Customer Reviews

Underneath the Colours

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Not a bad second attempt for a young band at the time; very similar to their debut album. Basically a rough little rock album from the New Wave period. Some great stand out tracks like 'Stay Young' and 'Night of Rebellion', but many fillers as well.

This album and their debut album basically sound like warm up for their third album, 'Shabooh Shabah' which was to take the australian alternative music scene by storm in the early 80s.

This is a great buy for the serious Inxs fan, especially if you are not Australian as I doubt any of these tracks made it outside of Australian college radio at the time of release. Fans from their commercial period will be found wanting however, and I wouldn't suggest this is the Inxs album for you.

However it still gets several plays a year from me, and that was worth it in my book!

The Australian band, Inxs burst on the American Pop Scene in 1987 with a breakthrough album called "Kick", but Inxs had been a band that had been for several years prior to that album. "Kick" was actually the sixth album by the sixsome. Prior to "Kick", Inxs had established themselves as one of Australia's great bands. The album that actually landed them on the map in Australia was their third effort (from 1982) entitled "Shabooh Shoobah". Inxs would release two albums prior to "Shabooh Shoobah" that would be mostly unnoticed outside of their hardcore fan base and native Australia. The first album, the self-titled "Inxs" while raw and "rough around the edges" showed the promise of what was to be a great band. It would be on their second album, "Underneath the Colours" where Inxs would polish the edges a bit and begin to establish the foundation of their core sound for the next three decades.

One fact that I find amazing about Inxs is that this six member band stuck together from their formation in the late 1970s through Michael Hutchence's untimely death in 1997. During this period, the band would release 10 studio albums, 1 Greatest Hits album, and 1 Live album. This has allowed the band to meld together and grow professionally. Much of this is due to the fact that three band members are brothers: Andrew Farriss (Keyboards), Jon Farriss (Drums), and Tim Farriss (Guitar). The other three members also stuck tightly with the band the whole way. These members include: Michael Hutchence (Lead Vocals), Garry Gary Beers (Bass), and Kirk Pengilly (Guitar and Sax). Hutchence - known for his long hair and theatrical performances in concert often gets the most publicity. But the remaining five members all make major contributions from a musicianship standpoint. It would eventually be that Hutchence and Andrew Farriss would form the core songwriting nucleus for the band that would yield some of their greatest successes. In the earlier days - all six members contribute to the songwriting.

I've always looked at Inxs' musical style to be an offshoot of the Punk and New-Wave movements of the late 1970s and early 1980s. These elements are combined with both traditional Funk, Rock and Dance to give the unique sound that has trademarked Inxs for the last 25 years. Like their debut album "Inxs", if you listen to "Underneath the Colours" album, it is very clear that this is an album that has its roots around Punk and New-Wave. On this collection, they would introduce Funk and Dance elements that would also become a trademark of their sound. We hear Hutchence's voice mature a great deal from the first album - and as lyricists the band explores some socio-political avenues.

Here is a track by track synopsis of the collection:

"Stay Young": This is a catchy song that combines some of the raw New-Wave elements with some of the Dance elements. This being the first track I noticed a real maturation in Hutchence's vocals from the first album.

"Horizons": Another example of the maturing voice of Hutchence. Andrew Farriss does a great job on keyboards and synth on this track. This song deals with "horizons" of relationships - good stuff.

"Big Go Go": This song is highlighted by the classic Pengilly saxophone work. Inxs incorporates their New Wave elements that had worked so well up this point of their career - resulting in a very good track.

"Underneath the Colours": A worthy title track. Very good mix of synth keyboards and guitar, but ultimately it is Beers' bass that I feel controls the tempo of this track. Listen to some of the socio-political undertones in the lyrics.

"Fair Weather Ahead": Beers' bass once again sets the tempo - this time from the opening notes. This song is a very good track - Hutchence has very good vocals on the track. While I like the chorus, the hook on the chorus seemed a little forced on the part "These strange new creatures..." More socio-political commentary with the lyrics, "Living and chewing on the fat; built upojn the hazy plan".

"Night of Rebellion": Here we have Inxs going back to their Punk roots. This is probably the one of the more "raw" songs of the collection - and probably one that reminds you most of the debut album.

"Follow": When I listened to this track, I almost saw this as the foundation of Inxs' sound for the next three decades. This element brought those new-wave and Punk elements together with the dance elements. Hutchence's voice still sounds raw (like the first album), but on this track it works.

"Barbarian": This is another "raw" track. Beers' bass work truly rocks on this track. Hutchence's vocals are also raw on this track, but combined with the bass work it also works beautifully. I found this to be a very catchy song as well.

"What Would You Do": This track features some good synth work by Andrew Farriss. Tim Farriss and Pengilly's guitar work come in at the right time. This is a forgotten song in the Inxs catalog, but it still is not a bad one.

"All Those Years of Learning": This song has a new-wave base with a lot of synth on it. Hutchence's voice works perfect on this. I particularly like how he switches the tempo and the ranges. It helps give an identity to this song. Once again - another forgotten song in the Inxs catalog, but a very good one. Nice saxophone bridge by Pengilly.

Overall, this is a very good album. It's too bad that this album is forgotten by some of Inxs' more mainstream fans. Once you listen to it, you can understand where much of Inxs' musical foundation came from. It is one that I would highly recommend.

Like their first album, "INXS", this album features straight ahead rock tracks and more reggae/ska tinged new wave sounds. Lyrically the album is more sophisticated than their fairly wacky debut. "Stay Young" and "Horizon" are both excellent.

Most of the songs have really catchy and well constructed verse sections mixed in with questionable choruses. A good example is "What would you do" which starts off like a promising rock song and dramatically shifts to some dork fest for the main chorus. "Just to learn again" is another half briliant, half awkward song. You can tell the band is reaching for the stars song writing wise, but it would be another year before they'd grab onto them. You wont get anything on here approaching the brilliance of "Don't Change" or "What you need" but it's a curious record, and one you grow to like more with each listen. Hutchence also sings more with a young mans bark than with the sex symbol celibrity croon he would years later.
I'll bet these songs sounded great live in 1981 Australia.

This effort isn't the band's best, but it's a decent album. The disc kicks off with the bass driven rock track "Stay Young", which is probably the most accessible and enjoyable song on the album. Following that, the rest of the album is fairly standard new wave rock fare, featuring funky intricate bass lines and guitar with accents from analog synthesizers and occassional horns...and even caribbean influences on the title track.

While there are occassional elements of the band's later (and more substantial) output, this disc is quite a bit different and less memorable. If you're a fan, then you might want to pick this up for the few standout tracks... However, if you don't have the band's later albums, I would suggest starting there first...

Originally released in the U.S. and Canada in 1984 on Atco. I have the original Australian LP on Deluxe/RCA. It's the only one I have as an import. The album goes a bit too fast, and then they realise they need a change of direction before taking on the rest of the world.

Produced by Richard Clapton, this is the album that took INXS off the floor of Aussie beer barns, polished them off & prepared them for the world stage- which they promptly took over, for a very short time. Michael is not with us any longer, but these songs from the early eighties show him as the master- before he got the recognition.

Stripped down, simple, with much sparer arrangements than on their later Aussie-funk-pop records, this is INXS' closest attempt at American early '80s indie rock. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't. But when it does click (as on "Follow," and "Stay Young"), the results are as good as those sweaty kids in the garages of Athens, Georgia.

(that's a joke, people)

Its always great when a band lasts long enough that you can look back over their catalog and see the changes the band went through. So is the case with INXS, and what is clearly their first album. They are young, their sound not yet matured, but still have great pop and dance sensibilities, with classics like 'Stay Young' (a minor hit that helped get them noticed) and 'Night of Rebellion.' A great nostalgic trip to 1981.