Sunday, May 07, 2006

A Schoolboy Coming Home

More celebrity deaths in Australia - the passing of singer-songwriter Grant McLennan of The Go-Betweens:

Described by a Village Voice critic as "the greatest songwriting partnership working today," McLennan and partner Robert Forster produced hit singles Cattle and Cane and Streets of Your Town, before disbanding in 1989.
The Go-Betweens were a Brisbane band at a time (1977) when it was not only unfashionable to be from Brisbane but not even permitted by the snobbish musical elites of Sydney and Melbourne who demanded groups migrate to their cities to be worthy of a recording contract.

Wikipedia notes Princess Caroline of Monaco and Bono and The Edge of U2 as among The Go-Betweens' fans.

Locally - at least in their home town - we've recently been treated to an airing of the sweet-sounding but lyrically ironic Streets of Your Town sanitised as the musical hook for TV commercials for the new-look Courier-Mail newspaper.

-- Nick

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