Brat Farrar/Physical Education

Two contrasting projects showcase the punk and rock sides of Melbourne musician Sam Agostino, writes PATRICK EMERY.

[Historical image is withheld pending rights review.] The symbiotic relationship between stadium rock and punk rock is worthy of its own laborious analysis. In its original ’60s guise, what’s now described as “punk” – a term in those days with a far more devious and deviant connotation – was said to represent sub-cultural rebellion against the institutions and discourse of the dominant culture. Later, in the 1970s, rock’n’roll became subsumed its own grotesque corporate largesse, replete with stadium tours, catered convoys and sponsorship deals, punk served as a reminder of rock’n’roll’s obnoxious and confrontational edge.

The occasional spikes in popular and critical interest in punk – for example, the Nirvana-led grunge obsession of the early-1990s and the White Stripes’ celebration of the simplistic, razor sharp garage blues riff – have, from one perspective, reflected the cyclical pattern of popular and industry interest. From another, more important, perspective, punk is neither in nor out of fashion: it is an attitude that transcends popular fads and trends, occasionally cloaking itself in colourful anti-establishment rhetoric.

To many of its proponents, punk lends itself to binary categorisation of the accoutrements of music: limousines, stadiums and French champagne are not punk; share houses, filthy inner-city bars and street quality amphetamines are. The reality, if such a mythical beast actually exists, isn’t so simple: punk and rock’n’roll are siblings in a dysfunctional family, occasionally engaging in fits of jealousy, while all the time subconsciously feeding off each other’s creative peaks and troughs. On the eve of his departure to Europe, Sam Agostino has found time to release two records that explore notionally different points on the rock’n’roll spectrum.

Brat Farrar is Agostino’s celebration of punk rock in all its snotty, rebellious and periodically contrived glory. Conceived originally as Agostino’s solo project, Brat Farrar has evolved into a fully-fledged live beast, featuring YIS members Simon and Andre Fazio on bass and drums, respectively. The debut Brat Farrar album, however, is Agostino’s work in totality, with Agostino not only writing all the songs, but playing all the instruments, including the programmed drum beats.

With 12 tracks crammed into 27 minutes, Brat Farrar is a freakish ride through the various guises of punk. The opening track, the fuzz-stained ‘Punk Records’, is a fast-pasted narrative through 40 years of the genre, name-checking everyone from The Stooges through Television, the Gun Club, Bikini Kill, Husker Du and beyond.

[Historical embedded media is withheld pending rights review.] Brat Farrar - Punk Records by Mess+Noise

The pop sensibility of tracks such ‘You Got Me Hanging Around’ and ‘Ask The Night Tonight’ is reminiscent of the late Jay Reatard in his later years. ‘So Overwhelming’ burns with the deranged excitement that tends to come with one’s juvenile years when the world is an object of abuse and derision. ‘Party At Hawks’ is a mere minute’s worth of sludgy noise masquerading as melody. In more ways than one, this is the album’s true punk track, offering a two-fingered salute at convention, structure and melody.

‘Thursday’ and ‘Boneyard’ are as dirty as a New York loft inhabited by a collective of egotistical and drug-addled artists, and guaranteed to fuck up your next dinner party. ‘Mine All the Time’ is Ramones-meets-’80s LA punk without the amphetamine obsession. ‘Leo Cried’ reminds us that new wave brought with it a fusion of electronica and punk into anti-social harmony. ‘Advice’ falls enigmatically off the cliff just as it threatens to break into speed rock excitement. The album’s final track ‘Work Your Way Back Down’ dances on the edge of Velvets fucked-up psychedelia, while ‘And I’m In You’ is a punk-pop track with rhetorical links to Agostino’s parallel project, Russian Roulettes.

[Historical image is withheld pending rights review.] That band’s second album, Physical Education, locates itself closer to the regularly plagiarised and oft-maligned world of Hendrix, Sabbath and Cream. It’s a landscape dominated by Marshall stacks, tight denim ball-huggers, shagpile carpet chests and cocaine-fuelled egos.

Led by Agostino’s machismo-stained riffs, and augmented with the hirsute rhythm section of Tim Wold (Specimens) and Agostino Soldati (Legends of Motorsport), Physical Education swaggers like an over-sexed football player cruising a city bar for nocturnal pleasures of the flesh. There’s everything a chest-beating rock’n’roll fan could want for: self-obsessed nihilism (‘Never Had Nothing’), gyrating 70s blues rock licks (‘And That’s All’, ‘Wait and See’) and double-entendres and sledgehammer-subtle sexual humour that Gene Simmons would lick his lips at (‘Physical Education’).

“It’s only convenience and serendipity that’s allowed 'Brat Farrar' and 'Physical Education' to be released contemporaneously.”

‘Why Can’t We Be Together’ is the heavy rock lament from central casting. ‘FBI’ invokes the brazen spirit of Radio Birdman and the anti-government paranoia of Ted Nugent. ‘Coloured Vinyl’ is the classic mid-concert moment when the guitar-noodling goes into overdrive. The call- and-response ‘It’s Time to Rock’n’Roll’ is invigorating, while Soldati’s vocal effort on ‘Baby, Please Quit Your Cryin’ conjures up images of Ray Charles. And what’s a rock album without the obligatory tear-jerking ballad (‘Waiting for You’) and projection of emotional angst (‘Every Time That You Need Me’)?

It’s only convenience and serendipity that’s allowed Brat Farrar and Physical Education to be released contemporaneously: the contrast is obvious, the subconscious relationship more interesting. It’s all just rock’n’roll, and the people should like it. Yes, they should.

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‘Brat Farrar’ and ‘Physical Education’ are out now through Off The Hip.