What are you listening to right now?

That would involve me actually choosing what I listen to: sacrilege

You have no idea how pivotal this song and band were to Oz music's coming of age.

So...if I said Midnight Oil was born from Skyhooks...would that be correct?

That's a little bit of a reach. Skyhooks were unashamedly Australian but still had a commercial, even edgy sound, for the time. They also were the first band to really successfully push the 'image' side of pop/rock in Australia - prior to that any band trying to wear make-up would have been labelled 'poofters' and ridiculed. Skyhooks managed to get away with it by retaining their sense of humour and blokeness.

Lyrically they were one of the first (and certainly the most successful) to use local geographic and cultural references without sounding self-conscious.

The Oils are a weirdity - I would love to know what James Moginie and the rest listened to in their formative years. They had a hard rock edge, but really they also had prog rock sensibilities - I'm talking the first 3-4 albums. I still find it hard to find another band to stick in whatever category the Oils were in. Although your Skyhooks to Midnight Oil thread is correct in the sense that they were both unashamedly Australian but Skyhooks were glam rock (early on) and lightweight in terms of politically commentary - the Oils were one of the most politically outspoken, non-sellout bands Australia has ever known - and some of the music is quite brilliant.

Skyhooks' rise coincided with the rise of national music program CountDown which became a very influential taste arbiter in the 1970s - Midnight Oil refused to perform on CountDown unless they could perform live (CountDown always refused them - like the UKs Top Of The Pops, only lipsynching and miming was permitted). At the time this was considered commercial suicide. The Oils proved that it wasn't, and at the same time dragged a bunch of teenagers to the political left without being overly preachy or righteous.

Sadly the Oil's international success coincided with my loss of interest in their output. Skyhooks came back from the USA ignored and scarred, but their last album with their original singer was a really good album, arguably their best, and released the same year as the Oil's first.

I have lots of associated memories with both these bands - I'm feeling rather whimsical and pensive.

That's a good thing-for us music fiends

Thanks for putting up with the unprompted waffle Panz.

fantastic...McDonald sings the best back-up harmony ever

damn, ron and fez open the show with this tune, forgot how good it was

I used to love this track as an adolescent (I used to fall asleep with the headphones on listening to the Jays and wake up in the middle of the night to all sorts of weird and wonderful tracks - and the fact that you were waking up to them completely disoriented used to make them even weirder and spacey).

He still has a really good voice.

For John Hughes - in memory- he was a fun part of my young adulthood and now he's moved on- I hope it's like this:

I enjoyed this movie

Yeah - me too - my favorite sister looks alot like Molly Ringwald- she even has that beautiful auburn hair (of which I was always jealous).
The Breakfast Club brings back such fond memories.

ally sheedy was beautiful

here's a montage of film clips set to the who's teenage wasteland

I liked ally sheedy too - yeah she was beautiful- oh I bet they're all so sad - I know I am.

That was great. Thanks for posting it