Embed and breakfast man: The Go-Betweens

This weekend, let's spend some time delving into the Go-Betweens back catalogue, shall we?

Oh, go on.

Much supported by the Record Mirror and Snipe, the music fanzine which morphed into When Saturday Comes, the Go-Betweens were part of what felt like a very minor Australian invasion at the time. Which would have been early-ish on in the 1980s. (See, young people, it wasn't all outsize phones and Richard Branson launching airlines...)

Built around Robert Forster and Grant McLennan's songwriting partnership, you could argue that they were two bands, or a single band with two hearts. Or a multi-headed single beast. In fact, people spent quite a bit arguing that. Smudge even got a song out of the idea that two men had different approaches and produced a noticeably different style of result:



They've picked up some interesting honours in the years since they split, since they reunited in 2000, and especially since Grant McLennan's way-too-early death from a heart attack back in 2006. Cattle And Cane was voted one of the 30 best songs ever by the Australasian Performing Rights Assocation; there's a bridge named after the band in Brisbane. Oh, and 24 used Forster-McLennan as a company name during series four.

Let's go Go-Betweens, then.

To kick off, here's Lee Remick - a tribute to the much-pecked actress which was the first single in 1978. This version is a later revisiting of the tune:



Buy
Bellavista Terrace: The Best Of
Liberty Belle & The Black Diamond Express

Go-Betweens GOTOs
Lovingly constructed fan site
Last FM
Spotify

More to come across the weekend
Cattle And Cane live
The House Jack Kerouac Built
Right Here

Tribute

Over now, on MySpace: Rare Victory, a musical tribute to Grant McLennan, featuring The Orchids, Trembling Blue Stars, Luke Haines and others; we've posted about this before, but it's worth mentioning again.

In rock and roll seventh heaven

Robert Forster's first post-Go-Betweens solo outing is coming together; called The Evangalist and due at the end of April. CMJ is touting it as Ocean Rain continued, as it shares producer and studio with the last Go Between album. It points out, in the face of Forster's denials, that three tracks were even co-written with the late Grant Mclennan.

Love Goes On sale: Tribute to McClennan

A quick mention that Love Goes On, the tribute to Grant Mclennan, has gone on sale. It includes covers by Luke Haines, The Orchids, Future Pilot AKA and - as the KTel ads would always have it - many, many more.

Togther, apart

It was planned before his death, but there's something almost heartbreakingly apt at Grant Mclennan sharing his solo best-of album with solo stuff from fellow Go-Betweener Robert Forster.

Intermission is due June 18th.