Edmund Kuepper was born in Bremen, West Germany in 1956. His parents emigrated to Australia when he was about three years old, settling in the south-west suburbs of Brisbane. The suburb he lived in, Oxley, is far from the heart of the city and a visit paints it as the kind of place where people live only because it is close to the place they work and maybe because it's a cheaper mortgage. It is close to the industrial areas of Brisbane and is surrounded today by golf courses. It is also on Oxley Creek, a feature in Ed's work for decades to come.
School was reputedly not fun for Ed in the early years, being subject to racist taunts from the "native" school goers, and it's unquestionable that he would take the role of the outsider in many of his narratives later on. There, however, he would meet up with someone who he found as a friend, and later as a partner in crime.
Christopher Bailey was also born overseas in Nanyuki, Kenya in 1957. They left Africa early in Chris' life and his parents dragged him and "the brood" all over the place - including their native Northern Ireland - before finally settling in Brisbane when he was around ten years old. His home suburb, Inala, was a housing-comission estate filled with welfare- and low-income families, aboriginies and other immigrants. It too was miles from the city, and was close to Oxley Creek.
Ed and Chris linked up early at school, the pair being practically the only two males to have long hair. Bailey had been thrown out of Richlands High School and the pair soon found they had similar interests in music and politics.
Kuepper had been spending all of his spare time becoming involved in music, taking an interest in older recordings and newer. He was a fan of Black Sabbath, Rod Stewart, Roxy Music as well as the older bands, such as Sydney's Missing Links. However, it would be the Stooges and the album "Funhouse" that would have the biggest impcat on him. "That album," he says, "changed the way I looked at music."
Bailey's music tastes were given to him by his siblings. His sisters had a love for rockers of the old style - Eddie Cochran, Del Shannon and Australians like the Easybeats. His brother impressed upon him the folk troubadors Dylan, Guthrie and Seeger.
Ed had been playing guitar since the age of thirteen and kicking around with friends, playing and singing. Kuepper preferred singing, believing that a guitarist and songwriter could stay in the shadow while the singer up front could get all the attention. This suited Bailey fine - "Any rock band worth it's salt has the local looney on lead vocals. That was the role I performed," he says.
In 1972, they would meet Ivor Hay, from the nearby Corinda High, at a party. The introduction came through a mutual friend who was keen on forming a Rod Stewart covers band. The three of them would form a band almost immedately, taking the name Kid Galahad and the Eternals. Kid Galahad was taken from the Elvis movie ; the Eternals were from the sci-fi film Zardoz, who were portrayed as a bunch so decadent they were only waiting around to die.
.theres alot more but im not going to make you read it all.
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