Texas Radio and the Big Beat have been together for some time. In the beginning, after playing at most venues in Newcastle NSW and spending time in studios in both Newcastle and Sydney, their tune Wasteaway was featured on the 'Cat in A Hat' compilation album. The compilation was released in 1995 here in Australia and played on college radio in the United States. Since then, Texas Radio and the Big Beat have released two albums. Their first full-length venture was in 1997, released on the independent label, PMP Records.

This self-titled album was well received by the critics with Wayne Hindson from Concrete Press saying that "their pop melodies were refreshing in this age of heavy guitar rock." Greg Cormack from the same music magazine declared that, "Texas Radio bring relatively simple arrangements to life with terrific energy. Highlights are many. It has lots of fun, a lot of feeling and I could only be more impressed if there was actually someone who didn't like something about this record. Seek this album out." Chad Watson from The Herald wrote, "it was a relief to hear sublime pop instrumentation from solid players. The album opens with Wasteaway, a haunting song that smacks of urban reggae. Hope and Glory oozes with gorgeous keyboards while my favourite, Temptation, was built on moving lyrics and a diverse base of splendid guitar work. An impressive debut album!" 

After the album release the band undertook a few short tours from Sydney through to the North Coast to promote it, as well as landing support slots with bands like the Saints and Dave Graney and the Coral Snakes. With this album in hand, The Radios, as they became affectionately known, accumulated an extensive media file, including press clippings, television stories with Prime TV, as well as radio interviews and live to air performances (2NURFM, Austereo station NXFM, 2BOBFM and NEW FM). 2BOBFM made it "album of the week!" Songs from that first album also received regular airplay on internet based ILR radio during 2004 with tracks being played in Europe, the USA and Australia. This airplay pushed Paris Island, a song from that first Texas Radio album, to number one on the ILR Radio ‘Aussie’ charts.

After releasing NASA (Be Informed) as a Christmas single and video in 2002, they took a hiatus, accumulating a wide range of experiences (screen writing, games designing, producing and engineering other artists recordings, and playing studio sessions). Then in 2018 they released 'Everything's Okay', their second album. Karen, one of the band's biggest fans, exclaimed - “It’s in my car all the time - sounds like the Beatles – well not the Beatles but like you – it’s the Beatles! – every song is different but every song is just as catchy as the others - I love it! – You’ve got to let everybody know about it – have you let everybody know about it?!!”  Famed mastering engineer, Don Bartley, who worked on the post-production of the album, simply said, “Good Record!” 

Band biographies

Phillip McIntyre

Phillip played his first gig at seventeen. Since then he has played hundreds of shows, working in bands like Boris and the Karloffs, Rum Jungle, Rush, Dee Zees, The Rhythmbusters, and now Texas Radio and the Big Beat. In those bands he was a vocalist, songwriter, performer, musical director and often their manager. As well as the many backyard parties, country halls, town halls, golf clubs, bowling clubs, surf clubs, nightclubs, RSLs, wedding venues, festival stages and the many, many pubs he has played in, he has also performed on the same bill as bands like Heroes, Ayers Rock, Eurogliders, Moving Pictures, The Saints, Dave Graney and the Coral Snakes and quite a number of others.

As a producer and engineer he has recorded a wide variety of bands including recordings he made for Einstein’s Wireless, No Reason, Hanged Man, Wyndham Earle, Magic Bus, Men Without Shame, Housequake, The Hauntingly Beautiful Mousemoon, Supersonic, Peter Mackie, Rum Jungle etc. He has spent many nights on the road hired as a Front of House engineer by bands like Silverchair, the Don Burrows Band, Steve Gibson and the New Cowboys, The Tex Pistols, Something for Kate, Floyd Vincent and the Childbrides, Tactics, Small Toys, Faceplant, Raiding Party, I Go Bang, Punch Heads and Bolt, Skazoo, Little Hornet, Men Without Shame, Natural Mystics, Soda Jerks, Heartfelt Rodneys and Supersonic. During this time he was also hired to stage manage the Cockroaches, the Ted Mulry Gang and DV8 helping out with their back line. A number of the music videos he produced, directed and edited have been broadcast on ABCTV and he continues to produce and engineer music recordings for local artists.

Phillip’s work as a music journalist entailed interviewing and writing feature stories on a wide range of musicians including David Bowie, John Fogerty, Paul Kelly, Dave Faulkner, Andrew Farris, Don Walker, Daniel Johns, Mandawuy Yunupingu, Tim Rogers and many, many others. His stories have been published in On the Street, Concrete Press, Uturn, Reverb and Attitude. He also managed the musical instrument section of Berrigan’s Music, a large music retailer with a chain of stores across the north-east of NSW. For a short time, he also produced and presented a local music radio program on 2NUR FM. He also sat on the 2NUR Advisory Board for ten years. A recent radio documentary series he co-produced, directed, shot and edited, and wrote and recorded the theme music for, was made about the wine industry for ABC Radio. It was funded by the ABC's Regional Production Fund.

Phillip is now a respected music industry figure in Newcastle. He has taught in the Ausmusic Basic Music Industry Skills course at TAFE as well as teaching courses for the Music Industry Training Package at WEA. He began teaching at the University of Newcastle in 1994 and achieved a full-time continuing position there in 1999.

Dr McIntyre was also heavily involved in managing the award-winning independent band Supersonic. The album project he helped them with ran from 2003 to 2004 and was primarily funded by the band's activities and a group of investors. Dr McIntyre was instrumental in negotiating this funding. The project involved the coordination and oversight of the recording, manufacture, release and promotion of a popular music single, an album of songs and a video, as well as the business management of the musical group involved. Phillip undertook the planning, budgetary and oversight responsibilities during this project period (2003-2004). The project also required engaging a PR firm (AMB), a manufacturing plant (MAD) as well as negotiating conditions and terms with a commercial distributor (MGM) for the product. The project also saw him acting as the producer of a promotional video clip using an eight person crew. The management of this entire project by Phillip McIntyre eventually involved the organisation of the work and transportation of five personnel touring across the east coast of Australia. Dr McIntyre's management and creative expertise was instrumental in the success of this project.

Professor Phillip McIntyre’s latest album of songs with Texas Radio and the Big Beat, 'Everything's Okay', was produced and engineered by himself and was released in 2018. An EP of AI inspired tunes he produced and performed under the name Tree and the Machine was released in 2020. Both are available on iTunes, Spotfiy, Pandora and a host of other online streaming and subscriptions services.

For more information about Phillip, see his Research and Consulting page.

Joe Velikovsky

For more information see Joe's site at joeteevee.

Dave Carruthers

Before joining Texas Radio, Dave played in a number of bands including Room 101. He comes from a family of musical siblings. On the day Dave auditioned for Texas Radio he was the first name on the list. Joe and Phil liked him so much they cancelled all the others right there and then.

Dave's fairly quiet, except when he's on the kit. He’s not only an inventive drummer but he's also a very good guitar player. He has an abundance of musical taste. He knows when and what to play and he knows how to play it. He’s not afraid of the big topics either and he’s a joy to be on the road with. He is one of nature’s gentlemen.

In between stints with the Radios Dave has kept his chops up playing in bands like U-boats and currently he works weekends with Newcastle cover band Vdubs. As well as recording with the Radios, he has played a number of dates in various studios in town taking the drum seat on Peter Mackie’s second solo album.

For his day gig he’s been a practicing lawyer with two of Newcastle’s largest law firms since he graduated in 1990. He opened Carruthers Solicitors in May of 2002.