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Surf & Mull & Sex & Fun: The Classic Recordings Of Mental As Anything Vinyl

Double LP red/white vinyl compilation album pressed in the UK by Demon Records released in December 2020.

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Mental as Anything Chronology


1977 – 16th August (the night Elvis died).

MENTAL AS ANYTHING (Reg Mombassa, Greedy Smith, Martin Plaza, Wayne ‘Bird’ Delisle and Peter O’Doherty) perform together for the first time at the Cellblock Theatre, East Sydney Tech. Start a year long residency at the Unicorn Hotel, Sydney (using the pool table as their stage).

1978 - Move to the Civic Hotel, Sydney, for another year long residency on a larger stage.

1979 - The Nips Are Getting Bigger and the album Get Wet hit Top 20 in Australia. Nips released in UK, reaches indy Top 40.

1980 - Come Around off the album Espresso Bongo manages to hit Top 20. Release another hit single (Just Like) Romeo and Juliet Dec ’80

1981 - If You Leave Me Can I Come Too? & Too Many Times, two of the year’s biggest singles off the Platinum Album Cats And Dogs. Too Many Times goes to number 19 in Canada.

1982 - Tour USA. Release single I Didn’t Mean To Be Mean (produced by Elvis Costello). First single, Close Again, from the album Creatures Of Leisure. Band tours U.S and Canada.

1983 - Spirit Got Lost & Brain, Brain released off Top 10 album Creatures Of Leisure. Also release cover of Roy Orbison’s Working For The Man. Too Many Times hits Top 20 in Canada as the band tours Canada and USA – First Group Art Exhibition, with works by each of the band members, held at Watters Gallery, Darlinghurst (Sydney). Buyers included Patrick White and Elton John. (White later bequeathed one of Reg’s works to The Art Gallery of NSW)

1984 - Apocalypso (Wiping The Smile Off Santa’s Face) the band’s only Christmas single

1985 - Fundamental As Anything – Platinum Best Selling Australian Album – Live It Up – Best Selling Australian Single – singles You’re So Strong( No. 8) / Date With Destiny(No. 18) – multi platinum Greatest Hits Vol I goes to No. 2 on the charts – Live It Up received Apra award for most performed work and Countdown award for best single and song writer.

1986 - Live It Up -no.1 in Scandinavia No.2 in Germany and No.3 in the U.K – Band tours UK, Holland, Spain and Italy (Band wins coveted Telegatto award on Italian TV)

1987 - Release Top 20 album Mouth To Mouth. Singles Let’s Go To Paradise & He’s Just No Good For You also enter Top 20.

– Also release a Top 40 cover of Elvis Presley’s Love Me Tender

– Band tours UK again and then N.E. USA and Canada with Robert Palmer.

1988 - Rock & Roll Music from the film soundtrack YOUNG EINSTEIN reaches No. 6 on the charts

1989 - Another Top 40 Album – Cyclone Raymond with the No.15World Seems Difficult and top 5 hit Rock n Roll music.

1990 - Then deputy Prime Minister, Paul Keating, opens second Mental As Anything Art Exhibition with works by all five Mentals attracting huge critical acclaim. It tours Tamworth at the Country Music Festival, travelling on to Melbourne, Lismore, Campbelltown and back to Sydney.

1993 - Release B Sides and rarities album Chemical Travel

1994 - Bicycle EP Tour – limited copies of the EP given away to loyal fans around the country – Radio picks up Mr Natural off the Bicycle EP CD sampler

1995 - The album Liar, Liar Pants on Fire enters the top 40, to glowing reviews, and the single Mr Natural hits Top 30. Two other singles are released – Nigel, which instantly becomes a radio hit, and Whole Wide World, a cover originally written and recorded by Reckless Eric.

1996 - Marianne, the final single from Liar, Liar…, is released and the band retreat into the studio to work extensively on their new album., An appearance at the Mountain Rock Festival in New Zealand, followed by the Australian Tour with Chris Isaak and a tour of New Zealand with The Exponents.

1997 - Release Garage LP. Mentals III art exhibition opened in Sydney by ex- PM Gough Whitlam. This exhibition then tours Australia continuously till late 2002.

1998 - Tour UK

1999 - Bass player and songwriter Peter O’Doherty leaves the band to become a full-time painter. He goes on to win numerous art prizes and continues to this day to have very successful exhibitions around Australia and abroad. He is replaced by Rockhampton raised David Barraclough who had spent the previous seven years as guitarist for New Zealand pop rock idols The Exponents. He decides to switch to bass for The Mentals.

2000 - Mentals play Ho Chi Minh city in Vietnam on Australia day. Soon after, Reg Mombassa leaves the band to concentrate on his art. He is a major designer for the closing ceremony of the Sydney Olympics. He also continues as a major designer for Mambo Surfwear and he continues to have sell-out exhibitions of his painting, drawing and print making, both in Australia and overseas. Both Peter and Reg will continue to successfully perform and record as Reg and Pete’s Dog Trumpet. Meanwhile back in the Mentals, Reg is replaced on guitar by Murray Cook, a gifted multi-instrumentalist who has played with Midnight Oil, Warumpi Band, Mixed Relations, Marlene Cummings, Leah Purcell and Lock, Stock and Darryl. Recorded Beetroot Stains album produced by the band, recorded by David Barraclough, mixed by John Haeny, Andrew Beck and Jonathon Burnside.

Liar Liar Pants on Fire

Reg's art took the ARIA Award for "Best Australian Cover Art" for Mental as Anything's CD Liar Liar Pants on Fire in 1996.

Reg has also created cover art for Mondo Rock, The Stetsons, Bellydance, Floyd Vincent and the Childbrides, Dog Trumpet, Mary-Jo Starr, PIL, and Crowded House.

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© 2022 Reg Mombassa