The AngelsIs there a more Aussie experience than hearing The Angels’ Am I Ever Gonna See Your Face Again, with everyone chanting in unison:
“No way, get fucked, fuck off!”
Even the Prime Minister loves it. “There’s no better singalong than Am I Ever Gonna See Your Face Again by The Angels,” Anthony Albanese declared during the 2025 election campaign.
As The Angels get set to hit the road to celebrate the 50th anniversary of their debut single, the time has come to tell the tale of the song that just gets bigger with every passing year.
It’s a story of tragedy and triumph. Plus claims and counterclaims regarding the mysterious origins of “The Chant”. More on that later.
This story starts in 1976 when Adelaide band The Angels relocated to Sydney to work on their debut album with legendary producers Vanda & Young.
Am I Ever Gonna See Your Face Again was their first single.
It flopped.
The band and their label, Alberts, had high hopes for the song, but it stalled at number 58 on the national charts.
Channel Seven’s music show Sounds even made a video for the original version. Angels trainspotters will notice it’s so early in the band’s career, the usually statuesque Rick Brewster is actually moving.
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Written by Brewster-Neeson-Brewster, the song’s first version featured singer Doc Neeson on bass, Charlie King on drums, and the Brewster brothers, John and Rick, on guitar.
“Doc’s bass playing was enthusiastic but didn’t record well,” remembers drummer Buzz Bidstrup who would soon join the band. “I heard that George Young actually played bass on the track, but I wasn’t there, so I can’t say for sure.”
Despite becoming the ultimate crowd-pleasing pub rock anthem, Am I Ever Gonna See Your Face Again actually has a tragic backstory. It was written after the girlfriend of the band’s first manager John Woodruff was killed in a motorbike accident. Her death had the band pondering the hereafter.
“Can’t stop the memory that goes climbing through my brain/ I get no answer, so the question still remains:
“Am I ever gonna see your face again?”
“The song had begun life as a ballad and ended up a foot stomper,” Bidstrup explains.
Two years after it was first released, The Angels, then featuring Bidstrup and bass player Chris Bailey, re-recorded the song with producer Mark Opitz, and it was featured on the international version of the Face To Face album.
“I didn’t change the arrangement,” Opitz notes. “But I added some shakers and upped the tempo to keep the song moving. I wanted to emphasise the groove.”
Am I Ever Gonna See Your Face Again finally became a Top 40 hit in 1988 – 12 years after it was first released – when a live version was unleashed to coincide with The Angels’ classic live album Liveline. The single soared to number 11.
By this time, the crowd response had become an integral part of the song. The Angels call it “The Chant”. But they have no idea of its exact origins.
The band first encountered The Chant at a gig in Mount Isa in 1983.
The mining town was going off.
After blazing through their main set, the crowd kept demanding encores. As they stood sweating backstage, the band members looked at each other and pondered, “What else are we going to play?”
As it was seven years since it was first released, the band had actually dropped their debut single from their set. But needing one more song, someone suggested, “Why don’t we do Face Again?”
When they hit the chorus, they were greeted by The Chant.
“I genuinely thought they were telling us to get fucked,” Doc Neeson told me two decades after the event.
After the show, Doc jumped into the crowd, grabbed a guy by the scruff of the neck and demanded to know what was going on.
The young fan explained that he and his mates had attended a police Blue Light Disco in Fairfield in Sydney, where the DJ would stop the song and the crowd would yell the response.
Doc smiled when he recounted the story. “So, in a way, we have the police to thank. It’s amazing that it spread from just one disco.”
Over the years, many people have claimed to be the instigators of The Chant, so its exact origins remain a mystery.
“What we do know is the band had nothing to do with The Chant,” Rick Brewster adds. “And we love that – it’s something that the audience has given us.”
Buzz Bidstrup highlights the band’s performance at La Trobe University in Melbourne in 1979. It’s a blistering live version, but The Chant is nowhere to be heard. “One thousand people, not a murmur.”
After Chris Bailey exited The Angels in 1982, he put together a new band called the Invisible Men with Mal Green from Split Enz, and Geoffrey Stapleton and Greg Webster from The Aliens.
During the summer of ’82, the Invisible Men did a residency at the Mooloolaba Hotel on the Sunshine Coast, which was also known as Thomo’s Hotel.
Their set included a call-and-response song by The Aliens called No Way. When the band hit the chorus, the rowdy crowd would respond: “No way!”
The next song in the band’s set was Am I Ever Gonna See Your Face Again.
“It’s not hard to extrapolate that people would be going ‘No way’ and then in the next song it led to ‘Get fucked, fuck off’,” Buzz believes.
Geoff Stapleton ruefully admits The Chant might have started with his encouragement. “It’s not something I’m particularly proud of,” he told The Angels’ official biographer Bob Yates in an email that was never published.
“I feel a bit embarrassed by it all, to be honest.
“As a songwriter, I’ve sweated over so many songs and lyrics over the years. Songs about love, life and the human condition, and if it turns out that it was me that came up with ‘No way, get fucked, fuck off’ … well, it’s not exactly Shakespeare, and it proves once again that life is nothing if not ironic.”
Sadly, the Mooloolaba Hotel was bulldozed in 1998. Whether it was Ground Zero for The Chant, and the Invisible Men were the originators, or whether it started at a Blue Light Disco in Sydney, no one will ever know for sure.
What can’t be contested is the fact that The Chant has gone all around the world. Doc proudly told me that in the UK, ex-pats would play the song at a pub so they could find other Australians.
“It’s like an Aussie mating call,” he observed.
Helping spread the word has been an array of artists who have covered the song, including David Hasselhoff, Metallica, Keith Urban and a rugby league star. And it’s been re-recorded many times by The Angels themselves.
The band redid the song for the American version of the Beyond Salvation album in 1989, with Jim Hilbun on bass, and Rick Brewster and Bob Spencer on guitar.
While recording Beyond Salvation in Memphis, producer Terry Manning asked if The Angels could “gatecrash” a friend’s show at the Mud Island Amphitheatre and play a few songs.
On the banks of the Mississippi, the band played Am I Ever Gonna See Your Face Again. “We watched in amazement as all the Aussies in the crowd stood up and yelled The Chant,” Rick Brewster recalls.
“It was like we were playing ‘Spot the Aussies’. By the end, thousands of people were on their feet joining in. I guess that’s exactly how it spread here in Australia, with no internet and no mobile phones.
“We were able to witness the ‘bush telegraph’ in action as The Chant took hold in America.”
A decade later, Doc delivered an unforgettable live version – with a little help from John Farnham and Kylie Minogue.
Doc – who was a sergeant in the Australian Army before becoming a rock star – organised a gig for the Aussie troops in East Timor in 1999.
The commander of the International Force for East Timor, Australia’s Peter Cosgrove, was in the audience, alongside Bishop Belo, the head of the Catholic Church in East Timor, and José Ramos-Horta, who would later become the Prime Minister and President of Timor-Leste.
“When the whole ensemble got onstage, I could hear it loud and clear,” recalls General Cosgrove, who would later serve as Chief of the Defence Force and Governor-General.
“And from where he was sitting a couple up from me, Bishop Belo leant forward and said, ‘Mr General, what are they actually singing?’
“I went a bit purple in the face and said, ‘I can’t quite hear, my Lord Bishop’, as Ramos-Horta gave me a knowing look.”
David Hasselhoff was in on the joke when he did the song at the Rock for Doc benefit concert at Sydney’s Enmore Theatre in 2013. But he feigned surprise when the crowd did The Chant.
“Fuck off? What kind of a welcome is that?”
The Hoff took the opportunity to introduce the song’s original vocalist. “Well, I’m gonna fuck off and bring on Doc Neeson.”
As the crowd erupted, Doc did the song one last time. He died of a brain tumour 14 months later.
The Hoff also did an unplugged version with Buzz Bidstrup, Dave Leslie from Baby Animals, and Mark Gable from the Choirboys.
A highlight of Doc’s life was getting to sing the song at the MCG, for the Mushroom 25 Concert in 1998.
When radio legend Lee Simon introduced the band, he said: “Before I do, I’ve got a question to ask – Am I Ever Gonna See Your Face Again?”
And 75,000 voices responded.
“I didn’t just have a lump in my throat,” Doc recalled. “I was amazed and humbled.”
A year after Doc’s passing, The Angels did a new version to celebrate the song’s 40th anniversary, with Dave Gleeson on vocals.
In 2004, Reg Reagan, the alter ego of rugby league star Matty Johns, reinvented the song as Am I Ever Gonna See The Biff Again.
Reg’s version, produced by Mark Opitz and featuring John Brewster and Kevin Borich on guitar, went gold, matched the original’s chart peak of number 11, and was nominated for Best Comedy Release at the ARIA Awards.
Am I Ever Gonna See Your Face Again is such a part of the culture, it can work in any format.
The TV comedy Upper Middle Bogan turned the song into a choral piece.
And The Angels did it as part of their Symphony of Angels show with the Adelaide Symphony Orchestra.
Keith Urban reminded everyone that he’s an Aussie from Queensland when he toured last year.
Also in 2025, Metallica and American country rapper Jelly Roll both covered Am I Ever Gonna See Your Face Again on their Australian tours.
And Canadian punk-pop band Simple Plan ripped through the song when they were here in 2024.
“The song just seems to get bigger every year,” John Brewster smiles.
Am I Ever Gonna See Your Face Again has twice been covered for triple j’s Like A Version. Newcastle band the Seabellies turned it into a downbeat delight in 2010.
And in 2022, Dune Rats did the song – with a little help from the Brewster brothers, as well as Ruby Fields, Jacko from Beddy Rays, Anna Ryan from Teen Jesus and The Jean Teasers, and Kell from Totty.
As one YouTube comment stated, “Please stand for the national anthem.”
Comedy duo Scared Weird Little Guys actually turned the song into a new national anthem in 2004.
The Dune Rats cover came in at number 11 in triple j’s Hottest 100 of Like A Version.
The Brewster brothers also joined the Brisbane band when they did the song at Splendour. Singer Danny Beus called it “the greatest Aussie pub rock song of all time”.
England’s glam gods Sweet did a faithful version of the song in 1992.
Tania Bowra covered the song for David Caesar’s 2009 movie Prime Mover, teaming up with lead actor Michael Dorman.
And during Covid, The Angels did a powerfully poignant version with Ella Hooper.
In 2025, Am I Ever Gonna See Your Face Again came in at number 12 on triple j’s Hottest 100 of Australian Songs. It was the oldest title in the Top 40.
“We were blown away when the song ranked so highly,” Rick Brewster says.
Yep, this is one face you’ll never forget.
“Fifty years on, Am I Ever Gonna See Your Face Again still has so much meaning for us,” John Brewster says.
“When we play the song, we’re thinking about all the people we’ve lost, like Doc and Chris Bailey. And all the people that we’ve played with over the years. And all the roadies, the tour managers, the record company people, our friends and, of course, all the fans.
“I’m reminded of Don Lane’s famous signoff: ‘I love your faces.’”
This piece of content has been assisted by the Australian Government through Music Australia and Creative Australia, its arts funding and advisory body
