Dude Raunch

Rip It Up, Issue 16, 1 October 1978, Page 1

Dude Raunch

Bruce Belsham

Th’ Dudes profess to be modest people. Guitarist lan Morris claims that two and a half years ago, when Th' Dudes were born, filling the Windsor Castle seemed a distant pinnacle of achievement. Hardly the reckless stuff that sends young men of ambition into giddy heights of fame. Now playing the celebrated Parnell beer-hall is routine and the band is still making progress. Steadily Th’ Dudes are securing a place as one of the outfits of real promise in Auckland

With their standard two guitar, bass, drums line up and their mixture of nuggety rock and roll covers and originals, they have become familiar figures in Auckland clubs and bars. Th’ Dudes have a reputation as a hot dance band and kids follow them around with an enthusiasm which seems a sign of the city's younger music fans.

However, there exists, with Th’ Dudes, a healthy feeling that the band means something more than their current working-band status. To an extent the optimism surrounding them has to be taken on credit. Despite the buzz, little concrete evidence of their potential exists no record contract, no air play, no extensive tours, one cancelled support tour with Dragon.

On the credit side, the band have useful amounts of talent, patience and time. “The progress has been, apparently to other people, slow.” says singer Peter Urlich. “We’ve been around for a while now, but there’s no real hurry cause we’re all still young and we’re all still learning to play. I’m still learning how to sing

hold my notes and stuff like that. We don’t need to be chart-busters yet.”

The band’s background explains much of their attitude. The three front men, Morris. Urlich and guitarist Dave Dobbyn, are school friends, product of Sacred Heart College which has also processed the Chunn Bros, the Finns and Phil Judd. Urlich, Morris and Dobbyn continue to

think of the music world as fun. All in their early twenties, they form the heart of Th’ Dudes and assert that if this band folds, none of them want to work in any other. If the sentiment sounds uncomfortably close to young love, major advantages develop from loyalty. The primary one is that internal unity can ensure time to progress. “I’m not going to say this band’s made of concrete or anything,” says Urlich, “I can see problems arising. But we’ll just have to hope the music keeps us together. We have a lot of fun. We find things are just happening. It’s like going along a road with the milestones steadily coming by.”

How many further milestones Th’ Dudes see pass will depend on how far they develop their undoubted musical talents. At their best, Th’ Dudes are very good. They display a compact and economical use of the two guitar set-up. Their rhythm section of Bruce Hambling (drums) and Peter White (bass) is an efficient, cohesive unit underlying what are often highly inventive guitar arrangements. At worst. Th’ Dudes can relax the sparseness of their sound to the point where it becomes shambling. Tapes of the live

show they did for the IZM Radio Workshop seem to indicate that they could pick up the tempo occasionally for Increased impact. But assuming little Inconsistencies are Ironed out (and the band are very critical of their own mistakes) more significance will lie within song-writing. At present Th’ Dudes are able to present a full bracket of original songs to receptive audiences. "We're getting a lot of real good positive encouragement lately from people saying have you written any new songs?’" When' we announce a new one," says Dobbyn, "people are actually clapping. The people we’ve been playing to lately, - they want to hear original stuff. Maybe next month we’ll be doing two brackets of our own material."" Even If well in arrears of someone like Citizen Band who have firmly established a right to play originals, Th’ Dudes are thinking carefully about their songs. For dances and pubs, they play a

large measure of gutsy, primitive rock and roll Rolling Stones, MC 5, Troags. But this tendency Is discarded for Morris's and Dobbyn s own song composition. In the future, the band claim, there will be a leaning away from the heavy metal approach. "Any of the heavy stuff we do Is just for fun. It's a lot of fun doing that raunchy material." Dobbyn, In claiming that his real Idols are the Beatles and not MCS, speaks for the rest of the band.

Of the fourteen or fifteen originals at Th’ Dudes' command, there are several which fit the three minute, pop song prescription the band gives as an ideal. lan Morris’s "Right First Time" a song that is about a year old, has a chorus which might have felt at home with the early Kinks. Dave Dobbyn's "Tonight Again” evokes memories of The Dave Clark Five. Songs like "Here comes the Money" display that while Th’ Dudes also, have their aggressive side, It is in the tighter and more strictly melodic of their songs that they shine. Dobbyn, with numbers like "On a Sunday" and the tense, Insistent ballad “Quite Frankly" is Th’ Dudes greatest asset in this regard.' His songs (although Morris does most of the Arrangements) are the ones In which the band sound most committed. - There is no doubt that Th' Dudes as a whole have become committed to their own material. Criticism Is sometimes levelled at them for putting more energy into the half of a set that contains their own work and Th' Dudes themselves say they have lost interest .in cover versions over the past two months. Their noisy version of "White Punks on Dope," a crowd favourite, comes over as much more jokesy than tough. It characterises much of the heavy covers they do.

Yet provided the song writing continues to develop, such an attitude Is no real hazard. Urlich Is becoming a strong and flexible singer, a useful frontman, and the band behind him is learning Its business well. There is no reason for Th' Dudes not being able to stand on their own merit In the near future.

. The band thinks the same way. They Intend to go fully professional In early November. A tour Is on the books. Around provincial towns for promotion and in the words of Peter Urlich "to toughen up". Suitably toughened and polished, Th’ Dudes should return as obvious candidates for recording. Surely not even* New Zealand's wayward recording policies can ignore them for long.