Hey Punx! Melbourne punx, Charter 77, (my old band) are getting back together for one show! It's been 10 years since Charter 77's album Our Reality came out, and to celebrate the anniversary and playing a show again, we have started a Band Camp! Here you'll find all the recordings that have been lost in time.
Charter 77 - Our Reality (2005 Trial and Error)
I wanted to write something about Charter 77 but didn't know where to start. So the following is an interview that went badly between me and my girlfriend Holly.
In the end she found it too hard to ask me any questions because I was being an unhelpful jerk and I got mad with her interview style, but she did a great job dealing with my shitty attitude...here it is...it's titled...
Still-birth of Charter 77
By Holly Saville
Lisa's Backyard party in Clayton
"Ever since I was a young punk I had watched Charter 77 in awe and admiration, smashing myself around in the pit with my friends screaming about fish and chips and ray martin, but as with all great things it had to come to an end. They left a lasting legacy on the Melbourne punk scene, leaving all their friends and fans with the question, 'when are you boys getting the band back together?' Rumours would crop up every now and then about a reformation, but they always ended up being the wishful thinking of some old punk.
Late 2015 the rumours started circling again, I had gotten my hopes up to many times to pay much mind to it, but this time it wasn't wishful thinking, thanks to the persistent efforts from Stu (Loners with Boners and more recently Organ Donor), and a killer offer to play with none other than G.B.H the Charter boys agreed to play one more show. just one, for old times sake. curious about how this all came about i asked Paul from Charter 77 a few questions.
Ok. So what made you finally reconsider getting the band back together?
Stu, got it back together.
How did he manage that?
He spoke to every one individually, and convinced us all separately that it would be fun to play a show together again, he offered us the g.b.h support. We thought it would be fun.
What made you guys break up in the first place?
I remember the day i didn't want to do it anymore. It had got to the stage where rehearsals weren't fun or we just weren't rehearsing, for me it just became stagnant, we weren't writing anything new, so i told the guys i didn't want to do it. and i quit. some other people played guitar for a bit, Stu played for a while and Trav from geelong,
How long after you quit did the band break up officially?
I have no idea when I quit and I have no idea when they decided to stop either. I drank a lot. I saw Stu play in the band when they supported The Exploited when Exploited first came to Melbourne.
Joel, whipping up a storm. At the Tote?
Why did you decide to only get back together for one show?
We all have different things going on now, i have other bands that i am committed to and i live in Western Australia, Lucas lives in lakes entrance, I also feel that the band had run its course, it was fun while it lasted.
Will you guys be doing anything new at this show or will it be all the classics?
No its just going to be all the classics,
Will you have any of your music available to buy on the night?
We are re-releasing Our Reality on band camp, thats our only album. It was released in 2005 on Trial And Error and hasn't been available since it sold out. Also there is an older release called 3 Year Binge, which is live tracks and demo tracks of the first 3 years of this line up. There might also be a release of the songs that Red did when he started the band, songs that were released for the Hardcore Revolution Bastard Squad Tribute (came out on Noise Pollution Records).
Most memorable gig with the band?
The first gig that comes to mind was at Fun Factory in Footscray. I had been drinking bourbon all day and only got through 3 songs before i thought we were playing out of time - and we probably were - and i threw my guitar and walked out. Not my proudest moment but the most memorable. I got lost and had to take a shit in someones yard after that.
Best gig?
Wasted Festival in 2006 in the Gershwin room. we played well and it was a great day... Peter and The Test Tube Babies played and Beerzone, The Blurters, heaps of bands!
Best road trip story? I vaugely remember something about red and canberra?
Road trips didn't happen very often, but we played in canberra in a park in the middle of winter it was minus 2 degrees! There was a fire, and we played on one side of the fire and there was about 10 people on the other side of the fire. I remember that we played with Hard Luck. After the show, when we were piling in the car to go stay at someones house, Red told us he wasn't coming and walked off the other way. The next morning before we headed to Sydney we rang him and he told us that he had started walking along the highway to sydney. When we asked him which highway he was on we found out that he had been walking all night on the highway back towards Melbourne. He got nicknamed Vagrant for the rest of the trip.
Favourite place to play?
The Birmingham Hotel...in Collingwood. It was awesome because there was a function room and a p.a and we could put on gigs when ever we wanted. "
And that's as far as we got.
(Thanks Holly, I think you are rad! :-) Love Paul.)
MORE STUFF ABOUT CHARTER 77
By Paul McGoldrick
We played as much as possible between 1999 and 2007. We did make it to Adelaide, Sydney, Canberra, and Brisbane but not often. Sydney was definitely a few times. We were big fans of The Blurters and would more than likely play with those guys when we went to Sydney. Punks Picnics in Sydney were great too!
Playing so often made us really tight. We got really good at playing drunk. Our songs were simple but there was still room to fuck them up if we were too wasted. Most times gig's would go well..., we'd nearly always ended the set on a classic Oi! song or later, more often than not, Just to Get Away by Poison Idea, which seemed to antithesis a common feeling in the band.
Lucas at House of Fools
Somehow we managed to record, despite all of us being broke all the time. Lucas was handy with sound, so we've got some good demo's and live recordings. It's weird that we just kept pressing along and didn't care about anything except playing to our friends at the Birmingham every weekend. We would play other venues but I don't remember ever wanting to get known by people or get a following. All that mattered was that some people would come have a beer with us and a sing a long. Now I see that we flew under the radar of a lot of people, and that was a good thing, the people who knew us either loved or hated us.
Our influences were anything punk. Punk. Pop-punk. Oi! Street punk. Hardcore. Anything under the broad banner of punk. Early on I was all about Oi!, The Business, Cockney Rejects, Iron Cross...I was massive fan of Dropkick Murphy's and in 2002 we got to support them at the Corner Hotel. We played Never Fall by Al Barrs' old band, The Bruisers. We asked him to sing it, but he politely declined.
Red at a Freeza show in Pakenham
Other gig highlights, included playing shows with Anti-Nowhere League, U.K Subs, The Bouncing Souls, Toe To Toe, and Strung Out. When Trial and Error released our album, they organised a tour with folk punk outlaws Sydney City Trash, and we loved their music instantly and became good friends. The second last show Charter 77 played was with SC Trash at the Nash in Geelong.
Most of the time it wasn't playing with well know bands, we played with GGF (Go Get Fucked), The Homewreckers, Hippy War Generals, No Idea, Loners With Boners, Dropped at Birth, Filthy Beer Mugs...those are the ones of the top of my head. We played with most of those bands nearly every other weekend.
I feel like I quit the band around 2007 but I really can't remember. I got to see Charter 77 play with Exploited the first time they were here, Trav was playing guitar. That was really cool to see them play with the Exploited. The band has always been about fun and adversity. The reason we are playing with G.B.H. is that it will be fun and we are keen to play to some people who never got to see us play. Punk music attracts young people too it, so there will be some people who may have heard us but never seen us play. I've talk to a few people like that already, since this show was announced. I'm really looking forward to playing this. I've been sober for nearly 4 years now, so my playing is much better than I used to be, and you can expect and solid performance from all of us...not the train wreck that would occasionally happen in the past.
I was doing it way before Miley Cirus!
Cheers...Thanks for reading. - Paul
Here's our new BandCamp with all that lost music.
