DESCRIPTION:
A short biography for a University assignment, narrated by Wade Black & Genevieve McGuckin.


"Rowland S. Howard was born on the 24th of October 1959 and from the day that he
wrote the song "Shivers" at the age of 16 with his band The Young Charlatans, music
would never be quite the same.
After after achieving local success and recording various demos, The Young
Charlatans disbanded in 1978 after only playing around 13 shows. After the
disintegration of The Young Charlatans, Rowland joined The Boys Next Door as
guitarist and songwriter, and contributed to the B side of their LP "Door, Door" which
contained their first and only single "Shivers" - the song achieved commercial success
was banned from being aired on various radio stations due to it's reference to suicide.
The addition of Rowland's guitar work was a catalyst to the innovative and aggressive
music making that would see The Boys Next Door change their name to The Birthday
Party and relocate to London. The Birthday Party saw these misfits relentlessly tour
through Europe, U.SA and Australia until they eventually found themselves
relocating to West Berlin where they recorded their final releases Mutiny and The
Bad Seed.
The Birthday Party's live performances were wickedly gleeful romps. They drew on a
very wide span of influences; from The Stooges to Jacques Brel and were often to
frightening effect fueled by drugs and alcohol. They were considered hugely
influential on the world music scene before their self-destruction and the rifts
occasioned by Nick Cave's ever expanding artistic diversions.
Rowland continued to successfully collaborate and write with other artists such as
Crime & The City Solution, Einsturzende Neubauten, Nikki Sudden and Lydia Lunch
while still writing and touring with his own band These Immortal Souls. It wasn't
until 1999 that his first solo debut appeared, "Teenage Snuff Film", which
was followed up years later and only months before his death by "Pop Crimes".
Rowland also ventured into the role of producer for the first time in 1997 with the
band "Hungry Ghosts" and again almost a decade later on HTRK's debut "Marry Me
Tonight".
Rowland's guitar cracked, bled and howled, inspiring the Post Punk movement to
modern day bands like The Horrors and Yeah Yeah Yeahs.
Rowland S. Howard tragically contracted liver cancer and slipped away into the ether
in December 2009."