There was a time in the l980s when Townsville really rocked . Townsville's community radio station 4TTT-FM and the Townsville Rock Association organised many musical gigs , including well attended battles of the bands in various venues .
One of the bands in town was deceptively called the Pensioners ,who wheeled in from south , where they were known as the Riff Raff, which had an ominous ring . .
Because people thought Pensioners were into oldtime music, maybe barn dancing , perhaps with a bingo call , at first, they did not attract many people to their performances.
However, these pensioners were the wild kind - into sex, drugs and rock and roll , playing deafening music. They were anti - Disco music, wore black T-shirts , with the message "Disco Sucks."
Their wild parties were notorious . At the last one , police cars were damaged, gendarmes were supposedly kicked in the groin. Ouch! The Pensioners were thrown into the clink ,some probably wilfully throwing themselves on the end of an officer's boot , repeatedly.
The troublesome Pensioners were escorted out of town and firmly told never to come back like a boomerang . They reportedly retreated to Adelaide where they cheekily described themselves as the band found on Townsville's rubbish dump.
Nowadays Townsville has a lively, well behaved popular band of mature age musos-not pensioners- called Midlife Crisis , recently hired to perform at a wedding reception, not the kind of function at which the outrageous Pensioners would be asked to perform .
