A popular urban myth concerns a group of art students who passed themselves off as a band in order to con the local publican into giving them a gig in exchange for free beer. The deception worked better than intended, and the group came to be known as Mental as Anything. Nearly two decades later, they are still irritating the public with their highly listenable, idiosyncratic brand of garage pop.

A self-explanatory single to reflect their success, The Nips Are Getting Bigger, rose through the charts as did their fundamental understanding of the old adage that 'for every action there is a reaction'. Ahead lay a very lengthy pub crawl which only the accomplished could survive.

During the past 3 years, The Mentals headed into Electric Avenue Studios in Sydney to lay down tracks for Tents Up. This is the most satisfying recording experience for the band in a long time, but it turns out due to legal issues, it will be a long time before it will be released. Most of the tracks are mixed at Rocking Horse Studios, Federal in northern NSW, by Steve James (“Rock n’ Roll Music” producer) and mastered by Aussie Leon Zervos at Stirling Sound, New York. While this is going on, the band is constantly touring Australia with detours to Shanghai and Macau and a short tour of Port Moresby in early 2007.

On June 12 the Mentals release the new original album “Tents Up” on Warner Music - the culmination of all the effort, blood, sweat and tears of the past most tempestuous five years in the life of Mental As Anything.