Mike Rudd and Bill Putt have been around for so long they're considered part of Australia's musical furniture. Bands such as Spectrum, The Indelible Murtceps and Ariel illuminated the ‘70s and inspired many of Australia's popular music icons. Spectrum's enormous ‘70s’ hit, I’ll Be Gone (Someday I'll have money) still inspires crowds to sing along all over the country.
I’ll Be Gone was honoured in 2001 by being included in the APRA’s list of the top Australian songs of the last 75 years (it came in at No.13). I’ll Be Gone was featured in the ABC TV’s A Long Way To The Top series and the band was included on the fabulously successful LWTTT tour, which toured the nation in 2002.
During their thirty-eight year career together, Mike and Bill have played alongside such artists as Deep Purple, Manfred Mann, The Kinks, Joan Armatrading, Leo Sayer and Marc Bolan as well as playing all the legendary Sunbury Festivals. Ariel recorded at London’s famous Abbey Road Studios in the ‘70s (Rock & Roll Scars) and artists as diverse as John Williamson and Manfred Mann (see the discography) have recorded versions of Rudd’s I’ll Be Gone.
Spectrum and Ariel released numerous albums up until the late ‘70s, including Spectrum Part 1, Milesago, (‘a double album with no fillers’ according to NME), The Indelible Murtceps’ Warts Up Your Nose, Ariel’s A Strange Fantastic Dream and Rock & Roll Scars – the list goes on.
After Ariel’s break-up in 1977, other bands followed, notably Mike Rudd and the Heaters and the ambitious WHY project. WHY, with Rudd on keyboards and a drum machine called Weird Harold, boldly married video projection and live performance in the early ‘80s, and spent some time recording at Klaus Shulze’s (Kraftwerk) I.C. studio in West Germany and travelled round Europe recording their experiences and creating synchronised stage videos.
Then, in 1995, after a ten-year hiatus, Mike and Bill re-emerged as a duo with an acoustically skewed new CD, Living on a Volcano (three-times the Herald Sun’s critics’ choice) that saw the pair maturing as songwriters, producers and instrumentalists. Mike and Bill regularly perform live as a duo at schools, festivals, music workshops and live venues.
Later in the ‘90s, Mike and Bill teamed up briefly with the late Paul Hester, another long-time Spectrum fan, which culminated in an appearance on ABC TV’s Hessie’s Shed. Current Spectrum drummer, Peter ‘Robbo’ Robertson joined in 1997, and keyboardist Daryl Roberts joins Spectrum on stage as the fourth member when the occasion warrants it, evoking the original organ-based Spectrum line-up.
In 1999, Spectrum released Spill - Spectrum Plays The Blues, a CD that revisits Rudd and Putt’s blues roots. Spill features such famous guests as Men at Work’s Colin Hay, (who says of Rudd and Putt ‘those guys are my heroes’), and Chris Wilson, another unabashed Rudd /Putt fan. The second highly entertaining Spectrum Plays The Blues CD, No Thinking, was released recently guesting Ross Wilson amongst others. The end result is that the Australian record buying public has embraced the blues CDs, and both Spectrum and Spectrum Plays the Blues are back in demand on the live circuit.
And playing live is what Spectrum is all about. Mike and Bill have played together for more than thirty five years, and there seems to be some kind of empathetic communication on stage that even Robbo and Daryl seem to share, as Spectrum switches seamlessly from blues, to rock, to almost ambient nylon-string guitar music, without losing focus.
Blues classics like Baby Please Don’t Go and Hoochie Coochie Man come alive with Bill’s down-tuned nylon-string slide guitar and Robbo’s amiable groove underpinning Rudd’s distinctive vocals and harmonica playing. New songs like Rocket Girl, Silicon Valley and Sensible Shoes slip right into the eclectic Spectrum-plays-the-blues mix.
Then they’ll treat the audience to a guided tour of Spectrum classics, including such weird and wonderful tracks as What The World Needs Is A New Pair Of Socks, Fly Without Its Wings, the Crab Saga, We Are Indelible and much, much more (never forgetting I’ll Be Gone of course).
Over the past few years Spectrum has played the Port Fairy Folk Festival, the Goulburn Blues Festival, the Dandenong Ranges Folk Festival, the Queenscliff Music Festival, the Sydney Opera House, the Tamworth Country Music Festival (!), the Healesville Sanctuary Unplugged Concerts, the Arts Centre Lawn Concerts, the Melbourne Zoo Concerts, the Bridgetown Blues Festival in WA - as well as gigs in NZ and California.
Mike & Bill memorably guested with the late Billy Thorpe playing I’ll Be Gone at the Tsunami Benefit at the Myer Music Bowl, and Spectrum has played the Melbourne International Music & Blues Festival, the Port Fairy Folk Festival, the Canberra Blues & Rock Festival, and the Thredbo Music Festival. (The two live tracks on the No Thinking CD were recorded at Thredbo).
Spectrum continues to tour Australia as well as make the occasional overseas visit. They are enthusiastically received wherever they play and obviously enjoy what they do as much as their audiences. See and hear them - and be inspired!
Fiona Orbright
Mike Rudd & Bill Putt's Spectrum's Friend Space (Top 7)
David Hosking is launching his new album at the Thornbury Theatre
with very special guests The Killjoys. Friday 6th November. Hope you
can come. www.thethornburytheatre.com
Thanks for the add, mates! Those two songs are lovely. I recently suggested a feature on Ariel to The Word's editor Mark Ellen, by the way. "A Strange Fantastic Dream" absolutely blew my mind while I was at college. Greetz and best wishes from Munich, Bavaria. Oliver
'Hair Today' @ Melbourne Propaganda Windows New video work by Jenny Hall Venue:Melbourne Propaganda Windows and Michael Koro Galleries -(Blender Studio Art Complex) 110 Franklin St Melbourne Opening Time:6:00PM Friday, May 29th
The Melbourne Propaganda Window is a multimedia project that turns Franklin Street into an outdoor multimedia art space every night at sunset. 'Hair Today' will be showing every night in June.
Don't use SMS TEXT language on your mobile cell phone to send a loved one a message.. i did today and it wrecked my relationship with my much younger 26 year old GF (girlfriend) who dumped me on what was supposed to be a very special day.. all I did was text her this message "Happi VD" trying to be hip & cool, I wasn't thinking about Veneral Desease when I messaged her!
Do YOU Know The Unknown HiSTORY of VALENTiNES DAY?..
Valentine's Day is a holiday celebrated on February 14. It is the traditional day on which blokes express their love for their sheilas (women), or girls at work they think they have a chance with, by sending Valentine's cards, presenting flowers, or offering alcohol, so they can get a root (fuck). The day was originally a pagan festival that was renamed after two Early Christian dickhead martyrs named Valentine. The day became associated with romantic love in the circle of Geoffrey Chaucer in the High Middle Ages, when the tradition of courtly love flourished, which makes me sick!.. The day is most closely associated with the mutual exchange of bodily fluids from those who get lucky. Valentine symbols include the heart-shaped outline, doves, the winged Cupid and other shit that makes me sick. Since the 19th century, handmade wines have largely given way to mass-produced alcohol in pre-mixed cans to get the sheilas (girls) pissed (drunk). The sending of Valentines was a fashion in nineteenth-century Pommy Gitland. The popularity of Valentine cards in 19th-century was cashed in by the bloody Yanks, with the U.S. Greeting Card Association estimating that approximately one billion valentines are sent each year worldwide, making the day the second largest card-sending holiday of the year, behind Christmas.
Hi guys, I hope you are having a great day because today I'm feeling fabulous! I just finished four tracks off my upcoming "Blu-Azz" CD. They are the first four songs on my site right now if you care to listen. Best Always, Ray Burton {Australia}
Gidday MIKE & BiLL & MySpaced out Friends of this great lager land,
So wot ya think about?.. "The NEW AUSTRALiA DAY DATE Extended To AUSTRALiA WEEK... Australia Week, will be the official national week of Australia, and celebrated annually on the 26th January to 1st February. The week commemorates the arrival of the First Fleet of alcohol in 1788. Australia Week will be an official public holiday in every state and territory of Australia, and is marked by the Disorder of Australia (D.O.A) and Pissed Australian of the Year awards, along with an address from the future Prime Minister, Mervyn E. Skilton, the president and founder of the ALLP ~ Australian Less Labour Party".
..Let me know if I 'ave ya show of support (leave comment mate).. if so, STOP WORK NOW, it's too bloody hot for this shit, I'm off to the nude BEACH to show my point, watchin' beach volleyball, BBQ'n my red meat and scallops, drinkin' shit loads of cold BEER bevarages from my bloody icy cold esky, while lyin' in all my big blokey naked gloriness on my Aussie flag towel from Big W.. let me know wot your gunna do to continue our Aussie heritage celebration for this whole hot week, & wood ya like to meet me to rally at the nudie beach this week ladies? (& guys welcome if they bring a full esky of cold beer carried by their spunky wife, girlfriend, mistress & daughters over 18). please see my No.1 Google "SUNNYSiDE NUDE BEACH MELBOURNE" to see my nudist editorial review, photos & map)
"Any boss who sacks a worker for not turning up to work this week is a bum bastard prick!" BiG MERV Skilton
