Add articles to your saved list and come back to them any time. The two teenagers met in 1970, during detention at Oxley High School in Brisbane. Ed Kuepper was there because his hair was too long.
Chris Bailey had worn a Vietnam War moratorium badge and a women’s liberation badge to school. “We hit it off right away,” says Kuepper, 68, speaking from his Brisbane music room in front of a floor-to-ceiling shelving unit packed with vinyl records and at least a dozen guitars lined up against one wall. “There was something that connected us.
We were both outsiders and misfits in lots of ways.” The two misfits would go on to form The Saints, an incendiary band that began in 1973, burned brightly and imploded just as majestically. Before Kuepper left the band in 1979, after falling out with Bailey, they released three ground-breaking albums in 20 months, starting with (I’m) Stranded in 1977.
Kuepper is about to go on a national tour under the name The Saints ’73-’78 to play many of those songs and celebrate the release of a box set of that iconic debut album. There will be a notable omission from the line-up. Frontman Bailey, the kid Kuepper met in detention in 1970, died in 2022 at the age of 65.
Kuepper is more than aware of the gripes from some circles about what he’s doing, including a statement from Bailey’s estate in June questioning the decision to reform the band, and complaining that his family were not consulted. “It’s not compulsory to come,” sa.