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 The Handmedowns – a brief history.
Adelaide, South Australia 1985
Guitarist, singer and songwriter Trevor Comley started jamming with bassist Dave Gray and a drummer named Brian to form The Funeral Directors. It wasn’t long before drummer Jason Kilic was invited along to a practice session and soon joined replacing Brian. The Funeral Directors played several gigs around Adelaide, their first gig at the opening of a T-shirt shop in Glenelg where the makeshift stage was merely a ping-pong table.
Original Line-up: L-R
Gray, Dyer, Kilic & Comley
Dave Gray got talking to Tony Dyer at the Tivoli Hotel at a gig one evening. Dave mentioned that they were after a second guitarist so Tony soon joined. The new line-up was quick to craft its fine set of catchy guitar driven pop songs. The band realized that the name of The Funeral Directors could limit their potential so they changed their name to The Handmedowns.
In June 1987 the band recorded a six song demo at Bartels Street Studio in Adelaide with engineer Kim Horne who was in high demand as the engineer sought after by most of the bands on the infamous Greasy Pop label. The brilliant demo yielded the pop masterpieces by Comley of ‘Goodbye’, ‘Quarter to 12’, ‘What’s in a Heart’, ‘Reflections’, ‘Really Hot Woman’ and Dyer’s superb melodic classic ‘Slip Away’. The line-up continued for a few more months until Dave Gray left under mysterious circumstances. Interestingly, several years later Gray gained international recognition as bassist with Melbourne psychedelic thrashers Rocket Science who carved out a successful following.
 Rohan Belton from Greasy Pop bands The Garden Path, The Verge and Dust Collection joined as bass player in late 1987 and the Handmedowns were quick to reunite and play the many gigs that came their way until Tony Dyer departed the band under mysterious circumstances. The Handmedowns continued as a three piece of Comley, Kilic and Belton recording the pop classic EP ‘Back to Yourself’ on Greasy Pop Records (GPR140).
Line-up 2: L-R Belton, Kilic, Dyer, (Front) Comley
‘Back to Yourself’ gave us six blistering guitar pop tunes featuring Comley’s ‘State of Confusion’, ‘What If I’, ‘Back To Yourself’, ‘Cornerstone’ and Belton’s pop anthems ‘Home’ and ‘When All the World Was Young’. The EP reached the No.23 position on the Australian alternate charts in Juke magazine but sold out the remainder of its first pressing in Europe. The main sources of interest in The Handmedowns came from Italy, France and Sweden where listeners were thirsty for Australian independent music.
Line-up 3: L-R Kilic, Comley & Belton
Soon after the release of ‘BTY’ Scott Allen of the Dust Collection was asked to join as a guitarist to broaden the live sound and emulate the power of the recordings. Around this time in 1988 the second Greasy Pop compilation ‘Oasis 2’ hit the shops. It included ‘Quarter to 12’ from the Bartels Street sessions which were all remixed at Artec Studios and contained further vocal harmonies by Belton. This line-up continued until 1989 when the band decided to lay down their instruments for an undetermined amount of time (under mysterious circumstances). During 1989-1991 Adelaide was in the grips of a recession and many pubs closed their doors to bands. Many punters threw their hard earned cash toward dance parties as live music venues reassessed their investments.
 Before too long Comley, Gray and Allen formed a new part time band called the Half-back Flankers, aptly named after a player’s position in Aussie Rules Football. Trevor once commented that the plan was that when they would come on stage they’d kick plastic footballs into the audience and singer David Prendergast will blow an umpire’s whistle into the microphone. It should get the audiences attention. Like many bands, the Flankers never
really broke up, they just stopped playing for a while.Right: Final
Line-up 4: L-R Comley, Kilic, Belton & Allen
During 1991, the Swedish fanzine Sound Affects released a free 7” white vinyl with their edition #38 which include ‘Goodbye’. Also on this disc were tracks by The Walkabouts, Cheepskates and The Flatmates.
By the mid 1990s Comley, Kilic and Dyer regrouped as Swerve and released the brilliant six track EP ‘Let Me Out’ in 1997. Once again it contained more Comley and Dyer brilliance but slightly more hard-edged that The Handmedowns. Swerve were busy gigging around Adelaide once more and entered the Triple J FM national music competition ‘Unearthed’ for the Adelaide region. They bravely fought to third place, ironically no one can seem to remember the name of the winning band who disappeared in mysterious circumstances.
During late 2002 the Italian record label No Tyme Records tracked down Jason Kilic, pestering him to release any unreleased track by The Handmedowns. The No Tyme spokesperson was a big fan and apparently gave ‘Home’ several months flogging on a student radio station in Catania where he was a DJ. Although the release never eventuated, in 2004 the 1987 recordings were released as the EP ‘Free Set of Steak Knives’ on Smashed Records (SMA003). The title came about from an interpretation by Belton of a line from ‘What’s in a Heart’. “At the beginning of the second & third verses I thought Trevor was singing the words Free Set of Steak Knives”.
 Discography
Back To Yourself (GPR140) - 1988
Oasis 2 (GPR143) ‘Quarter to 12’ - 1988
Sound Affects 7” White vinyl: ‘Goodbye’– 1991
South Central Indi Pop From The Mullet Era (SMA101) ‘Home’ & ‘When All The World Was Young’ 2003 >>
Free Set of Steak Knives (SMA003) – 2004 >>
Back To Yourself (SMA005) - 2004 >>
Associated
Swerve – Let Me Out - 1997
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