The Celibate Rifles changed my life. It was 1986 and suburban high school music tastes were dominated by Australian pub rock: Chisel, The Angels, Oils, augmented with a bit of LA mullet metal and some hair sprayed tinny pop. Beatbox, a three-hour music video cum social commentary and vox pops show on Saturday morning on ABC television, featured a clip from this Australian band, the Celibate Rifles. Thrashing guitars, a pummelling bass riff and frenetic drums. The tall, laconic guy fronting the band mused on the social and political failings of the day in a monotonal drawl. From that moment, I was hooked.
30 years later and the Rifles are still around. Damien Lovelock, of the dry humour and incisive social commentary, is weathered but never beaten. Kent Steedman – who, incidentally, produced the early Mudhoney records – a rake thin, hyperactive garage punk guitarist with no peer. No one in the world can get away with wearing tights in a rock’n’roll band, except Kent. Dave Morris – white chesty bonds t-shirt, scraggly long hair – locks into Steedman’s groove and never lets go. Jim Leone is on bass, never flashy, impregnable. Paul Larsen has a subtle flourish on drums that creeps up on you with subliminal intensity.
They played two sets, an acoustic set followed by a typical rock’n’roll Rifles set. The acoustic format exposed the hidden pop sensibility so often forgotten in the wake of the Rifles’ garage attack. Pretty Pictures was a work of poetic and folk beauty – who shot that man for that 12 gram bag? – and Eddie was Lovelock’s social realism, writ large. You can tell a lot about a band by its covers: the Rifles showcased MC5’s Shaking Street, The Stooges’ Gimme Danger and Patti Smith’s Dancing Barefoot. This was very good.
A short break, and the band was back in full electric mode. Steedman and Morris were crazed teenagers plundering riffs like there’s no tomorrow. The entire set was a highlight, with special mention to Johnny, Wonderful Life (who remembers yuppies?) and Back in the Red, the latter penned by early Rifles bass player James Darroch, the brilliantly talented songwriter and performer who died in a car crash on the road with his post-Rifles band, Eastern Dark.
They finished the set with a request from support band She’s the Driver. It’s O Salvation, replete with Damien’s witty couplings. Fans would all have happily heard another set but it wasn’t to be. Long may The Celibate Rifles reign.
By Patrick Emery
Highlight: Everything.
Lowlight: That any Rifles set can’t feature the band’s entire catalogue. It’s that fucking good.
Crowd Favourite: Johnny
