In 1984, with bass player Mark Ferrie, guitarists Terry Doolan and Andrew Pendlebury, and drummer Des Hefner, Ian formed the Slaughtermen in Melbourne,[1] a mid eighties post-punk alternative Southern gospel group (albeit 12,000 miles away from their original source of inspiration, America's Deep South Bible Belt).

Prior to the Slaughtermen, Ian's checkered career included The Armchairs, a satirical four piece outfit co-founded with Johnny Topper which had its debut in 1979 at the infamous Crystal Ballroom in St Kilda.

The Armchairs, later with the help of Stephen Cummings, who in the early 1980s Ian had struck up a songwriting partnership with, morphed into the mildly successful, yet short lived 11 piece group, Go Wild in French, which featured songs of Elvis Presley, as well as original compositions.

In 2000, Ian moved to San Francisco and while living in the Mission District continued recording and releasing a number of left of center albums.

A San Francisco Indie Music Festival review panel described it in so many words, "It seems as though the band is purposefully singing and playing badly, so if this is the intention, why not make it worse?"

In 2010 Ian released "Tea First Then Sex", a 13 track CD of original compositions recorded at "Granite Fortess", an 1895 Romanesque Revival-style Frank Estabrook-designed house, in Upstate New York.

Tracks included "Frostcreep", "Velvet Cough" and "Strollermeat" In January 2012 saw the release of "Great Wall of Sound", a completely instrumental project, recorded in Sydney Australia in 2000, and unreleased until the present time.

(Johnny Moonlight-guitar, Barry Divola -bass, Mary Anne Slavich -vocals and Tony Slavich- keyboards, and 'Bird' David Two Hill – drums), played a one-off show on 15 August 2013, at the Green Room Lounge in Enmore, NSW.

In 2014 Ian Stephen and the Imperfectionists featuring the 2013 line up, minus MaryAnne and Tony Slavich, played a one-off show in August at the Petersham Bowling Club in Sydney Australia.