Men at Work were of course an iconic and uniquely eccentric australian
rock band back in the pub rock 80`s. They are best known of course for
the anthemic `Down Under`, a spaced out and beautifully textured song
which as you might be aware got the Men, well Colin Hay anyway, into
some strife recently after a court decided that the band had something
to answer for for ripping off a few bars of the song `Kookaburra Sits In
The Old Gum Tree` back when they recorded the song in the very ear-
ly 80`s. It really was a load of hogwash if you ask me, Norm Lurie, the
person who owns the publishing rights to `Kookaburra`, had no genuine
reason to think that `Down Under` was ever a rip-off of his song, what
is really sus is that Lurie is part of the record company establishment,
he wasn`t some pauper who was waiting by the letter box waiting for
the next royalty cheque to arrive. In the end some stupid judge gave
some ground to Lurie`s ridiculous claim and the last i heard a percen-
tage of future royalties from `Down Under` will be going to this para-
site`s bank account. Not fair at all, and very un-australian. The Men
were made up of Colin Hay, Ron Strykert, Greg Ham, John Rees and
Jerry Speiser. Greg Ham was truly the artistic genius behind Men At
Work, even though Colin, with a good dose of lead singers disease, al-
ways got most of the limelight. `Who Can It Be Now` also was a very
successful single, both it and `Down Under` come off the debut album
`Business As Usual`, which as far as i know remains the biggest selling
australian album of all time. The somewhat more introspective album
`Cargo` come out a year or so after `Business`, in 1983. While more
of a serious and workmanlike album, it still bore the breezy and jazzy
arrangements which categorised the more happy go lucky debut. The
excellent flute playing and sax interludes of Greg Ham gave the Men
a lightweight but contemporary sound which wasn`t so unlike late 70`s
Fleetwood Mac, which might explain why the band wound up being the
support act for that band on their world tour. Following `Cargo`, Men
at Work quickly went into burn out mode, band members started bick-
ering and fighting with each other, to the point where they began stay-
ing in seperate hotels and catching seperate limos to gigs. Two albums
was it for Men At Work - right? Wrong! They did release one more al-
bum in 1984 called `Two Hearts`, a much more sophisticated, dense
and atmospheric rock album than the first two. By this stage, Ham &
Hay were the only two left and they brought in session musicians to
finish the album off, but given the fact that the two `men` left were
always the creative axis of the band, i think `Two Hearts` still does
pass as a Men At Work album artistically speaking. The best song
on there to me is the spine tingling ballad `Still Life`, a song that i
dont know whether Hay or Ham is singing, because it sounds a lot
like Sting and Sting doesn`t sound like Colin Hay. Whoever is sing-
ing the song, it is a gem. `Maria` is a breezy yet powerful number,
probaly the best vocal of Hay`s on the album, `Hard Luck Story`
is a percussionists bonanza, whoever the session drummer was
he was pretty damn good, even if Hay`s vocal was way down in
the mix too much. `Man With Two Hearts` features one of the
more modern and progressively influenced guitar solos which
Ham played in Men At Work. `Two Hearts` is a much under-
rated gem of australian 80`s atmospheric rock, the only criti-
cism i have of it is that you can barely hear Colin Hay on a lot
of the songs. His vocals were drowned out, the album it has to
be said was over-produced, but it`s still got a lot going for it.
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