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Elegantly Wasted Or Such A Waste?

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I still really like guitar players, not that that's particularly new in pop chronology. INXS I like.... I like people that know what direction they want to go in as opposed to what people might like. - Keith Richards*

Flipping through television channels the other day I stumbled upon MuchMusic (Canada’s MTV) playing Live Baby Live by INXS. I’d seen it before but this time I was struck by the similarities between INXS and the Stones. Even their name: INXS brought to mind the Stones whose reputation has each of them living “in excess.” The more I thought about it, the more I realized that there couldn’t have been an INXS without the Stones.

INXS featured three brothers. Andrew Farriss (keyboard, guitar), met Michael Hutchence (vocals) in high school. Garry Gary Beers (bass). Tim Farriss (guitar) and his friend, Kirk Pengilly (guitar, saxophone) were added next. In 1977, Jon Farriss (drums) joined what was then known as The Farriss Brothers. In 1979, the band was renamed INXS. They moved from Perth to Sydney and, like the Stones, started building a reputation as a pub band.

Many of the reviews I’ve read about INXS comment on the “Stonesy” sound of their music and the “Jaggeresque” stage presence of lead singer Michael Hutchence. But the connection to the Stones is more than that. The Stones were early proponents of the two guitar band. The INXS lineup of two (sometimes three) guitars, drums, bass, keyboards and the occasional sax is very much the Stones lineup. The main INXS songwriting credit was Farriss/Hutchence much like the Stones’ Jagger/Richards. The whole band is credited with a few songs, but most INXS works were credited to two people.

When I heard, in 1997, that the INXS new album was called Elegantly Wasted I was a bit miffed. To me, that phrase was so deeply connected with Keith Richards I couldn’t forgive this upstart Australian band for using it. When Michael Hutchence committed suicide in November of that year I started to think the term might apply to Michael as much as it did to Keith. Of course, Keith survived his wasted years and Michael did not.

At that time I also began to wonder what would have happened to the Stones if Mick, not Brian, had died in 1969. So far, INXS has not been able to recover from Michael’s death. There are rumors of them working on a new album with another singer. Without Michael, they are not INXS – not to me anyway. I doubt the Stones could have recovered from Mick’s death. Keith would have joined another band. He’d probably still be a rock star. The rest of the band? Who knows.

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