W 1980 roku światło dzienne ujrzał pierwszy album zespołu "Inxs", który niestety zdobył marne recenzje, a co gorsza nie zwrócił uwagi potencjalnych słuchaczy. Zespół jednak się nie poddawał - rok później zostaje wydany album "Underneath The Colours", który zdobywa ogromną popularność w Australii i doprowadza do podpisania kontraktu z wytwórnią Atco Records, która załatwia chłopakom wyjazd do USA, który to okazuje się być przełomem w ich karierze.
Underneath the Colours is Australian rock group INXS' second album. It was released in Australia in 1981. It was with this album that Michael's songwriting started to mature and the band started to find a unique sound. Included were political songs and their very first ballad.
Perhaps the most underrated album of INXS's long career, 1981's UNDERNEATH THE COLOURS is an intriguing sidestep. The Sydney band's self-titled 1980 debut had been a mildly schizophrenic melange of straight-ahead rock & roll and new wave experiments. 1982's SHABOOH SHOOBAH would meld the two into a seamless, commercially viable whole, but this intervening album sounds in retrospect like INXS's attempt to get all its arty affectations out of the way once and for all.
Although the songs are melodic and basically commercial, the arrangements and production are quirky and dissonant. Kirk Pengilly's sax and Andrew Farriss's keyboards dominate the mix, with Michael Hutchence's vocals and Jon Farriss's increasingly dance-oriented drums lost in the background. The effect is very much of its time, but new wave fans and those who only caught up with INXS through its more successful later records will find UNDERNEATH THE COLOURS surprising and illuminating.
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1. Stay Young
2. Horizons
3. Big Go Go
4. Underneath the Colours
5. Fair Weather Ahead
6. Night of Rebellion
7. Follow
8. Barbarian
9. What Would You Do?
10. Just to Learn Again
