Phill Calvert

The drummer from the outset at school, Phill survived the roller-coaster ride until 1982. His drumming was the back-bone of the band in their embryonic years as The Boys Next Door and he was constantly required to drive the equipment to gigs in his old Holden. He left the old rust bucket in Australia in 1980 and the rest of the band just accelerated past him.

The drumming he executed brilliantly on ‘Prayers on Fire' and 'Junkyard' was as radical style-wise as the rest of the group had become but the others were having to push the chassis up steeper and steeper hills in order to achieve such results. Phill became the necessary scapegoat when the band ran into the gravel in 1982 and he was left to hitch a ride back to Australia with The Psychedelic Furs while the others free-wheeled into Berlin and recorded ‘The Bad Seed’ EP. After his stint with the “Furs” he joined and recorded a few albums with the Melbourne based Blue Ruin.