Hoodwink Music Credits

Home , Mental As Anything, Regular Records

(Cast): The Model Husbands Prison Band

'Someone Told Me' sung by Debbie Conway Written by Graham Bidstrup and Cameron Allan Recorded at E.M.I. Studios 301 Available on Regular Records

Song 'Kentucky Fried Chicken' by The Model Husbands

The Model Husbands appear in the ﬁlm as the prison band, ﬁrst fronted by Aboriginal activist Essie Coffey as Redfern Rita:

Then front man Shakey (actor Ralph Cotterill - not from the real band) introduces the blind man (John Hargreaves as Martin) to do a number, Kentucky Fried Chicken:

Whatever might be said of of Hargreaves' enormous talent as an actor, he was a shamelessly execrable singer: The Model Husbands consisted of Warren Nunn (vocals and harmonica, Red Kellaher (guitar), Ron Blake (bass guitar), and Dennis Burke (drums) and were active on the Sydney live music circuit. They can be found performing a couple of numbers on YouTube, here, where it's suggested they were a seminal inﬂuence on the Sydney band The Cockroaches.

Deborah Conway, who sings the end title song - , composed by Graham Bidstrup and Cameron Allan - when she was going by the name "Debbie" in the credits - was in the 1980s a member of the rock band Do-Ré-Mi, and went on to have a long career as singer-songwriter, guitarist and occasional actor. She has a detailed wiki here.

(Below: Deborah Conway) Co-writer of the song, Graham Bidstrup, was a musician, songwriter, producer and artist manager, and he has a relatively short wiki here. He has worked in the Northern Territory with Aboriginal performers, and there are details of his work here.

(Below: Graham "Buzz" Bidstrup).

Composer Cameron Allan:

Cameron Allan made his screen composing debut for director Jim Sharman at the age of 19, composing the score for Sharman's second feature ﬁlm Summer of Secrets. He received another leg up when Peter Sculthorpe couldn't do a gig for a show on the ABC, Ten Australians - About Art, and suggested Allan for the job, provided he could do the music in a week.

Allan went on to work on television shows for the ABC and commercial television, for feature ﬁlms such as The Umbrella Woman and Hayden Keenan's Pandemonium, the rarely seen telemovie Call Me Mr. Brown, and Susan Lambert and Sarah Gibson's documentary Landslides.

Allan was born in Melbourne but moved to Sydney and went to Meadowbank Boys High School. On the second go, he was accepted into the Conservatorium of Music. Along the way, Cameron had also spent time in the National Youth Orchestra and the Gladesville RSL Junior Brass Band.

Cameron began doing theatre work, and toured Australia with Carl Vine (the pianist on this soundtrack) as part of the Australian Young Composers group. Allan then made a career change, and formed a partnership with Martin Fabinyi called Regular Records.

His pop music credits included producing Mutants of Modern Disco by Captain Goodvibes, and producing Mental as Anything, including hits such as The Nips are getting bigger and If You Leave Me Can I Come To.

Other bands included The Sports and a win in 1982 of a Best Australian Producer award for working on Icehouse with Iva Davies and his band Flowers.

Taken in total, Allan's work constitutes a rarely acknowledged but remarkable contribution to Australian popular music.

Allan eventually shifted to LA to live and work. He was at one time in a relationship with Patrice Newell, a model, before she formed a relationship with producer, broadcaster and columnist Phillip Adams.

Composer Felicity Foxx did a short one page interview with Allan for the May 1988 issue 69 edition of Cinema Papers. There is a later interview with him here (up at time of writing March 2014).

(Below: Cameron Allan) Lyrics for the song 'Someone Told Me' that run over the end credits, which perhaps set a new standard, even for Australian ﬁlms, for repetition.

The song opens by coming from a car AM radio station as John Hargreaves' character drives across the Sydney Harbour Bridge:

… you were only ever ... It could have been different It should have been better … yeah It would have been right Someone told me yeah heh You were lonely yeah heh Someone told me yeah heh You were lonely yeah heh I'm only saying I'm concerned Some people never learn Someone told me yeah heh You were lonely yeah heh Someone told me yeah heh You were lonely yeah heh

(musical bridge with synth)

Yeah heh

(musical bridge with synth)

You were lonely yeah heh Someone told me yeah heh You were lonely yeah heh

It could have been different It should have been better, yeah heh It would happen late And the kids don't listen anyway … Someone told me yeah heh You were lonely yeah heh Someone told me yeah heh You were lonely yeah heh Someone told me yeah heh You were lonely yeah heh Someone told me yeah heh You were lonely yeah heh Someone told me yeah heh You were lonely yeah heh Someone told me yeah heh You were lonely yeah heh Someone told me ...