Although my memory from those days is not great, there’s a few things that stand out for me about my time playing in Trek. Around the time that I was 8 or 9 years old, my mother showed me three chords on the guitar. Mum was a gifted musician who could sing, play guitar and piano accordion. With those 3 chords, plus some help from Willy’s father Col, I started to pick out country tunes.

A little later on, I spent lots of time with my mates Willy and Mulla listening to music that was popular in the 60’s, from artists such as The Easybeats, PJ Proby, Buddy Holly and The Beatles. We met Pat O’Brien who had been playing drums in the de la Salle cadet band. We started mucking around and learning a few songs at Trevor or Paul’s place or in Pat’s garage. We did a gig at the CWA hall around that time, and Pat and Paul got hold of a bottle of port from somewhere. Pat fell off his drums, and Sergeant Dixon ended up taking them both home.

Our family left Uralla and moved to Armidale around 1967, and I went to Armidale High for about a year, before leaving school and starting an apprenticeship at New State Motors as a spray painter. I worked alongside my cousin Robbie Poulson who was into his second year. My wage was $8.16 per week. I hadn’t been playing with the Uralla boys since I left Uralla, and I didn’t play at all for about 12 months after I started work. They had been playing with Andy Donnelly and had Les on bass. Andy decided to leave the band and I began hitch hiking to Uralla on weekends to meet up with them. I used to go to the little park not far from our previous home and meet the boys there. We would head out to the Wagon Wheels, a small roadhouse out on the Tamworth road, where Bill Geldof would let us practice in the shed. We could make as much noise as we liked out there with no complaints from neighbours. We called ourselves Hot Frost, and were starting to pick up little gigs around the area. Les moved away to do his training with the PMG, and Trevor became the bass player. He bought a huge VASE bass amp from Johnny Marshall. It was the biggest thing in the band and we could plug in a couple of mikes as well as the bass. We didn’t have a PA at that stage. Paul was playing a small Farfisa style organ. Myself, Paul and Trevor shared singing duties.

It was while I was working at New State that I properly met Bob Hobbs. I’d known of him from his time in The Finx, and now he was back from Vietnam and working as a car salesman. I asked him if he would show our drummer Pat a few tricks. He was so good we decided to ask him to take over the drumming in our band. I don’t regret that decision although we all liked Pat. It was never personal for me, just all about the band.
During that time I was playing a Maton semi-acoustic…similar shape to a 335. I sold it and bought a Rickenbacker copy…also semi acoustic. Later on when the money was bit better I got an SG Gibson, and after that one, a Strat.
After Bob joined we got a lot more professional. Paul bought a PA, and we started getting more serious gigs, such as uni colleges, Teachers College, B&S balls in places like Deepwater, Emmaville etc. We decided the band needed a bit more grunt so we looked around for a good rhythm guitarist. That’s when Russell came on board and that completed our sound.

The songs we covered were high energy and popular tunes of the day, from artists such as The Stones, Jimi Hendrix, Free, Jethro Tull and Joe Cocker, as well as earlier American rock and roll stars Chuck Berry, Jerry Lee Lewis and Buddy Holly.
We played at the coast and used to set up and run our own gigs from the Sawtell Reserve Hall. We’d camp down there, hire the hall for a night, then run around Coffs with posters advertising the gig. Friends would man the door including Les and Pat and Andy. I think it was $1 to get in. We did this a few times…there was never any trouble. We used to draw straws to see who had to sleep in the hall and mind the gear. One night Mulla was on duty, and was woken to some very loud and drunk surfies having a party outside. The hall had trellis windows and he could see a large fire. Someone yelled out “lets burn down the hall”. I don’t think he slept at all that night!

Our great achievement in 1972 was the Battle of the Sounds. This was a nationwide band competition sponsored by Hoadleys. It was a really big thing at that time, with regional, state and then national heats. We entered the Tamworth competition and were up against some very good bands from that area, as well as Armidale band Bogoslav. They were the most popular and biggest band in the area at that time. They were all Uni students and very capable musicians. Don Walker was their keyboard player for some time. They were good and didn’t they know it!
We decided to really get serious about this competition, although we didn’t rate our chances very highly. We bought uniforms, worked out an original and a couple of covers to play, and even had a little bit of choreography. To our absolute delight we won! Bogoslav were not happy.

The state finals were held in Newcastle a few weeks later. We didn’t give a great performance that night. We were too nervous and overawed by the occasion. As second place getters, Bogoslav shouldn’t really have been there, but second places were allowed to make up the numbers. They were not to be denied twice and were awesome. They had brought in a singer from Sydney and they blew everyone else off the stage…touche.

We were busier than ever after the Battle of the Sounds, and when bookings became too much for us we decided we needed a manager, and that’s when Roger Hong took over all our bookings. He had us playing every weekend, and often multiple jobs in one night. He was keen to see us busy, and we had to beg him for a weekend off every so often so we could do other things.

Paul’s decision to leave the band came as a bit of a shock in early 1974. He was doing most of the lead vocals so we needed someone to replace him fairly quickly. We had heard of an old time country band called “Whack Henry” which had been playing around the clubs. They had a young singer who had a fine voice so we asked Doug to audition with us. This took place at the Wagon Wheels one Sunday afternoon, and he was asked to join. Doug’s singing voice and style was quite different to Paul’s, so our repertoire changed slightly, with new songs from artists such as Del Shannon, Neil Diamond, Elvis etc.

The band continued on it’s busy schedule, but after some time our bass player Trevor had decided to see the world, so he quit and was replaced by George Finney, a teachers college student, who we’d seen playing the previous year with the college rock band “Rockin Rodney and the Rockets”.
This band also featured Al Heeney, who later played in bands with both Russell and Paul.

George played in Trek until leaving for his first teaching posting, which was coincidentally Moree. We found another bass player in Ross Gilbert. Russell knew him from somewhere. Ross was a very good bass player and muso, and a full on hippy.
We learned new material all the time, picking songs that would work for the audience but also suited our sound which was a very tight, high energy band with strong guitar solos and a very full sound. We knew hundreds of songs across pretty much all styles and could play any type of show from full on rockin’ parties and formal shows, through to country and even more laid back “club” nights. Our song list and variety of material was huge.

The band played on for another eight or nine months, but by that time Hobbsy had moved to Tamworth for his job, and the travelling for gigs and rehearsals was becoming too much. Everyone had had enough at that stage anyway and needed a break, so the band folded in around early 1977. I moved to Batthurst after the band folded, and found a job with Oberon Smash Repairs; I ended up working there for 22 years. I formed a band called “the Boys” with some locals from Oberon. They were all younger than me and either couldn’t play at all, or were very inexperienced. I taught most of them how to play, as well as some of the stagecraft we’d developed in Trek. After a while the band started to sound quite good, and we began to get work around the area. We played all sorts of gigs in towns such as Mudgee, Lithgow, Orange, Batthust and Canowindra. We were pleased to support Ice House on their “Crazy” tour. That band broke up after a while and I joined a bush band. We played mainly wool sheds and country dances, and appeared at the Tamworth Country Music Festival for a couple of years playing at the “Goodies” hotel. That’s where I met the guys from The Wolverines. They asked me to join them on their tour, but I had work and family commitments and sadly was unable to take up that offer.

At this time I was working at the timber mill in Oberon as production manager, and I stayed there for 13 years until the mill eventually closed down.
I left the bush band…it wasn’t really the style of music I enjoyed and formed another rock band called Greywater. Once again the members were short on experience. I brought in a mate, Garry Graham, and taught him how to play bass and the band kicked on for about 14 months or so. We played most weekends mainly at pubs in the Batthurst/Oberon area. We played at Mount Panorama one year for the Batthurst 1000.
Faye and I had decided to get out of cold old Oberon after spending our entire married lives there, so we made the big move to warmer climes at Evans Head. I was able to renew my friendship with our old manager Roger, as he is managing the Bowling and Surf clubs.

In early 2020 all my old mates from Trek came to Evans Head for a week of rehearsals and fun, culminating in two gigs on the Friday and Saturday nights. What a great time we had, and we were all pleasantly surprised that the band sounded great too.
This was only a week before Covid hit, but one year later we tried again. This time the lineup was a bit smaller as Hobbsy, Doug and George were unable to make it. However we played on the Saturday night, albeit within social distancing guidelines, and once again had a ball.

I enjoyed every minute of the two reunions, and it was great to rekindle friendships and relive past glories. These memories for me will last forever.
That’s my story…Love youse all!!
Steve