The mod revival of the late 1970s seems an eternity away: Vespa scooters, green parkas and Fred Perry shirts have given way to Subaru four-wheel drives, boot-cut denim jeans and pastel shirts. Mod music – rooted in the black soul and r’n’b sounds of the ‘60s, spliced with the attitude of punk – lives on, albeit with negligible commercial attention. The mod subculture will never die, but right now, society seems as mod as a Leyland P76.
The mod revival of the late 1970s seems an eternity away: Vespa scooters, green parkas and Fred Perry shirts have given way to Subaru four-wheel drives, boot-cut denim jeans and pastel shirts. Mod music – rooted in the black soul and r’n’b sounds of the ‘60s, spliced with the attitude of punk – lives on, albeit with negligible commercial attention. The mod subculture will never die, but right now, society seems as mod as a Leyland P76.
Not that anyone’s told Little Murders, of course. Little Murders were undeniably Melbourne’s – and arguably Australia’s – pre-eminent mod-revival band. After a hiatus that effectively began in the late 1980s, with brief flurries of activity in the 1990s, Little Murders have surfaced again with the band’s first album in over 25 years. Crucially, Dig For Plenty isn’t an attempt to dwell on, or rekindle, the band’s past glories – there’s no pretentious youthful attitude or sharp-edged social commentary – but it is an album chock-full of melody and spice.
Rob Griffiths’ songwriting has little, if any, of its precision. The rocking edge of For You is packed full of loutish harmonies and Rickenbacker riffs, Pretty Penny is a perfectly crafted power-pop song bursting straight out of central casting, while Rock Academy is The Clash fronted by Jeremy Oxley at the Bondi Lifesaver.
Roxy (I’m Digging Your Scene) is as sweet and fresh as teenage love in the back of the parents’ station wagon with Paul Weller on the radio, Running Man throws up a bit of skiffle and Billy Bragg for good measure, while One More Chance spits out a lick worth bottling, preserving and savouring for time immemorial.
Mrs Walker could be a latter-day nod to The Who’s Tommy – or maybe Herman’s Hermit’s protagonist has remarried – and Bad News is apple pie in its ultimate power-pop guise.
The last time I had anything to do with a fashion magazine, pundits were talking about an ‘80s revival – baggies, shoulder pads and groomed mullets. Fuck that noise. Give me the glorious world of mod, and give me Little Murders any day.
