ComposerGroove X

(Tail credits)Composer Groove X

Additional Background Music byPlanned CommunicationsSystems/Musak ® Australia

It could, and has, been argued that the two worst things to affect the Australian feature film revival during the 1980s were: (a) the early discovery by film producers that the 10BA federal government tax break system could be easily rorted, and (b) the discovery by producers that film composers could be locked in a room and produce a synth score vastly more cheaply than the bother of hiring a composer, a large orchestra, and all the fiddle faddle of scoring and recording to image.

It could be argued that 10BA rorting was uniquely Australian, and that synth scores swept the film world internationally like a plague of cockroaches, but rorting tax breaks also turned out to be an international sport, and there is something remarkable in the way synth music scores became the de facto preference for feature film and television drama music in Australia.

A Dangerous Summer takes this trend to heart and the presence of Musak ® as a supplier of additional background music shows just how much its producers loved the synth sound.

Some love and yearn for the golden days of film synth; some fear and loathe it, but either way it is deeply embedded in 1980s Australian feature films.

Apart from the synth score, the film also features an uncredited band, which provides some music for a dance, and an uncredited violinist, who serenades the dancers. Kim Deacon's and Ian Gilmour's characters also sing a couple of Christmas carols and like any decent arsonist, Ian Gilmour also tinkles at the piano.

(Below: the uncredited band and violinist)

Composer: Groove X

Back in the day, Wayne 'Groove' Myers traded as Groove X for the film.

There is a brief personal memory of him at Australian Music History, here:

The guy Harry mentions as having made an original video for Cicada was Groove Myers. Groove was an artist and raconteur who had a great place called The Milk Bar in Surry

Hills…..it was an old corner store milk bar. The roof opened up and he had a wonderful large telescope with which to stargaze…..a great guy.

While the name Groove X deployed for the film credit sounded synth modern, Myers had been around the scene for a considerable time.

His theme for the 1971 travelogue Holiday Magic appeared on a 7 inch single, and is described in sales catalogues as "laid-back jazz".

Myers is also listed as organ player in the 1967-68 iteration of the Jeff St John band, Jeff St John and Yama, here at Miles Ago.

Myers is also fondly remembered by Dean Thomas here:

Coming back to Australia and getting recorded at radio station 2JJ by Sandy McCutcheon, then a DJ. He played a song of mine called Combination Soup a lot.Rekindling a friendship with musician Groove Myers and starting a very successful musical partnership: Deano and Groove.

In the early 1970s together with US singer Sharon Redd (who'd come to Australia to work in "Hair"), Myesr did a single used for radio and TV commercials to promote Amoco petrol. The main song sold petrol, and there are more details here.

It also was known as Sharon and Groove sing for Amoco and is listed in that form at Trove here. The song, which was enormously successful in its day, can be still be found on YouTube here.

There is no record that the Groove X score for A Dangerous Summer ever made it to disc or tape, and so it's best accessed through the DVD. There is also no record that Groove X or Myers ever did another feature film score.

Presumably, though Ozmovies can't confirm it, Groove is on the front cover below, with Sharon, of the Amoco song (and below that, though it has nothing to do with the movie, details of the song):

Side 1

A Preferential Matter, Allan Johnston

Side 2

Where The Mind Can Breathe, Sharon Redd and Groove Myers

Amoco DNP-602 (Australia) / 1971-2 / Cat # n/a7" single Red flexi disc 45 rpm vinyl record