Why No Post-Modern Love For Combo Audio?

Combo Audio, L to R: Angus Thomas, Rick Neuhaus, and John Kellogg 

It's impossible for me to bring up Combo Audio without mentioning the fact that, if not for a well-timed mention in a regional write-up on Chicago's burgeoning music scene in Trouser Press magazine that also name-dropped the Elvis Brothers and U.S.S.A. (the band that included former members of Off Broadway, Pezband and Cheap Trick), I would probably be completely unaware of their existence.

Though the mention of Combo Audio was brief, it included the only two words this midwestern music fan needed to hear in order to give them a fair shake: Ken Adamany.

For those not in-the-known, Adamany was Cheap Trick's manager and, in 1982, his management company took on not one, but two Champaign, IL-based acts, the Elvis Brothers and Combo Audio.

While the Elvis Brothers had come to Adamany's attention via a growing reputation as a stellar live act throughout the midwest, Combo Audio's buzz was more studio-based and centered around a song called "Romanticide", which was already getting airplay on college radio and major market alternative stations in New York and Los Angeles.

Once Adamany took them on as clients, a deal with EMI Records quickly followed and hopes for taking "Romanticide" to the masses was now high. While the band had already filmed a performance video for the song prior to signing to EMI, a second, higher-concept video was filmed to reflect the band's current line-up, which found its way onto MTV's playlist and seemed to indicate that mainstream success was just around the corner.

Adding to the band's allure was the fact that they'd recorded their EP in Boston at the Cars' Syncto Sound Studios with Roy Thomas Baker's lead engineer, Ian Taylor, which was just about as cool as things got at that time. The resulting EP bristled with a propulsive sheen that was as "Taylor-made" (get it?) for radio as any song by The Fixx or A Flock of Seagulls.

In fact, I would have bet my meager allowance at the time that they would soon be joining those bands on the forefront of the '80s music scene.

After all, by 1983, MTV was well on its way to becoming top dog in the music industry for breaking new acts, as radio was still largely beholden to the same '70s acts that had led MTV, Night Flight and other video outlets to take matters into their own hands.

For a time, it was nigh impossible for this writer to turn on MTV without catching "Romanticide" and wondering aloud to no one in particular, "What of this 'Rock Art and the X-Ray Style' album listed in the video's credits?"

Having already tracked down a copy of their EMI EP and worn out those four songs, I figured, much like Missing Persons following up their debut EP with the smash hit album Spring Session M, that it would only be a matter of time before EMI releasedthis full-length LP and every kid on the block would be blasting Combo Audio.

And then a funny thing happened: The band just disappeared.

Mind you, if you happened to live in Champaign-Urbana, you still got to see the band on a regular basis at the popular nightspot Mabel's, but for those of us who didn't live in C-U (and couldn't have gotten into a 21-and-over club anyway), it seemed as if the earth had opened up and swallowed one of 1983's most promising acts.

The band would go on to release "Stand!". and indie single for Windy City Records in 1986 that was so poorly promoted that this fan didn't known of its existence, even though, by 1986, I lived in Chicago.

To this day, the group's EMI output remains out-of-print, save for "Romanticide" occasionally popping up on one '80s new wave compilation or another. To coin the title of the original B-side to "Romanticide", that's not just ridiculous, "It's a Crime"!