All Tomorrow's Parties

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Curated and Headlined by Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds 17 & 18 January 2011 Cockatoo Island, Sydney


Named after The Velvet Underground song, and conceived as a counterpoint to large commercial rock festivals, All Tomorrow’s Parties (ATP) is a music event unlike any other. Individual artists or bands are invited to draw together some of their favourite performers to play in unique and relatively intimate settings. 2009 sees the first ATP in Australia, curated by and starring Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds and performed twice in the centre of Sydney Harbour on the beautiful Cockatoo Island. ATP is your only chance to see Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds, The Saints, Laughing Clowns and Robert Forster live in Sydney this summer. They join an eclectic mix of artists, from Krautrock pioneers Harmonia to the electro-static throb of the UK’s Fuck Buttons; the delta-blues of James ‘Blood’ Ulmer and the avant-rock freak out of Japanese outfit Afrirampo. Look out for surprise collaborations on the day, enjoy the limited, crowd-friendly capacity, chill out areas, green spaces and quality catering — all of which makes ATP the ultimate summer event.

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Each All Tomorrow’s Parties’ line-up has the feeling of a genuine one-off event, and The Bad Seeds’ ATP was put together with that in mind. To get the ball rolling, names were chosen while on a Bad Seeds tour of Europe in Spring 2008, then handed over to the organisers to deal with. Some have connections. Some don’t. There were no hard and fast rules as to the choices other than that a majority of people wanted to see them on the bill. Efforts were made to keep the line-up as diverse as possible, in the hope that people will leave the island having seen something they may never have, were it not for the festival. In many cases, it’s the only way these acts have the possibility to play in Australia. It also provided the chance to invite some Australian groups to reforms for the event.

— Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds


GETTING TO THE

ISLAND

WILL THERE

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FOOD

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DRINK Your ATP ticket includes a return boat fare to Cockatoo Island. Boats depart from three locations (Circular Quay, King Street Wharf and Birkenhead Point) from 10am each day.

Private Vessels Private vessels are not permitted to dock at the island, however you may catch a water taxi (telephone 1300 420 829).

Return Journey Boats will be departing the island after Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds every 20–30 minutes until 1am — seats will be allocated on a first come, first served basis. There will also be public ferries (usual fares apply) departing from Cockatoo Island hourly during the afternoon.

ON THE

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There will be a number of licensed indoor and outdoor bars and food outlets on the island including wine and cocktail bars plus tapas and global cuisine. The island is licensed but BYO alcohol is prohibited due to Responsible Service of Alcohol regulations. Intoxicated or drug affected people will not be allowed on the boats or on to the island. You may bring unopened bottles of water (no glass) and small amounts of food on to the island but picnic baskets and eskys will not be allowed.


From Circular Quay 10:00 10:15 10:40 10:55 11:15 11:30 11:45 12:00 12:20 12:50 13:15 13:45 14:00 14:30 15:00 16:00 17:00 18:00

From King Street Wharf 10:00 10:30 11:00 11:30 12:00 12:30 13:00 14:00 15:00

From Birkenhead Point 10:00 10:15 10:30 10:45 11:00 11:30 12:00 12:30 13:00 14:00 15:00 16:00 17:00

Ferry Departing Times   Saturday & Sunday


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All Tomorrow’s Parties is an organisation based in London that has been promoting festivals and concerts throughout the world for around ten years. It was founded by Barry Hogan in 1999 in preparation for the first All Tomorrow’s Parties festival, the line-up of which was curated by Mogwai and took place in the unusual setting of Pontins Holiday Camp, Camber Sands.

Since then the festival has appeared every year, and continues to set itself apart from festivals like Reading or Glastonbury by staying intimate, non-corporate and fan-friendly. Another vital difference is that the line-ups are chosen by significant bands or artists, resulting in unpredictable and exciting events which combine performances by legendary and influential acts with appearances by the latest crop of experimental artists from any (and every) musical genre. The All Tomorrow’s Parties festival has become more successful with every passing year, moving in 2006 to a larger holiday camp. It has taken place in the UK, and the USA and has been curated by the following artists: Mike Patton & Melvins, My Bloody Valentine, Explosions In The Sky, Pitchfork Media, Portishead, Dirty Three, Sonic Youth, The Shins,

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Sleater-Kinney, Dinosaur Jr., Devendra Banhart, Mudhoney, Yeah Yeah Yeahs, The Mars Volta, Vincent Gallo, Slint, Jake & Dinos Chapman, Stephen Malkmus, Mogwai, Tortoise, Shellac, Autechre, Modest Mouse, and Simpsons’ creator Matt Groening. All Tomorrow’s Parties also sets itself apart from other festivals by embracing seemingly disparate artistic genres. Most festival events feature art exhibitions and cinema programmes (in New York ATP collaborated with Criterion to present a programme highlighted by an appearance from Paul Schrader), and others have featured spoken word performances and stand up comedy. In 2007 the curators allowed festival goers to pick the line-up by organising a voting process for all ticketholders in the months running up to the event. The festival now takes place three times a year in the UK (twice in May and once in December for the ‘Nightmare Before Christmas’). In recent years ATP’s involvement in festivals has spread further; including curating a yearly stage at Barcelona’s acclaimed Primavera Sound Festival, and also curating a stage at Pitchfork Magazine’s Music Festival in Chicago in 2007 and 2008.


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In 2008 ATP organised their first east coast U.S. festival at Kutshers Country Club, Monticello, New York. It was called ‘an unforgettable end to the summer festival season’ by Spin magazine, and Pitchfork stated that it was: ‘the most enjoyable festival experience of our reporter’s life.’ ATP plans to return to Kutshers in September 2009 with guest curators The Flaming Lips, and tickets are now on sale.

Significant past performances at ATP festivals include the reformations of The Magic Band, Television and Slint amongst others. All Tomorrow’s Parties were also proud to present the return of My Bloody Valentine with a series of worldwide live performances throughout 2008, the London concerts of which were named Time Out’s Gig Of The Year.

ATP Recordings In 2001 the organisation spawned ATP/Recordings, a record label originally created to bring out compilation albums related to its festivals. However the label eventually moved on from just doing compilations for the festival to sign and release singles and albums from artists

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including: Threnody Ensemble, Bardo Pond, The Magic Band, Deerhoof, White Out, Death Vessel, The Drones, Fursaxa, The Scientists, Apse, Fuck Buttons, Alexander Tucker and most recently Sleepy Sun. At the end of 2007 ATP/R announced plans to release a new series of double 7” singles called Custom Made, which would feature bands choosing four songs; one something old, one something new, one something borrowed (a cover version) and one something blue (artists were free to interpret this as they feel). The first two artists to release singles in this series are Australia’s The Drones and Britain’s Alexander Tucker. Other ATP/R projects during 2008 included the release of Street Horrrsing from Fuck Buttons, which received an 8.6 rating from Pitchfork, a re-release of the album Spirit by Connecticut’s Apse, a third full-length release from Alexander Tucker named Portal, a UK release of Deerhoof’s Offend Maggie, and a new album from The Drones: Havilah.


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Early in 2008, Australian concert promoters Feel Presents and UK promoters All Tomorrow’s Parties joined forces to bring the classic albums concept, Don’t Look Back, to Australia. A UK originated concept, Don’t Look Back asks artists to perform a work from their catalogue that has proven itself timeless years after it’s inception. In it’s first season, Don’t Look Back presented seminal works from Sonic Youth (Daydream Nation), Died Pretty (Doughboy Hollow) and Low (Things We Lost in the Fire) — among others — for what was a hugely successful debut enterprise. Later in 2008 Feel Presents and All Tomorrow’s Paries formed a new company; ATP Australia Pty Ltd, with a view to bringing the All Tomorrow’s Parties Festival to Australia. Named after the Velvet Underground song and described as the “ultimate mix tape”, All Tomorrow’s Parties is a boutique festival that goes against the grain of the larger, more commercial music festivals. Each new All Tomorrow’s Parties invites an artist or band to headline and then handpick their favourite performers to play at the festival.

For the inaugural Australian series of ATP events we are pleased to announce that arguably the most significant Australian export of the last twenty years Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds, are to make their curating debut. The Bad Seeds intimate knowledge of all things Australian (music and otherwise) coupled with their innate sense of the weird and wonderful will — we are sure — make for a series of very unique events.


Performers already chosen to appear at All Tomorrow’s Parties 2009 include seminal Australian punk band, The Saints — featuring original members Ed Kuepper, Chris Bailey and Ivor Hay performing their first Australian shows (outside Brisbane) since 1977; British transcendentalists, Spiritualized; avant-blues artist, James Blood Ulmer (US); krautrock supergroup, Harmonia (Germany); electro-terrorists, Fuck Buttons (UK); pioneering synth-minimalists, Silver Apples (UK); psychotic space rockers, Afrirampo (Japan); Ex-Swan M. Gira (USA), the jazz-noir stylings of the Laughing Clowns (Aust), former Go-Between Robert Forster (Aust), the synth-punk of Primitive Calculators: former Birthday Party guitarist, Rowland S. Howard (Aust), post-grunge/noise devotees, The Stabs (Aust), classical-rock teenagers Bridezilla (Aust) & the sublime ambience of The Necks (Aust. The other unique aspect of All Tomorrow’s Parties is the location. There will be no football fields or sport stadiums here. Instead, ATP has taken the time to present the festival goer a whole new experience. In Victoria, All Tomorrow’s Parties is to be held over two days — January 9th & 10th — in the remote yet easily accessible location of Mt.Buller Ski Resort, some 3 hrs drive from Melbourne City. Punters will have the option to either stay on the mountain in a selection of ski-chalets, lodges or hotels, or down the mountain in nearby Mansfield. Both on-site and off-site fans alike will have the opportunity to enjoy all that Buller offers: a fully serviced township complete with bars, cafes, restaurants, walking trails, bike trails, ski-lifts and a gymnasium plus ATP’s trademark rock ‘n’ roll trivia, cinema and 30+ bands performing over 3 stages.

In NSW, All Tomorrow’s Parties is to be held in conjunction with Sydney Festival on Cockatoo Island over the weekend of January 17th & 18th. In it’s former life, Cockatoo Island has been a prison, a reformatory for wayward girls, and a shipbuilding yard. The industrial and maritime landscape together with the picturesque backdrop of Sydney Harbour make this urban island the perfect setting for this unique event. For 2009, All Tomorrow’s Parties (and Sydney Festival) will present a one day program on Saturday January 17th, which will then be repeated on January 18th. There will be three stages - all with amazing views of the harbour and surrounds - a food court (that’s real food - not regular festival mush), undercover bars, outside bars, a Bad Seeds video display, green ‘chill out’ areas, a free ride across the harbour to and from the show plus 20+ Bad Seeds hand picked acts. In Queensland, All Tomorrow’s Parties will present a series of one stands between January 12th - 16th at Brisbane arts & culture venue, The Powerhouse. Featured acts will include Fuck Buttons, Afrirampo and Harmonia with more to be announced. In addition to this, ATP will also present a larger afternoon/evening show on January 15th at the picturesque Brisbane Riverstage headlined by Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds and featuring Spiritualized, Robert Forster, James Blood Ulmer and others.


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Arguably Australia’s most successful cultural export of the last twenty years, Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds - both collectively and individually - are also the most prolific. In the last eighteen months alone, Nick Cave, alongside fellow Bad Seeds; Warren Ellis (violin, mandocaster) Martyn Casey (bass) and Jim Sclavunus (drums), have released an album and toured under the name Grinderman — a bump and grind exaggeration of the Bad Seeds groove. Warren Ellis and Nick Cave have also written and released the soundtrack to the Brad Pitt produced movie The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford; bassist Martyn Casey has revived his former role in the reunited Triffids performing at last year’s Sydney Festival; and the longest serving Bad Seed, Mick Harvey (guitar and organ), has released a solo album (his fourth) entitled Two of Diamonds. Harvey has also performed as guest musician at The Triffids reunion shows and most recently has been remixing the entire Bad Seeds back catalogue in 5.1 surround sound. It’s when The Bad Seeds are all together though, that the magic really shines, as anyone who has seen them at any time during the last twenty years can attest to.

With a set list that tilted heavily toward old favorites from his inimitable catalog, Cave won the crowd early and never let go, barnstorming through the rockers, casting a spell during the ballads, and effectively mixing camp with creepiness on sinister tales like “Red Right Hand” and the spectacularly vulgar “Stagger Lee” — the latter putting a decisive exclamation point on the night’s proceedings. Hollywood Bowl 2008. On record too, the Bad Seeds continue to revitalise with each release, a statement backed by their success of this year’s album Dig, Lazarus, Dig!!! which received the winners gong for the 2008 ‘Album of the Year’ award in the prestigious MOJO magazine. Dig was also The Bad Seeds highest placed US release to date charting at no. 68, whilst back in Australia, Dig was to be the first nomination in the Triple J — Album of the Year’ awards, and has also been nominated for three Aria Awards. The back catalogue continues to impress also with a national newspaper survey voting ‘The Ship Song’ from 1990’s Tender Prey being voted the #3 Australian song of the last twenty years while their 1996 album, Murder Ballads was the subject of a recent TV and DVD documentary ‘Classic Albums’. Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds perform at ATP Mt.Buller and Sydney and also at the Brisbane Riverstage on January 15th.


If Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds are Australia’s most significant musical export of the last twenty years, then arguably the group that did the most in aiding that rise are The Saints. The very same group who released their seminal debut single (I’m) Stranded in October 1976 (pre-dating the Sex Pistols, The Clash and The Damned) and who were promptly signed at the urging of EMI UK to a three album deal that saw them leave Australian shores for the UK in May 1977, never again to return as a group. Along the way, The Saints released three classic albums (I’m) Stranded, Eternally Yours and Prehistoric Sounds, but broke up acrimoniously in late 1978 denying at least two generations of Australian music lovers the chance to see them live. At the request of the Brisbane Festival, though, The original Saints reformed last year to headline to over 5000 people at ‘Pig City’, a celebration of Brisbane music, initiated and sponsored by Brisbane Festival. Grown men were seen to weep as The Saints — complete with a three-piece brass section — ripped through a set of those first three album classics. This summer Sydney, Brisbane and Melbourne get to witness these bonafide music legends for real.

THE SAINTS

“The most important


‘ Australian album ever made”. — Nick Cave on The Saints (I’m) Stranded. Released in April 1977, The Saints (I’m) Stranded regularly appears in any poll nominating Australia’s greatest ever albums. In recent times this included; Melbourne newspaper The Age based on a survey of Melbourne’s music and journalistic elite, a poll of the Australian music industry by AIR (Australian Independent Record Industry) and Australian on-line fanzine Mess & Noise. But it’s not just here in Australia that the plaudits for this groundbreaking album have appeared. UK fashion bible GQ nominated (I’m) Stranded as the no.3 Australian album of all time behind AC/DC’s Back in Black and the Bee Gee’s Saturday Night Fever. Now there’s some good company... In addition to the regular poll positions, (I’m) Stranded was also the first album included in new Australian TV and DVD series ‘Great Australian Albums’ appearing alongside Crowded House, Silverchair and The Triffids. Not bad for an album that on release was as good as ignored, received no commercial radio play and did not chart. Further proof that great art is often initially misunderstood only to be fully appreciated by later generations. To celebrate this fact — along with their inclusion in the inaugural Australian All Tomorrow’s Parties Festival series — The Saints (including original members Chris Bailey, Ed Kuepper and Ivor Hay as well as long time Saint Archie Larizza on bass) have graciously agreed to recreate the album (all 32 minutes of white noise, punk snarl and songwriting smarts) in its entirety — via two very special Don’t Look Back performances.


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As one half of the songwriting partnership of seminal Australian group the Go-Betweens, Robert Forster helped define a national identity and a sound — ‘indie’. As solo artist, Robert Forster carries the torch for flamboyant and eccentric songwriters everywhere. But having spent large portions of his adult life in Europe, Forster, these days, calls Brisbane home. His most recent release — and fifth solo album, The Evangelist, is his first post-the death of his former GOB songwriting partner Grant McLennan. Not a tribute as such it is never-the-less infected with his former partners spirit mixing melancholy with wry humour. More recently Forster has been performing a touching tribute to his ‘mate’ performing songs from The Evangelist as well as some GoBetweens favourites.

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South Carolina born musician James Blood Ulmer has a pedigree others could only dream of. A soul jazz guitarist initially, ‘Blood’ would go on to record with Art Blakey’s Jazz Messengers in an outfit that included Rashied Ali and Larry Young before moving on to the become the first electric guitarist to record with free-jazz pioneer Ornette Coleman, a result that proved to be both innovative and inspired. Throughout the eighties and nineties, ‘Blood’ would lead various big bands including the Music Revelation Ensemble (with Ronald Shannon Jackson) and Phalanx before stripping back to a three-piece drums, guitar and violin outfit — once described as “avant gut-bucket” — named Odyssey. In more recent years, Ulmer has gone back to his roots; the blues, and has found even more success, most evident on his recent release ‘In the City’. He is a major 21st Century blues artist who transcends category, and this disc is a major work.

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With the demise of his first band, the hugely influential Spaceman 3, singer guitarist J Spaceman A/K/A Jason Pierce opted to go it alone under the moniker of Spiritualized, producing space age music for far out people best exemplified on their classic 1997 album ‘Ladies & Gentlemen We Are Floating in Space’. The albums that have followed; ‘Amazing Grace’, ‘Live at the Royal Albert Hall’, ‘Let it Come Down’ and the new one ‘Songs in A&E’, have continued the ever present themes of alienation and loss supported by a psychedelic soundscape imitated by many but mastered by only one.

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One of 2007’s most interesting and celebrated local records was Bridezilla’s self-titled debut EP. Compared to everyone from The Dirty Three through Catpower to PJ Harvey, the release of “Bridezilla” saw the band become staples on JJJ and Community Stations as well as share stages with the likes of Wilco, Architecture in Helsinki and Broken Social Scene. Now, after a long examinduced hiatus, and having finally shed the schoolgirl tag, they are to return with a new single “Forth and Fine”; one side of a split 7” with heroes The Tren Brothers. Bridezilla’s saxophone and violin-fronted attack, and twisted take on jazz, folk and pop sets them apart from any of their young Sydney contemporaries, and makes for a thrilling live show.


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Decades after their brief yet influential career first ground to a sudden and mysterious halt, the Silver Apples remain one of pop music’s true enigmas: a surreal, almost unprecedented duo, their music explored interstellar drones and hums, pulsing rhythms and electronically-generated melodies years before similar ideas were adopted in the work of acolytes ranging from Suicide to Spacemen 3 to Laika. The Silver Apples formed in New York in 1967 and comprised percussionist Danny Taylor and lead vocalist Simeon, a bizarre

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figure w h o played an instrument also dubbed the Simeon, which (according to notes on the duo’s self-titled 1968 debut LP) consisted of “nine audio oscillators and eighty-six manual manual controls...The lead and rhythm oscillators are played with the hands, elbows and knees and the bass oscillators are played with the feet.” Although the utterly uncommercial record — an ingenious cacophony of beeps, buzzes and beats — sold poorly, the Silver Apples resurfaced a year later with their sophomore effort, Contact, another farflung outing which fared no better than its predecessor. After the record’s release, the duo seemingly vanished into thin air, perhaps returning to the alien world from whence they purportedly came; however, in 1996 the Silver Apples mysteriously resurfaced, as Simeon and new partner Xian Hawkins released the single “Fractal Flow.” American and European tours followed, and a year later a new LP, Beacon, was released to wide acclaim.


Harmonia Harmonia is comprised of three of Germany’s experimental music heavyweights, Michael Rother, Dieter Moebius and Hans-Joachim Roedelius. Formed from the crusts of Kraftwerk, Neu! and Cluster, Harmonia make up something equally as tantalising as any of those three acts, inspired, according to Moebius, by ‘Velvet Underground, Mozart, Coltrane, Brel, Arabic, Hindu … the list goes on and on.’ Michael Rother: “I was driven by the wish to forget all the musical clichés I had grown up with and to create a new music that was as unique as possible.” Over the years they’ve turned the heads of anyone who’s heard them, such as Brian Eno — who once declared them the world’s most important rock band — David Bowie and Aphex Twin. In their short time together (1973– 76), the trio released two albums: 1974’s strungout ‘Musik Von Harmonia’ and the friendlier electro-pop of ‘Deluxe’.


Saturday 17 January Shipbuilder Stage

Foundry Stage

12:45

12:15 Bridezilla

The Stabs

14:00 Beaches

14:45

15:00 Afrirampo

17:15 Spiritualized 18:45

Dead Meadow The Saints

20:15 Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds 22:15

The Reels

ATP Australia, Sydney

P L A Y I N G T I M E S

Barracks Stage 14:00

Hunter Dienna

15:15

The Holy Sea

16:30

Conway Savage


Sunday 18 January Shipbuilder Stage

Foundry Stage

11:45 Harmonia

12:15 Hoss

12:25

Robert Forster

14:45

14:00

The Necks

17:15 Spiritualized

15:00

Fuck Buttons

18:45

Laughing Clowns The Saints

20:15 Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds 22:15

Turbine Stage

The Reels

Barracks Stage

18:00

James Blood Ulmer

22:00

Silver Apples

14:00 Michael Gira (Angels of Light /Swans)

23:00

Sounds of Seduction

15:15 Psarandonis 16:30

Rowland S. Howard


ATP


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