The Saints were a Brisbane band that shook up the world of music. Along with The Ramones, the Saints were regarded as leaders and originators of the punk music scene in the 1970s, even though the band itself did not see themselves in that light.

Whatever their classification, The Saints were a breakthrough political rock band in a city regarded then as a sleepy backwater.

Bailey and The Saints emerged from Brisbane at a time of restrictive and conservative government and the band shook its foundations.

The song I’m Stranded (EMI, 1977) and has long been regarded as one of Australia’s greatest rock songs. Bailey, who lived in the working-class Inala, was quoted as saying the song was about living under the Bjelke-Petersen regime.

“When you’re 16 or 17 there’s heaps of things that you get angry about – your parents, school, job if you’ve got it, police. You are at an age where you want to be doing a whole range of things that are restricted because of your age. Especially in Brisbane at the time there was active harassment from the police force. There was a political agenda at that stage too if you were in the least bit left-leaning and the Saints were quite blatantly left-leaning.”

Born in Kenya and raised in Northern Ireland until the age of seven, Bailey was the only founding member to stay with the band throughout its life. The original line up split in 1979 and co-founder Ed Kuepper later created The Aints!.

Kuepper and Bailey met while on school detention.

“Chris and I met when we were about 14 during detention at Oxley High School and became close friends which later developed into what I always thought was an extremely strong artistic partnership,” Kuepper said in a post on Twitter.

“I couldn’t have hoped for a better singer. My deepest condolences to his wife Elisabet, his sisters Margaret, Carol and Maureen and the rest of his family and loved ones.”

The band’s share house and rehearsal space, known as Club76, on the intersection of Petrie Terrace and Milton Road, was infamous and eventually shut down by police and health inspectors. The building is on Brisbane’s music trail and a mural of the band was painted at Upper Roma Street.

Even Bruce Springsteen tipped his hat to the band when he sang their hit song Just Like Fire Would at his 2014 concert in Brisbane. He also included it on his High Hopes album.

The Saints were inducted into the ARIA Hall of Fame in 2001 and amid all the rancour, Bailey reunited with Kuepper and Ivor Hay for a Pig City concert in 2007.

The band announced Bailey’s death in a short post: “It is with great pain in our hearts that we have to inform you about the passing of Chris Bailey, singer and songwriter of The Saints, on April the 9th 2022,” it said.

“Chris lived a life of poetry and music and stranded on a Saturday night.”

Kuepper said he could not have hoped for a better singer than Bailey.

“Chris and I met when we were about 14 during detention at Oxley High School and became close friends which later developed into what I always thought was an extremely strong artistic partnership,” he said.

“I couldn’t have hoped for a better singer. My deepest condolences to his wife Elisabet, his sisters Margaret, Carol and Maureen and the rest of his family and loved ones.”