Fearful Pleasure and Lovely Infestation are for sale, visit Shop https://brianpurcell.art/shop/

History of Distant Locust

Brian was a founding member and the singer/lyricist for the alternative Sydney band Distant Locust (1982-95) with whom he toured Europe in 1991, playing in the Netherlands, Italy and Germany.

The original band began in late ‘82 with an unashamedly dadaistic and avant-garde approach to creating music. This lineup consisted of Brian, creating lyrics, vocals and gizmo sounds, Matthew Bright on keyboards and synths, and Tony Lawrence on bass, echo and treated electronic instruments. The period 82-85 was amazingly productive in term of creating sonically challenging work, and eventually led to them playing live at obscure inner-city venues like French’s, and warehouses such as The Gunnery. Only recently some live footage of an early warehouse gig was uncovered, the second clip here; to differentiate the early band from the later, very different lineup, these earlier songs were under the name ‘Sleeping Psychics’.

(323) Rider’s Star by Sleeping Psychics – YouTube

(323) My Heart Takes Root by Sleeping Psychics – YouTube

Early gigs polarised audiences, either clearing halls or inspiring a dedicated fanbase; their unique electronic sound soon attracted mentors such as M-Squared’s Shane Fahey, who recorded some of their early gigs. These were released on an independently-released cassette, Lovely Infestation in 1987. Later that year Tony Lawrence left to concentrate on filmwork and was replaced by Steven Moore, a skilful bass player and drum programmer, who gave the band a solid live sound. In 1988, their debut self-titled vinyl release attracted radio play of the song, ‘Father’s Suit’. Eventually their mixer Timothy Edmonds created a music video for the track, which was played on Rage and later, MTV Europe.

In the late eighties, although their live performances became more popular – even famously attracting David Bowie to their audience – they were still too ‘avant-garde’ for local record companies. After releasing Top of the World in 1989, they resolved to sell all their belongings and travel to Europe in late 1990. Here are notes from the back cover of Brian’s book, Lovely Infestation (1995).

 

“How can I live in a world that contains your music?” said the girl, “come with me and let’s jump off the roof”. When these words were spoken at a rooftop gig in the late eighties, Brian Purcell knew he was in a special band. “Lovely Infestation” is a psychoportrait and celebration of Distant Locust through lyrics, collages and poems written on the road. Told they were ‘too weird’ for Australia, Distant Locust left inner-city Sydney for Europe in 1990. Soon they were signed by Contempo International, which released “Chemical Wedding Feast” to rave reviews. They appeared on European MTV and toured Holland, Italy and Germany with industrial and techno icons Laibach, Clock DVA and Christian Death. On their return to Australia, the Sydney Morning Herald’s Shane Danielson described them as “…the underbelly of the underground” harbouring “…a fascination with the subversion of technology”, their music shaped “… into a pounding machine pulse, complete with eerie vocal effects and skewed, repetitive melodies that verge on the mesmeric.”

Although they were scheduled to return to Europe and record with Contempo again, a financial crash and recession in Italy extinguished the company, and their hopes of further European releases. The band slowly wound down and effectively ended when Steven Moore left Australia to work in research in the USA at the end of 1995. Shortly before that, the band released its final CD, Fearful Pleasure and Brian’s book, Lovely Infestation, both released on the independent label We Make μ-sick.