Campact Reunion 2006

The group Cam-Pact operated in the years 1967-1970 and was a staple of the Melbourne city disco/suburban dance scene. The band released five 45’s on the Festival label. The first two, 'Something Easy' and 'I'm Your Puppet', made the top 20 of the Melbourne charts mainly due to the group's incessant live performance schedule. The most notable things about the band however is the line-up of talent that passed through the ranks and the fact that the official B side of their second single ('Drawing Room') has become something of a pop psychedelic classic, appearing first on the landmark So You Wanna Be A Rock N Roll Star compilation put together by Glenn A. Baker and more recently the UK issued collection Peculiar Hole In The Sky.

For the one-off reunion on Saturday October 7 2006, original members Keith Glass, John Pugh and Chris Stockley were joined by Chris Lofven (bass) who together with original drummer Trevor Courtney carried on after Keith and Chris had left (in 1969, the former to join the cast of Hair, the latter the group Axiom.). All are still active musicians with credits way too long to list here, but this was the first time there had been a Cam-Pact gig in 36 years! Before the event Keith Glass pointed out that the occasion came up because of two factors. 1/ recent activity with the aforementioned overseas album plus the release of a 19 track album pulling together all of the group's recordings (including many unreleased tracks) and 2/ the publication of a book titled Tomorrow Is Today on the exact era Cam-Pact straddled which was a time of great social, political and musical change. As Glass said "We started out wanting to be soul-men but the psychedelic era took effect. My main concern now is to play the music with the same intensity and life we did back then and not impose any veneer of what we know now bland-out/age/experience on it. I'm more excited about this gig than I ever thought I would be."

The show was an all round sucess with people crowding into The Tote in Collingwood to catch Cam-Pact as well as sets from Even and The Great Apes. To watch the band perform 'Something Easy' click here. To see their version of 'Zoom Zoom Zoom' click here. A partial version of the band's 'Drawing Room' can be found here and the soulful 'I'm Your Puppet' can be viewed here.