REGURGITATOR - UNIT

REGURGITATOR - UNIT

Label: East West Records

Distributor: Warner Music

Catalogue Number: 3984-25260-2

Release Year: 1997

Producers: Lachlan "Magoo" Gould at The Dirty Room

Personnel: Quan Yeomans (Guitar, Keyboards, Vocals)

Ben Ely (Bass, Keyboards, Vocals)

Martin Lee (Drums)

Tracklisting:

1) I Like Your Old Stuff Better Than Your New Stuff

2) Everyday Formula

3) ! (The Song Formerly Known As)

4) Black Bugs

5) World Of Sleaze

6) I Piss Alone

7) Unit

8) I Will Lick Your Asshole

9) Modern Life

10) Polyester Girl

11) 1234

12) Mr. T

13) Just Another Beautiful Story

Regurgitator were always a band to surprise and shock people and never content to rest on their laurels or categorising themselves into one genre. Anybody who was expecting another "Tu-Plang" was in for a shock, for Regurgitator had followed similar footsteps to Savage Garden and gone for 80's inspired electronic pop but unlike them tackling more controversial and off-beat topics than love and romance.

1) I Like Your Old Stuff Better Than Your New Stuff - good opening song with Ben Ely's vocals put through a vocoder similar to the old Georgio Moroder sound and bloopy bass keyboards. It is a slap in the face to listeners who refused to adapt to the changing cultures that Regurgitator were exploring and wanted them to stay a band similar to Primus and the Chili Peppers. The moral of this song: broaden your horizons cos we ain't gonna the sound the same forever! This track also appeared on the compilation Endangered Species featuring Brisbane bands protesting against the then Howard Government seeking to allow parallel imports of CDs because the local record companies were overpricing albums (still are today - I drink to the day we can buy singles for $2 and albums for $13 again).

2) Everyday Formula - The first single taken from the album, this is a cross between 80's power pop with dashings of synth pop in the chorus. The song is all about taking a dump in the toilet and where it ends up.

3) ! (The Song Formerly Known As) - The third single from the album, this is a great piece of sassy funk about the joys of living the life of a bedroom loner whose had enough of the party circuit and nightclubs. Great funky guitar riff, and a sample from Silver Convention's 1976 hit "Get Up And Boogie" thrown in for good measure.

4) Black Bugs - Owing a bit to Kim Wilde's "View From A Bridge" but a lot slower. This was the second single from the album featuring a very cute cartoon video with exotic animals playing the instruments like the Banana Splits.

5) The World Of Sleaze - Opens up with a half-hearted played riff of "Sweet Home Alabama" which is what the song is based around. Quan's tired and jaded vocals glorify a pornographic underworld with a great rousing singalong chorus with the charming line of "We've got dicks and cunts and slutz and butts and pimps and hos yeah plenty of those. There's no end to the things you can win, and i'll be your friend if you just spread your legs". Obviously not a song that would have gone down well with mainstream radio programme directors.

6) I Piss Alone - Decrying public urinals in men's toilet blocks due to inadequacy over penis size. Starts off with a big stringy organ chord section then suddenly explodes into a thrash punk number with fuzzed vocals mixed so far back it's impossible to decipher them unless you are reading the lyric sheet.

7) Unit - a filler track with a hypnotic beat and metronomic keyboards and ethereal New-Agey vocals.

8) I Will Lick Your Asshole - Taking the mickey out of 'name songs' that were popular in the early 90's like the Beloved's "Hello" and Billy Joel's "We Didn't Start The Fire". It name-drops the band's heroes like Sarah Jane Smith from Doctor Who, Cliff Richard, Peter, Paul & Mary, and David Attenborough put over a jiggly funk backing track and the chorus rapped out sounding like they had been ingesting helium.

9) Modern Life - Ben Ely is on vocals on this track whereby he decries the disposable society we live in today. A more pleasant pop number with an incessant guitar riff and big accentuated chords in the chorus.

10) Polyester Girl - The third single from the album ended up being the band's biggest hit, reaching No. 13 in the charts and it's not hard to see why. The bass riff is taken from the Jackson's "Blame It On The Boogie" and deals with unrequited love over a blow up doll. This is geeky karaoke pop at its best. Sadly commercial success for the band started to slowly diminish after this song was released. It also featured a very eye catching video, but is sadly not available on the Net.

11) 1234 - 51 seconds of pure silly thrashing mayhem and nonsensical lyrics. Sounds like the proto track for "I Want To Be A Nudist" from their subsequent album "...Art".

12) Mr. T - Sounding like a bad detective track, it's not so much a homage to everybody's favourite destructive punk Negro from "The 'A' Team" but about a guy who's learned from his mistakes from his past relationships and ready to take another chance at love.

13) Just Another Beautiful Story - Sounds like a scuffy remake of the Beatles "Strawberry Fields Forever" before going into an Oasis-ish chorus. Good closing track as it deals with the uncertainty of romance in the face of death and in the afterlife.