Dogs in Space (1986)

Michael Hutchence of INXS fame stars as the lead singer of Dogs in Space, a band partying and gigging and trying to make it. Based on the story of local band The Ears, it turbulently captures the feel of what the 1979/1980 Australian music scene must have been like, just as punk was moving into new wave. A remarkable movie with an incredible soundtrack, full of well-known and relatively unknown bands from that time and place. In fact, it's the only "period" movie that I can think of that actually makes me wish I was there when it was happening.

Check out this clip from Dogs in Space that features The Marching Girls' "True Love":



Check out the music video for Michael Hutchence's "Rooms for the Memory":



Unfortunately, the soundtrack for this one is very difficult to find. A CD version of the soundtrack was only issued in two countries back in '86. The German disc contains dialogue from the movie and the tracks segue into each other. It's this version that was also released worldwide on vinyl. This mix is much more common than the Japanese version, which I'm posting here. I prefer this version because it presents the songs uncut and complete, without segue ways or dialogue.

Finding a rip of any version is tough and originals CDs regularly sell on eBay for well over US$100. The only good rip I've found was on BitTorrent site mininova a few months ago. It was posted with a rip of the only DVD released for this film worldwide, a reportedly awful cropped hazy release from England. It's an absolute mystery to me why this hasn't been remastered and rereleased on CD and DVD. I cleaned up the tags, correcting the artist, song title and release year info.

This rip is only 160kbps, but was at least Fraunhofer encoded, so it sounds surprisingly good, with no noticeable artifacts. I've tried for years to obtain an original of this CD, but have never had luck. This does a good job of taking its place until I do.

Dogs in Space (1986)
1. Iggy Pop - Dog Food (1:42)
2. Michael Hutchence - Dogs in Space (2:58)
3. Ollie Olsen - Win/Lose (4:57)
4. Gang of Four - Anthrax (3:00)
5. Brian Eno - Skysaw (3:24)
6. The Marching Girls - True Love (3:05)
7. Boys Next Door - Shivers (4:25)
8. Thrush & the Cunts - Diseases (2:58)
9. Primitive Calculators - Pumping Ugly Muscle (5:11)
10. Michael Hutchence - Golf Course (2:59)
11. Michael Hutchence - The Green Dragon (2:19)
12. Marie Hoy & Friends - Shivers (4:05)
13. Iggy Pop - Endless Sea (4:56)
14. Michael Hutchence - Rooms for the Memory (5:07)

58.87MB RAR archive
MP3: Constant bitrate (160kbps)

Grab it.
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