Hunters And Collectors:

[newwavepopman]

Does anyone remember or like this New Wave band from Australia? I absolutely loathed their very first album from 1983 on A&M Records,except for "Lumps Of Lead" and "Talking To A Stranger" At first they were a very hard band to get into for some reason.Their songs had no concistantcy on their first album.But after that one album they changed their style altogether and went for a more acceptable style.

They had some other albums that I liked alot and the hits U liked by them the most were the following songs.

Is There Anybody Out There?
Throw Your Arms Around Me
Talking To A Stranger
Lumps Of Lead
Inside A Fireball
Back On The Breadline
Lazy Summer Day
The Way You Live

Whatever happened to these guys? Does anyone even know if they are still together? Will look around for a website or two on the band,and if I should find anything I will post it.Thanks.Are there any other fans out there of this band?

[newwavepopman]

yes there is a website on this band Hunters And Collectors.To get all your needs and fill from the band go to www.humanfrailty.com

[newwavepopman]

And by the way,I made a mistake.It's called "Is There Anybody In There" not Out there.sorry about that.

[BeauBeau]

I liked them too. I think they were trying to figure themselves out on that album, but I did love "Talking to a Stranger." "Throw Your Arms..." was another song that stood out. It's been a while since I've listened to them. I'm going to check out their website.

[scramjet]

I once had a tape a friend made me with a song of theirs. The song was a little strange and atmospheric, maybe with something that sounded like primitive chanting, but I'm not too sure. Can't remember the title or anything else about it. I'd love to get hold of it. I know it's not much to go on, but does this ring a bell with any of you who know H & C well? This was no later than '85 - can anyone help?

[devildog]

All of their albums are on cd, albeit they are Australian imports. Check out chaosmusic.com, an Australian cd site which had them last time I checked.

[KYYX4ever]

Oh yeah, I loved that first tape of theirs, too. "Talking to a Stranger" was a great introduction to their sound. They were very weird, had a spooky, almost goth-y sound, all about the atmospheric. Remember the video for "Talking to a Stranger" ? It was mostly in darkness, and it showed the singer singing away all primal-like, with strings or maybe rubber bands wrapped around his face ! Very spooky !

[golfer]

Oh yes.I know of H&C.....there was this hum in Sydney circa 1980/81 of this band in Melbourne that had a new and original sound. We waited anxiously for this band to arrive in Sydney. Look, this period in Sydney is hard to describe. It was so exciting. Every night gigs everywhere by the most interesting and new sounding bands. Lots of venues would have up to five bands on the bill. I digress. H&C finally arrive in Sydney, I think the venue was the The Graphic Arts Club in Redfern, the mind is a liitle blurry (drugs i guess) but I do remember going up the stairs to the venue , they were already on stage, mannnnn, I'm immediately blown away. Unbelievable rhythms, hot and very sweaty, Mark Seymours destinctive voice, another thing I do remember was thier dress-sense, I'm sure they wore tuxedos/suits, whatever, something like that. A stand out was the percussionist Greg Peranno, his kit was made up of tom-tom, snare, cymbals & a water heater which to today still, is one of the best things I have ever heard live. They immediately became a must see band, I think one of the next times they were supported by Deckchairs Overboard (seek out thier song That's The Way) About 18 months later they added a brass section to the line up and there was a drastic feel change with loss of Perrano and guitarist Ray Totsi and then a move to commercialism.....having seen them many times my favourite song by them is World of Stone. They were great!![;)]

[randy]

Here we have another band that I really dont know a whole helluva lot about. Ive heard a few of their tunes--one that I love -although I dont know the name-and several that were just OK. These guys worth looking into?

[korova1]

Man, "Run, Run, Run" is a classic NW/PP song. I love that and the extended version of "Talking To A Stranger". Their sound was pretty amazing for a while... then they lost me around "Throw Your Arms Around Me." If they would have stayed with the moody, dirgy stuff, I would still like them.

[Grunch]

Really enjoy all their releases, from their first up thru about 1998, and I think their release "Fate" from 1988 is stunning. Many really amazing tracks on that release. It is the CD release that features Back On The Breadline, but that song, as good as it is, is not even in the top 5 of the great tracks on that CD. It is consistently excellent IMO. Song adfter song, it is relentlessly a great listen. The 'Fate' CD is usally dirt cheap, you can't go wrong to scoop it.

[bpdp3]

Fellow Trouser Press subscribers like myself might remember this...during their last year or so, they included flexi-discs with each issue. One month the flexi came out with the back-side saying "Do Not Play This Side" and no other identification. However, there was a song on that side! It was a mystery among readers who this mystery band was, because the song was pretty good.

Turned out to be 'Talking to a Stranger' by Hunters and Collectors.

[TragicMagic]

Hehe .. its quite funny seeing people talk of H&C like this. In Australia, they were and still are of course a huge band. Their song "Holy Grail" is still used today as a Football anthem, and can pretty much always be heard late at night as some sort of request in pubs and clubs.

TM

[Surly]

I'm a fan - I was hooked when I first saw the video on MTV for "Talking To A Stranger." There's a great best-of CD available from Australia called [i]Natural Selection[/i] - all of the big songs are on there. The only glitch - they didn't use the original version of "Throw Your Arms Around Me" on this disc, so I had to buy the remastered version of the [i]Human Frailty[/i] CD as well. IRS released a best-of from them in the US in the early 90s.

There's also a DVD of [i]Natural Selection[/i] available with all of their video clips.

"Words like conviction can turn into a sentence"