An anniversary that went slightly unnoticed was the 40th anniversary of the first Hunters & Collectors released in January.
Like the anniversary, Hunters & Collectors went relatively unnoticed for years after the first record. “We didn’t have major commercial success until nine months later,” Mark Seymour tells Noise11.com. “We were just playing and playing and playing and having moderate increases in record sales over a long time. That’s kind of how it worked out. You lie in a bed you make.”
Hunters & Collectors were signed to Mushroom Records, at the time the home of the more radio friendly Split Enz and Skyhooks. “There was definitely a sense that we were different and we had a different attitude<’ Mark says. “I was piggy in the middle. I was head down, writing, singing. I really didn’t have a broad sense of what that meant. I remember watching the ‘True Colours’ (Split Enz) and the Skyhooks albums and thinking ‘that’s something we will never do’. Not because we wouldn’t choose to do it but I never thought Hunters & Collectors would be that big. Oddly enough, it has kind of worked out that way”. Mark never considered Hunters & Collectors would ever be a Top 40 band. The idea of actively trying to write commercial songs? Well, Split Enz did that with ‘True Colours’. That was a major turning point for them. They hadn’t had an album anywhere near close to that. I loved that record at the time. It was one of my favourite records of the era”. “The place to celebrate 40 years of Hunters & Collectors is only on the Red Hot Summer tour. “I was going to try and make the show a bit of a time capsule,” Mark says. The time capsule looks like this: Talking to a Stranger (from Hunters & Collectors, 1982) Where Do You Go? (from Cut, 1992) True Tears of Joy (from Cut, 1992) Inside a Fireball (from Living Daylight, 1987) When the River Runs Dry (from Ghost Nation, 1989) Blind Eye (from Ghost Nation, 1989) Say Goodbye (from Human Frailty, 1986) What's a Few Men? (from What’s A Few Men, 1987) Everything's on Fire (from Human Frailty, 1986) Holy Grail (from Cut, 1992) Do You See What I See? (from What’s A Few Men, 1987) Throw Your Arms Around Me (from Human Frailty, 1986) Red Hot Summer is heading to Ballarat and Launceston this weekend (March 19 and 20).
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