Michael Sheridan is an Australian jazz/punk/noise guitarist who sometimes performs as Scaleshack and has been a member of several bands since 1975 including No

No (band)

No were an Australian band, active during the late 1980s. They blended electronic music with nihilistic punk rock, in a similar fashion to New York's Suicide. The band included Ollie Olsen, Marie Hoy, Michael Sheridan, and others...

 (1987–1989) with Ollie Olsen

Ollie Olsen

Ollie Olsen 1958, Melbourne, Australia) is an Australian composer, synthesist and sound designer who has been producing and performing rock, electronic and experimental music for the past thirty years...

 and Marie Hoy

Marie Hoy

Marie Hoy is an Australian musician and actor. As a vocalist and keyboardist, she has been a member of Sacred Cowboys, Orchestra Of Skin And Bone , No and a number of bands in the Melbourne Little band scene...

, which were described as One of Australias most compelling stage acts incorporatin speed metal, hip hop and electro funk. In 1989 he followed Olsen to join Max Q with Michael Hutchence

Michael Hutchence

Michael Kelland John Hutchence was an Australian musician and actor. He was the founding lead singer-songwriter of rock band :INXS from 1977 to his death in 1997, a period of twenty years. Hutchence was a member of short-lived pop rock group Max Q and recorded solo material which was released...

 of INXS

INXS

INXS are an Australian rock band, formed as The Farriss Brothers in 1977 in Sydney, New South Wales. Mainstays are Garry Gary Beers on bass guitar, Andrew Farriss on guitar/keyboards, Jon Farriss on drums, Tim Farriss on lead guitar and Kirk Pengilly on guitar/sax...

 on vocals.

Biography

Michael Sheridan was born and raised in the Melbourne. In the seventies, whilst still at secondary school, he became fascinated by the guitar playing of Jimi Hendrix and others. Michael moved to Sydney to further his interest in improvised music. He has been a member of several bands since 1975. In 1983 he formed a jazz

Jazz

Jazz is a musical style that originated at the beginning of the 20th century in African American communities in the Southern United States. It was born out of a mix of African and European music traditions. From its early development until the present, jazz has incorporated music from 19th and 20th...

 punk

Punk rock

Punk rock is a rock music genre that developed between 1974 and 1976 in the United States, the United Kingdom, and Australia. Rooted in garage rock and other forms of what is now known as protopunk music, punk rock bands eschewed perceived excesses of mainstream 1970s rock...

 outfit Great White Noise, soon followed by an improvisation group Slaughter House 3, with Jon Rose

Jon Rose

Jon Rose is an Australian violinist born in the UK in 1951. Rose began playing violin at age 7 after winning a music scholarship to King's School in Rochester. For over 35 years, Rose has been at the sharp end of new, improvised, and experimental music and media...

 and John Gillies. By the mid 1980s, Sheridan had moved back to Melbourne and formed Trans Waste with keyboardist Jamie Fielding

Jamie Fielding

Jamie Fielding was an Australian pianist, composer, and experimental musician.Fielding began his music career as a jazz musician, but later became interested in electronic music, working extensively with a Yamaha DX-7 synthesiser. He performed in Michael Sheridan's Slaughter House 3 ensemble, and...

. He also played in Whaddya Want? with David Chesworth

David Chesworth

David Chesworth is an award-winning Australian-based composer and installation artist. Known for his experimental, and at times minimalist music, he has worked in rock groups, classical ensembles, theatre, opera...

.

In the late 1980s, he formed electro-punk band No

No (band)

No were an Australian band, active during the late 1980s. They blended electronic music with nihilistic punk rock, in a similar fashion to New York's Suicide. The band included Ollie Olsen, Marie Hoy, Michael Sheridan, and others...

 with Ollie Olsen

Ollie Olsen

Ollie Olsen 1958, Melbourne, Australia) is an Australian composer, synthesist and sound designer who has been producing and performing rock, electronic and experimental music for the past thirty years...

 and Marie Hoy

Marie Hoy

Marie Hoy is an Australian musician and actor. As a vocalist and keyboardist, she has been a member of Sacred Cowboys, Orchestra Of Skin And Bone , No and a number of bands in the Melbourne Little band scene...

, and played with Michael Hutchence

Michael Hutchence

Michael Kelland John Hutchence was an Australian musician and actor. He was the founding lead singer-songwriter of rock band :INXS from 1977 to his death in 1997, a period of twenty years. Hutchence was a member of short-lived pop rock group Max Q and recorded solo material which was released...

 in Max Q. Following No, Sheridan formed Dumb And The Ugly

Dumb And The Ugly

Dumb And The Ugly were an Australian band operating in the late 1980s and early 1990s. They consisted of Michael Sheridan , John Murphy , and David Brown ....

 with John Murphy

John Murphy (musician)

John Murphy , sometimes credited as "Jonh Murphy", is an Australian drummer, percussionist and multi-instrumental session musician who has played in numerous Australian and British post-punk, ambient and industrial music groups...

 and David Brown

David Brown (Australian musician)

David Brown is a musician from Melbourne, Australia, who has played bass guitar or guitar in a series of improvisatory ensembles from 1978 to the present day....

. In 1990 he released his first solo CD, Scaleshack, influenced by sampling

Sampling (music)

In music, sampling is the act of taking a portion, or sample, of one sound recording and reusing it as an instrument or a different sound recording of a song or piece. Sampling was originally developed by experimental musicians working with musique concrète and electroacoustic music, who physically...

 and dub

Dub music

Dub is a genre of music which grew out of reggae music in the 1960s, and is commonly considered a subgenre, though it has developed to extend beyond the scope of reggae...

 techniques. Soon after this, Sheridan joined Peril

Peril (band)

Peril were a Japanese/Australian industrial band operating throughout the early 1990s.Peril was founded by drummer Tony Buck and were active from 1992 to 1996...

, with Tony Buck

Tony Buck

Tony Buck is a drummer and percussionist. He graduated from the New South Wales Conservatorium of Music , becoming involved in the Australian jazz scene....

, Otomo Yoshihide, and Kato Hideki

Kato Hideki

Kato Hideki is a Japanese musician and composer. He was a seminal member of the Tokyo Noise music scene of the late 80s and early 90s, collaborating with Japanese experimental musicians such as Otomo Yoshihide, Tatsuya Yoshida, Makigami Koichi, and Yamatsuka Eye. He led his own bands, Player...

. His second solo CD, Digital Jamming, was released in 1996. Sheridan also studied and completed a Bachelor of Music degree at the Sydney Conservatorium and is qualified as a teacher and composer.

Albums

Michael Sheridan

• Electric Lead Breaks (1985, Pedestrian Records)
• Post Transwaste '85 (September 1985, self-release)
• Scaleshack II (as Scaleshack) (1993, Sound Factory)
• Digital Jamming (May 1997, Black Hole Records)