Purple Hearts (Australian band)
| Purple Hearts | |
|---|---|
| Also known as | The Impacts |
| Origin | Brisbane, Queensland, Australia |
| Genres | R&B, rock |
| Years active | 1964–1967 |
| Labels | Sunshine/Festival |
| Associated acts | Coloured Balls |
| Past members |
|
The Purple Hearts were an Australian R&B, rock group, formed in Brisbane as the Impacts in 1964. The band included lead vocalist Mick Hadley, lead guitarist Barry Lyde (later known as Lobby Loyde), rhythm guitarists Paul Steffen (1964–65) and Fred Pickard (1965-66), bassist Bob Dames, and drummers Adrian "Red" Redmond (1964–66) and Tony Cahill (1966-67). The group issued an extended play, The Sound of the Purple Hearts (1966), and several singles, including "Long-legged Baby" (1965) and "Early in the Morning" (1966). They disbanded early in 1967.
Purple Hearts were formed in Brisbane in 1964 with the original line-up of Bob Dames on bass guitar (ex-Impacts), Mick Hadley on lead vocals (ex-Impacts), Barry Lyde on lead guitar (ex-Stilettos), Fred Pickard on rhythm guitar and Adrian "Red" Redmond on drums. Dames and Hadley had both migrated from London in the previous year or so and formed the Impacts, an R&B group, with Scotish-born Pickard and two locals, Lyde and Redmond. Lyde had joined the Stilletos in 1963 to play the Shadows-styled instrumentals and left near the end of the following year to join the Impacts.
Brisbane, traditionally the most conservative of Australia's state capitals, has fostered some of this country's most anarchistic rock bands from the Purple Hearts to the Saints. The Purple Hearts were tough, arrogant and pioneering and Lyde, as Lobby Loyde, is acknowledged as Australia's first true rock guitar hero – busy blowing up speaker boxes before high volume and feed-back became rock staples. When the Impacts performed in Melbourne, they found another band of the same name, so Dames provided their new name – Purple Hearts – for the illicit amphetamine pills favoured by the mod subculture. The group's debut single, "Long-legged Baby", was a cover version of Graham Bond's track. It was "a rough recording made at a radio station studio" and issued "on the obscure, independent label Soundtrack" in 1965.
They signed with Sunshine Records (home to Normie Rowe) and reissued "Long-legged Baby" in October 1965, which reached the top 10 in Brisbane. The group were uncompromising in their attitude toward recording; consequently, their handful of singles are enduring artefacts of their style, which blended blues, R&B and prototype psychedelic rock, a style made even tougher by the regional influences. The group relocated to Sydney where Redmond was replaced by Tony Cahill on drums.
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