Radio Birdman
(Career/Crying Sun/Citadel)
Can we permanently retire the word "underrated" from the rock ‘n' roll lexicon? Great is great - hell, for that matter, classic is classic, and timeless is timeless - irregardless of SoundScan numbers, station adds or box office receipts. Put another way, if one man's measure can be found in his deeds, than why not one band, too? And in terms of deeds, Radio Birdman's lifelong toils in the service of rock are nearly without peer, their influence upon the Australian music scene nigh-on inestimable and their international influence continuing to resonate down through the ages. So if you ain't already hip to all that, pal, you are reading the wrong rag (and definitely the wrong writer).
Cutting to the chase here: in June of 2007, roughly a month before they would be inducted into ARIA, Australia's equivalent to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, Birdman was touring North America and wrapping up promotional duties for their 2006 Yep Roc album Zeno Beach. Hitting Texas, they hooked up with Houston's KPFT-FM to record the June 24 and 26 Austin and Houston gigs for subsequent broadcast (in January of 2008) over the airwaves. The lineup for the tour featured founding members Rob Younger on vocals and guitarists Deniz Tek and Chris "Klondike" Masuak, plus bassist Jim Dickson (a longtime associate and also a member, with Younger, of the New Christs) and drummer Russell Hopkinson, on loan from You Am I.
It's been said that touring Texas will either crush you or make a man out of you, but on this particular foray into the Lone Star State, Radio Birdman arrived with all barrels already loaded and looking for trouble. From opening cut "Murder City Nights," a primo slice of Birdman thrash that goes all the way back to their '77 long-playing debut Radios Appear, to an astonishing finale that segues out of the sinewy, rumbling anthem "I-94" (which, originally hailing from the Burn My Eye EP, predates "MCN" by a year) and catapults headlong into a positively incendiary version of Blue Oyster Cult's pre/proto-punk classic "Hot Rails to Hell," this 15-track live disc provides ample evidence that the Birdmen could still soar higher and farther than musicians one-fourth their age.
In between those tunes you get plenty of primo Bird-age, like a riotous "What Gives?" and the 6-minute, surfing-on-a-nuclear-reactor Hand of Law," alongside a handful of Zeno Beach standouts including the tuneful, almost power-pop sounding "Subterfuge." The band also lobs a couple of additional covers curveballs: "Circles," a relative obscurity from the pre-Tommy Who (in it Younger is clearly relishing the twisty vocal line), and the Kinks' smouldering riffer "'Til the End of the Day," taut ‘n' tuff from start to finish.
As a concert recording, a lot of care obviously went into getting Live In Texas down on tape and subsequently mixed. Here and there one detects an occasional dropout or slightly off-mic vocal, but those moments are so few and so fleeting it's easy to rank this highly if you like your rock served hot. A 12-page booklet boasting in-your-face color photos from the show rounds out the package to make it an essential purchase for longtime fans. It ain't a half-bad introduction for new recruits to the Birdman army, either.
DOWNLOAD: "Hand of Law," "Subterfuge," "'Til the End of the Day" FRED MILLS
