Ed Kuepper

Edmund "Ed" Kuepper (born 20 December 1955) is a German-born Australian guitarist, vocalist and songwriter.

Edmund Kuepper was born on 20 December 1955 in Bremen, then part of West Germany.

His family migrated to Australia in the 1960s and settled in Brisbane.

He attended Oxley State High School and Corinda State High School with Chris Bailey and Ivor Hay.

He co-founded the punk band The Saints in 1973, the experimental post-punk group Laughing Clowns (active 1979–85) and the grunge-like The Aints! (1991–94, 2017–present).

He has also recorded over a dozen albums as a solo artist using a variety of backing bands.

Ed Kuepper's music career began in 1973 when he formed The Saints in Brisbane initially as a garage band, Kid Galahad and the Eternals.

The line-up was Kuepper on lead guitar, Chris Bailey on lead vocals and Ivor Hay on piano.

Early in the next year Hay switched to bass guitar and Jeffrey Wegener joined on drums, and they were renamed as The Saints.

Their early sound was a hybrid of Howlin' Wolf, Pretty Things, and The Stooges; it "eventually coalesced into [their] own distinctive sound as defined by Kuepper's frenetic, whirlwind guitar style and Bailey's arrogant snarl" according to Australian musicologist, Ian McFarlane.

Kuepper noted "[The Saints] was a full thing by 1974. Two and a half years later, this incredibly fashionable movement comes along, only an arsehole would have associated himself with that".

By 1975 Hay switched to drums when Wegener left and Kym Bradshaw joined on bass guitar.

The group had difficulty finding performance venues, and converted Bailey and Hay's share-house into a music venue, Club 76.

In 1976, the group wanted to record their material but found no interest from the Brisbane music industry.

In September of that year they set up their own marketing company, Eternal Promotions and their own label, Fatal Records.

They pressed 500 copies of their debut single, "(I'm) Stranded" co-written by Kuepper and Bailey.

The track was lauded by Jonh Ingham of Sounds magazine as the "single of this and every week".

In November the group were signed to EMI which quickly pressed their single and by December issued an album of the same name.

The group relocated to Sydney and then London, by May 1977, where they were promoted as punk rockers, however they eschewed "the spiky-topped, safety-pinned style of the leading UK punk groups".

Kuepper remained with The Saints until late in 1978 by which time they had issued Eternally Yours (May 1978) and Prehistoric Sounds (October).

According to McFarlane, Bailey had wanted "three-chord rockers and pop songs" while Kuepper preferred "less commercial, more cerebral material".

Kuepper left the group, returned to Australia, and The Saints continued with Bailey using a variable line-up.

Kuepper returned to Sydney late in 1978 and considered retiring from the music industry.

However, in April 1979 he launched Laughing Clowns as a rock, soul and avant-jazz group.

He provided lead guitar, lead vocals and banjo, with former bandmate Wegener on drums, Bob Farrell on saxophone, and Ben Wallace-Crabbe on bass guitar.

Early in the next year, Ben's cousin Dan Wallace-Crabbe (ex-Crime & the City Solution guitarist) joined on piano.

In May 1980, they issued their debut self-titled six-track EP on Missing Link Records, which was produced by Kuepper.

AllMusic's John Bush described their sound as "jazzier and quite a bit more experimental than" The Saints.

Meanwhile, Kuepper and the group's manager, Ken West, started up their own label, Prince Melon Records, to release Laughing Clowns material.

Laughing Clowns subsequently issued three studio albums, Mr Uddich Schmuddich Goes to Town (May 1982), Law of Nature (April 1984), and Ghosts of an Ideal Wife (June 1985) the last two on the Hot label.

During July 1984 Kuepper rejoined The Saints on bass guitar as a touring musician alongside Bailey, Chris Burnham on lead guitar, and Iain Shedden on drums.

However "old conflicts arose and he left" according to McFarlane.

Laughing Clowns disbanded early in 1985 and Kuepper started his solo career.

Early in 1985, Kuepper released Electrical Storm (June 1985), co-produced with Bruce Callaway (New Christs) and released by Hot Records.

For the album he provided vocals, guitars: electric, acoustic and bass, and mandolin; he also used Callaway on guitar, Nick Fisher on drums, and Louis Tillett on piano.

McFarlane describes the album as "stark and angular".

While Bush felt it was "surprisingly pop-oriented".

His highest charting solo album, Honey Steel's Gold, appeared in November 1991 and reached No. 28 on the ARIA Albums Chart.

His other top 50 albums are Black Ticket Day (August 1992), Serene Machine (March 1993) and Character Assassination (August 1994).

At the ARIA Music Awards of 1993 he won Best Independent Release for Black Ticket Day and won the same category in 1994 for Serene Machine.