John Scott has provided an insight into a few of the tracks from the album.
Track 1 – Wake Up
“From about 10 tears of age till maybe even 30-ish, I used to wake up some nights, around 3am, suddenly, and the first thing I would think of is how one day I’m going to die. I would really concentrate on the idea for some reason, and try imagine not existing. It used to scare the shit out of me. Somehow I grew out of it – maybe I accept it – but I remember that the idea of an eternity of not existing used to floor me. So, I wrote this weird 7/4 time song. ”
Track 2 – The Hammer
“This was a great bassline I never wrote. Kim came up with it. I wrote the melody part, and it was such a great song to play. John Rickert helped flesh it out too. We must have wrote it around 87 I think. Lyric wise it was based on a real event of a dream I had when I was a kid that I thought was true at the time.
I was about 4 or 5 and snuggled into my parents bed one morning and it seemed to be there was something out in the street, like a giant stobie pole that was thumping about – like a hammer – sort of like those hammers in the Pink Floyd film clip. Contrary to interpretation, the song was never written about drugs.”
Track 3 – Dead Man’s Mail
“I wrote this after a couple I knew said they kept getting letters for a man called Chuckie and after they did some investigation found out he was a previous tenant who had died. I think I quipped “dead-man’s mail” and wrote some words about it. I had in my mind a sort of horror story twist where the person who receives this dead man’s mail realizes in the end that it is addressed to him and that he is actually dead.
The song was a bit different for us at the time as it did have a sort of horror comedy to it but it was still anchored in the angst of personality disphoria etc. ”
Track 4 – Call In Anger
“We wrote this one real early when John Rickert had joined the band as a fill in for our drummer Roger who was overseas. This is way back in 87 I think. The bass line just was a spur of the moment thing, I suggested Kim keep playing this and that the guitar could supply all the changes around it. With John Rickert there was a real synergy that worked and we started to write a lot of songs.
On our previous drummer’s return, it became obvious that John should continue playing. It was the start of the drum stool (whatever that game is). Lyric wise the song was about anger being a way to overcome disappointment rather than collapse – I always liked the idea of losing someone or seeing someone you love leave you at the station (harks back to old blues numbers I guess). ”
Track 5 – The Setback
” I am pretty sure we wrote this when Rod Archer was singing for us (Rod became Adelaide’s “The Iron Sheiks” front man, a sort of cross between the Mentors and metal). The Setback was a more faster punk type of song we had. About setback after setback but at the same time taking it. ”
Track 6 – Battlesick
” I bought a drum machine, very rudimentary one, back in the late 80’s, maybe 88. I was messing around with it and was playing bass to it with a ghetto blaster recording it. When I played it back I heard this 5 seconds of something I liked and it became the main bass and drums for Battlesick.
The lyrics I think came out of some drunken writing after being out one night, pissed off and sick of rejection. Also, it was the height of my fixation on Vietnam and the idea of the countless unknown heroes who walk among us. I loved the line “Battlesick Loner”, cos that’s what I was. Ahh, youth.”
Track 10 – Visions Of Love
” TMOC don’t write a lot about love –not straight up anyhow. Don’t know why. Probably because everyone else does. But this was about the idea of wanting something pure and beautiful in the hope it would set you free. This is the first song we ever recorded, probably 86. We did it once with Rod Archer, and then it was called “Here it comes again” – later when I started singing, it became “Visions of Love”. Very Joy Division.
In those days showing your derivative nature was a real no-no. It’s strange how now bands who sound like the Beatles, or Nirvana, or Pearl Jam etc etc etc, do not get shit for it. We showed our influences, and were slaughtered. Now a band like Interpol can state they’re influenced by the Smiths and Joy Div and whatever and its all cool. Ain’t it strange? (I like Interpol though, nerdy suits and all). “