If the Martians want guitars that badly, they can get all they need in Australia. High-energy axe maniacs with colorful handles like the Celibate Rifles, the Lime Spiders and the Screaming Tribesmen are breeding like bunnies down under, making a joyful noise forged from Sixties garage grunge, daredevil MC5 metal and Seventies pogo pop. Sydney's Hoodoo Gurus have already succeeded in taking that big-rock sound out of the streets and onto the charts with their 1984 debut, Stoneage Romeos, a major Aussie smash and a hit with U.S. college broadcasters as well.

With a major label boost, Mars Needs Guitars!, the Gurus' rip-roaring follow-up, might have been all over AOR radio even now. (The band left A&M Records last year.) Nevertheless, in "Bittersweet," a moody cave stomp leavened by jangling guitars and a grabby chorus, singer and guitarist Dave Faulkner has written a worthy successor to his memorable Stoneage Romeos nugget "I Want You Back." With fellow strummer Brad Shepherd, he spikes the Grand Ole Opry gallop of "Hayride to Hell" with strident Creedence guitars and Cramps-like voodoo menace. There is also a faint Top Forty ring to the chorus in "Poison Pen," which survives the enthusiastic blues-rock beating it gets from the Gurus – bassist Clyde Bramley and drummer Mark Kingsmill, in particular.

While not exactly knee-deep in nostalgia – "The Other Side of Paradise" sounds more like the Buzzcocks than the Beatles – the Hoodoo Gurus quite openly acknowledge their king-size debt to psychedelic kitsch. Lovers of Sixties guitar freakouts will marvel at the spirit and accuracy with which the Gurus relive the fuzz and feedback climax of "Psychotic Reaction" in their own swinging "Like Wow – Wipeout." It would certainly be interesting to see what kind of effect that kind of wiggy riff rock would have on a club full of little green grooving E.T.'s. But frankly we need the Hoodoo Gurus – and the rest of the Australian guitar crowd – right here on planet Earth. (RS 470)

DAVID FRICKE