Live It Up review: Mental As Anything are fabulous in feel-good film

Beginning their musical journey with a residency at Sydney’s Unicorn Hotel, where they famously huddled together on a pool table to play as the venue didn’t have a proper stage, Mental As Anything appeared with a goofy exuberance at odds with the nihilism of the punk explosion happening around them. A bunch of art school oddballs with eclectic tastes and a love of a boozy good time, their unforced quirkiness struck a chord.

From the start, there was a refreshing lack of careerism about the group. Andrew ‘Greedy’ Smith, who went on to write their biggest hit, was initially an enthusiastic fan who would make impromptu appearances on stage with his harmonica, and ‘accidentally officially joined’ the band to pay off his debt for breaking one of their amps.

They left their name up to the artist designing the poster for their first show and seemingly stumbled, rather than schemed, their way into a record deal. ‘We weren’t thinking long term,’ drummer David Twohill (aka Wayne DeLisle) recalls with a glint in his eye. ‘We were just having the time of our lives.’

Written and directed by Matthew Walker – whose credits include the award-winning I’m Wanita, another engaging music documentary – Live It Up is a spirited portrait of a hugely likable and idiosyncratic band. It features interviews with all remaining members from the group’s classic line-up (Smith passed away in 2019) and a handful of peers, including Neil Finn and Colin Hay.

A happy-go-lucky origin story

Live It Up it effectively conveys the frenetic activity of the band’s early years, often using rapid-fire montages of archival images, some coloured or enhanced to align with the band’s neon-bright visual aesthetic.

By the chaotic standards of rock and roll, Mental As Anything were a harmonious bunch. While they had four songwriters each vying to pen the catchiest tunes, the internal competition was productive rather than poisonous. They avoided another common industry pitfall by agreeing on a sensible royalty split early on.

Similarly, the group sidestepped familiar squabbles over who got more attention, with the more reserved members happy to let the personable Greedy Smith take centre stage as the band’s de facto spokesperson.

While their tale doesn’t have the interpersonal drama of contemporaries The Go-Betweens, the thrilling volatility of The Birthday Party, nor the melancholy narrative of the chase for elusive commercial success, a la The Triffids, there are plenty of interesting side-plots in this prolific band’s story.

There are detours, both personal (the hints of insecurity beneath Greedy Smith’s sunny extroversion) and political (the members’ candid reflections on how a more generous arts funding climate facilitated their early years), that help flesh out their tale.

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Mental As Anything hit their stride

Their pop sensibility was in place by their first single, the laconic drinking anthem The Nips are Getting Bigger, released in 1979. Over the next few years, they gigged tirelessly and released a string of classic singles, including If You Leave Me, Can I Come Too? and Too Many Times, both of which were Top 10 hits.

By 1985, the group’s quirky and catchy New Wave hit a new level, with the effervescent Live It Up racing to number two on the Australian charts. Described here by Dave Graney as the rare example of a ‘wholesome’ pop song, it had a second life as an international hit across 1986 and 1987 after its inclusion in Crocodile Dundee.

Live It Up is elevated by the open and unpretentious tone these musicians strike in the interviews for the project. They’re particularly interesting when reflecting on how their new level of fame – which came with the prospect of spending long months on the road trying to crack the US market – didn’t sit well with them. Martin Plaza calls the ensuing frenzy ‘exhausting and invasive’, while Peter O’Doherty admits he became disillusioned with what he saw as the band’s more commercial and less humanistic direction.

The rolling fortunes of rock

After completing some monster tours at home, leaner years followed, with the band abruptly dropped by their record label via a Telex message and struck by This is Spinal Tap-style farcical misfortune when a tour was scuppered after Greedy Smith fell off a horse. Save for the surprise hit Mr. Natural, their commercial fortunes declined in the 1990s as younger bands took their place.

Eventually, ill health and weariness with the touring life saw the band drift from its original foundations and at one point, Smith was the sole surviving original member. While not shying away from these more downbeat chapters in their story, Walker’s documentary is predominantly a celebratory affair, most interested in chronicling the band’s remarkable run with the five-person line-up that solidified in 1977 and lasted until 2000.

Live It Up also touches on the quintet’s significant parallel careers as visual artists. While Reg Mombassa was perhaps the best known in this field for his evocative painted landscapes and the surreal and ribald designs he created for the ubiquitous Mambo label, the whole group were multitalented creatives. Elton John was among the collectors of their works while Paul Keating opened one of their group art exhibitions.

Late in Live It Up, comedian and actor Claudia O’Doherty, the daughter of Reg Mombassa (real name Chris O’Doherty), describes how people inevitably light up when they ask her about her father’s musical career. ‘They make people really happy,’ she says. It’s an honourable legacy for any band and one that probably would have suited those young eccentrics on the pool table just fine.

Live it Up: The Mental As Anything Story is in cinemas 5 March.

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