The Hard-Ons - Hot For Your Love Baby

Possessing roughly the same obsessions as a B-grade nerd comedy, Australia’s premier surf-punks sing about farting, kissing, sex and rejection with various levels of good-natured crudity. Beginning as suburban kids from immigrant parents (Korean, Sri Lankan, Yugoslavian), the Sydney trio; Blackie (guitar), Keish (drums/vocals) and Ray (bass/artwork) formed in 1982 in Punchbowl, New South Wales. The band issued eight studio albums prior to their disbandment in 1994, achieving 17 consecutive number-one hits on the Australian alternative charts during their first 12 years. During that time, they became Australia's most commercially successful independent band, with over 250,000 total record sales. Australian music historian Ian McFarlane has described the band's music as "fused punk tempos, hardcore attitude, heavy metal riffs and surf-pop melodies into a seamless ball of energy".

The Hard-Ons - Smell My Finger EP

Hard-Ons shows in the '80s weren't for the faint-hearted with band and audience alike throwing themselves into the action. The initial wave of punk could claim first dibs on tearing down walls but, in Australia at least, this was really where the barrier between stage and mosh pit dissolved. The Hard-Ons were the right guys in the right place and they took their thing right around the world, multiple times. The high-energy auditable noise jumps out of the speakers on these songs and makes up for any recording shortcomings. You probably already guessed/know that the Hard-Ons were one of the most perfect mixes of punk, metal, glam, bubblegum and thrash to grace the planet. If you needed it, "Smell My Finger" is proof positive. The eight-track EP from where the collection's name comes has aged remarkably well. It also firmly places the band's collective tongue in its cheek with the cover of "Then I Kissed Her." What SoCal hardcore band (a rough comparator) would have attempted that one without smothering it in irony? Who would have reprised it with lyrics in Arabic? The Hard-Ons didn't (don't) take themselves seriously and that's much of the appeal. The image - or lack thereof - was another characteristic that set the band apart. The Hard-Ons looked like the suburban kids they were. Ray Ahn's confrontational, sometimes impenetrable but never forgettable artwork intentionally stuck it up the arse of the faddists and precious pretenders.