It’s incongruous to think that Heads Up is only The Stems’ second full length album, and the band’s first new release in twenty years. Incongruous not just because The Stems remain one of Australia’s most virtuous garage and power pop bands, despite a playing and recording history that lasted a mere few years in the mid 1980s, but also because Heads Up is so pure, fresh and potent that it could have been recovered from recording sessions shelved at the height of the band’s original popularity or – better still – found lying dormant on tapes discarded at the apex of the halcyon days of the 1960s garage rock era.

Whereas Iggy meandered through the motions on The Stooges’ The Weirdness, and David Johannsen and Sylvain Sylvain mocked band branding reality on One Day It Will Please Even Me to Remember This, on Heads Up The Stems – comprising original members Dom Mariani, Richard Lane, Julian Matthews and Dave Shaw (sometime drummer Gary Chambers is, by some reports, farming potatoes in rural Western Australia) – are as vibrant as the day they first donned stove pipe trousers, flopped their fringes over their eyes and went in search of fuzz laden lands.

Mariani's opening line on the stomping Leave You Way Behind – "I'm feeling so much better/All of my pain has gone away" – is significant. The Stems imploded in the late 1980s under the weight of a relentless touring schedule and egos unable to manage the pressure of burgeoning national and international fame. Twenty years later the band has rediscovered the basic ingredients of the rock'n'roll form, sans all the industry bullshit that smothered their original zest and enthusiasm. She Sees Everything gives a power popped Loved Ones flavour to the wild eyed perspective on matters of the heart, and the Dave Shaw penned Surround Me is positively drenched in the sunny eyed optimism that none of us should ever forget (and neither should we ignore Mariani's spin on Roger McGuinn's Eight Miles High solo that appears late in the song).

For a healthy dose of garage attitude, '60s fashionista style and a slick sound to die for, you'd be insane to go past What's Your Stand, while Hellbound Train finds Mariani rediscovering a brutal riff he left lying around the studio after the recording sessions for the last Stoneage Hearts album, and discovering his band mates love it just as much he does. The rock'n'roll perfection that characterises Get to Know Me puts the seal of authenticity to the rhetorical statement that forms the song title – why would you do anything else but embrace contemporary The Stems after hearing this song?

Richard Lane's Only if You Want It shows what you can do with a bit of garage spice on a simple pop tune, and Liar is as down and dirty as much of the rest of the album is brimming with sunshine and beauty. Finally, Mariani is at his power pop best in Get So Bad – a tale of adolescent emotional dysfunction, a simple and catchy melody, and a guitar solo that slices and dices the air like a razor sharp Ginzu steak knife.

The ironic beauty of rock'n'roll is its seemingly infinite interrogation of simple riffs, melodies and specious narratives. If you need an antipodean example of the intrinsic attraction of garage rock and its close cousin power pop, look no further than The Stems – and if you need proof that rock’n’roll is an attitude, not a date on a birth certificate, check out Heads Up.

PATRICK EMERY (BEAT MAGAZINE 7 NOV ISS1089)

The Forum "Clash of the Titans" Tour

"HEADS-UP" ON THE STEMS  http://www.i94bar.com/ints/stems2007.html
The Stems are unveiling their first studio album in 20 years: "Heads Up". It's a fine return to form - a strong, hooky and sometimes slightly dark dose of rock-pop, done on the band's own terms. The Stems were a major revelation for many of those who caught them on the "Battle of the Titans" undercard to the Hoodoo Gurus and Radio Birdman recently - so much so that a short follow-up run of dates around the country in November seem sure to sell out. To mark the new CD and The Stems' return to Aussie stages - and looming tour of Europe in 2008 - THE BARMAN interviewed guitarist-singer DOM MARIANI who spoke frankly about the toll success had in the '80s and the band having its time over again. Read about it here.

http://www.i94bar.com/images/Stems21090765.jpg   http://www.i94bar.com/images/Stems21090763.jpg  http://www.i94bar.com/images/Stems21090754.jpg

Hoodoo Gurus, Radio Birdman, The Stems @
the Acacia Ridge Hotel, Brisbane,
16/09/2007
Reviews by Demosthenes, 23rd September, 2007

First up in this no-holds barred musical battle are the Stems – classy exponents of shimmering 60s-style guitar garage-pop and undoubtedly one of the finest outfits to ever emerge from Perth. And from get-go to close, they’re firing on all cylinders, winning new fans and charming old ones. Dom Mariani’s vocals are rich and golden while Richard Lane’s guitar shivers with so-beautiful-you-need-to-hear-it 60s pop sensibilities and the rhythm section of Julian Matthews and Dave Shaw play with energy, panache and a sense of fun that musicians half their age would envy. It’s glorious, and the occasional injections of harmonica and keys from Mariani and Matthews make it even more jaw-droppingly perfect.

It’s perhaps testimony to their self confidence that they open with something new, but the mighty cheers that greets the conclusion of the fat, bluesy sound of Leave You Way Behind proves the faith is not at all misplaced. And they keep it up by not only mixing old and new in equal amounts, but by skipping over major hit At First Sight. Still, the unashamedly retro keys of Tears Me In Two, plus Mariani’s swaggering mid-song solo and Lane’s soulful harmonica breakdown on Make You Mine more than compensate for the lack.

Hellbound Train continues to spruik the aural delights of just-released long-player Heads-Up, but it’s She Sees Everything that’s the showstopper – old yet new, evoking the early blues-rock of the Rolling Stones and the Kinks. By the time they wrap up with Sad Girl – a joyous blast from the past for anyone who was watching Countdown back in 1987 – they’ve undoubtedly left many wishing that they were the headline act!  Read More

Rave Magazine

Acacia Ridge Hotel - Sun Sep 16

The Stems are a revelation to these virgin ears.

Read More:

Review By: SIMON TOPPER

Their Chiming indie-garage sound is timeless even in this air of nostalgia - Think Hoodoo Guru, then multiply it by a thousand! Time Off - Brisbane

Why do the Stems sound twice as good as nearly any other band trying to emulate such salty garage swing? Dunno, but they do! Inpress Magazine - Melbourne

Songs such as Mr Misery, Rosebud, Move Me, Golden Heart, Just Aint' Enough and the impossibly brilliant Make You Mine were performed with a sense of fun that polished the night perfectly Beat Magazine -Melbourne

Simple songs, done simply well. You can't lose with tunes like "Under My Mushroom", "Tears me in Two", "On and On" and "Move Me". "Sad Girl" is a killer, live or on record. "Man With the Golden Heart" grows an extra leg live. We even get a newie, "Hellbound Train"! www.ibar94 <http://www.ibar94.com> .com <http://www.ibar94.com> Sydney show

And that led to the Stems. I never saw the Stems in their prime – my first taste of their work was the songs featured on the better than excellent Citadel compilation "Take Everything Leave Nothing", and I’ve never forgotten the sensation the first time I heard "Make You Mine". Dom Mariani is undoubtedly a legend of Australian rock’n’roll. Not only does he have a unique ability to make his guitar sound as dirty as an Eastern European waterway, but Mariani’s sense of pop is so good it should be bottled and shown to aspiring musicians the land over. <http://www.ibar94> <http://www.ibar94> www.ibar94.com <http://www.ibar94.com>

Melbourne show

Beat Magazine

The Stems just strolled onstage, plugged in and launched into that drum beat from their first single Make You Mine. It was clear, right away, that the pre-gig discussions of Will they suck – Yay or Nay? - were going to be rightly stomped on and squashed. Within five minutes everyone looked at each other and went – YAY!. Make You Mine was undeniably catchy, and quite possibly an early evening highlight.

Six songs in and we get Love Will Grow. By this stage with the amount of great ideas, song-writing that The Stems profess in just six songs, I’m sure the audience could, and I say could have gone home feeling satisfied, but The Stems are having none of this. Love Will Grow is the ballad, but it’s not the obligatory ballad, deemed to be pushed into a live show, or on a record, just to slow things down. Love Will Grow is a terrific piece of Byrdsian whimsy, all toughed up with its fuzz-nut growling guitar.

We got the first of the two covers for the evening. The first one is Hey Joe, as interpreted by Love or The Leaves or The Standells. That fast, rollicking version, but The Stems added a great touch on the chorus, with a rousing, built-up pop explosion. Seems like it’s always fun to sing Hey Hey Hey in celebrated harmony. Later on they did a fairly standard cover of I’m Not Your Stepping Stone. Which was quite pleasant, but not interpretive enough, which begs the question – Why didn’t they do a freaking Stems song!?

The two best songs on this night were Move Me & Sad Girl. They were stripped of their lavish production, hit-single sound, that does at times annoy on their album. Here the songs were mammoth. They were spiteful as all good punk songs should be, but fanciful as all great pop moments have been.

They played, they had two encores, which some would say was too much, but c’mon The Stems these days only play once every fifteen years, and as the fella next to me said “Man, they got great hair.”

Dom Mariani is a colossal guitarist, and The Stems are a conduit for all fun times. They had too many magnificent tunes, and the sheer magnitude and polish of their performance was undeniable. It was one of those shows were afterwards most people I saw had big, dumb, goofy smiles on their faces. Part pissed, but mostly in part due to the entertaining gig from one of this countries best ever bands.

Shane Jesse Christmass

By the time THE STEMS are finishing their set with a staggering She's A Monster, my face hurts from smiling so much and my voice is shot from singing along! holy moly they were fantastic. There's always a real danger of disappointment when a really cool band from a long time ago reforms for whatever reason. Will they be able to recreate the magic, the sounds and the energy after 17 years apart? Will they live up to the memories (or the legend), will they look old (or make me feel old)? When they were around the first time in the mid 1980's riding the wave of 60s influenced garage rock (Lime Spiders, Hoodoo Guru's, et al) they were one of the most exciting bands you could ever want to see. They looked and sounded great : all pointy boots, paisley shirts, pageboy hairdos, Rickenbackers, Vox amps, groovy keyboards and an armful of killer songs. But that was almost 20 years ago, could they still pull it off.

The paisley shirts and do's were gone but last Thursday The Stems surpassed our wildest dreams, with a perfect set of sixties tinged garage rock, dripping in perfect pop, the songs are still killers and band air tight. Dual singers Dom Mariani and Richard Lane have had their differences in the past, the hatchet seems well buried, with them obviously digging playing these classic songs together. Make You Mine, Can't Resist, Love Will Grow, At First Sight and the underground classic Tears Me In Two were slotted amongst b-sides and album faves like My Beach and Mr Misery. They are so powerful, their songs so tuneful, I felt I should be out in the streets dragging people in to see a blueprint of how to be a fantastic band.

The night belonged to the mighty Stems, let's do this again - soon!

Ian Bell