The Scientists – Pink Album (Anthology Recordings, 2007)
(This originally appeared in the Cleveland Free Times)
Apart from the singles that voracious, nerdy collectors seek, this first proper album from Perth’s Scientists represent a water shed event in the development of punk and underground music in Oz. If at some point the compilation Pissed on Another Planet has become accepted as the encyclopedia of Scientist history, this early era of the band seems misrepresented. On Pissed, these tracks appear out of sequence and are interspersed with singles and other album tracks. The evolutionary point that Pissed misses is that, this initial album was recorded as a trio, unlike a fair amount of tracks that have in the past accompanied the thirteen tracks that make up the Pink Album. Kim Salmon, who alternately sounds like Jake Burns and Dan Treacy, created a sound from what he discerned was punk. Working on the model offered by Jonathan Richmond, who happens to be echoed lyrically in almost every lyric, and other simplified rock of the mid ‘70s, Salmon gushes songs about girls, being a loser and enjoying science as a way of dealing with the feeling of being cast aside. Despite the future fame, cult or not, of the Saints as well as the Birthday Party, the Scientists have lived in a lull, not working full time, but being given popularity bumps every so often with a release or two and a spot opening for U2 during an Australian tour. This resurrection brought around by Anthology Recordings, an all re-issue, digital label has done the reassembly needed to introduce new fans to an excitable, innocent and confused sound of down under rock.
