BLACK ALICE - Endangered Species (1983)

Black Alice was a Perth heavy metal band from the early 1980s that sounded like Judas Priest.

The album was financed by West Coast Records, Perth, of which was managed by Gary Keady who at the time had an output deal with Powderworks Records in Sydney and Powderworks were an independent distributed by RCA. RCA sponsored their recording session in Singapore and released the album internationally before it was made available in Australia.

Powderworks never released the album, only the single 'In the Hall of the Ancient Kings'. The album was only ever released in Europe with a deal done by Gary Keady with John Glover of 'Street Tunes', who owned the library of Paul Kossoff.

Black Alice were badly done by. The album Endangered Species was excellent and totally original, a little ahead of it's time for Australia. Even Kerrang voted it in 1984 as one of most original albums to come out of Australia. Like a lot of Australian albums at the time 'Endangered Species' got caught up in the independent 'hassle'. Because the album was made without major record company support and because the band was from Perth, there was little chance of getting a deal direct with a major and thus no hope of gaining promotion to promote the album and the band. It was not a particular success and Black Alice effectively ceased to be shortly afterward.

In 1988 Page and Hartley revived the band with help from Cichon and Johnston from Rose Tattoo to provide the soundtrack for the film Sons of Steel in which Hartley starred.

Page formed Trilogy in 1984 with two former members of Saracen and later did extensive session work including two Angus McDeth albums and in the mid-90s formed a cover band called Black and Blue that evolved into Black Steel.

01. Wings Of Leather, Wings Of Steel
02. Psycho
03. Hell Has No Fury Like Rock 'N' Roll
04. Place Of Slaughter
05. In The Hall Of The Ancient Kings
06. Roll The Dice
07. Running Hot, Running Wild
08. Rat Catchers Eyes
09. Power Crazy
10. No Warning

Rob Hartley (vocals)
Jamie Page (guitar)
Vince Linardi (bass)
Joe Demasi (drums)

a colonial jig in the song 'Man of Metal' (about Ned Kelly - title forerunner to the later movie title 'Sons of Steel' ). This song was left off the album along with 'Hellhouse' but later added to the 'No Warning' release in Europe only

thanks to Deutros
Black Alice