Created by Mondo Rock's bass guitarist, Paul Christie, with founding member Kevin Borich (ex–La De Da's, Kevin Borich Express) [1] as a part-time venture for professional musicians with downtime from their other projects; the group had temporary members from Status Quo, the Angels, Sherbet, Skyhooks, Rose Tattoo, the Choirboys, Australian Crawl, Divinyls, Models, Dragon and Swanee, plus international stars such as Joe Walsh, Eric Burdon, Alan Lancaster, and Graham Bonnet.
[2][5] Australian Crawl vocalist James Reyne was in Sydney shooting the TV mini-series Return to Eden and agreed to play some shows between filming.
The band toured the east coast, again playing only covers from artists including Bob Dylan, Aerosmith and the Rolling Stones.
A second live album, Greatest Hits (of Other People) (1983) was the result of that tour and the Bobby Fuller Four cover single, "I Fought the Law", was issued in November.
[2] In 1986, Christie, Borich and Harvey teamed up with Rose Tattoo lead singer Angry Anderson, guitarist John Brewster from the Angels and ex–Status Quo bassist Alan Lancaster to form a new version of the Party Boys.
[8] In December that year, it was followed by the band's first ever studio album, the self-titled The Party Boys, which featured six original tracks, plus covers of AC/DC, Argent, the Angels, Them and La De Da's songs.
Swan left after these shows, having served the longest continuous period as the band's singer, broken only by Bonnet's two week tenure.
The new line-up were Christie, Borich, Walsh, and American Calvin Welch on bass guitar with Hamish, Fergus and Angus Richardson on backing vocals.
[9] By late 1989, the Party Boys had become Christie, Ross Wilson (Daddy Cool, Mondo Rock) on vocals, guitarist Stuart Fraser (Noiseworks, Swanee), Dorian West on bass guitar, Adrian Cannon on drums, Brett Jacobson on drums, and backing vocalists Kevin Bennett and Alex Smith.
[2][3] Vince Contarino of Adelaide Led Zeppelin tribute band the Zep Boys re-recorded the lead vocal track and the single became a No.
In September 1992, the band (featuring the 1987 line-up) released a cover of the Billy Preston song "That's the Way God Planned It" before coming to an end.
[2][3] The Party Boys was revived for some shows in 1999 with Christie, Price, ex-Angels members James Morley and Bob Spencer and singer Mark Gable.