Machination - Big Music [1985]

Machinations was: Fred Loneragan, Tim Doyle, Nick (Nero) Swan, Tony Starr, Warren McLean, Henry Downes, John Mackay

Profile: Machinations was a Sydney-based Australian pop band in the early 1980s. Notable national hits included "Pressure Sway", "My Heart's On Fire" and "No Say In It". Their first two releases originally had a very new wavish, trancey, almost goth sound, not unlike Siouxsie & The Banshees Juju or The Cure's Seventeen Seconds. But the meteoric rise of "Pressure Sway" (a very dancey single lifted from the Esteem album) propelled the Machinations in a new direction. They got themselves a fulltime drummer and produced Big Music, a tight 10 track collection of boppy, edgy, dancey tunes. [This issue has 3 bonus tracks and re-mixes]

At least four singles were lifted, with "My Heart's On Fire", "No Say In It" and "You Got Me Going Again" all becoming massive hits both in their native Australia and overseas ("Execution of Love" was the fourth single). Amongst these massively hook-laden tunes was still some of the band's trademark dark & moody residue as a leftover from their earlier days with tracks such as "Spark" (a haunting goth-like ballad) and "5 Minutes Black", plus "The Letter" which was more than a little reggae-inspired.



01 My Heart's on Fire
02 Predator
03 Jabber
04 Execution of Love
05 Spark
06 No Say in It
07 Don't Take Me
08 You Got Me Going Again
09 5 Minutes Black
10 The Letter
11 One Step Closer
12 Man Over Board
13 Dusted Down
14 I Ain't Waitin' For No Train
15 Execution Of Love (Extended)
16 My Hearts On Fire (Extended)