Flash & The Pan

After the fluke success of "Hey Saint Peter" made Flash and The Pan's first album into an international hit, this side project from Harry Vanda and George Young had to contend with a follow-up. Vanda and Young, best known as the core of 60's hit makers The Easybeats and producers to AC/DC (George Young is family to Malcom and Angus), were already no strangers to hit song-writing. The result was "Media Man" charting in several countries, and the album expanding on the band's cult audience. The formula remained pretty much the same. Heavy new wave synths paired to either dance-beats or down tempo gloominess, along with monotone, processed vocals. This doesn't click quite as often as it does on the debut album, and there's nothing here as memorable as "Hey St Peter" or "The Band Played On/Down Among The Dead Men." But more than half the album clicks, with "Media Man" being the dance-hit and the title track being the best of the bummers. It's also worth pointing out that, despite the minimalist trappings, these guys were pretty incredible musicians. Give a listen to the piano solo on "Welcome To The Universe" for proof on that one.

Weighing in at 19 tracks, Repertoire's 2005 collection Ayla: The Best of Flash and the Pan is the most generous compilation yet assembled of Harry Vanda and George Young's impish post-Easybeats new wave creation, Flash and the Pan. Not only is it four tracks longer than the previous best F&P comp, 1994's plainly titled Collection, but it's more carefully assembled too, boasting good liner notes from Chris Welch and eye-catching comic book artwork. If F&P didn't have any other song as immediate or memorable as "Hey St. Peter," their gloriously ridiculous new wave novelty, they did have a number of good oddities and robotic new wave pop before sinking into coldly slick anthemic pop at the end of the decade.

The best-known alter ego of the Harry Vanda/George Young songwriting team (the creative force behind the Easybeats), Flash and the Pan began simply as a between-production project in 1976. By 1979, the project had turned out a novelty hit with the single "Hey St. Peter." A second single, "Down Among the Dead," also became a hit throughout Australia and Europe, inspiring the release of the album Flash and the Pan. American radio began playing import copies which led to a deal with Epic Records. The album would soon reach the Top 100 in the U.S. despite the lack of a supporting tour.