Various Artists-”Love is in the air
Wow, this is weird. Without the context of the fabulous ABC series of the same name, the Love Is In The Air compilation would seem like just an odd collection of Australian music. Love Is etc also demonstrates just how camp Aussie rock really is. Back up our Olivia Newton-John’s I Love You, I Honestly Love You with Skyhooks’ All My Friends Are Getting Married if you don’t believe that. Or how about the queer-as Peter Allen’s balladodrama Tenterfield Saddler and Renee Geyer’s Stares And Whispers? The five-part ABC series is plugged as being all about the biggest and brightest Australian hits of the past 40 years, and so is this compilation. Except, interestingly, there’s no Barnesy or Farnsey. The closest to the former is the horrible Take Me Back by Noiseworks which was recently reborn as an Australian Idol moment by that country boy competitor. And the latter? Probably Moving Pictures’ singular single What About Me. As well as camp (which peaks, of course, with Kylie’s What Do I Have To Do?) Love Is In The Air has a heap of great queer-ish classic Oz rock of the 70s and 80s -“ does anyone remember Mi-Sex’s Computer Games or Australian Crawl’s Boys Light Up? Thankfully, the compilers do. Rugby fans, take note. There’s a nation full of music out there that would make a better official song than Waltzing Matilda.
