Flowers were formed in Sydney in 1977 by Iva Davies (vocals, guitar, bass guitar, keyboards, oboe), a classically trained musician, and their main creative force; with bass player Keith Welsh. Davies was working as a part-time cleaner at a squash court managed by Welsh's mother, they lived nearby and were both interested in forming a band. Additional musicians used by Flowers in 1978 were Michael Hoste on keyboards and Don Brown on drums. The band built up a strong following as a live act around the pub circuit, providing distinctive cover versions of songs by Roxy Music, David Bowie, Lou Reed, T-Rex, Ultravox and Brian Eno. In Feb 1979 they supported The Stranglers tour of Australia.
By the middle of 1979 John Lloyd (ex-Paul Kelly and the Dots) replaced Don Brown on drums, with Anthony Smith (who was sometimes called Adam Hall), on keyboards, replacing Michael Hoste who remained associated with the band and later rejoined. They supported the tour of British band XTC during July/August. After signing to the independent Regular Records label, distributed by Festival, Flowers released their debut single in May 1980, "Can't Help Myself" (written by Davies), which hit the Australian Top 10 in June 1980. This was followed by their debut album 'Icehouse', which reached #4 on the national albums chart and became one of the year's biggest selling albums in Australia. The album, co-produced by Cameron Allan (Mental As Anything's producer) and Davies, made use of synthesisers, including the Minimoog, Solina Strings and Oberheim OB-1. Hoste co-wrote four tracks with Davies and played additional keyboards, with Smith continuing to provide the main keyboards. Further singles "We Can Get Together" and "Walls" from Icehouse also hit the Top 20.
Flowers' popularity was recognised when they were awarded the 1980 TV Week / Countdown Rock Awards 'Johnny O'Keefe New Talent Award' ahead of The Dugites, INXS and Karen Knowles. They were also nominated for 'Best Album' and 'Best Album Cover' for Icehouse but lost on both to Cold Chisel's 'East', Iva Davies was nominated as 'Best Songwriter' but lost to Cold Chisel's Don Walker. At the award ceremony, Flowers performed "Icehouse" with Davies framed within a cube of white neon tubing. In early 1981, Flowers signed to Chrysalis Records for European, Japanese, UK and U.S. releases; they had to change their name due to legal restrictions and to prevent confusion with a Scottish group The Flowers. Their last performance under the name Flowers was on 27 June 1981 at the Capitol Theatre in Sydney, they chose the name of their album to become known as Icehouse.
As Icehouse, the band spent the second half of 1981 touring the UK, Canada and the U.S., whilst Chrysalis released most of their Flowers material under the name Icehouse. The single "Icehouse" was released in Europe and created some interest in the UK, partly because of a video directed by Russell Mulcahy, while in the U.S. the song peaked at #28 on the Billboard Top Tracks chart in 1981. "Icehouse" had been written by Davies when he lived at 18 Tryon Road, Lindfield in an old, cold flat of a two-storey mansion - across the street was a dishevelled house which had its lights on all night peopled by short-term residents. Davies later learned it was a half-way house for psychiatric and drug rehab patients. The first U.S. single "We Can Get Together" peaked at #62 on the Billboard Hot 100. A single-only release, "Love in Motion", was recorded by Davies using the Sequential Circuits Prophet 5, and became the first new recording credited to Icehouse; it hit the Australian Top 10 in November 1981. Icehouse split up late in 1981, Keith Welsh later becoming manager of Australian bands Do-Ré-Mi and Boom Crash Opera.
In January 1982 Davies recorded 'Primitive Man' essentially as a solo project, it was co-produced with Keith Forsey who had worked with Giorgio Moroder and later worked with Simple Minds. Forsey supplied additional percussion; Davies supplied vocals, guitars, keyboards (Prophet 5), bass and programmed the Linn drum machine. Released in August 1982 as an Icehouse album, 'Primitive Man' reached #3 on the national album charts and provided their international breakthrough single, "Hey Little Girl" which peaked at #7 in Australia, #2 in Switzerland, #5 in Germany and top 20 in UK, Sweden and Netherlands. The album was less successful in the U.S where it peaked at #129 on the Billboard 200 and the song "Hey Little Girl" appeared on the Billboard Top Tracks chart for one week at #31.
Another single "Great Southern Land" made the Australian Top 5, it was later featured in the 1988 Yahoo Serious film Young Einstein and remains their most popular song according to listeners of Triple M in 2007. To promote 'Primitive Man' on tour, Davies re-assembled Icehouse with Hoste and Lloyd, and new members: Robert Kretschmer (guitar, backing vocals), Guy Pratt (bass guitar, backing vocals) and Andy Qunta (keyboards, backing vocals). 'Fresco' was a five-track EP released in 1983 by this line-up, they supported David Bowie on the European section of his Serious Moonlight tour.'Love in Motion' was released in 1983 by Chrysalis for the UK market, it was the 'Primitive Man' album with "Love in Motion" replacing album track "Break These Chains". Back in 1982, Russell Mulcahy had directed two of their video clips: "Hey Little Girl" and "Street Cafe" (released February 1983), after these Mulcahy asked Davies to record the score for his film Razorback; it was entirely instrumental, and featured Davies' first recorded use of the Australian designed Fairlight Music Computer. The trailer for the movie was released in 1983, the film itself in April 1984.
Icehouse's next album 'Sidewalk' was released in 1984 and peaked at #8 on the national albums chart with singles "Taking the Town" peaked at #29 in May, "Don't Believe Anymore" peaked at #31 August and "Dusty Pages" peaked at #82 in November. Davies used the Fairlight CMI digital sampling synthesizer exclusively on this more sombre and reflective album. Davies was commissioned to compose and record the score for the Sydney Dance Company production of Graeme Murphy's work Boxes, from Icehouse Davies only used Kretschmer, percussion was supplied by Masaki Tanazawa and Boxes was first performed live at the Sydney Opera House on 7 November 1985. After the Boxes project, Icehouse was Davies, Kretschmer, Pratt and Qunta with Simon Lloyd (sax, trumpet, keyboards) and Steve Jansen (drums, percussion).
Their 1986 release 'Measure for Measure' featured Brian Eno as an additional performer; it provided the Australian singles of "No Promises" #19, "Baby, You're So Strange" #12, "Mr. Big" #14 and "Cross the Border". Further inroads into the U.S. market occurred with "No Promises" peaking at #9 on Billboard Mainstream Rock chart and "Cross the Border" reaching #19. On tour for 'Measure for Measure', Icehouse were Davies, Kretschmer, Lloyd and Qunta with Glenn Krawczyk on bass (replacing new member Vito Portolesi after nine shows) and Paul Wheeler on drums. On 14 August 1986 their performance at New York City's The Ritz was recorded as Icehouse: Live at the Ritz, directed by John Jopson and broadcast on U.S. TV on 9 September 1987 and on Australian TV on 15 November 1987 it was released on VHS and NTSC formats. Jopson was subsequently used to direct four music videos for Icehouse. Stephen Morgan replaced Krawczyk on bass during 1987.
Their best-selling album is 1987's 'Man of Colours', which contained the Australian hit singles "Crazy" which peaked at #4 in July, "Electric Blue", co-written by Davies and John Oates of U.S. band Hall & Oates, peaked at #1 in October, "My Obsession" #12 in December, "Man of Colours" #28 in February 1988 and "Nothing Too Serious" #29 in May 1988. It was the first Australian album to have five singles charting in the top 30, it remained at #1 on the Australian album charts for eleven weeks and has sold over 700,000 copies. With U.S. chart success for "Crazy", which reached #14 on the Billboard Hot 100 and #10 on its Mainstream Rock chart, and "Electric Blue" peaked at #7 Hot 100 and #10 Mainstream, the band had reached their zenith of popularity, the album 'Man of Colours' reached #43 on the Billboard 200.' Man of Colours' was lauded in Australia during 1988, it won two ARIA Awards, 'Album of the Year' and 'Highest-Selling Album'; the associated song "Electric Blue" won 'Most Performed Australasian Popular Work' at the Australasian Performing Right Association (APRA) Music Awards for its writers Davies and Oates.
'Full Circle', an entire album of remixes was recorded during 1993, it included the track "Shakin' the Cage" which was released on the Spin One EP in early 1993 and was followed by the album 'Big Wheel' in November, which contained the singles "Satellite" in October and "Big Wheel" in March 1994, while the 'Full Circle' album itself was not released until December 1994; neither albums nor singles had any Top 40 chart success.
Davies had been working in 2001, on a proposed Icehouse album to be titled 'Bi-Polar Poems'. As of February 2009, the album was still unreleased. On 14 March 2009 Icehouse reformed for Sound Relief benefit concert at the Sydney Cricket Ground. Sound Relief is a benefit concert for victims of the Victorian Bushfire Crisis and the Queensland Floods. Appearing with Icehouse at the Sydney concert were, Coldplay, Eskimo Joe, Hoodoo Gurus, Jet, Josh Pyke, Little Birdy, The Presets, Wolfmother, You Am I and additional artists.
On 6 April 2011, Icehouse and Universal Music Australia publicly announced a new partnership for sales and distribution of the band's material. Accompanying this were details of the planned issue of a 30th-anniversary edition of the band's debut album 'Icehouse'. This release marks the first time any of the band's catalogue has been available for commercial download. The album was released on 20 May 2011 digitally and as a multi-disc set. On 7 July 2011, the band issued a press release about the forthcoming release of a new greatest hits compilation, titled 'White Heat: 30 Hits'. The album was released on 26 August 2011.
Since 2011 Icehouse have started to play regular live gigs again around Australia. One of the most recent was at 3 December Homebake 2011 concert, performing under the moniker of "Icehouse Plays Flowers", where they played songs from their first two albums (both released singles and unreleased songs) — "Icehouse", "We Can Get Together", "Skin", "Boulevard", "Great Southern Land" and "Sister." Keith Welsh joined them on stage, playing bass-guitar. Black-and-white original PR photos from the early 1980s were flashed as a backdrop behind the band as they played.
On 12 July 2012, the entire Icehouse studio catalogue was reissued. 'Primitive Man' and 'Man of Colours' also received a bonus DVD to celebrate their 30th and 25th anniversaries, respectively. The band will be promoting the two anniversary albums with the "Primitive Colours" tour. On 4 and 7 December, Icehouse performed two shows at the Esplanade Hotel in Melbourne and the Oxford Art Factory in Sydney, respectively, under the moniker of "DubHouse performing reggae-styled versions of classic Icehouse songs and old reggae favourites". These concerts spawned the release of a live album released in January 2014.
They also performed a 40th Anniversary concert at the Roche Estate, in the NSW Hunter Valley in March 2017. The full concert is available for free on YouTube, and is highly recommended for any fans to watch. On 9 February 2020, Icehouse played the St. Kilda Festival in Melbourne, Flowers had played the 1st festival in 1980, so for the 40th anniversary Icehouse played the majority of the Flowers album plus a few covers that they would have played back then, a recording of the concert was released in October 2020 as Icehouse Plays Flowers.
In 2021, a remix of "Hey Little Girl" was released by Australian duo Mark Vick and Danny Muller, with the record credited to The Antipodeans Vs Icehouse. In 2022, they performed "Great Southern Land" and "We Can Get Together" on the ICC Men's T20 World Cup in Melbourne Cricket Ground, Australia. Anthony Smith died in 2019.
Members
Iva Davies (vocals, guitar, keyboards, oboe), Michael Hoste (keyboards),
Anthony Smith (keyboards), John Lloyd (drums), Bob Kretschmer (guitar), Andy Qunta (keyboards), Guy Pratt (bass), Simon Lloyd (keyboards, trumpet, saxophone), Steve Morgan (bass), Paul Wheeler (drums), Glen Krawczyk (keyboards), Roger Mason (keyboards), Paul Gildea (guitar), Tony Llewellyn (keyboards), David Chapman (guitar), Max Lambert (piano), Adrian Wallis (cello), Graeme Perry (drummer), Vito Portolesi (bass)
SINGLES
Can't Help Myself
|
Flowers
| 2 JUN '80 | #10 |
We Can Get Together
|
Flowers
| 6 OCT '80 | #16 |
Walls
|
Flowers
| 26 JAN '81 | #20 |
Love in Motion
| 26 OCT '81 | #10 |
Great Southern Land
| 30 AUG '82 | #5 |
Hey Little Girl
| 15 NOV '82 | #7 |
Street Cafe
| 21 MAR '83 | #57 |
Taking the Town
| 23 APR '84 | #29 |
Don't Believe Anymore
| 23 JUL '84 | #31 |
Dusty Pages
| 17 DEC '84 | #82 |
No Promises
| 18 NOV '85 | #30 |
Baby, You're So Strange
| 24 MAR '86 | #14 |
Mr. Big
| 30 JUN '86 | #18 |
Cross the Border
| 10 NOV '86 | #65 |
Crazy
| 22 JUN '87 | #4 |
Electric Blue
| 31 AUG '87 | #1 |
My Obsession
| 23 NOV '87 | #12 |
Man of Colours
| 8 FEB '88 | #28 |
Nothing Too Serious
| 30 MAY '88 | #29 |
Touch the Fire
| 9 OCT '89 | #13 |
Jimmy Dean
| 21 JAN '90 | #47 |
Big Fun
| 5 AUG '90 | #47 |
Miss Divine
| 23 SEP '90 | #16 |
Anything is Possible
| 9 DEC '90 | #49 |
Love in Motion
|
Icehouse feat. Christina Amphlett
| 10 JAN '93 | #74 |
Satellite
| 10 OCT '93 | #83 |
Heroes
| 16 AUG '04 | #87 |
References
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Icehouse_%28band%29
http://top100singles.blogspot.com.au/
Spare Change drummer Graeme Perry is in the video for Baby You're So Strange, as is Vito Portolesi (later Mighty Reapers). Both were replaced early in that tour.
ReplyDeleteThanks for the update. I've added them to the members list
ReplyDelete