The Go-Betweens on DeBaser: reviews, albums, and facts

The Profile

The Go-Betweens were an Australian indie rock band formed in Brisbane by Robert Forster and Grant McLennan. Celebrated for literate songwriting and jangling guitar pop, they issued classic 1980s albums and reunited for acclaimed 2000s records. The band ended after McLennan’s death on 6 May 2006.

Formed in Brisbane in 1977 by Robert Forster and Grant McLennan; active 1977–1989 and 2000–2006. Known for songs such as Streets of Your Town and Cattle and Cane. Final studio album was Oceans Apart (2005). Grant McLennan died on 6 May 2006. Brisbane’s Go Between Bridge (opened 2010) was named in their honor.

Seven DeBaser reviews trace The Go-Betweens’ path from 1980s classics to their 2000s reunion. Writers praise the Forster–McLennan songwriting balance, jangle-pop elegance, and literate melancholy. Albums like Before Hollywood, Spring Hill Fair, Liberty Belle…, 16 Lovers Lane, and Oceans Apart receive strong acclaim. One piece is an in-memoriam for Grant McLennan (1958–2006).

Notable Quotes

❝ Before Hollywood is the second album by the Go-Betweens, the band from Brisbane, Australia, and it is considered by many to be one of the greatest masterpieces of rock music (even though this could be said for all the albums recorded by the Forster-McLennan duo).

❝ New album for the Go-Betweens, and once again the Australian band does not disappoint expectations, delivering a perfect album centered on an explosive mix of engaging rhythms and captivating melodies.

❝ Bright Yellow Bright Orange may not be a masterpiece, but it matters little because the album works.

❝ Spring Hill Fair is a unique album in its genre, music with an unmistakable flavor, beautiful, joyful, paranoid, mysterious, and relaxing and hysterical at the same time... and above all that unmistakable mark... the mark of the Go-Betweens.

❝ Overall, a very pleasant album that with each listen keeps its main qualities intact.

❝ The Go-Betweens took quite a while, five albums, to release this treasure chest filled with jewels, now buried by the sands of time; indeed, we are talking about 1988.