Wollongong in the 1980s wasn't the greatest place to be for a band wanting to play their own music.
Subscribe now for unlimited access.
$0/
(min cost $0)
or signup to continue reading
Venues were only interested in booking local acts if they played covers.
Out-of-town bands could get a slot because they simply had to be better than anything Wollongong could offer - at least that was the logic back then.
The band that started changing the way people saw Wollongong music was the Proton Energy Pills. While Tumbleweed, the band that grew out of the Protons, certainly gained wider recognition - they were able to springboard off the back of the early work done by the Protons - like breaking into the Sydney market and signing with indie label Waterfront.
Proton Energy Pills frontman Dave Curley remembers the dark times of the 1980s, where "the cultural cringe was alive and well" in Wollongong.
"You were automatically a second class citizen if you're from Wollongong, Curley says.
"Wollongong was made fun of, its only appearance in the media was to be made fun of - at least that's how I remember it from my childhood and I think that cultural cringe did go with that.
"Funnily enough, that was the way that we were treated by people running local venues. If we ever did get a gig at a pub here it was almost a locally enforced thing that 'local bands aren't in the same league as touring bands'.
"We didn't cop that from crews in Sydney - we were just another band to them. They didn't care where we were from."
The band started in 1986, but got serious when Dave Curley joined several years later and broke up in 1990. In that time, they released two vinyl singles and an EP (which was released posthumously).
In 2007 a Spanish label re-released all those songs on a compilation, along with a handful of live and previously unreleased tracks.
Then last year Music Farmers put out a limited vinyl release collecting the songs from the single and the EP - that album ended up being Music Farmers' biggest seller of 2021.
Curley was pleasantly surprised people remembered the Proton Energy Pills after all these years; though part of the appeal is no doubt the sense of self-worth the band created in those living in Wollongong - yes, you can come from here and be successful.
The band was a force of nature in the context of what Wollongong was in 1988-89.
- Dave Curley on the Proton Energy Pills
"Now it's 30 years later, people talk about it, saying 'you had your place and it was important', so that's a nice feeling," he says.
"It's nice to go back to those times and those memories and how exciting it was. The band was a force of nature in the context of what Wollongong was in 1988-89.
"For a group of young guys to be so powerful and so in your face compared to what else was going on in the place - it was good."
The past is now the present, with the release of a new Proton Energy Pills single.
The origin of the Tombstone seven-inch is a bit unusual in that it wasn't the band's idea.
Curley was approached by drummer and fan Grant Lawrence who said he and friends Brett Hottes and Jonny Turcinskis going to record some Proton Energy Pills tunes that were never put down in the studio before the band broke up.
Lawrence had also approached original Protons guitarist Stewart Cunningham about the project.
Both were asked if they'd like to take part, and they jumped at the chance.
Curley says he didn't look to invite other members of the Proton Energy Pills to take part because it was Lawrence's project and "they arrived as a three-piece".
Curley says it was "unreal" to record the songs alongside Cunningham and that the importance of the project grew when Cunningham was diagnosed with lung cancer in 2018. Suddenly what was supposed to be a simple recording gained a lot more significance - the songs had to be recorded properly, Curley says.
"The goal was not to release the songs formally, it was just to record the songs that were never recorded because the band broke up," Curley says.
"We thought we might put them up online for free. Just for old time's sake, no big deal. The recording would be in a garage or lounge room."
But then a friend offered the project some studio time - and so the first 'new' Protons tunes in 30 years saw the light of day.
Lawrence found the unreleased Protons songs via that Spanish label release, and also a few live recordings of gigs from back in the day.
There were a few live tapes floating around - we had Walkmans in the '80s and early '90s and kids would take Walkmans into gigs and record shows," Curley says.
"Grant's got some stuff - I don't know how he got it, because I don't have it."
Given that 30 years had passed, it's not surprising that Curley had forgotten about some of the songs and had to relearn them - and rework them.
Curley says he only remembered Tombstone when he stumbled across YouTube footage of a 1989 show.
"The thing with that song, it was put aside for later in about 1989, Stewart said there was other things he wanted to do with it but we never went back to it.
"So I forgot about that song until I saw the video, around about this time the whole thing came together. I said 'Stew, listen to this' and he's like 'oh wow, we should finish that song' so that's basically what we did."