Like their U.S. counterparts in Rocket From the Tombs, Australian quintet Radio Birdman took the über-garage of 1970s Detroit in a vital new direction that very few noticed at the time. By marrying the wild joy of the MC5 and the borderline insanity of the Stooges to traditional rock songwriting, they helped push underground rock from garage to punk. The rewards were slight at the time, though, and the band broke up before they really had a chance to succeed. Bands like Radio Birdman justify our seemingly insatiable reunion craze by giving us an experience that almost nobody was lucky enough to have the first time around.
This article appears in Jun 21-27, 2007.