypes. That said, insipid situation comedies like Hey Dad were also popular during the latter half of the decade. In this episode, we focus on two strains of alternative humour in the form of Australia You’re Standing in it and Wogs Out of Work, the latter paving the way for a new brand of non-Anglo comedians.

Comedians like Rik Mayal, Alexie Sayle, Dawn French and Jennifer Saunders were an integral part of alternative culture in the 1980s. And In many ways, these figures were as innovative and iconoclastic as their cousins in the post-punk music scene. While groups like The Goons and Monty Python testify to a satirical and surreal strain in British comedy that preceded the alternative comedy scene of the 1980s, most television comedy in Old Blighty was dire. For the most part, comedy on the tube trafficked in broad stereotypes: shrill harpies, dumb bimbos, and hapless migrants from the subcontinent and the Caribbean: Love Thy Neighbour, Mind Your Language, Are You Being Served and so on. In short, mainstream comedy from the 1970s was pretty low brow. It performed the cultural work of normalising sexist and racist prejudices that were prevalent during the 1960s and 70s. The Alternative comics of the 1980s consciously defined themselves against these immediate precursors.  In this episode, we revisit The Young Ones, arguably the most exemplary televisual manifestation of the anarchic ethos of the alt 80s zeitgeist. So, let’s all go on a summer holiday to Thatcher’s Britain with Rik, Vyvyan, Neil, and Mike, the chaotic, dishevelled, unruly, slothful Young Ones.

Glenn and Peter talk about one of the most influential albums of the 1980s, released at the very start of its first year. The unassuming trio from Cardiff formed from the local scene and played local-sized gigs with patterns from a home-made drum machine on tape. Two songs on a neighbourhood compilation album later they were heard and signed by Geoff Travis for his eclectic hi-cred Rough Trade label. This, their only LP continues to influence bands at the indie end of town. 

This episode pays tribute to Melbourne's eclectic alternative music scene in the 80s. COVID 19 has put a temporary halt to the city's normally vibrant artistic pursuits, so we thought we'd devote this episode to our adopted home. As regular listeners will know, we are interstate blow-ins, from Perth and Brisbane respectively, which is why we provide an outsider's perspective on the big city sounds of old Melbourne town by recalling and resurrecting them from the ashes of the decade that taste, apparently, forgot. Hey, this is serious, mum!

1984. Newspaper columnists were playing Spot the Orwellian Overtone. Hawke in Australia but Thatcher in Britain and Reagan in America. A young filmmaker fresh from the U.K. punk scene found a new one in L.A. which only gave him ideas.  The result is Repo Man, a powerful bird-flip to the powers that be, the rise of the religious right and the insult of trickle down economics. Oh, and it's also bloody funny.