The Definitive 1000 Songs Of All Time 1955 to 2005: Number 485

Number 485

Cold Chisel

"Cheap Wine"

(1980)

Genre:Rock

One of the greatest [if not the one] rock bands ever to come out of Australia and ... I stand by that statement. Even New Zealanders loved Cold Chisel, in fact, Kiwi's love Jimmy Barnes so much, that there was a movement to make him an honourary New Zealander. Trust me people of the world, this is a RARE event for any New Zealander to honour any Australian! New Zealand almost declared war against Australia in 1981 over a cricket match where Australia bowled underarm. [see video below] New Zealand quickly realised that any retaliation was futile as we didn't have an Air force [we still don't] and our Army consisted of 14 part time soldiers, often stoned and our Navy ships were designed pre WW I. [an exaggeration yes, but probably not lost with most NZ'ers] So what did New Zealand do? We did what any patriotic God fearing Kiwi would do ... we yelled obscenities at all Australians. [sigh] As for Cold Chisel, they were respected highly on both sides of the Tasman, it was a shame then that the American record labels rejected them becuase if they had been accepted Cold Chisel would have been bigger than INXS. >click here for the video of the Underarm Incident<

I see a Ninja!

Cold Chisel's following had been steadily building for a number of years when their third -- and slickest to date -- album, East, broke them through to a wider audience in 1980. More commercial without compromising on the rawness of their roots, the band hit pay dirt with a clutch of songs it seemed everybody could get into. The virtuosity of the Chisel's musical abilities still comes through on songs that were, nevertheless, compact enough to be radio-ready. The up-tempo loner anthem "Standing on the Outside," the enchanting ballad and breakthrough single "Choirgirl," and the tongue-in-cheek "Ita" all had the hooks to land a singalong audience. On "Star Hotel," the sonic fury of the chorus captures the essence of the subject matter: a wild street battle between angry pub patrons and police that took place in the city of Newcastle, Australia, in September 1979.

Jimmy Barnes

And the customary, all-out rockers are here, as well: "Rising Sun" (singer Jimmy Barnes' love-lost song about his Asian girlfriend) and the rousing closer "My Turn to Cry." As always, the rhythm section gymnastics of drummer Steven Prestwich and bassist Phil Small provide an alternately swift and delicate undercurrent for Ian Moss' guitar heroics, Don Walker's exuberant piano playing, and Barnes' banshee wails. Walker still holds down the job of head songwriter, but the duties are more shared on this album: five of the 12 tracks were written by the other members of the band with Barnes penning two and Prestwich, Small, and Moss one each. The album peaked at number two on the Australian national charts and even broke into the Billboard 200. With East, Cold Chisel signaled that they had moved on up without selling out. The glory days had come at last. [Note: The 1999 re-release contains three bonus tracks and multimedia features.] ~ [Adrian Zupp, All Music Guide]

Ozzie Roll Call

For INXS see Number 551 & #719

For AC/DC see Number 552

For Men At Work see Number 498

For Tina Arena see Number 510

For Little River Band see Number 550

For The Angels see Number 562

For Mondo Rock see Number 693 & #993

For Nick Cave see Number 701

For Hunters & Collectors see Number 720

For Mental As Anything see Number 942

For Air Supply see Number 645

For Australian Crawl see Number 968

For Choirboys see Number 833

For Daryl Braithwaite see Number 731

For The Divinyls see Number 869

For Helen Reddy see Number 1000

For Joe Dolce see Number 801

For Kylie Minogue see Number 886

For Olivia Newton John see Number 985

For Rick Springfeild see Number 724

For Savage Garden see Number 807 & #936

[That is one impressive list! Who says I don't love Australia? And thats not even including what OZ artists I have in the Mellow Mix Volumes]

Rolling Stone have no view on Cold Chisel [gasp]

Rolling Stone magazine deemed their '485th Song of all Time' was "Graceland" by Paul Simon. Paul Simon has appeared in The Definitive 1000 @ Number 742 & #468

Other songs with reference to Cold Chisel #785, #833

Rolling Stone Top 500 Songs ranked this song at Number (We don't even know the group) the Album ranked at (Are they from Iceland?)

This song has a crowbarred rating of 76 out of 108