Calling from a Country Phone

Calling from a Country Phone is the second album by former Go-Between Robert Forster, and his first self-produced disc. Drummer Glenn Thompson would later join Forster and Grant McLennan in a reformed Go-Betweens years later. The album also features Custard frontman David McCormack on lead guitar.[1]

Calling from a Country Phone
Studio album by
Robert Forster
Released24 October 1993
RecordedSunshine Studios, Brisbane, Australia
GenreRock
Length38:14
LabelBeggars Banquet
ProducerRobert Forster
Robert Forster chronology
Danger in the Past
(1990)		 Calling from a Country Phone
(1993)		 I Had a New York Girlfriend
(1995)

Details

Forster had recently returned to Australia from Germany. "I came back with an agenda, because I had an album written. I wanted to come back and find some musicians in Brisbane, and I wanted to record it probably at Sunshine. There wasn't a better studio in town."[2]

Forster was unsure where to find local musicians. He said, "So I went to the one place in Brisbane where, if you’re a little bit disoriented, you’re looking for information, you’re looking for people – there’s only one place you can go. So I walked into Rockinghorse Records, and I said to Warwick Vere – who’s run the shop since 1975 – 'I need a band. I need some young musicians around town.' He told me to go to the Queens Arms on a Sunday night, down there on James Street. I walked in and there was a band on stage called COW. "[3] COW (Country or Western) were a Bob Moore band that featured Dave McCormack from Custard and future member of the Go-Betweens and Custard, Glenn Thompson. As Forster's backing band, they toured under the name the Silver Backwash.

Reception

Lisa Kearns, writing in the Melbourne Age of Forster’s ‘idiosyncratic brilliance’, praised the album as a ‘softly glowing, moody, and many-faceted concoction that gathers memories from the years Forster spent travelling the globe, from Los Angeles to Berlin.’[4]

Professional ratings
Review scores
SourceRating
Allmusic link

Track listing

All songs written by Robert Forster.

  1. "Atlanta Lie Low" – 3:13
  2. "121" – 3:28
  3. "The Circle" – 3:45
  4. "Falling Star" – 4:05
  5. "I Want to Be Quiet" – 3:34
  1. "Cat's Life" – 3:52
  2. "Girl to a World" – 4:18
  3. "Drop" – 4:08
  4. "Beyond Their Law" – 5:03
  5. "Forever & Time" – 2:48

Personnel
  • Robert Forster – guitar, vocals
  • John Bone – violin, piano, organ
  • David McCormack – guitar
  • Robert Moore – bass
  • Dallas Southam – pedal steel, acoustic guitar
  • Glenn Thompson – drums

References
  1. "Calling from a Country Phone - Robert Forster | Songs, Reviews, Credits | AllMusic". AllMusic. Retrieved 2015-11-07.
  2. Clinton Walker (1996). Stranded: The Secret History of Australian Independent Music 1977–1991. Pan MacMillan. pp. 290–91. ISBN 0-7329-0883-3.
  3. "Robert Forster: 15 Songs About Brisbane". Collapse Board.
  4. Lisa Kearns, ‘Robert Forster: Calling from a Country Phone’ Melbourne Age 11 June 1993 p. 31
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