REPOST: Rose Tattoo - All The Lessons: Live Reading Festival (1981) Ex SB

(Australian 1976-1985)
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Rose Tattoo was formed in Sydney in 1976 with Leigh Johnston on rhythm guitar, Tony Lake on lead vocals and were led by slide guitarist Peter Wells—who had just departed as bass guitarist of heavy metal band Buffalo. Drummer Michael Vandersluys completed the line-up. Ian Rilen from Band of Light joined on bass guitar. He had taught himself to play while in prison and gave Wells' band the street-cred he was looking for. Rhythm guitarist Mick Cocks soon replaced Johnston; Lake and Vandersluys were substituted by former Buster Brown members Angry Anderson and Dallas "Digger" Royall respectively. Melbourne-based Buster Brown had enjoyed local notoriety, playing at the 1974 Sunbury Festival and had included future AC/DC drummer Phil Rudd. Rose Tattoo made their public debut on New Year's Eve at the rock club Chequers.

Chiefly inspired by The Rolling Stones, Faces and Billy Thorpe and his 1970s Aztecs, Rose Tattoo's hard-rocking sound quickly earned a devoted following in the Sydney area. Members of AC/DC were fans and recommended them to their label, Albert Productions.

Early in 1981, "Rock N' Roll Outlaw" started to chart in Europe, peaking at No. 2 in France, No. 5 in Germany and No. 60 in UK. The line up of Anderson, Cocks, Leach, Royall and Wells toured Europe from April. Three years after their debut the band issued the follow-up album, Assault and Battery in September, which reached the top 30 in Australia. Both Rock N' Roll Outlaw and Assault and Battery peaked at No. 1 on the UK heavy metal albums chart.

Rose Tattoo's 1981 tour of Europe included an appearance at the Reading Festival, where Anderson repeatedly head butted the amp stacks until his scalp started bleeding.They were hailed as the loudest band to play London's Marquee Club since Led Zeppelin [extract from wikipedia].
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Live At The Reading Festival 1981
Rose Tattoo played all venues during the 1981 tour of England, from small town pubs to the major stadiums. Their approach to the bigger venues was laid back. They didn't set off rockets, or use huge special effects. They just played like they were playing in a pub...a small group making a loud noise. There were always a few theatrics, but for the most part, the band just went out there and played.
The biggest gig the band ever did was the Reading Festival, in front of a huge crowd. Reading is part of a tradition in Britain, the biggest outdoor rock festival of the year. Rose Tattoo was about the middle of the line-up, but there was no doubt that, on the day, they made the biggest impact. It was one of those days where Angry walked on to the stage, but was carried off.

As he says, "It was a great day. Reading is like The Marquee. I mean there's history attached to it. I remember walking on the stage. It was amazing. It was huge, the biggest crowd we'd ever played to. You could just see people going on forever. I mean the band were fantastic that day. We played really well...really well."

In England, Angry had a thing going with the crowds that he could drink a bottle of vodka every performance. He couldn't, but he always gave it his best shot. It just became part of the show, a sort of sight gag. Angry would begin each gig with a full bottle on stage for himself, plus all the beers for the rest of the band. During the show he'd pour drinks for the boys, and toast the crowd with his vodka. After a while the British crowds turned it into a regular challenge. Toward the end of the band's set, they'd start calling for Angry to drink up and finish whatever was left in the bottle. "Skol, skol, skol" they'd yell. As the band was only on stage for just over an hour at most gigs, it was a big call. They'd want the bottle finished every time.
At the Reading gig, Angry had been drinking even more than usual, and he was way past his limits before the challenge even began. The combination of the alcohol and the adrenalin was potent. In the latter half of the band's set on stage, Angry was obviously feeling really extravagant, and in one passionate moment, head butted Pete's guitar amplifier stack. Although Angry did a lot of head butting in those days, this time, he hit his head even harder than usual. He dropped to the floor, virtually unconscious, covered in blood, and had to be carried offstage by roadies.
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He was mindless and reckless, too drunk and too high. But even now, you can see as he talks about it, that although it may not have been one of his proudest moments, it certainly was one of his most memorable. The image is unforgettable, Angry in the arms of the roadies, bloody, sweaty, tragic, in front of a sea of screaming fans. It's the kind of image that makes you realise he's serious when he says, "You feed off the crowd. The commitment is so great that sometimes you just want to die for them. Not in the true sense, but you know what I mean. You just want to give that much."
The next day Angry was infuriated when some rock writers reported that he'd been "bottled off stage". It was the suggestion that there were some fans there unhappy enough to do that which bothered him most. He tracked down the journos involved, and found out that they'd never even left the media tent, where they were too busy drinking the free booze to figure out what happened.
But, at the end of the day, it was Rose Tattoo's Reading. They stole the whole show. Angry can't help smiling when he thinks of it. 
"It was huge..I mean we could have walked on their hands. It was our gig. The crowd were ours. Even kids years later would say, 'I was there at Reading. I saw you.' We walked out on stage and the place went just nuts...I mean really nuts. It was goose bump territory. No, bigger than that. It was goosebump on goosebump on goosebump territory."
[extract from Angry: Scarred For Life, Ironbark Publication, by Karen Dewey, 1994. p127,129]

Rose Tattoo On Stage At The 1981 Reading Festival

This post consists of a soundboard / FM radio recording in glorious FLAC format and includes full album artwork and choice photos of the Tatts Reading Festival gig. The sound quality of this bootleg is brilliant and features many of their major hits. This bootleg is not to be missed.
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NEW IMPROVED FLAC  RIP 

Track Listing
01 - One Of The Boys
02 - Manzil Madness
03 - Bad Boy For Love
04 - Assault And Battery
05 - The Butcher And Fast Eddie
06 - Rock'N'Roll Is King
07 - Rock'N'Roll Outlaw
08 - All The Lessons
09 - Nice Boys (Don´t Play)
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The European 1981 Tour band were:
Angry Anderson - Vocals
Mick Cocks - Rhythm Guitar
Georgie Leach - Bass
Peter Wells - Slide, Lead Guitar
Dallas 'Digger' Royall- Drums
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Rose Tattoo Link (283Mb)
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Rose Tattoo - Wax Museum, Washington (1982) Ex. Bootleg

(Australian 1976-1985)
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In the latter part of 1982, Angry and Rose Tattoo set off to take on the United States. America was nothing like England. The crowds were different, the music was different. Rose Tattoo arrived with their Australian-produced album, and their Australian-produced sound, and basically no one knew what to make of them.

For a start, the Americans couldn't get over their appearance. One of the first record company executives spent ages on the phone with Robbie trying to get a handle on what was required to prepare the band for a performance. They'd seen photographs, so they thought the band members needed to spend hours in the dressing room having their tattoos painted on before walking on stage. They'd already experienced the make up and costumes of Kiss, so they assumed Rose Tattoo was just an extension on the theme. They thought the tattoos were just a gimmick.

As Angry says, "Basically they just didn't believe that five guys in a band could all have tattoos. It didn't make sense to them. They started asking questions like 'How long is it going to take to airbrush all those tattoos? How much will it cost?' They just couldn't come to grips with the fact they were real and wouldn't wash off." Even when they understood the tattoos weren't fakes, they couldn't believe the band had come together like that. They thought they'd all sat down one day, and said "Gee, Rose Tattoo is a good name for a band", then spent months with the tattoo artist getting ready to look the part.

They couldn't really cope with any part of the band's image. "Robbie had to say to people in the record company 'Look, you've got to be prepared. Don't expect them to walk in, and be like me. Don't expect them to look like me. Look at the album cover, that's what they're really like.' In other words, it was like they thought the whole image was part of a costume...like we might actually clean up to be really nice guys underneath it all. We were nice guys of course, but not to their standards. It was like, you know, having your daughter bring home twelve Hell's Angels and you're a church minister. It really freaked them out."
After a while though, people did cope, and as Angry says, "Once they got used to the fact that we didn't beat people up, and we didn't molest small dogs and children, we had a really good relationship with the record company."

* US Tour Backstage Pass

Work was tough in the states.   Rose Tattoo played every night of the week, sometimes twice a night. The picked up part of the ZZ Top tour, which was great for them because they'd worked so well together in the tour across Europe. They also did a tour with a guitar player called Pat Travers, and then did a full tour with Aerosmith. They couldn't afford to take a single day off. They'd open for Aerosmith early, then go on to a pub on the other side of town and do a later gig.................

Rose Tattoo had two major problems in the States. The band just wasn't gelling the way it had in the past. There were some bitter internal conflicts between the members and management. A couple of the guys were really unsettled and unhappy about the way things were turning out. They were still convinced they should have consolidated their success by touring England and Europe for a second time, because they felt like they'd sort of hit America half-baked.

They weren't properly prepared for the US audiences, and their music wasn't packaged properly for the American promoters. Although they were getting rave reviews from their live gigs, the album wasn't getting any airplay. "It wasn't recorded in America, so it didn't sound like it was recorded in America," Angry says, "We were told that to get radio airplay we had to re-record the whole album. There just wasn't the time or money to do that. We were led to believe that if the record had an American sound, it would have got a lot more play, which would have meant a lot more sales and a lot more promotion for our spots on the tours. But, that didn't happen."

* The Tatts Live In Washington 1982

On stage, the band was having problems relating to the American style. The band was so rebellious and defiant, their reception on stage was always somewhat guarded. As Robbie says, "Obviously when they used to go on stage they got a reaction. You could always hear this expression of'oh'. It was this sort of group sigh, because most of the time they looked like they'd just been dragged out of graves. They were constantly pale and grey."

Angry's style as a front man also caused some problems with the American audience. He was too brash, and he wanted to say too much. Instead of just standing on stage saying, "Let's party", Angry always wanted to rant and rave between songs about the evils of the world. His approach suited the English audiences, but the American audiences found it too confronting. They didn't want to hear what he had to say, they just wanted to have a good time.

American Crowd Not Sure What To make Of Angry

There were even quite a few gigs where the band was booed off stage. Angry would hear the wisecracks of a heckler near the front of the audience, and in taking on one individual, would end up taking on the entire crowd. As the booing got louder and louder, he'd get angrier and angrier.
After gigs like that, the whole band would have to go somewhere quiet to try to settle down. Angry would have to sit alone trying to calm his rage before he could speak to anyone.

 Fat And Forty As Support For Gun's N Roses

In many respects the American tour was a disappointment, but it wasn't a complete disaster. Despite the problems, the boys kept up the appearance that things were terrific, so outsiders would never have known what was really going on. As Angry says, "To anyone else the band would have seemed supremely confident. Their perception of us was that we compared to the early Rolling Stones because we had the same stance. We were very brash, very arrogant...it was like 'You don't like this? Well, piss off' you know."
Some great things also came out of the tour. While the death knell might have been sounding for Rose Tattoo, another rock band was only just getting things together....Guns N' Roses, the band that later became the biggest rock act in the world. If it hadn't been for Angry and the boys touring the States, Guns N' Roses may never have formed.

In 1982, they were just a backyard band, performing under another name. They were nobody's, but they happened to be fans of Aerosmith, so one day they went along to one of the concerts. That's when Guns N' Roses first saw Rose Tattoo, and in their own words, they were never the same again. Later, when Guns N' Roses had achieved worldwide recognition, they freely admitted that Rose Tattoo was their inspiration. They even, to some extent, followed in the same tradition with their names...they matched the feminine rose with the masculine gun.

* US Tour T-Shirt

"They openly, gushingly credited us with their beginning, to the point where it's almost embarrassing," Angry says. "It took them a year or two to actually adopt our look and go out and get tattooed. Then they started to play like we played. I met them all when I was living in LA in 1989. They'd got word I was in town and they called and suggested we hang together for a while. They say that we were the spark that lit the fire that became Guns N' Roses. We were very flattered, and mightily pleased that we'd left our mark on the US."
[Taken from Angry: Scarred For Life p136-143]
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This post consists of FLACs taken from a taped FM Radio Broadcast of their Washington concert. Sound quality is excellent and vibrant and includes full artwork for various releases of this popular bootleg. A must for any Tatts collector. Many thanks to the rosetattoo fanpage for the US Tour Photos shown above*

Set List:
01. Introduction
02. Bad Boy For Love
03. Rock 'n' Roll Outlaw
04. We Can't Be Beaten
05. One Of The Boys
06. The Butcher & Fast Eddy
07. Juice On The Loose
08. Rock 'n' Roll Is King
09. Branded
10. Scarred For Life

The Tatts were:
Angry Anderson (Vocals)
Pete Wells (Slide Guitar)
Robin Riley (Guitar)
Georgie Leach (Bass)
Dallas 'Digger' Royall (Drums)



Rose Tattoo FLAC Link (342Mb)

Rose Tattoo - Live at Hordern Pavillion (1978) Bootleg

(Australian 1976-1985)
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Rose Tattoo's performance at Sydney's Hordern Pavilion for Live-to-air broadcast on the soon-to-be national broadcaster, 2JJ. The performance is some time in 1978, and clearly well before the release of their first album in November of that year, given the amount of covers (including a most obscene version of Willie Dixon's "Hoochie Coochie Man"!) they play. This often circulates as being from 1976. An excellent, and I think unique, early Tatts soundboard show, there are a few pops and flashes of static, and the sound is not crystal clear, but it's a very good recording overall. A second of static/silence in track 3 has been eliminated by substituting the same notes from elsewhere in the song.

There seems to be an awful lot of good rock and roll that comes from Australia. Maybe a lot of it gets overlooked in the US because Australia is so far away and we just don’t hear about the bands that work for years but don’t get the big breaks like AC/DC or Silverchair.

Rose Tattoo is one of those bands that never really got that big break in America. They came out of Sydney, Australia, following in AC/DC’s footsteps. The Tatts officially got together in 1976, three years after AC/DC, and released their debut album in 1978, again, three years after AC/DC had led the way with their debut.

I mention the AC/DC connection for a couple of reasons: The bands’ histories are somewhat tied together in that AC/DC drummer Phil Rudd had played briefly in a band called Buster Brown with Rose Tattoo’s singer “Angry” Anderson. The Tatts also made their first public appearance at the rock club Chequers, where several years earlier AC/DC had kicked off their own career. As Rose Tattoo were getting started, they received a fair amount of support from their “older brothers” in AC/DC. Harry Vanda and George Young, who had also produced AC/DC, produced Rose Tattoo’s first four albums. And George Young is, of course, older brother to Malcolm and Angus Young.  

The following is  an extract from 'Angry: Scarred For Life' by Karen Dewey, Iron bark Publ, 1994 
In 1978, ACDC were huge in Australia and were just beginning to take off overseas. They were being handled by Alberts of Sydney, so with all the common gigs, it didn't take long for the Alberts producers to take an interest in Rose Tattoo. They came along to a gig one night, and within a week, Rose Tattoo had an offer to join the Alberts stable.
Angry was totally committed. He loved the lifestyle. He loved Rose Tattoo. He loved the boys club. As he says, it was a special time in the music industry. "In those days there was a real brothers in arms mentality. There was a real camaraderie. You know, members of Sherbert used to come and watch the Tatts. So did members of Ted Mulray Gang, John Paul Youngs band at the time, and other bands who seemingly had nothing in common with us. And vice versa. I've always loved Sherbert, but the reason I so publicly put shit on them in those days was because Angry Anderson, the frontman for Rose Tattoo, would not be expected to love Sherbert, where in truth, I loved pop music. Also, I liked Sherbert because I thought they were better than a lot of the other bands around at the time."Rose Tattoo cut their first single with "Bad Boy (for love)" on the A side, and "Snow Queen" on the B side. Almost as soon as the single was finished, lan Rilen decided to quit the band. That made an opening for Geordie, who'd been hanging around on and off since the band had first started. With Geordie, the boys recorded their first album...it was released under the name of "Rose Tattoo" in Australia, but overseas it had a more punchy title. The importers called it "Rock n' Roll Outlaws".
As soon as the album was out, Rose Tattoo hit the road. They spent the next year living literally out of a suitcase, touring the length and breadth of Australia. They played at just about every pub and club in every small town. They were a small-time band, so they still had to rough it with most things. "First we travelled in a kombi, then in a series of cars...later on when the band got more of a profile we hired cars and vans. I can remember, like so many other people in this country, doing trips to Melbourne where you'd pack the van or the truck so that there was three feet between the top of the stack and the roof where you could put mattresses and the band could sleep. 
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In the early days we only had one roadie, and Geordie and I used to do the rest. We enjoyed it because it was such physical work."They were very much a boys' drinking band. They were seen as brute macho, so they were recognised as blokes' territory. In all the early photographs, it's hard to spot a female face in the first few rows of the audience. There's just rows of men, reaching out to Angry, faces twisted with the noise, and the heat and the push from the crowd behind.
They started making big news. Towns geared up for their arrival weeks in advance. In many places having Rose Tattoo arrive in the main street was something like playing host to a freak show. Angry and the boys looked out of place enough in the city, but in some of the country towns, they stood out so severely they looked more like they came from another planet. Loyal fans turned up everywhere, and word travelled quickly about the sensation they were causing at live gigs.
The band went through good times and bad times. "We broke up and reformed all the time...we were irrational, taking lots of drugs, doing lots of booze, living on the road. We shuffled members, and we'd have a disagreement and walk out saying 'That's it', but two weeks later we'd be crying on each other's shoulder and looking forward to the next tour."  (p97-98)
Just as the first album was climbing slowly up the charts, Rose Tattoo got a new manager. His name was Robbie Williams. He was a committed rock promoter, who had tremendous faith in the band. He believed wholeheartedly they could make it to number one worldwide. He had absolute confidence in Angry as a dynamic frontman, and he believed he had the talent and charisma to be the next big name in rock.
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Once with the band, Robbie decided he was there for the long haul. Rose Tattoo weren't an easy band to manage. They were unreliable, irrational, and usually drunk, but he believed in the band, so he ended up staying until the very last gig years later.
The band's profile grew, and as they got bigger, Angry's stage antics got wilder. He became as extravagant and as outrageous as the crowd wanted him to be. They'd yell for blood, sweat and tears, and Angry would deliver. He was the tragic, drunken outlaw, the bad boy of rock and roll at his worst. No one knew what to make of him. He was dangerous, radical, and stupid. He had one trick on stage that shocked even the hardest fans. "When we wrote the album there's this song on it called 'Suicide City'. It's about Canberra because Mick told me that there was this article talking about how Canberra has the highest suicide rate of any Australian city. 

So we wrote a song about it. We used to do this as the last song in the set. So what I used to do...I'd sometimes put a plastic bag over my head till I passed out. All the audience can see is the eye sockets, and the plastic bag pumping in and out over the mouth. The crew would all rush over after I'd passed out, and thump my chest."
He had another trick too, which was just as obscene. "At the end of 'Suicide City' it gets into a really crazy thing. It's supposed to be insanity, and I'd strangle myself with the microphone cord until I passed out."
This was the dark side, the madman. It was the side that frightened everyone, even Angry himself. Pete used to talk about it, saying there was something magic in the drama of rock and roll. He used to say, "You know you've made it as a rock performer when the crowd comes just to see whether or not you die." As Angry says now, there's no doubt that's why some of the fans were there. If it ever happened, they wanted to play their ghoulish part in history. And, the fact was, if there was an Australian rock star likely to go to those extremes on stage, Angry Anderson would surely have taken honours on top of the list. (p102-104)
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This Bootleg post contains MP3 (192kps) sourced from the web many moons ago (thanks to the original uploader) along with full album artwork and all photos displayed above. This is truly a rare early recording of the Tatts when they were just starting out, and although the bitrate of the sound files are disappointing, the music is not and shouldn't be missed.
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Track Listing
01. Astra Wally
02. Bad Boy For Love
03. Hoochie Coochie Man
04. You Really Got Me
05. Sweet Love

Only a 26 minute show but very rare radio broadcast at the time when founding member, bass player Ian Rilen was around
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Rose Tattoo Link (40Mb)
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Rose Tattoo - Rare Blooms (78-82) Bootleg

(Australian 1976-1985)
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Rose Tattoo was formed in Sydney in 1976 with Leigh Johnston on rhythm guitar, Tony Lake on lead vocals and were led by slide guitarist Peter Wells—who had just departed as bass guitarist of heavy metal band Buffalo. Drummer Michael Vandersluys completed the line-up. Ian Rilen from Band of Light joined on bass guitar. He had taught himself to play while in prison and gave Wells' band the street-cred he was looking for. Rhythm guitarist Mick Cocks soon replaced Johnston; Lake and Vandersluys were substituted by former Buster Brown members Angry Anderson and Dallas "Digger" Royall respectively. Melbourne-based Buster Brown had enjoyed local notoriety, playing at the 1974 Sunbury Festival and had included future AC/DC drummer Phil Rudd. Rose Tattoo made their public debut on New Year's Eve at the rock club Chequers.
Chiefly inspired by The Rolling Stones, Faces and Billy Thorpe and his 1970s Aztecs, Rose Tattoo's hard-rocking sound quickly earned a devoted following in the Sydney area. Members of AC/DC were fans and recommended them to their label, Albert Productions. Their career simply took off from here.
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Rose Tattoo In The Media
When it came to the press, Rose Tattoo always made good copy, so writers were never short of fodder. Although he was living the wildest lifestyle, Angry had a social conscience even then. When rock writers came to talk to him, they'd ask him about the band, and he'd start talking to them about homelessness or street kids. Writers weren't interested, and it was a hard lesson for him to learn.
"After a few months of being newsworthy, magazines wanted to talk to us and photograph us, and you know, I was doing endless interviews," says Angry. "There's only so much you can say about the band, and then you've got to talk about other things. But basically, rock journos just want you to tell them that over the last month you were with so many women, took so many drugs, drank so much alcohol etc.
In other words, they want you to be what they think you are.
When I first started doing interviews, you know I loved the attention, but some of the best interviews I've ever done were cut down to about two paragraphs, and none of the issues were ever raised."
For writers, Rose Tattoo was the copy. Angry Anderson was the news. No one was interested in what he had to say about it.
In the Rose Tattoo years, stories about Angry grew and grew. As he says, if he'd done only half the things of which he was accused, he'd have been a monster. At one time, a newspaper reported that he'd been charged with carnal knowledge, which simply wasn't true. The newspaper did print a retraction many months later, but it was hidden toward the back pages. It hardly made up for the headline which basically screamed that Angry Anderson had taken sexual advantage of a fourteen-year-old girl.
Many articles also talked about Angry as a person who'd spent long periods of time in prison, when in fact Angry s only experiences in prison cells were for eight or twelve hour spells, usually for being drunk and disorderly. There was one night in Perth where Angry was arrested for using offensive language on stage, and another time in Kempsey where he was arrested for assault, but he was never the longtime ex-crim that people talked about. As Angry says, "The things I'm supposed to have done are unbelievable. I could have been locked up for most of them. You know, people come up and still say 'I heard this about you', or 'I heard that about you', and you say 'No, that didn't happen'. They just look at you. They want to believe it, but they look at you and they're saying, 'I know you did you bastard.' Even though you're saying no, they're saying they know you did. It's damned if you do, and damned if you don't."
Angry copped most of the flak without too much complaint, but he did get frustrated with the stereotypes. He didn't mind so much if someone met him, talked to him, and then decided he was a jerk, but he hated the articles that summed him up unfairly. Some writers would analyse him without ever meeting him, and others would arrive at the interview with such a definite preconceived idea of who Angry was, and of what he was about, that they may just as well have not turned up at all.
It was all part of being a rock and roller. There were just so many critics who weren't comfortable with Angry because he broke the mould. At one stage, a Juke Magazine article basically admitted the press was selling Angry short. The writer made what almost amounted to an apology: "The fifteen minutes allocated for the interview extended to a three hour yap session about everything from science and philosophy to the latest in porno movies. I left impressed with his courtesy and general knowledge, and somewhat sheepish that I'd dismissed him as a moronic jerk, simply for the way he looked."
Years later, when Angry s profile was big enough to earn him a complete feature article in Playboy magazine, the senior contributing editor Phil Jarratt made a similar observation. "There is no subject on which he will not offer a mouthful, and the work of the interviewer was essentially to keep him to one subject at a time. Although he looks like a midget wrestler, Angry is in fact a sensitive performer, a deep thinker, and a philosopher. [extract from Angry: Scarred For Life, by Karen Dewey. Ironbark Books, 1994. p98-100

 
Tattooed Terrors
"Angry" Anderson, Australia's original punk rocker, loves shocking little old ladies on buses.
"You see them staring out of the windows when you walk down the street. They're horrified" says the lead singer of Rose tattoo.
"We all love being outrageous".
The band's effect on elderly females is hardly surprising.
Angry - he answers to no other name - is bald, short and stocky.
His tall, gaunt partners sport flaming red hair, short cropped at the front with tails at the back.
and they all wear the band's trademark....anti-social tattoos.
This motley crew never wanted fame.
They originally formed a year ago as an underground punk band: Australia's answer to the likes of Johnny Rotten and The Sex Pistols.
"We thought it was highly unlikely that we'd get anywhere but it was possible that we might" said Angry.
"We just wanted to sing punk songs and have a nasty image".
For the first six months the band achieved its aim. People hated them.
"We were spat at, punched and abused. It didn't worry us at all". But something went wrong".
Bad Boy, a single the band recorded, suddenly sprung up the charts.
Rose tattoo became something it neither wanted nor expected - a well-known band.
But Angry and the boys have learned to live with this fact of life and to continue "freaking people out"
Their personalities have remained intact and they all live together in a room in Sydney were we breed cockroaches".
We've managed to remain anonymous" says Angry.
"People can't tell the band members apart, except for me of course".
"And we dig dropping clangers on stage and getting kicked out for playing too loud".
Angry is glad that Rose tattoo was the first punk rock band to make it big in Australia but doesn't think the musicians look all that unusual.
"You see more extravagant punks on the streets. There are a lot of sharp-looking guys around."
"Our stage act is really theatre but it's not contrived."
"We all had tattoos long before the band and we're playing ourselves".
"When I was young I was a larrikin. You don't grow out of something like that."
"Some people stay with us at concerts but others come once and never return. They're freaked out."
When he's not freaking out people, Angry travels incognito - he wears a hat to cover the bald pate.
"It's nice not to be recognised sometimes".
"I'm not a lair all the time"   [Newspaper article by Bryan Patterson]
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This post consists of MP3 (192kps) compilation taken from various sources (studio and live) and released as a Bootleg with full album artwork.  although the bit rate is not the greatest, the overall sound is pretty good - no distortion thankfully. This is a great anthology of the Tatts spanning over a 5 year period, and includes some of their best known hits such as "Bad Boy For Love", "Rock'n'Roll Outlaw" and "Snow Queen" to name but a few. So get out ya ol' denims, crank up ya amp and let the Tatts send a message to ya neighbours that you've had enough of their winging about ya loud music!
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Track Listing
01. Bad Boy For Love (BBC Session)
02. Nice Boys (BBC Session)
03. The Butcher & Fast Eddie (BBC Session)
04. Rock'n'Roll Outlaw (BBC Session)
05. All Hell Broke Loose (B-Side)
06. Fightin' Sons (B-Side)
07. Never Too Loud (B-Side)
08. Release Legalise (B-Side)
09. I Had You First (B-Side)
10. Snow Queen (B-Side)
11. Rock'n'Roll Is King (Single Version)
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Band Members
Angry Anderson (Vocals)
Pete Wells (Slide Guitar)
Mick Cocks (Guitar, Vocals)
Ian Rilen (Bass)
Dallas 'Digger' Royall (Drums)
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The Tatts Link (67Mb) New Link 16/01/2025

Rose Tattoo - Live at Bondi Lifesaver (1980) - Ex SB

(Australian 1976-1985)

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Rose Tattoo began as a dark, brooding vision conjured up by Peter Wells, the imposing figure who had played bass with Sydney street punks, Buffalo. What he wanted to create was the loudest, most aggressive rock 'n' roll outfit the planet had ever seen. Inspired by Ry Cooder's work with Frank Zappa associate, Captain Beef hart, Peter switched to slide guitar and set about forging a brutal, slashing style. This move created a vacancy in his monster band vision for a bass player and Ian Rilan was drafted. A tiny howler of a vocalist from Melbourne by the name of Angry Anderson who had fronted the notorious Buster Brown - which featured later AC/DC drummer, Phil Rudd and bass player Geordie Leach who would end up on Tattoo's rank - and a young guitarist, Mick Cook's were looking for just the sort of band Peter was working on. On one of Angry's recruiting trips to Sydney he and Mick got together with Peter and Ian and blasted out in a basement in Petersham and Rose Tattoo was born. The band were round off with another Melbourne dweller, Dallas "Digger" Royal on drums.

On New Years Eve 1976, Rose Tattoo first official show was at Sydney's Bondi Lifesaver and it wasn't just the volume and aggression that drew attention. Legend has it that Angus Young and Bon Scott from AC/DC regularly joined the band on stage to do Chuck Berry and The Kinks numbers (a lot differently mind you). One night they dragged brother George and partner Harry down to see this unsigned act. George & Harry was mightily impressed and virtually signed them up on the spot. The rest is history.

In 1979, Rose Tattoo's first single with Alberts was Bad Boy For Love, produced by Harrry Vanda and George Young. Ian Rilen wrote the song and left the band after the release of the single which much to everyone's surprise was a hit.

On 11th November 1980, the first album "Rose Tattoo" was produced by Vanda and Young, providing a quite awesome statement of intent. The band also contributed two live tracks, "Bad Boy For Love" and "Rock n' Roll Outlaw" from Canned Rock compilation. Geordie Leach had been recruited to consolidate the lineup with Angry Anderson. The album re-issued with eight bonus tracks, six of which are previously unreleased on 20 September 1990. (Taken from aussiebands.com)
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The Bondi Lifesaver: A Sydney legend and institution. At least for those who frequented this part of the world. I think every major Australian band of the era must have played there, and it was an industry type hang out through the seventies. It closed sometime in 1980, so these gigs must have been very near the end. Interesting to note on this poster that they didn't know how to write INXS.
Rose Tattoo played many times at the Bondi Lifesaver, and one of their gigs was reported on by Anthony Grady in the March edition of RAM Magazine #53 in 1977. It would seem that Supernaut were billed on the same evening, but it is unsure which band was the main act and which band was supporting.

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Rose Tattoo are about the ugliest band in Australia right now. Deliberately so. From their carefully grafted (rose-coloured) tattoos to t-shirts that have been constructed to look ripped and tat­tered, to singer Angry's punkoid stance and bald headed aggression they are anti-clean image through and through. Their music is basic boogie and could be as boring as any other basic boogie band currently doing the 12-bar shuffle around the clubs of Oz. But Rose Tattoo play their stuff with heightened aggression - As if every 12-bar is a fresh statement and not the cliche it really is. It's full-on electronic distortion topped off with screaming vocals and if you wanna protect yourself, you should stand at least 100 feet from the speakers. If you wanna blow yer brains though, stand right up on stage. Most of the fans do, and the band themselves like the sound louder'on stage than it is in the hall. Rose Tattoo are Peter Wells (guitar) Angry Anderson (vocals) lan Rilans (bass) Stork Van (!?) (drums) and Michael Cocks (guitar). There are three "name" players in the ensemble. Past form had Wells with Buffalo, Angry with Buster Brown and Rilans with Band of Light. At the moment, the song that has the edge over the rest of their repertoire is a non-original "Street Fightin' Man". But if Rose Tattoo can break their long in­stilled 12-bar habit and come up with a faster musical (?!) form that better suits their live (here comes that word again) aggression. They'll be out of the clubs and onto the concert circuit faster than you can say boooooooooogie. And that's a prediction.
.Supernaut on the other hand offered splendid music variation but minimal vibe. Their two singles "I Like It Both Ways" and "Too Hot To Touch" actually give a misleading impression of what the band has to offer. They're into song construction with spacey effects and their lyrics are wry and dry humoured with more than a little melodic inventiveness, The trouble with their stage act at the moment is. they could almost play the record through the PA and leave themselves at home. Musically they're absolutely honest to what they've put down on album and that may be a feature that needs re-thin king. Simply because the album has a nice sort of flow that is often subdued and approaching the laidback. But the punters at live gigs expect some­thing more, arrrgghh, raunchy. From the tepid applause, the boys at the Lifesaver did anyway. After Supernaut had finished there was another floor show, It ended with a bottle smashing into one fighter's face and the flow of blood reminded me most uncom­fortably of seeing someone else get booted to a pulp in London just before Xmas. (see last ish for details — sub ed). Maybe I just keep running into bloodbaths. Maybe it's just the way rock V roll is starling to gel these days. There are no conclusions yet. just an encroaching feel of dread. But at the moment I'm having trouble denying the links between an ag­gressive performance of say, Street Fighting Man, and real live street soldiers putting the boot in. [gig review by Anthony O'Grady, RAM #53, March 1977)
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This rip provided here was taken from a Live-to-Air broadcast of their 1980 Bondi Lifesaver Gig, produced by Double J - and thanks to Geospiri, I am now able to provide this amazing recording in full FLAC format &amp.
Album artwork is included (thanks to Graham Farrell) and to Visual Lightbox for the B&W photo directly above.

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Track Listing

01. One Of The Boys

02. Astra Wally

03. Tramp

04. Movin' On

05. Remedy

06. The Butcher & Fast Eddy

07. Nice Boys (Don't Play Rock 'n' Roll)

08. She's Gone

09. Snow Queen

10. Rock 'n' Roll Outlaw

11. Oxford St. Nick

12. Going Down

13. Sweet Love

14. Bad Boy For Love

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Band Members

Angry Anderson (Vocals)

Pete Wells (Slide Guitar)

Mick Cocks (Guitar, Vocals)

Ian Rilen (Bass)

Dallas 'Digger' Royall (Drums)

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Rose Tattoo FLAC Link (400Mb) New Rip & Link  23/03/2019

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