Sunday, September 18, 2005

Godfathers: "Sun Arise" 12" Single

Corporate Image, 1986

Enroute to their Epic contract, a minor 80's hit ("Birth, School, Work, Death"), an avid following, a run of several decent straight-ahead rock albums, and break-up (with rumors of reunions on and off) came this 12" which collects three of the songs from their 1st and independent release Hit by Hit. First appearing as The Sid Presley Experience in suits and ties (a motif they would adopt for many of their shows) and inspired by the entire continuum of rock (as the name suggests) from the 50's to punk, they had legal issues with continuing to use the name so switched to the less descriptive Godfathers. Often compared with early rockers Dr. Feelgood, I hear, at least in their early stuff, more of a mix of American garage-band Nuggets (they ended up on Rhino's new Children of Nuggets comp) and mod-era UK rock (think early Who - whom the band trashed in interviews as "sellouts").

The b-side song "I'm Not satisfied" is more mod than garage while "I Want Everything," while somewhat slick, is more US garage than Quadrophenia. Later they evolved into an even more conventional rock outfit (albeit with two guitars) favoring straight-ahead anthems, a liberal-working class political bent but still with an awareness of rock, both contemporary and past. After the 1991 Unreal World, they went into Greatest Hits mode but released a wan although above par pub rock album in 1995.

The real surprise is the title cut here -- a cool cover of Aussie eccentric Rolf Harris's tribute to Aboriginal music (written in the 60's, I believe) and later covered by Alice Cooper, here reworked as a tribute to Desmond Tutu who is quoted near the end of the song and on the back of the record -- the quotes apparently were made on the same day the song was recorded.

Band Members:
Peter Coyne - vocals
Chris Coyne - bass, vocal
Kris Dollinmore - guitar, vocal
Mike Gibson - guitar, vocal
George Mazur - drums, vocal, percussion

The band last played in the early 2000s and members Peter Coyne and guitarist Kris Dollimore were last heard playing backup for Rat Scabies (2003) as members of The Germans before he quit music and went to go search for the Holy Grail. Second guitarist Mike Gibson is doing acoustic stuff with his City Farm.

Song:
"Sun Arise"

Links:

Consumerism:


Update: late link: Rhino's Children of Nuggets

6 comments:

Jeroen Vedder said...

Do keep an eye out for the Germans' take on Authobahn on places like soulseek. More Who than the Who will ever be...

Anonymous said...

i'm a frequent visitor to this blog, love your taste. thanks for the link to my godfathers website (up since 1998 and frankly looking its age). (its geocities, so don't be worried if its blocked due to too many referrals, it comes back each hour . . . )

those interested in more godfathers talk and some extra mp3s now and then should check out "hit by hit" at

http://launch.groups.yahoo.com/group/hitbyhit/

cheers, mitch

p.s. and i'm looking for the Germans demo (with Autobahn + 3 others) if anyone has it . . .

Anonymous said...

I thought Driveshaft was inspired by Oasis and the famous feuding brothers.

Except they're even worse than Oasis. "(You all) Everything", indeed.

Anonymous said...

Hello Vinyl Mine,

Please, when you finish the conversion to digital, could you be so kind to put the files in an accessible site?

Many thanks.

Jim H said...

> Please, when you finish the
> conversion to digital, could you be > so kind to put the files in an
> accessible site?

I don't understand this question - are you referring to all my music or just this Godfathers single?

Mitch, are there any moves afoot to get The Godfathers music reissued, especially this early non-Epic stuff?

Anonymous said...

jim - i've not heard anything about having the early (or any) stuff reissued. Corporate Image was the band's label, and I'm not sure who has the rights today. Some of the early tracks (Lonely Man & Cold Turkey) appear on the 1996 "best of" album from Epic.