The Brag #443

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supported by Hot 30

KANYE WEST LIC. & ALL AGES

with special guests SNEAKY SOUND SYSTEM

FRIDAY 27th JANUARY 2012 SYDNEY ENTERTAINMENT CENTRE

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WITH SPECIAL GUESTS

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Supported by Triple M

TUE 24 JAN THE ENMORE

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WITH SPECIAL GUESTS TICKETS: MOSHTIX.COM.AU, 1300 438 849 & BIGDAYOUT.COM

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FRI 27 JAN THE HORDERN

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MY CHEMICAL ROMANCE

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WED 25 JAN, SYDNEY ENT. CENTRE TICKETS: WWW.TICKETMASTER.COM.AU, 136 100 & WWW.BIGDAYOUT.COM

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supported by Triple M

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rock music news welcome to the frontline: what’s goin’ on around town... with Nathan Jolly and Caitlin Welsh

he said she said WITH TIM

KENT FROM LOS CAPITANES and Garfunkel, John Denver and some Billie Holiday thrown in for good measure. Having said that, the first album I ever bought was Doggy Style by Snoop Dogg. I was only 12 at the time, so I had to hide the album from my mum. Like a true O.G.

trying to take the genre a little further. We take great pride in putting on a wild and unpredictable live show, which has gotten us into trouble in the past – but we’d much rather that than the boring ‘too cool for skool’ hipster shit that seems to be dominating the airwaves at the moment.

My favourite musicians have always been the ones who balanced a no bullshit punk rock ethos with creative musicianship. It’s a pretty random bunch, but Weezer, Frank Zappa, Aesop Rock, The Living End and Frenzal Rhomb are all great examples.

The Australian music scene is actually pretty massive. You just need to spend a little time on triple j Unearthed to get an idea of the hundreds and hundreds of new bands that spring up every day. I think the biggest obstacle to live music at the moment is increasing licensing fees for venues, and of course the rise of dipshits moving in next door to pubs and then filing noise complaints. Bands like Super Best Friends, The Art, Gay Paris and The Tijuana Cartel are all spectacular live and definitely inspire us to play.

We’ve long considered our producer Lachlan Mitchell to be one of the most vital ingredients to our success. Having worked with bands ranging from black metal heroes Naxzul to indie darlings The Jezabels, he really is the only one who truly understands our addiction to musical diversity. Pete ‘Porker’ Cooper has always been very supportive of our music too; he plucked us from Canberra’s bosom as nubile teens and helped turn us into the dysfunctional freak show we are today.

M

y earliest musical memories come from my dad’s record collection; mostly just Pink Floyd, Led Zepplin,

the usual dad staples. I must admit I also enjoyed a couple of LPs from my mum’s collection; guilty pleasures included Simon

We’ve been described in the past as Frenzal Rhomb vs. The Cat Empire, which I must admit seems fairly accurate. We still all share a deep love of reggae/ska like Salmonella Dub and Less Than Jake, but recently we’ve been

JIM JONES REVUE

Marilyn Manson

PUBLISHERS: Adam Zammit & Rob Furst EDITOR IN CHIEF: Adam Zammit 9552 6333 adam@peergroupmedia.com EDITOR: Steph Harmon steph@thebrag.com 02 9698 9645 ARTS & ASSOCIATE EDITOR: Dee Jefferson dee@thebrag.com 02 9690 2731 STAFF WRITERS: Jonno Seidler, Caitlin Welsh NEWS: Nathan Jolly, Chris Honnery

NYE ON THE HARBOUR

You probably already have your tickets for the NYE on The Harbour party, yeah? If not, hop to it, because only the final release and VIP tickets are left for the Cargo Bar shindig, and Architecture In Helsinki and French Horn Rebellion and Yacht Club DJs and Bag Raiders and Sampology and Alison Wonderland and a whole bunch of other people have been casually asking us if you’re coming along...

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Ad cancellations: Tuesday 4pm Published by Cartrage P/L ACN 104026388 All content copyrighted to Cartrage 2003 DISTRIBUTION: Wanna get The Brag? Email distribution@ furstmedia.com.au or phone 03 9428 3600.

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After successfully convincing 900 people to drink the Kool Aid (it was actually grapejuice, but that doesn’t sound as dangerously psychedelic) at Jonestown back in ’78, Jim Jones and his latest project The Jim Jones Revue (pretty sure it’s the same guy?) are coming to Sydney on Thursday January 5 to play the Annandale. The London-based ‘70s sounding rockers were last out for the 2010 Big Day Out, so it’s been a while between drinks, so to speak... Tickets on sale now.

SAN CISCO MANSON SIDESHOW

You know that scene in Wayne’s World where they’re stoked to be partying backstage with Alice Cooper, but when they meet him he is reserved, ironing and chatting about Milwaukee? Well from all reports that’s how Marilyn Manson is when you meet him, too.

Not sure about his geographical knowledge or skills with spray starch, but we’re still pretty sure he did play Paul in Wonder Years, despite what common knowledge/evidence/ the original Paul from Wonder Years suggests. On February 29, he’ll be at The Enmore, taking a break from Soundwave to perform a Sidewave, which we can only imagine will be a coming-of-age experience to rival that time that Kevin kissed Winnie. Those alt-metal Coal Chamber lads will be playing there as well.

San Cisco are a brand new act, and the latest Perth band to receive international interest, national interest and interest from the guy that runs the takeaway down the road who plays triple j all day. They signed worldwide with Alberts, and now they’re teaming up with shiny pop merchants The Jungle Giants for a headline tour that is winding h its way around the country, stopping in at s Spectrum on S February 19 Febr

Who: Bands – Bob Log III, The Art, Pat Capocci Combo (feat. Ezra Lee), Los Capitanes, Gay Paris, Jungle Rump Rock’n’Roll Karaoke, The Drey Rolland Band, Virginia Killstyxx; Burlesque – Lillian Starr, Jamilla Deville, Kelly Ann Doll; plus DJs and heaps more Where: Black Cherry NYE at The Factory Theatre When: Saturday December 31, from 9pm

after the band awkwardly bump their bass amp up that relentless flight of narrow stairs. Watch fingers!

HAPPY NEU! YEAR

When I was at University (imagine the dorm Rory and Paris lived in on Gilmore Girls, but with more pranks on the Dean), those three NEU! records were reissued on CD and, attracted by the slightly askew, avant-garde cover art, we started listening to them – and minds starting splitting open across campus.

These records led us backwards to their work in Kraftwerk and opened up a whole world of warm-yet-clinical, clingy-yet-detached German electro that sounded beamed in from either 2090 or 1930, we couldn’t quite place it.

Michael Rother (the main one) is coming to Oxford Art Factory on March 17 to perform the music of NEU! – and we’ll be seeing you there.

BLOOD ORANGE

When you’re a singer, one of the worst things that can happen is losing your voice for months on end. It would be like if you were a carpenter and someone stole your spirit level. I know, right? Well, the aforementioned voice nightmare happened to Essex-indie brat Devonte Hynes aka Lightspeed Champion, who had to re-learn how to sing before re-launching himself under the murderous-citrus-moniker Blood Orange, with a more electro-sounding musical bed to croon and shred Prince-style over. He is unleashing the new sound on Thursday January 5 at GoodGod Small Club and tickets are on sale now.

BEN KWELLER TOUR

Last time Ben Kweller played in Australia, while he was singing his first single ‘Wasted And Ready’ (written when the Texan singer songwriter was 19), he paused during the line “All maxed out like a credit card” and repeated it with all the reverence of someone reciting Virginia Woolf – and as a grin came across his still-14-year-old-looking face, we all loved him even more than we already did (which was 10,000%). He’s coming back out as part of the Hi-Fi Shorelines series, which celebrates the opening of the Sydney Hi-Fi, the newest member of the Melbourne/Brisbane venue family. He plays the mystical new room on March 2 and will no doubt showcase tunes from the forthcoming album Go Fly A Kite, which is polite-Texan-gent language for “Fuck off, c**t”.

The Pains Of Being Pure At Heart

THE PAINS OF BEING PURE AT HEART

Peggy Wang, the adorable keyboardist from The Pains Of Being Pure At Heart, should really have been the character that joined The OC in Season 4 and saved Seth from a life of endless Summer; she edits a tastemaking blog, plays in a twee/shoegaze band and is pretty much the perfect girl – plus, she is real. Pains’ latest album Belong sounds like Belle and Sebastian were quietly rehearsing before Billy Corgan and Kevin Shields burst in with a bunch of guitars and pedals (also, this scenario stars Siamese Dream-era Corgan). It’s pretty much the best sounding anything ever. They’ll be playing on February 9 at Manning Bar with the perfectly-booked support Geoffrey O’Connor, who writes a damn good pop song (more than one, actually). Buy his record!

q bar

phoenix

gig of spectrum the month wolfden fri 23rd DEC 10PM S10

fri 23rd dec 8PM s10

sat 31st DEC 8PM S2S20

hot damn new years eve Dream on Dreamer sienna Skies Northlane The Bride Where the Enemy Sleeps

sun 1st jan 10PM free

Loose Ends

Matty Vaughan Special guests sun 9th jan 10PM free

Loose Ends

Matty Vaughan Mc Gaffee My Bad Sister sat 24th dec 5am ss15 sat 7th jan 5am ss15 sun 8th jan 5am ss15

after

day club sat 31st dec 5am ss15 sun 1 st jan 4am ss15

up

day club

Bright Young Thing B Y Tech Dream Delay Ginger and Drum

fri 23rd DEC 9:30PM SS25

The Hellfire Club fri 30th dec 9PM free

feel Snatch good inc Ping Pong and Grab FreeS10 Buckets

hot damn

THURS 22nd DEC 8PM SS155 SS20

Divide and Conquer Caulfield Ghosts on Broadway City Lights Fade

sun 1st jan 4am

Recovery

fri 6th jan 9PM ss10 mon 2nd jan 5am s15

up

day club fri 6th jan 8PM

Iron Bar Hotel Bones Atlas Halier sat 7th jan 8PM s10

teen spirit

nothing but 90s hits sat 7th jan 9PM ss10

ghetto blaster

Live Art Djs Whipped Cream Chargers a s Vodka Kool Aid s5 Young Romantiics ss8 Margarita Buckets Hondas

THURS 29TH DEC 8PM S15 S 5 S20 S

To Our Forefathers City of Ghosts I The Hunter Craves Hearts Like Wolves THURS 5TH jan 8PM S1S155 S2SS20

Old Music for Old People Anchors Homeward Bound Isaac Graham

the nevada lounge Monday Fri F day 10am Late S Saturday Sunday 9am 6am Sunday Recovery 9am late Happy Hour 5 7 every day BRAG :: 443 :: 19:12:11 :: 15

rock music news

free stuff

welcome to the frontline: what’s goin’ on around town... with Nathan Jolly and Caitlin Welsh

FREESTUFF@THEBRAG.COM

five things WITH

THE RED PAINTINGS

SASH FROM ONLY THE SEA SLUGS thought this would look so much better if he was black.

Your Crew I met up with Z, the keyboardist, in high 3. school. First we wanted to become rappers.

Then we realised we were too unsteezy for that. So we decided to play Macedonian folk music, until we realised that was too unsteezy for us. Liam came from Perth, Dean drove in from Griffith, and Scott caught five buses from the Hawkesbury.

The Music You Make At the moment it’s dark, melodic and 4. driving, with clever arrangements focusing on rhythms. We would like to give a shout-out to Right Said Fred.

Music, Right Here, Right Now Five Things with 5.

Any band from Sydney that’s doing their own thing and not subscribing to fashion is a good band. And we need more small venues.

What: Street Music is out now via iTunes

1.

Growing Up I grew up in my grandparents’ house, listening to my grandfather playing clarinet and my grandmother screaming for him to shut the fuck up. Now it’s ironic, as he hates birds singing in the backyard. So I took his clarinet!

2.

Inspirations The first time I ever heard Outkast I was on a train home from school – I wanted to know how one album could be so fukkin’ wierd and slang-ridden. I saw Michael Jackson hanging off scaffolding at his concert, and I

St Vincent

With: I Forget, Sorry crew (Coptic Soldiers & co.), Thieves, The Ganaschz, FGMT & DJs Where: Xmas Party @ Oxford Art Factory When: Friday December 23; free entry and free drinks from 8pm (‘till they run out)

some live street art right in front of your face. Take that, Fitzroy coolsies! You can do all that for $10 at the second installment of Insert Coin(s) on Thursday January 19 – and why wouldn’t you?

SYDNEY RESOLUTION YES PLEASE

So you know how you were all, “Yeah bro, I would totally go and see Jamiroquai and Pseudo Echo and Culture Club and Pet Shop Boys on an island in the harbour where I won’t have to deal with borderline sociopath families who’ve been camping out on the forecourt since Christmas Eve and the view of the fireworks will be awesome, but I heard the whole harbour’s a big ol’ dry zone and I need my Bundy and cokes!” Yeah, well, the island where that exact event – Sydney Resolution

TOWNES IN TOWN

ST VINCENT IN SYDNEY

St Vincent won everyone’s hearts with the mixture of woodwind, ornate string parts and other wacked-out musicality that made up 2009’s Actor, then followed it up with this year’s Strange Mercy, which features none of these things, simpler song structures, and still manages to be amazing. Plus, she can really, really play guitar. She’ll be playing tracks from her new album at The Factory Theatre on March 12 next year, with tickets on sale now.

ZAPPA PLAYS ZAPPA

AMANDA FUCKING PALMER

In case you were wondering whether being raised by musica-mentalist Frank Zappa had any bearing on Dweezil Zappa’s wellbeing, well he seems to have turned out just fine.

He married Lisa ‘Stay (I Missed You)’ Loeb, has spent more than twenty years recording a 75-minute album featuring all his favourite guitarists basically shredding over each other aimlessly and, after practicing a bunch of his father’s material in a mysterious Californian research facility (with the ghost of Frank beamed in via audio/video technology, naturally), he’ll be bringing Zappa Plays Zappa back to Australia, to play the Metro Theatre on April 7.

Tickets are on sale now.

Listening to The Dresden Dolls is like dating that supremely attractive black haired, Panda-eyed girl who seems insanely fun and quirky in a nonZooey kinda way, until one day she flips out at a train station and pegs a handful of coins at the ticket-booth guy, and you realise, ‘Oh, that’s what everyone else was warning me about.’ (Advice: keep dating her anyway because life is dull and if it ain’t baroque…) Anyway, similar gothic twists and random flights of fancy apply to the Dresden Dolls back catalogue and live show, which is why you should get to the Enmore Theatre on Saturday January 7 to witness them. The hilarious Bedroom Philosopher is supporting, just to make it all odder than it already was going to be.

GOOD RELIGION

INSERT COIN(S) II

In Newcastle there is a Bad Religion covers band named Rad Beligion. That’s what is known in literary circles as “the perfect punny name”, but those guys are about to be made as redundant as those faxes you keep sending us, with the news that Bad Religion are celebrating their thirty years of radness with a February 29 show at Sydney’s Big Top, Luna Park. It’s another huge Sidewave (Soundwave sideshow), and Cali-punk veterans Strung Out and Street Dogs will be in support.

On Brunswick Street in Melbs there’s a place called Mana Bar where they have video games and a shot called FINISH HIM! – and there’s nothing quite like playing Guitar Hero with your elbow while sipping some crazy sugar-boozebomb of a beverage called a Princess Peach to make you feel super badass… Unless it’s playing the not-even-released-yet The Darkness II at Oxford Art Factory while drinking alcoholic milkshakes and listening to sick ‘80s and ‘90s tunes while watching Sprinkles and Crayon make

We’re not saying Justin Townes Earle is alt-country’s answer to Lindsay Lohan. LiLo doesn’t seem to be out here five times a year, for one thing, and we’re still waiting on JTE’s Playboy centrefold. (Come oooonnnnn, Hef – you know you want to.) But he does seem to be in and out of rehab just as often – and after a characteristically brilliant/patchy tour earlier this year and a currently-ongoing stretch of drying out again, he’s heading to the Factory Theatre on April 4 to play us some things from the follow-up to last year’s Harlem River Blues.

When was the last time something really blew your mind? (NB: If your answer has anything to do with a talking shell wearing shoes, we can be friends. Google it.) Let BRAG introduce you to The Red Paintings; an orchestral art rock experience who combine cello, violin, piano, drums, bass, guitar, vocals and human canvases to create life-changing performances. Their latest stage show ‘The Black Paintings’ will be at The Factory Theatre on Wednesday January 11, to remind us of the perils of wasting our natural resources. Intrigued? Yes. Excited?

Yes. Going? Maybe! The BRAG has a double pass to give away to whoever sends us their top earth-saving tip…

THE STEPKIDS

Here are some words from The Stepkids’ press release: “Stones Throw…buzz…

ELO…Steve Miller…Lauryn Hill…punk…

West African and 1960s folk…reel-toreel…psychedelia…blow up.” Here are some words that you’ll probably say after seeing them live: “What…the fuck…just happened?” Fabulously weird, inventive and yet somehow instantly classic, The Stepkids are what happens when MGMT listen to too much funk and soul and go on either a road trip or an acid trip or both and there are rainbows everywhere. The Stepkids are playing with Electric Wire Hustle at the Keystone Festival Bar as part of Sydney Festival on January 27, and we’ve got two prize packs with a double pass and a copy of their self-titled debut LP. To win one, tell us who you’d hate to have as your stepkid.

New Year’s Eve – is being held gets a special exemption from that dry zone, meaning you can totally drink brewski as you party down to ‘Little L’.

(So suck it, Mr & Mrs Craig and little Jayden, and your picnic rug and your little dog too.) Tickets are on sale now.

ANNANDALE HOLIDAY MADNESS

I know your mum was kind of planning on seeing you this Christmas, but you’re going to have to turn up, wave hello, grab a turkey drumstick for the road and hightail it to the Annandale, where you’ll be staying pretty much til February. Here’s why: sleepmakeswaves this Thursday December 22, the Big Village Xmas Show with True Vibenation and Ellesquire and more on Friday, The Mountains play the orphans’ party on Christmas Eve, on Roxing Day (Boxing Day) there’s the Celibate Rifles and Gay Paris and more, British India and FloatingMe play NYE, Tim Rogers will be heading there on New Year’s Day, The Jim Jones Revue are playing on January 5, Thee Oh Sees on January 19, The Kill Devil Hills on January 20, and all manner of Jäger band nights and Sunday sessions and other gigs in between.

Quality time with the people you love just can’t compete with all of that.

BIG DAY OUT’S LOCAL LINEUP

The BDO timetable is up, and despite my somewhat cynical hope that OFWGKTA would clash with Das Racist, creating a singularity of Hipster Rap Festival Clash Anxiety that would implode and reduce an unsuspecting Channel V host to a pile of very perky and semi-knowledgeable pixie dust, it’s actually pretty workable. And they also announced some awesome local bands that’ll be playing: Palms, Chicks Who Love Guns, Cassian, Finger Prince, Rüfüs, Nantes, Bonjah, triple j Unearthed winners Underlights and My School Act winners Sons Of Alamo. They’re joining a few lesserknown artists, like Kanye West, Soundgarden, Kasabian, Röyksopp, Battles, Girl Talk, Parkway Drive, Foster The People and more, at Sydney Showgrounds on Thursday January 26.

HAPPY NEW YEAR!

Justin Townes Earle

Yep, this is the last BRAG of the year – and to celebrate, we’ve crammed it full of holiday plans for you. Check out our Sydney Festival special on pages 28-35, some Peats Ridge picks on page 20 & 21, Flickerfest highlights on page 38 & 39, and our ridiculously comprehensive gig guides and club guides... You can find those ones yourself. Happy holidays!

“Are you experienced? Have you ever been experienced? Not necessarily stoned, but beautiful...” - JIMI HENDRIX 16 :: BRAG :: 443 :: 19:12:11

ARTISTS INCLUDE Staff Benda Bilili Democratic Republic of Congo Tinariwen Mali Gurrumul Australia Sharon Shannon Big Band Ireland Grace Barbé Seychelles/Australia First Aid Kit Sweden Ukulele Orchestra of Great Britain UK Chic USA Chapelier Fou France Blue King Brown Australia Eddi Reader Scotland Johnny Clegg South Dobet Gnahoré Ivory Coast Penguin Cafe UK Bonobo UK Groundation Jamaica/USA Master Drummers of Burundi Burundi Diego Guerrero y El Solar de Artistas Spain DJ Krush Japan

Africa

The Barons of Tang

Australia

Shane Howard

Australia

Lo’Jo

France

Shivkumar Sharma India Le Trio Joubran Palestine Kimmo Pohjonen Finland The Pigram Brothers Australia Nano Stern Chile Mo’ Horizons Germany Mahala Raï Banda Romania Joe Bataan & the I Like it Like That Orchestra Philippines/USA/Australia La Voce Della Luna Italy/Australia Melbourne Ska Orchestra Australia Pascals Japan Narasirato Solomon Islands The Bombay Royale Australia The Bearded Gypsy Band Australia Jay Hoad Australia ...

PLUS: KidZone, Taste the World, a Global Village, visual arts, street theatre and so much more!

G ro u p g B o o ki nn ts d i s coSuOF 6+

GROUP RIDAY CLOSEBFRUARY 24 FE012 2

Fri 9 - Mon 12 March 2012 Botanic Park Adelaide BOOK AT WOMADELAIDE.COM.AU 1300 111 369

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The Music Network

themusicnetwork.com

Music Industry News with Christie Eliezer

THINGS WE HEAR * Def Leppard are back here mid-2012, and US sources tell us Tony Bennett and Pitbull are also on their way. The Black Keys told triple j they’d be here early 2012, and Nickelback plan to hit the country in mid2012, they told Triple M. * Big Day Out’s Ken West told the New Zealand Herald that Eminem was offered $6 million to headline in 2012, and that Prince and Blink 182 wanted to be on too. He also said that his 30-year professional partnership with Viv Lees finished after Lees was hurt by Facebook “vitriol” from fans, and wanted to pull the plug on BDO. * Stereosonic drew 160,000 fans around the country. Its promoters praised 50 user-pay cops (at $700 and $800 each) for keeping the Melbourne crowd of 40,000 under control and preventing the gatecrashing that took place last year. But in Perth, Father Charles Waddell at St Thomas’ in Claremont complained that four drunken fans pissed

in the church’s memorial garden before the concert, and three other drunks barged into the church and abused people praying there. * Adele’s Live At The Royal Albert Hall DVD went 4x Platinum within weeks of release, and Ricki-Lee’s Top 20 ARIA single ‘Raining Diamonds’ has gone Gold. * Both the Bon Iver and Death Cab For Cutie Australian tours have sold out. * Machinations reunite for a show at The Bridge Hotel in Rozelle on Friday February 24, mostly at the urging of super-fan and former music scribe Peter Holmes. The band has played only one or two gigs since 1989, when singer Fred Loneragan broke his neck after being knocked off a bicycle in a hit and run. Meanwhile, long time rumours that Skyhooks were linking with Leo Sayer out front resurfaced, and have again been denied by all concerned – and The Happy Mondays are following the lead of their buddies The Stone Roses and plotting a big comeback next year, with reissues, a DVD and a doco on the reunion.

FEDERAL GOVERNMENT, MUSIC BIZ, ‘GENERATE’ INVESTMENT

NEON TREES' ‘ANIMAL’ MOST PLAYED SONG

A team-up between the Federal Government and the Australian music industry has seen the launch of a pilot music enterprise investment called Generate. It will be run through the Australian Music Industry Network (full details at www.amin.org.au) and in partnership with APRA. Generate will provide business knowledge, skills and mentoring, and seed investment of up to $30,000. This could go to someone who has a new music business concept that they are trying to get off the ground, or a small-to-medium business which needs investment to get to the next stage of profitability. It could also go to someone who has an idea for an innovative and enterprising project involving Australian music and games, film, or social media. There will be intro workshops held around the country; to register your interest to attend the NSW/ACT one on February 21, contact Music NSW on 92811600 or info@musicnsw.com.

Neon Trees’ ‘Animal’ was the most played song on Australian radio in 2011, according to broadcast monitor AirCheck. It got 16,568 spins.

‘Moves Like Jagger’ from Maroon 5 was #2 with 14,240. Then came ‘Last Night’ by Good Charlotte (13659), ‘Party Rock Anthem’ by LMFAO (13477), ‘Rolling In The Deep’ by Adele (12956), ‘Fuckin’ Perfect’ by Pink (12718), ‘Give Me Everything’ by Pitbull (12704), ‘The Lazy Song’ by Bruno Mars (12640) and ‘Last Friday Night’ by Katy Perry (12441), with ‘Happiness’

by Alexis Jordan (12253) rounding off the Top Ten.

PARKER + MR FRENCH EXPANDS Jo Walker has joined Sydney management company Parker + Mr French (Bluejuice, Evermore, Gypsy and the Cat, The Vines) as a director alongside founding director Todd Wagstaff. Also joining the team are Mel Nahas as talent manager on day to day duties, Shawn Hillier as online and social media coordinator, and Jacinta O’Connell on administration duties. Joining the roster is Channel [V] VJ Danny Clayton, who is co-managed by Walker, and Lauren Miller from Harry M Miller Group.

MADONNA JOINS UNIVERSAL After they swooped down on Robbie Williams, Universal Music has grabbed Madonna in a three-album deal that gives her a base of US$1 million a year. Maddy will be with the Interscope imprint, joining 50 Cent, P Diddy and Lady Gaga. The deal was struck by Live Nation, with whom she signed a $100 million multi-rights deal. Live Nation’s CEO Irving Azoff said earlier he’d look for a partner to release her music.

Her next album has leaked two tracks, and will include one cut featuring MIA and Nicki Minaj.

RIHANNA TOPS FACEBOOK Rihanna was the most “liked” musician on Facebook in 2011, while her ‘We Found Love’ with Calvin Harris was most played on Facebook. In the most liked section, the Barbados bombshell beat out Bob Marley, Avril Lavigne, David Guetta, Enrique Iglesias, Usher, Lady Gaga, Metallica, Green Day and Black Eyed Peas. ‘We Found Love’ came above Katy Perry’s ‘Last Friday Night (T.G.I.F)’ and LMFAO’s ‘Sexy And I Know It’.

TURN IT UP, DRINK MORE Loud music makes us drink more alcohol and at a faster rate, says research conducted at the University of Portsmouth in England.

Psychologist Dr Lorenzo Stafford claimed that alcohol tastes sweeter when loud music is playing – which makes it harder for us to work out how much we’re drinking.

44TH SUNSET WINS MYSCHOOLACT

Perth’s 44th Sunset won the MySchoolAct competition, beating 500 other high school bands. The act from Helena College took out the December 10 grand final at The Lair at Sydney’s Metro Theatre, scoring a recording and marketing package of up to $50,000 from Sony Music and up to $15,000 from Sony/ ATV Publishing. They also get a slot at next month’s Big Day Out. “I feel like a unicorn who’s just seen a double rainbow,” said singer

* At a recent meeting, Tamworth Regional Council discussed writing off some fees and charges owed to it by the Country Music Association of Australia. * British dance DJ star Judge Jules lost his gig on Radio 1 as part of a reshuffle to bring in younger DJs (jazz-funkster Gilles Peterson also left), and is returning to his former career as an entertainment lawyer. * One former student lamenting the closure of the 116-year-old Byabarra Public School near Port Macquarie was Grinspoon’s Phil Jamieson. Other ex-students included Iva Davies and producer Reuben Field. * Italian-Belgian DJ/producer Aeroplane revealed on a visit to Adelaide that a year ago he planned to form a band with SA dance act The Swiss – but the idea was dropped after record labels wouldn’t shell out the dough. * Sydney-based Brooke Fraser is one of ten finalists for NZ Herald’s New Zealander of the Year title.

Nik Thompson. Glenn Matthews, CEO and co-founder of MySchoolAct, added, “The front man for 44th Sunset was unique – he was engaging with the audience and he lifted the crowd to a new height with his performance.”

The five finalists flown to Sydney won a jam session at the MySchoolAct warehouse, a workshop hosted by SAE & Qantm College, and educational sessions by Julian Hewitt (Media Arts Lawyers), Adam Zammit (CEO of Peer Group Media) and marketer Shae Constantine from Sony Music.

HILLTOPS INITIATIVE RETURNS The Hilltop Hoods Initiative is funded by the hip hop group and APRA to help emerging hip hop acts who are APRA members manufacture, market and release an album. The grant provides $10,000 worth of legal advice from Media Arts Lawyers, a Shure microphone pack, and the chance to play at Song Summit, held on May 26–28. The deadline is February 28; see APRA’s website for details.

WANNA HOST ‘THE RACKET’?

Triple j’s heavy music show The Racket is looking for a new host. To enter head to triplej.net.au/racket. Applications close Sunday January 8.

PROMOTIONS GIG AT WORLD BAR The World Bar in King's Cross is looking for someone passionate about dance music and clubbing to join its promo team to run a new Saturday club night. Working alongside a co-promoter, you’ll help book DJs, market the night, run social media campaigns, increase membership and manage a street team. Email grant@theworldbar.com with your resume and a little bit about yourself, why you’d love the role, and what creative tangents you could bring to it.

JAGGER: CHART ME UP On the US charts, will.i.am’s ‘T.H.E. (The Hardest Ever)’ featuring Mick Jagger and Jennifer Lopez entered at #38 as Maroon 5’s ‘Moves Like Jagger’ was at #4. It’s the first time in 24 years that the charts simultaneously featured a song about, and by, a musician.

Billboard cites how The Carefrees charted

Lifelines Married: Yeah Yeah Yeahs’ Karen O and video director Barnaby Clay.

Married: Kerry O’Brien, founder and head of Melbourne’s Kerry O’Brien Publicity, and builder Kristin Petersen. They have a son, Dylan, 6.

Engaged: Peaches Geldof and S.C.U.M. member Thomas Cohen. Her first marriage, to US muso Max Drummey in August 2008, lasted six months.

Charged: Two females, with assault and affray at Port Macquarie’s Festival of the Sun, the only disturbances at the event attended by 3,000.

Jailed: Two Vermont men, for stealing a 1972 Fender guitar, which Pearl Jam had autographed for a teenage fan dying of a brain tumour.

The crooks had erased the autographs after stealing items from the boy’s house.

Arrested: Kevin Poe, affiliated with the Anonymous hacking group, for attacking a website belonging to Gene Simmons, a few days after the KISS bassist made comments about copyright infringement. Poe faces 15 years jail.

Suing: Soulja Boy, against his ex-manager and lawyer Philip Ransom, saying he was coerced into a contract when he was 16 which gave Ransom 5% of his income forever, and 50% of his copyright to his record label.

Died: Gigi Lee, 44, who startled the biz when she revealed she had Van Morrison’s two year old secret baby, passed away in October from cancer.

Died: US music exec John Atterberry, one time vice president of Death Row Records, after being shot in a random attack on an LA street.

with ‘We Love You Beatles’ alongside several Beatles hits in 1964. Ronnie McDowell’s 1977 Elvis Presley tribute ‘The King Is Gone’ was in the top 40 with Presley’s ‘Way Down’. Rick Springfield’s 1984 hit ‘Bruce’ charted at the same time as Bruce Springsteen’s ‘Born in the U.S.A.’; and, ABC’s 1987 ‘When Smokey Sings,’ shared space with Smokey Robinson’s ‘One Heartbeat.’

We has internets!

www.thebrag.com Extra bits and moving bits without the papercuts “Purple haze all in my brain. Lately, things don’t seem the same. Actin’ funny but I don’t know why. ‘Scuse me while I kiss the sky” - JIMI HENDRIX 18 :: BRAG :: 443 :: 19:12:11

BRAG :: 443 :: 19:12:11 :: 19

December 29, 2011 - January 1, 2012

I

t’s always hard to pick your party for NYE – but if you’re afraid to brave the city, we recommend escaping to Glenworth Valley for the oasis of sunshine, grass, music and arts that is Peats Ridge Festival. Besides a massive lineup that includes Gotye, Xavier Rudd, Salmonella Dub, King Cannons, Dum Dum Girls, Hanni El Khatib, Cameras, Sam Shinazzi, Jim Ward, Husky, Oh Mercy, The Bird and Tijuana Cartel, there’s also visual, performance, sculpture and interactive

arts – from regulars like The Alchemical Cabaret, Vic’s Russian Disco, and the bubble-making Surface Tension Quartet, to fresh blood.

Below we catch up with a few of the acts we’ll be circling on our festival schedule, and dig a little deeper into the arts lineup... Tickets are still available – we’ll see you at Peats!

Where: Glenworth Valley, an hour north of Sydney More: peatsridgefestival.com.au

Letting Go By Krissi Weiss

and giving them that Dum Dum Girls edge; the album has been criticised for not being as “fun” as the debut, but how could it have been? Only In Dreams is an extremely authentic, confessional account of personal, emotional experiences.

Gundred explains that the recording process was a challenging time for her; she tells me it’s only recently that she has felt like she’s started to deal with her mother’s death. “I did not cope or process what was going on very well at all,” she explains. “We recorded the album two months after my mother had passed away, and I was in a lot of shock. As much as I felt I put a lot of sincere emotion into the recording process, I wouldn’t go so far as to say I was debilitated from it. There were a few songs that I had a lot of trouble recording, because I [could] remember when I wrote them. A song like ‘Coming Down’, which is literally about taking a lot of drugs to dull things – well, playing that song recreates that emotion that I was going through. A song like ‘Hold Your Hand’ I wrote virtually immediately after finding out about my mother, and I can remember those emotions so vividly. We are in the process of preparing to tour the album and [whether or not] playing the shows will be a problem, well, that’s something that I am not really sure about.”

etting ready to tour an album internationally can create a lot of apprehension for any band, but it’s especially true for lead Dum Dum Girl, Kristen Gundred. The band released their second album Only In Dreams this year, with the album acting as a diary of sorts for Gundred, documenting what was an extremely difficult 2010. Following the success of Dum Dum Girls’ debut I Will Be, Gundred found herself stuck in a hectic touring schedule away from her husband (Brandon Welchez of noise-pop band Crocodiles). Meanwhile, her mother had been diagnosed with terminal cancer, and 2010 turned out to be the last year of her life.

Gundred is still emotional about the fact that she spent so much of that year away from her loved ones. “I was listening to a lot of The

Cure and it was the worst year of my life, so that contributed greatly to what I was writing,” she explains, her voice still swamped with sadness. “I was dealing with personal things but also having to travel and do a lot of work for the band. With my mother’s diagnosis – well, that experience was within the context of touring a lot and working really hard. It was a rough and very much disconnected year, which is pretty well represented on the album. There is a strong sense of being at a distance from where I wanted to be.”

Produced by Richard Gottehrer (Blondie, The Go-Go’s, and the Dum Dum Girls’ debut) and Sune Rose Wagner of The Raveonettes, Only In Dreams was always going to be a darker album than the upbeat adolescence of I Will Be. The two producers were charged with taking Gundred’s heartbroken songs

It has been hard for Gundred to decide exactly what to focus on this year. With Only In Dreams recorded in January, the band had to leave that project behind to tour their EP, He Only Gets Me High. “It was a little strange because we recorded this album prior to the EP’s release,” she says. “So we did this album and then I spent a month in New York mixing it and then we had to go on tour for the EP. We re-mastered the album three times with different mixes, trying to get it right. We then took a hiatus over the summer, partially intentionally and partially by accident, so then we had to come back to the songs on this album, which was a little strange. The timing of recording, releasing and touring can be peculiar.”

Being a touring musician is not normally on the top of most parents’ wish lists for their children’s careers, but Gundred says that her mother was extremely proud of her. “I’ve been doing this

for a long time, so they are both happy that I am getting somewhere – they gave up, years ago, thinking that I would move onto something else,” she says. With earlier attempts as a musician proving to be far less successful than Dum Dum Girls (most notably as drummer and singer for Grand Ole Party), Gundred seems to have finally found her musical home as Dee Dee. She says that the songs on I Will Be were essentially the first collection of songs that she had written entirely herself – it’s the first time she has taken such complete control. “I’ve been trying to do this forever, basically, and this is the first time I have ever made it this far,” she says with relief. “The people I play music with are the ideal group for what we do; it’s a pretty rewarding experience compared to other projects I’ve been in. I am extremely grateful that we’re getting to do this and, at least at this point, this is what I do and I don’t have to work another job.”

The success of a band’s sophomore album will usually determine whether they will go on or fade into oblivion, and so far it seems that Dum Dum Girls will be around for a long time yet. Gundred has proven that even in the face of massive adversity, she is still able to create music and stay focused as an artist.

I ask why she feels that this project has been the one to succeed beyond the ultraunderground. “I don’t know,” she says, trailing off for a moment. “I’m sure timing has a lot to do with it. Not from an egotistical standpoint, but this is the first project that I have been involved in that is entirely mine, and I have a very strong drive to do well with this. This band is everything to me and I am compelled to do this. I can’t not do this.”

What: Only In Dreams is out now through Sub Pop/Inertia With: Gotye, Xavier Rudd, Salmonella Dub, Stanton Warriors, LTJ Bukem, Hanggai, Jim Ward, Hanni El Khatib, The Holidays, Eagle & The Worm, Canyons, Oh Mercy, Ball Park Music, King Cannons, Husky and more Where: Peats Ridge Festival – Thursday December 29 at 7.30pm, on the Bellbird Stage When: December 29 – January 1 Sideshow: Monday January 2 @ Oxford Art Factory

Hot Chemistry By Oliver Downes

rian Campeau is a jumbling mass of contradictions: a writer of experimental folk who is also an avowed metalhead; a sublimely generous soul (he insisted on buying this starving writer lunch) who genuinely believes in the rightness of the writings of Ann Rand; a singer of rare levity who deploys a similarly punchy bluntness of tongue in casual conversation. Indeed at first approximation, it seems he gets off on giving the impression of being a total jerk. (He isn’t). Thank goodness then for the tempering influence of Elana Stone, jazz songstress, lover of slip ‘n slide and awful cheese-related jokes (“What did the cheese say to itself when it saw itself in the mirror? Hallo Me.” ...Shudder).

Highly respected soloists in their own right, together they are The Rescue Ships, one of the most exciting pop acts to emerge from the warehouses of Sydney’s underground in the last ever.

Named after their song of the same name (“Like Iron Maiden!” Campeau helpfully clarifies), the two halves of The Rescue Ships originally met through Stone’s brother Jake (half of Bluejuice, and BRAG contributor), with first contact provoking “hot chemistry 20 :: BRAG :: 443 :: 19:12:11

– musically and otherwise”, and resulting in numerous instances of both sitting in on each other’s solo projects before songs slowly began to be written in tandem. “For ages we just played each other’s songs,” says Campeau. “And then we decided to go to New Zealand, as a writing trip specifically ... During the day we’d go sightseeing and do whatever, during the night we’d just write. We finished with seven or eight songs probably, of which we’ve kept three or four ... Elana’s been really focused on getting a good song together, whereas I’ve been really focused on getting really good arty production. I think we have that common interest in making it as arty as it is songwritery.”

“It was quite hard,” continues Stone, “us both being lead singers – not that we have classic lead singer personalities or anything, but we were both just set in our ways of doing things.

And we both have very clear ideas of what should happen and sometimes they didn’t meet up, so it was at times difficult, and someone would have to capitulate. And a lot of the time that would be Brian...” she says. “I’ve never made an album that was consistent before, and this one is consistent. I mean, we’re not like

great radio songwriters together; we don’t really write hits. We just write things that we think are really beautiful, and hopefully quite different from everything else.”

Cooperation is clearly paying dividends though; the pair’s live sound, set to grace ears at this year’s Peat’s Ridge, is a vivid blend of the catchy and the oddball, with Campeau’s frenetically precise acoustic playing gracefully complemented by Stone’s accordion, the instrumentals topped by the luscious harmonies of two of the city’s best live vocalists. In between seeking further avenues for musical employment (including taking on the Musical Directorship of Underbelly) and making ends meet by juggling half a dozen side-projects each, the process of polishing the final mix of their upcoming self-titled debut has become a somewhat extended one. With the end in sight though, both are keen to move on to the next stage: “I just want to play, really,” says Stone. “Play as much as possible. And hopefully see people enjoying that.”

When: Thursday December 29 at midday, on The Bellbird Stage

Made It By Sheridan Morley

internalised that skill, to be able to express myself instrumentally.” Drawing on anything from metal to punk to IDM, the album and the resultant live shows have been received extremely well – “A lot better than I thought,” co-guitarist Kid Khor admits. “I wasn’t totally sure about what people would think, but we’ve got people all over the world saying it’s their favourite album of 2011. I’m like, ‘Wow. Really?!’” Otto agrees that around 90% of the reviews have been strong. “It’s never a perfect reception… but a lot of the negative reviews we got were really well-written, with some pressing observations about how we could improve.

We’ve taken all that on board with the writing of some new stuff that we’re working on.” t’s been a big year for post-rock act Sleepmakeswaves. Following the July release of their debut LP …and so we destroyed everything, they embarked on a national tour, playing some of their biggest shows to date. And there was a lineup change too; drummer Will Smith left the group in September, to be replaced by Tim Adderley, of Pirate. “Tim’s really bringing his own unique sound,” guitarist Otto Wicks-Green tells me.

“We’ve been rehearsing really hard for the last

month or two, getting him up to speed with all the stuff we’ve been writing, and ready for these next few shows.”

Sleepmakeswaves’ LP demonstrates their ability to pack honest, unfaltering emotion into their music. “We took a lot of influence from amazing bands like This Will Destroy You and Explosions In The Sky,” Otto says. “The first time I heard those bands I was stunned into silence by them. I’d like to think that I’ve

Kid describes …and so we destroyed everything as a snapshot of the band at the time of recording. “There were some songs that were almost completed, and had been sitting there for a year or two, and some songs which were completed weeks before hitting the studio,” Otto explains. “In that sense, there was no overarching concept – it was just a cross-section of the development of the band over the past couple of years. We really liked all the songs that went on the album, but our

one main gripe was that it could’ve been more cohesive as a whole. So what we’re going to be working towards on the next [release] is making it all fit together better, from start to finish.”

Apart from planning new material for next year, the boys have secured a co-headlining spot at dunk!festival in Belgium, playing alongside some of their biggest influences, including US-based Pelican and If These Trees Could Talk. “We could be playing rooms in Europe that are empty except for one or two fans that’ve heard of us from Tumblr or something,” Otto laughs. “It’s all a bit scary, but also pretty exciting.” And before that? “Peats Ridge!” he shrieks. “We’re absolutely psyched about it! Then we’ll be working out a pretty major national headlining tour for the beginning of next year, and we’ve also just been invited to play the Boris tour. It’s cool that we’re one of those go-to bands for tours like that now, it’s like – yep, we made it!”

What: …and so we destroyed everything is out now through Bird’s Robe Records When: Saturday December 31 at 2pm, on The Lyrebird Stage More: December 22 @ The Annandale Hotel

Taking Flight By Benjamin Cooper

has been a much cruisier year – I’ve just been floating around and floating back to Australia, and now I’m [near Byron Bay]. It’s strong country up here. That’s for sure.” It hasn’t been a complete holiday for the troubadour, though.

“I’ve got a few things coming up, like [Peats Ridge], where I’ll be bringing my new record live. It’s my first solo one, for no real reason except that’s what is coming through me at the moment, just something different.” The shift away from performing with band Izintaba is not necessarily permanent: “I’d love to tour with them: they’re my brothers.”

avier Rudd has played the massive Bonnaroo festival three times, but is still somewhat bemused as to his popularity in Tennessee. “I think it’s those American hippies from the South, just doing their thing. The last time I was there I felt pretty honoured ‘cause I got the highest CD sales of

any artist on the bill,” he says. “And I’m pretty sure that was the year The Police played!”

When we speak, Rudd is “just cruising, north of Byron” as he takes time off from a hectic touring schedule. “We toured for two years straight, and I went pretty hard internationally.

It’s been nice to have a break for a while. It

The new record, titled Spirit Bird, will be released in 2012 and features something new for the multi-instrumentalist: birdsong. “I’m using lots of different samples of bird sounds... building them into a big percussive frame with lots of loops. So far I’ve got samples of 24 native Australian birds, and I’ve taken all my tribal beats, then split them up into pieces. I’ve just finished changing my entire percussion kit,” Rudd says. “It’s been nice laying low, until I was ready to get into [the music] again. On the road, you can get into this groove of never stopping, but sometimes you need to stop. I think this year, for the first time, I was ready to stop. But now – now I’ve really started to get the itch again. I reckon I’m going to add all this audio-visual work I’ve been doing [to upcoming shows] too.”

Rudd anticipates Spirit Bird will trigger extensive touring, similar to his previous releases, but after a period of rest and recuperation he’s looking

forward to the possibilities. “To be honest, there’s a lot of places to hit,” he says. “Once you’ve spent your time touring and meeting people, you’ve gotta go back and make sure you visit with everyone. People like to spend time. It’s good.” And will his touring encompass a triumphant return to Bonnaroo? “Oh man, I love heading over there. It’s just hot as hell, and quite often it’s raining the whole time too, so there’s just this amazing stickiness in the air...

“I remember that year that The Police did play, I was waiting backstage for them to come on.

All these musicians are all standing around, no one knows where the band is, and the lights in the crowd are getting dimmer. Then the lights backstage are just going lower and lower. Out beyond the crowd there’s a light, and this faint whirring off somewhere. I’m looking around and you can see people asking each other, ‘Is that a chopper?’. No shit, like thirty seconds later, this helicopter appears over the crowd and The Police literally came out of it, with their guitars around their necks, all ‘Roxanne!’ It was fullon.” Rudd’s story is interrupted by a sound that jags his interest. “There’s some bloody big fish jumping around in this river mate,” he says. Has he considered recording some of their fishy noises for his next album? “I’ll give it a go,” he laughs. “I’ll give anything a go.”

What: Spirit Bird will be out in 2012 Where: Thursday December 29 at 10.30pm, on The Bellbird Stage

▼ PEATS RIDGE ARTS PARTS FIDDLE MY FIDDLE

Noisy Children Pirates Lair – photo by Rob Jones

Who: Beth Dillon and Joe Van Buskirk. Beth studies Sculpture and Performance at COFA, besides a bunch of other side-projects that range from illustration to jewellery and soft toy construction. Joe is a wordsmith.

What: Fiddle My Fiddle is an interactive installation exploring the wonderful but oft-overlooked world of hillbilly puppetry. Beth and Joe are making a life-size three-piece hillbilly band out of recycled plywood, decorated with a whole bunch of pen and paint illustration. When their pulley system is activated, Washboard Abbott, Bow-Leg Bob and Moonshine Mac will perform a special hoedown.

Why: “Following the success of last year’s Peats project, Thumbs up for the Environment!, we decided to try our hands at giant puppets. Fiddle My Fiddle was inspired by toothless grinners, bathtub brewers, nonironic overall wearers and amateur musicians from all walks of life. We were also inspired by old-fashioned children’s toys such as Jumping Jack pull toys, and the puppets of painter and Bauhaus legend Paul Klee.

More: bettyborehead.blogspot.com

THE DEEP SEA ASTRONAUTS

Who: The DSA are a ragtag collective from different disciplines, bound together by their common interest in fun and each other. You might remember them from The Hideous Demise of Detective Slate (Best New Theatre award at Sydney Fringe 2010) and The Vulture Gentlemen (Peats 2010).

What: The Surface Tension Quintet – a marching band that plays bubbles (a favourite from last year’s Festival); and Moirés The Electric Eel – a giant electric eel to swim through and light up the festival at night. DSA are also premiering their new junkyard theatre piece, The Importance of Being Ernest Dragons VS Hip Hop Hippolytus – a comedy mashup that brings dragon carnage to Wilde and funk to Euripides.

Why: “We’re excited by everything awesome – Noir to nautiluses, hair metal to hip hop, detectives to dinosaurs, comics to carnivals, techno to troubadours, science to sea monsters; we love subversion, sexual tension and making people laugh.”

PIRATES LAIR

Who: The Noisy Chicken crew – a collective of artists and techs who are united by a passion for fun-filled events and creating shared space.

What: Pirates Lair is a stage focused on electronic sounds to get you up and dancing. Noisy Chicken’s Ben Boehm says, “The theme plays a big part in what we create for events because visual stimulation is so important. Let’s just say the artists will be navigating on the Eggtronic Bounty: a truly fine vessel created for the high and wild psychedelic seas.”

Why: “The Pirates Lair was inspired by going to events and being bored; watching a band and wanting to throw colour bombs at the stage – anything to give some life to the party.”

More: figmenthub.blogspot.com

PUNK MONK PROPAGANDA

Who: Punk Monk Propaganda is a multidisciplinary arts and music crew.

What: Their base for Peats will be the Monastery Of 11 Strings, where punters can assemble to take part in one of their two crowd-sourced projects: 15MB Of Fame, which invites punters to upload videos taken during the festival, for Punk Monk to edit into a final film that screens on NYE; and a festival zine, helmed by queen zinester Susan Ihar and incorporating stories and pictures from festival-goers.

In addition to these two projects, Punk Monk are running a live art installation over the three days, with the help of Bunkwaa, Christie Torrington, Andros, Lim Cheung Ha and Lu C. Smith. The installation will start with panels and end on day 3 with a car, but if you have any spare stuff to donate to the cause, they’ll paint on it too. By night, Punk Monk will be presenting their signature ‘liquid light’ shows, projecting their psychedelic creations over live music performances.

More: 15mb-of-fame.tv

ZIN’S RAFT

Who: zin is a new artist-run initiative that creates idea-based work that’s big on audience involvement.

Co-founder Harriet Gillies says, “Our work focuses on the power of experience, combining immersive, visceral and hybrid art elements.”

For Peats, zin have selected a group of ten different Sydney-based artists and creatives from a range of disciplines and backgrounds (performance art, theatre, music, construction, design and visual art).

What: They’re building a raft, and inviting you to join them on the search for a (possible imaginary) flower with aphrodisiac powers!

If you’re up for a colourful, crazy, immersive theatrical experience, head down to the riverbank with your floaties, and a sense of imagination.

(But be warned, only six people will fit on the raft at a time so you’ll have to get in quick for a spot.)

Why: “Peats Ridge is in the middle of the bush, so we’ve looked at the local flora and fauna to inspire and drive the piece. We wanted to make the most our location, and we wanted to make a piece that would enhance this part of the festival experience.”

BRAG :: 443 :: 19:12:11 :: 21

Fleet Foxes In Perfect Harmony By Christine Lan

R

educing the disparity between ‘who you are’ and ‘who you want to be’ remains one of life’s greatest challenges. The title of the Seattle-bred Fleet Foxes’ sophomore album, Helplessness Blues, alludes to this struggle, and the realisation that sometimes the individual is the only thing standing in the way. “The songs on this record were really Robin [Pecknold – lead vocalist/ guitar] digging into himself and the things that he’s thinking about, as opposed to maybe referential lyrics,” says keyboardist/multi-instrumentalist Casey Wescott. “It was more things that had built up in his conscience, and the songwriting was an outlet for that, so that he would be the same person in his songs as he was off-stage... The idea of getting true to oneself.”

This philosophical mindset clearly rubbed off on Pecknold’s bandmates. “In my life, I’m coming from a different place than Robin, experientially,” Wescott muses. “I grew up in and consequently grew out of Christianity, but the idea of selfimprovement and wanting to aspire or transcend to something else is something that has been a big motivator for me in my life ... be it through guilt or fear or desire for thrills or changing or new experiences or understanding,” he continues.

“Robin had an upbringing that was free of religious suggestion, but I think the idea of wanting to meet your aspirations is a very universal concept for people.” Wescott tells me the band didn’t have an album title, even when they were up to the mixing stage. “‘Helplessness Blues’ felt a bit like a thesis statement or word association that reflected some of the concepts, sentiments and ideas that Robin was addressing lyrically.”

The band began recording demos for Helplessness Blues at Seattle’s Hall of Justice studio in October of 2009. “It started out really open-ended, because we had been touring for about 18 months after the first record, so we took a little bit of time off and Robin started writing,” Wescott explains. “We reconvened maybe a few months later, and I remember there was one meeting where we knew that we couldn’t impose anything on this process and we just kinda had to take it as it came – so we didn’t really have any guiding principles or rules going into it.”

The dreamy closing track, ‘Grown Ocean’, was written by Pecknold during his support tour with Joanna Newsom last year. “Over the course of nine months, he’d be continually re-introducing the material, tweaking lyrics and different things,” says Wescott. “And as a band, you adapt to the new songs and come up with ideas for them that thrill you, and can consistently do that. After he came back from Joanna Newsom, we really put our heads down for a good while longer. We do spend a significant amount of time making a record because you have to give yourself the time and space to let things happen – that’s how the first record happened.”

“The idea of selfimprovement and wanting to aspire or transcend to something else has been a big motivator for me.”

After the Joanna Newsom tour, the band recorded at Dreamland Recording Studios before moving in and out of numerous studios during the second half of last year – a period comprising bouts of illness, the usual feelings of creative doubt, and plenty of rewriting. In what would become an immensely rewarding experiment, Helplessness Blues saw Fleet Foxes exploring an abundance of traditional instrumentation, including the hammered dulcimer, tympani, tamboura, marxophone and Tibetan singing bowls. “I went to this store and this guy had all these copper bowls that he had gotten from Nepal,” Wescott relates. “It’s quite interesting – I think the copper comes from India, but then is shipped over to people with entirely different belief sets and interests, and they actually fashion the bowls. There are hundreds of them and they’re not tuned to any particular note in the equal tempered scale, so I just went through the hundreds of bowls to see which ones were the most in tune with the song that I wanted to use them on, and then I got them. I used these huge, heavy copper bowls for the end of ‘The Shrine/An Argument’ for these longer drones.

“And then I also had a tremoloa, which is a Hawaiian stringed instrument that I really enjoy,” Wescott enthuses. “It has this lovely sound that gives melodies a strange, dark, enveloping quality.

I was trying to use instruments like programmable music boxes and zithers, just so that I could have smaller sounds that would accentuate what Robin was singing with just him and his guitar. I wanted to have a relative perspective of smaller instruments in relation to his voice and the acoustic guitar.”

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Since mesmerising music lovers with their self-titled debut album in 2008, Fleet Foxes have continued to stir and inspire while exuding an elusive, mystical air. There’s something intrinsically magical within those multi-layered harmonies and the manner in which their melodies transcend time, environment and style. Pecknold has said that “the most enjoyable thing in the world is to sing harmony with people”, and Wescott happily agrees. “Singing is this really amazing thing because it’s so related to your identity and your physiology, so to sing – and first of all be breathing and using your body to produce a sound – is a really satisfying thing,” he says. “And to do it collaboratively ... when it’s good, it’s good.

But when it’s bad, it’s bad,” he laughs. “Singing harmonies is very satisfying because it’s four people coming together with their own instruments; themselves and their identity coming together and making a composite sound… So it’s really satisfying, even on a personal, non-physiological, emotional level.”

BRAG :: 443 :: 19:12:11 :: 23

The Kooks Everyone’s A Critic By Bridie Connellan

“O

n a turbulent aeroplane, we got struck by lighting and it was shaking in the storm. I had my last song lined up since I thought we were going to die. It was ‘Wuthering Heights’.” A few months ago, Hugh Harris had an Almost Famous moment – “But instead of ‘I’M GAY!’ it was ‘I LOVE KATE BUSH!’ Not a bad sound to go down to, it kind of made sense.

The last thing you want to hear in your life is a melody.”

The guitarist for indie-pop foursome The Kooks is hanging out in a freezing New York storm halfway through their US tour. Alongside bandmates Luke Pritchard, Peter Denton and Paul Garred, the London-based lad has a new album and a positive attitude. “I’m looking towards the next album rather than dwelling on this [last] one. It feels like a leading album, a stepping stone, a development with strings and a synthy side; we could go somewhere where we haven’t been before again. I really feel enriched musically.”

For their third full-length Junk of the Heart, the Kooks brought onboard their old producer Tony Hoffer as well as drummer Paul Garred, who

had left the group in 2009 with nerve damage in his shoulder. But the band copped a fair amount of slack for the record, with original supporters NME giving the album 4/10 and a poll, ‘Are The Kooks any good anymore?’ – while the reviewit-all Pitchfork failed to even give it a write-up.

Even BRAG gave it 1½ stars, and a reminder of Pritchard himself calling the band “stale”. But Harris has a simple response to all that: bring it on. “I love being criticised, I fucking love it, and I can’t stand the opposite – being told that you’re doing something good when you’re not,” he says. “I can’t stand dishonesty. Obviously if it’s an outrageous panning it’s a bit different, it’s hard to be offended by something that’s basically unconstructive. But you know what? It’s great to be alive. I adore playing our music and I don’t look too far beyond that.”

Junk of the Heart certainly is ripe for the masses, with lyrics like “She’s like the sunflower that never looks back at the sun” replacing Prichard’s original cheek, “I will do my best/Just to get under her dress.” So have the Kooks become less kooky, or is it time everyone let them grow up? “The first album sounds so young it’s actually ridiculous,” Harris answers. “It was very snappy.

We don’t really operate like that now and we can never sound like that ever again. We probably got sick of ourselves, and other people probably got sick of us as well.” Harris even explored the orchestral realm on this recording, with a stringladen piece ‘Time Above The Earth’ expressing his love of Debussy, classical modernism, and Chopin arpeggios. “My mantra is about subverting structure and the formulaic glory of ‘indie’,” he says. “Fucking ‘indie’ bands. They’re so one-dimensional; there is only one dimension to that music, when it should be multifaceted. Just because you’ve done well at one thing doesn’t mean you should regurgitate the same strategy over and over again.”

Harris and Pritchard are the only remaining members of the original Kooks lineup, the lineup responsible for the 2006 debut smash Inside In/Inside Out, after they met each other at the Brighton Institute of Modern Music. Harris laughs when he recalls the first day they met. “He was playing ‘Sofa Song’ on the step outside of our college singing on his own and I thought, ‘Fuck, that’s quite strange. He’s not even in a group of friends.’ I quite liked the song so I asked him to teach it to me. Then we found the other guys...

It’s funny to think about how much has changed since then.”

“The first album sounds so young it’s actually ridiculous. We can never sound like that ever again. We probably got sick of ourselves, and other people probably got sick of us as well.”

It hasn’t even been a decade since that day, and yet the Kooks blasted across the globe after that snappy debut went four times Platinum in the UK alone. For such a short space of time, Harris ought to be feeling pretty chuffed. “But has it been a short space of time?” he laughs. “We started pretty young – we got signed about four months after our first gig, and we did our first gig after a few weeks of being together. That really fucked everything because we had to grow up almost immediately in the public eye. We didn’t know each other very well and we had to make this album together which is great, awesome, fun music – but I think we’re stronger for it now.”

Something British music press can’t seem to resist is developing rivalries, or at least the myth of them – Rolling Stones/Beatles, Blur/Oasis, Richard Ashcroft/Everyone – and the Kooks were pitted against the Arctic Monkeys and Razorlight as foes in their field. But despite Pritchard’s ‘bickering’ with Arctic Monkeys’ frontman Alex Turner, Harris thinks the whole thing is ludicrous.

“We’ve had run-ins with bands but that’s what it is, it’s just a run-in. It’s journalists asking me that question more than you see it answered. I think there’s something really exciting about bands spurring each other on creatively, and I’m sure [Arctic Monkeys] like a bit of that as well – but beyond that we’re good friends.”

Where: The Hordern Pavilion More: Also playing at Falls Festival over New Year’s Eve, in Lorne (VIC) and Marion Bay (TAS)

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Bob Log III

Hanggai

Black Cherry’s New Year’s Eve By Benjamin Cooper

Mongolian Punks By Benjamin Cooper Hanggai’s music blends traditional Mongolian instruments such as Morin Khurr with modern trimmings like electric guitar and delay pedals, will the metal influence translate to a heavier sound on their new recordings? “I’m not sure,” Ilchi says. “You have to be careful with metal – not all of it is so good.”

Ilchi favours the banjo, which he says few people in China are familiar with; “but we will show it to even more.” His first experience with banjo was similarly epiphanous to his encounter with throat-singing. “The American banjo player Béla Fleck once played in Beijing,” he says. The two ended up jamming together: “He kept wanting to play Hanggai style, but I was asking for him to show me some of his American style!” A friend brought a four-string banjo over from America for Ilchi a year later. “Béla plays a five-string, but even though I try I cannot [play it]. So I play fourstring. It is fine for me.”

T

here’s a touch of the mystical in the mountains and plains of Mongolia, and awestruck Westerners are not the only ones to be enraptured. Ilchi, frontman of Beijing-based group Hanggai, is also taken with the power of the country – especially its music. “When I first saw it, it was very strong with me,” he says. Ilchi, the former frontman of punk group T9, was so impressed with a performance by Odsuren Baater – a master Mongolian throat-singer – that he decided in 2005 to journey to inner Mongolia and learn the technique himself. Whilst there he met with fellow students Batubagen and Hugeljiltu, and together they developed their shared interests: preserving Mongolian culture, while intensely rocking out. These three formed the group that would become Hanggai – a word referring to grasslands and open skies that captures only some sense of the vast and constantly-shifting country to which they belong.

While they may have taken on the massive task of keeping Mongolian traditions alive, Ilchi is quick to correct any perception that his group are sanctimonious culture crusaders.

“I think we’re very much like normal people,” he explains. “I like to go down into the city to see different bands... Lately I’ve been seeing a lot of heavy metal shows.” Given

Australian audiences last had a chance to see Hanggai play earlier this year, when they toured at the invitation of the Sydney Festival.

“We also played WOMADelaide... it was a very nice city, and a very good festival. We played in the park, which was very green, and we were also performing on a stage which was floating in the middle of a lake in the park.” There was food involved, too. “We were doing workshops on how to cook in a Mongolian style. We cooked up some fish, which people seemed to like, but the lamb was the best. I particularly like Australian and New Zealand lamb... the taste is very like Mongolian lamb, but not as hard.”

Another benefit of all this international touring is the chance to catch up with far-flung relatives. “My uncle and two brothers live in Sydney, so when we go there the whole band can relax and eat together,” Ilchi says.

But when asked if any of his family will be jumping on stage for Hanggai’s show, he laughs. “Maybe. My brothers might want to join in, but my uncle... well, he’s just an uncle!” Yet even though there’ll be family times, the rock and roll lifestyle will still dominate. “We’ll be drinking and smoking, don’t worry – all the time.” Hopefully their throats can handle both the demands of singing two different pitches simultaneously, and the decadence of a touring band…

Where: January 3 & 4 When: The Basement, Circular Quay More: Also playing Peats Ridge Festival, held from December 29 – January 1 at Glenworth Valley; for more on Peats, check page 20 & 21

B

lack Cherry has always been an infamously rocking fixture in Sydney – two years of working behind the bar assured this writer that the night amounts to a master-class in partying. Jumping venues throughout the inner-west to its present home at Marrickville’s Factory Theatre seems to have jacked up the presenters’ and the punters’ commitment to revelry, highlighted by the impending extravaganza that is Black Cherry’s New Year’s Eve – a variety show packed with bands, burlesque acts, circus shows & DJs, plus the notorious Jungle Rump Rock’n’Roll Karaoke.

Headliner Bob Log III, a rocking bluesman who performs in a human-cannonball suit with attached microphone helmet, is pumped for the event. “People better know they’re gunna have a damn good time,” he warns. The resident of both Tucson, Arizona and Melbourne has recently arrived back in Australia from a North American tour. “They asked me to do this New Year’s gig back in Arizona, but then the offer came through from Black Cherry and I just thought, ‘Shit!’ I remember playing one of their parties before, and I couldn’t believe it was real – no one goes that hard. It was like a party out of the movies or something. I mean, I could have stayed in Tucson, but come on...”

Log III has been taking it easy since returning to Australia. “Today is Cake Day, man! I’m headin’ over to grandma’s place, and we got ourselves some pecan tart and a big, tasty donut. The pecan one kinda reminded me of the Thanksgiving ones that I was eating back in the ‘States, but I don’t think I’m gunna get any of the donut. Grandma’s gonna hog that one, she always does.” I ask if cake is a big deal for him – part of his Black Cherry rider, perhaps? “I haven’t been promised any cake, and possibly at this stage I’m sleeping in the carpark, but we’re gonna wait and see on that one,” he says.

“I doubt there’ll be much room for sleeping.”

Black Cherry’s headliner takes his craft seriously, trying to “do about thirty days of touring and shows in a row, [before] I take another thirty days off to try remember what just happened.” When it’s suggested that this intensive approach is similar to people working on oil rigs, he laughs. “Yeah, it’s pretty much the same thing. Only we’re tired for completely different reasons. I’m pretty sure my tiredness involves a lot more whiskey.”

In addition to showcasing his much admired “titty-shot” trick, Log III promises a swift-kicking evening of anarchic fun this New Year’s Eve. “When I get up there in Sydney, well, y’see, I got this sport I invented where I try and rile up a room full of drunk people. It’s great because every night I win!” he laughs. “Well... that’s not exactly true. When I was in Salt Lake City some

guy managed to throw a whole glass of beer, so that most of it fell and filled up my guitar. The guy kept apologising, saying, ‘Sorry man, I saw it online, I didn’t mean to fill up your guitar, shit man!’ I had to walk backstage for a minute and take some breaths. Had to tip the guitar upside down too, to let all the beer out. My science is basic, but even I know an entire glass of liquid colliding with and pouring into something rigged up to electronics is not going to end well.” Does he have a plan if things get similarly out of hand at Black Cherry? “I’m bringing two guitars.”

Who: Bands – Bob Log III, The Art, Pat Capocci Combo, Gay Paris and more; Burlesque – Lillian Starr, Jamilla Deville, Kelly Ann Doll; DJs – Dylabolical (Twist n Shout), Toz Riot, and a whole bunch more Where: Black Cherry NYE @ The Factory Theatre When: Saturday December 31 from 9pm; presale tickets on sale now.

The Hondas Such A Drag By Juliette Steinweg with us to talk about it.

“I didn’t think much about how the song would be received,” Honda maintains. “I think it’s a good pop song. Some people from the gay community seem to be offended, because we are just a bunch of straight rock ‘n’ rollers playing in drag.

But most gay people like it. My gay housemate and his boyfriend like it. Getting support from people I know is the most important thing, because I can’t please everyone.” Certainly Taka, who is gay himself, doesn’t think that’s the primary point of concern – he says the song is a metaphor for being different, and possibly encapsulates the immigrant experience at large as well. “The way I speak English and the way I think is a bit different,” he says. “I’ve always been a bit of an outsider.”

T

aka Honda is looking a bit different to how you remember him. The animatronic drummer behind Melbourne pop rockers Little Red, most famous for his wider-thanwide grin and flamboyant drumming style, has stepped out of the shadows with his new

project, The Hondas. Boasting a lineup that has him out the front, The Hondas first single, ‘I Am A Homosexual’, has a film clip that sees the boys play a local Melbourne nightclub entirely in drag, while the punters sneer obscenities at them. It’s a bold move – and Taka caught up

The Hondas feature a number of different players from a bunch of Melbourne bands, but you’ll have a hard time figuring out who they all are because Taka’s given them all his surname, a la The Ramones. “I wanted to make the band like a family. The Hondas aren’t my solo project. It’s a collection of amazing musicians contributing to making the music,” he reasons. “I just happened to have the best surname in the band. I don’t want to play in a band where the lead singer fires his bandmates just because he is successful enough to get a session musician. It’s horrible to see bands getting rid of their members against [their] will.” Taka cites the well-known

story of the original drummer from The Shins to illustrate his point. “Apparently [singer] James Mercer thought his drummer wasn’t good enough, although the drummer really wanted to contribute to the band. I really hate to see that kind of behaviour, you know? We want to look after each other rather than stab each other in the back.”

For now, Taka – who enjoys wearing dresses and pearls as much as your average Melbournian male – is toning down the responses to his clip from the GLBT community, some of whom he says don’t really ‘get’ the joke.

“Using the word ‘homosexual’ in our music isn’t really important,” he says, “but supporting gay rights is important. I’d be happy if the song gives people something to think about. Homophobia really pisses me off as much as racism; both result from closed-mindedness.

“I pretty much play every gig in drag. The others do when they feel like it,” he says. “I’d like to live in a world where everybody is female until 30, and turns to male when they hit 30. I think some fish start as male and become female once they have reached a certain size. The world I have in my head is opposite. Imagine how cool that world would be?”

What: ‘I Am A Homosexual’ is out now Where: Spectrum When: Saturday January 7

“A broom is drearily sweeping up the broken pieces of yesterdays life” - JIMI HENDRIX 26 :: BRAG :: 443 :: 19:12:11

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sydney festival 2012 Like any good festival, Sydney Festival presents the cutting edge of theatre, performance, music and art from around the world; like any good festival, it's a place to discover new things, and see what and who is creating waves in the cultural pond. This year, there are old dogs like Mike Patton and J Mascis teaching us new tricks, long-standing legends like PJ Harvey, Beth Orton and Ira Glass doing what they do best, and young revolutionaries like TuneYards, Shabazz Palaces and Brook Andrew showing us what's next. And this year’s festival has some new tricks up its own sleeve, including a firm push into Parramatta that includes a massive lineup (and their very own Spiegeltent).

J Mascis

By Lachlan Kanoniuk

R

eleased earlier this year, Several Shades Of Why is legendary Dinosaur Jr. singer/guitarist J Mascis’s first fully-formed solo effort. The quaint, gentle acoustic-led album is a far

cry from the blaring, overblown electric guitar assault of the iconic shoegaze trio – but although there’s the starkest of contrasts between the instrumentation, there’s barely a variance in vocal intonation.

As I soon found out, his distinctive disaffected style also carries into J’s cadence as interviewee; though sporting a head of hair that would make Gandalf jealous, J speaks so

It all kicks off for free with the Festival First Night held on Saturday January 7 around the city, from travelling caravans in Macquarie Street to a massive music lineup in the Domain that runs the gamut from Gurrumul to Washington to Manu Chao (in his Australian debut). Below we survey some of our festival picks, from the Australian premiere of a concerto by Yeah Yeah Yeahs’ Nick Zinner to the new project from Grizzly Bear’s Chris Taylor, and a cluster-bomb of international performance provocateurs that includes Ontroerend Goed, Frantic Assembly, and choreographic game-changer Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui.

But this is just a slice of the action; sydneyfestival.org.au has more.

sedately that Treebeard seems like a veritable motormouth.

surprising to me sometimes. It’s fun to give it a shot and see what happens.”

Although he's released several solo efforts over the course of his twodecade-plus career, this LP marks the first instance of original compositions – it's J’s most absolute solo statement yet. “I guess Sub Pop wanted me to do it for a while. I guess I just got around to it now,” J states matter-offactly. Comparing the differences in instrumentation from Dinosaur Jr. to the solo record, it’s almost bizarre how little his vocal style has had to adapt; it’s more a case of transforming the gentle/abrasive dynamic of the band into a more sensible gentle/gentle dynamic on Several Shades Of Why. Whatever it is, it’s a phenomenon J hasn’t paid much mind to. “I think I just have a limited voice or something, it just sounds the same. I don’t really think about it, I guess.” Though notoriously laconic, you can by no means accuse J of emanating disdain; it’s just the way he talks – what of it?

That Meredith set gave my earholes a thorough workout even as I stood at the top of the hill, and J is well aware of the OH&S issues of performing in front of his monstrous stack of amps.

“Yeah, I’ve always worn earplugs,” he says. “From the beginning I was a drummer, then I switched to guitar; I kind of missed the physical aspect that drums gave you, so I tried to play loud to get the air moving so I could feel it against my body,” he muses. “Early on I knew I wanted to feel it more than I could hear it – I already knew it was too loud for my ears, so I just wore earplugs. I like getting the chance to play so loud, it’s fun.”

Last time Mascis was in the country was with Dinosaur Jr., on a tour which saw the band obliterate the Supernatural Amphitheatre at Meredith Festival with one of the loudest sets I’ve ever heard. So how does he fare when it comes to solo festival appearances? “It’s a lot harder, but I haven’t done too many festivals with the acoustic,” he says. “Sometimes it’s surprising how quiet people get when [they’re] listening – I guess that’s

Reformations are a funny beast, but Dinosaur Jr.’s mid-2000s reunion has proven to be one of the select few that retained the original magic, not only on the touring circuit but also with the quality new albums that followed.

“I guess we just have a certain chemistry or a certain sound, just from learning how to play together when we were kids,” Mascis explains. “I guess it still interests people; we still have a certain energy, [which] is rare.”

There’s a strange, ostensibly tempestuous rapport between J and Dinosaur Jr. bassist Lou Barlow.

When I spoke to Lou earlier in the year, he said, “My perfect world would be touring with all my bands

it’s made more apparent when we speak of her physical transformation for performances; the banshee face paint is just a pointer to the person who walks on stage. “The face paint has become part of the ritual of it, and I do kind of need that to say, ‘OK, now you’re transitioning into this space. Now you’re going from real life to stage life.’ And I have to have a separation between those two in order to survive.”

Ending most comments with a soft giggle, Garbus explains that this process of survival when performing is something that developed over time, stemming from her college days at Smith – a progressive women’s art school in Massachusetts – when she was 20, and the crippling self-doubt and depression that plagued her there.

TuneYards

By Emily Williams

I

f Tune-Yards hasn’t bleeped upon your radar at all this year, run back to your rock and keep hiding. Merrill Garbus’s second LP, whokill, is sure to sneak its way into many critics’ End Of Year lists for its rowdy, bold, and loud melding of sirens, saxophones, percussion, shattering glass, loops and above all else voice, used as much as an instrument as a tool of communication. Garbus is granted a rare gift of range, as capable of a 28 :: BRAG :: 443 :: 19:12:11

croon, a yodel or a roar as she is of delivering lines in a conspiratorial whisper. It’s confrontational, beatladen music, delivered in a raw, live and unusually honest performance.

“It’s scary, it’s really scary,” Garbus says. “I think I am so dedicated to being honest about my conscience and about who I am as a person… I mean, I’ve had people recommend to me that I not be so honest.”

Perhaps she’s alluding to those at her label, 4AD, who talked her out of naming her debut collection of lo-fi, ukulele and dictaphone pastiches White Guilt. (They went with Bird-Brains instead.) “It’s different when I get up on stage,” she explains. “I don’t feel fear, because that’s Merrill the performer and I have my performance mask

on, and I still have a choice as to who I let into my life. But when I talk about the music, and certainly what the songs say within them, I don’t want to care about what people think because it’s not all truth – a lot of it is just based on my experience, and people can think what they want beyond that.”

The subject matter of whokill is not simple, nor is the lady that writes it – but that’s another beguiling element to Tune-Yards. “They’re tender subjects, they feel very vulnerable, and I can only hope that in talking about them other people feel safe. Talking about them as well, I think a lot of them are human conditions.” This sense of vulnerability is something that permeates Garbus the woman, and

“I remember being in Waiting For Godot some time when I was in school, and I was deeply depressed at that time; that specific year of my life I was deeply depressed, partially because every night I would be saying ‘I can’t go on’, ‘I must go on’, ‘I can’t go on’… It was very dark,” she says. “I’m 32 now, and when I look back at when I was 20 I think, ‘Oh my gosh, how did I ever make it through?’ Those dark times of figuring out who I was as an adult, and how I was gonna deal with the problems of the world, and was I gonna save the world, or did I wanna be in the world?” she laughs.

“It was a very fitting theme, to do Waiting For Godot at that point in my life.”

Merrill Garbus looks back at this time with a sense of perspective only age can afford, and coming from such defeating depression to create something delivered with as much celebration as it is confrontation is something that's uniquely her own. It is, in a sense, battle music. “What fuels my

together, playing the one night. Then J Mascis can sit on a fucking throne, and all these balloons can fall down, because he plays lead guitar...” But just as you can’t charge Mascis’s laconic nature as being a result of underlying disdain, neither can you call Lou’s outspokenness meanspirited. “I don’t know,” J laughs, when asked about the state of their creative relationship. “I guess it seems alright, it depends. He’s kind of – I don’t know what you’d call it – volatile or something. He’s not always evenkeeled...”

Soon after performing over the New Year period in Australia, J sets sail on the rather curious Weezer Cruise, a five-day long “festival” on board a cruise ship during which he will perform alongside a star-studded roster with Dinosaur Jr., as well as under his solo guise. “I don’t know anything about that,” Mascis states, despite there being little more than a month until the departing date...

“I’m just hoping for the best. I have no idea what it’s gonna be like. It’s definitely a first, I’ve never been on a cruise or anything like that,” he says – and I can sense a tinge of excitement shining through.

What: Several Shades Of Why is out through Sub Pop Where: The Famous Spiegeltent When: January 11 & 12, 7pm; January 13, 5.30pm

creativity is stuff that’s wrong, a lot of the time. Stuff that I feel needs to be changed, whether in myself, or the world, or both," she says. "So at the same time I feel my music is a celebration of life – and sometimes I feel sort of cheesy saying that, but I have come to understand that when we all come together for these concerts, when people come together for a performance, we’re all there to celebrate being alive in some way; to dance, or to sing along, or to let the music hit you in some way that nothing else can.

I know I am there for that reason, and it’s a life-affirming experience – let’s put it that way.

“Regardless of the fact that there are problems with me and with the world, my sense has always been, ‘Yes, but that is what life is about,’” she continues. “If you didn’t have challenges in life, you’d just sit back and take it all for granted. I think it’s resistance and revolution in action and in thought, but also giving into the fact that we’re alive right then, right there.”

As sufferers of depression would know, it’s very rare for the beast to exit entirely. Everyone has their own coping mechanisms, and Garbus is pragmatic in her approach. “Making sure that I’m sane with myself, listening to what’s going on with me," she says. "And honestly, when I started yelling louder and singing louder, it really helped with my depression because I was no longer unable to express my feelings. And I think a lot of my depression stems from that: having so much inside of me that I felt I couldn’t get out.”

What: whokill is out via Remote Control Where: The Famous Spiegeltent / Keystone Festival Bar @ Hyde Park Barracks When: Wednesday January 18, 7pm / Friday January 20, 8pm (with Jonti)

BRAG :: 443 :: 19:12:11 :: 29

Music

sydney festival 2012

The Stepkids

By Dan Watt

T

he Stepkids have been kicking goals this year. Their self-titled debut album came out through tastemaking label Stones Throw in September and is absolute bliss to listen to, with the three-piece artfully combining soul and psychedelia, and capping it off with their stunning harmonies. Made up of bass player Dan Edinberg, singer/guitarist Jeff Gitelman and drummer Tim Walsh, the band have become extremely in-demand live acts too, as news of their superior sonic wooing spreads.

Edinberg took a night off making music to sit beside his phone and chat about the band’s album, their upcoming Australian tour, and the internet’s impact on the soul revival that’s helped The Stepkids get to this stage. “I feel that with the internet, it has allowed for more types of bands to get out there. Major labels are on the decline – one has to consider that their large corporate structure makes them too slow to react to the constantly changing tastes of the music fans; you can literally cruise through a hundred styles and genres in just one evening on a computer! …

That being said, we came to Stones Throw Records’ attention through a friend passing our music on to another friend,” Edinberg laughs, proving that those older distribution channels aren't quite dead yet.

By Michael Hartt

T

wenty years since revitalising Primal Scream’s career by turning their ‘I’m Losing More Than I’ll Ever Have’ into the indie-house anthem ‘Loaded’ and producing the landmark Screamadelica album, Andrew Weatherall has had one of his biggest years yet. The DJ and producer has spent much of 2011 in the studio working on remixes for other artists, as well as starting work on the follow-up to his 2009 solo debut LP. With dry wit, he puts most of his workload down to two factors: “It’s weird – as the music industry kind of falls apart around me, this year’s probably the busiest I’ve been in the studio for remixes in the past 20 years.

I don’t know how much of that is to do with the Screamadelica effect [Primal Scream celebrated the album's 20th birthday with a huge UK tour this year], and how much is to do with my prodigious talent… I suspect it’s mainly the former,” he laughs.

Amongst the studio work, he's also been DJing around the UK and Europe on most weekends, including joining his Primal Scream cohorts as they toured the Screamadelica live show. He says the experience was somewhat different to the way they did it two decades ago. “It was as exciting and as inspirational, but we’re all older, wiser and probably much more well-rounded individuals than we were 20 years ago, so we didn’t need to fill the holes in our soul with narcotics. We filled the holes in our soul with sensible conversation, reading and doing crosswords.”

Weatherall’s DJ sets are famously eclectic affairs ranging from soul, disco, electro and techno to everything in between.

Although a devout user of vinyl, for practicality he transfers his records to CD in order to carry a larger range of material. “I always work hard the day before a gig.

I’ll spend six or seven hours listening to music and assembling a set. With vinyl sometimes it’s 30 :: BRAG :: 443 :: 19:12:11

difficult to stray from that, but now I can work out the backbone to a mix [and also] flesh it out in a different direction, if the crowd seems up for a certain sound,” he explains.

Weatherall only really knows what to do with a live set once he’s there. For his Sydney Festival show, the set time will be a factor.

“I’ve asked to play for at least three or four hours, so given that, I’ll run the gamut. I do a night in London once a month called A Love From Outer Space, and that’s all kind of down-tempo to mid-tempo new cosmic disco stuff. So if I get four hours, I’ll start like that, relatively downtempo, then just kind of build up steam until I’m in faster electro and techno territory. That’s the plan.

“You have to think about where you are in the evening,” he continues. “Sometimes, if it’s a big venue, there’s no point in trying to be subtle; you just hit them with the big guns. But if you’ve got four hours, then you can be a little bit more experimental.” For Weatherall, finding more music – whether it’s old or new – is still the driving force behind his passion for what he does. “There’s so much music around now. I live a stone’s throw away from Rough Trade, and I know I can walk in there and spend half an hour and find loads of music. It depends where you’re shopping. Somewhere like that makes it relatively easy. That’s what keeps me going,” he says.

“I’ve been in music now for over 30 years, and I’m still finding stuff that I’ve not discovered yet. If I’d thought I’d heard everything, there’d be no point in me carrying on in music. I might as well go do something else, because I wouldn’t have that hunger.

Anyone that’s been doing music for over 15 or 20 years must still have that hunger; either that or a massive tax bill.”

With: Neville Watson Where: Keystone Festival Bar When: Saturday January 14

After listening to the album, and in particular the song ‘Suburban Dream’, one can’t help but be overwhelmed by the band’s drenching harmonies.

Edinberg explains that growing up in Connecticut had a major influence on his and his fellow members' passion for good vocals. “In Connecticut there’s a majorly awesome gospel scene – it’s funny that we’re so into it because two of us are Jewish, but we’re very obsessed.” According to Edinberg though, the band has a bunch of different influences. “It’s more general ideas and concepts that inspire us to create music,” he says. “I mean, we’re all hugely into 20th century classical music like Scott Joplin, Strauss, and so many others. We wrote an album before this one that's pretty much straight-up rock – the funny thing is that when I

was at high school I was into, almost exclusively, soul and RnB, so it’s nice now to be back into making that style of music.

“On this next record we’re going to have a really strong jazz influence, but I’m not talking cheesy easy listening,” he continues. “I mean jazz that really rocks – like Rick James and Prince. I honestly believe that we are fostering something really unique that no one else is doing right now.”

Capping off our chat, Edinberg expresses his and the band’s excitement to be heading to Australia for shows in January. “I’ve never been to Australia before so I’m super excited to be coming. Jeff our guitarist has been out before with Alicia Keys, and he loves it. Hearing that got me so excited to be coming there.”

What: The Stepkids is out now through Stones Throw With: Electric Wire Hustle Where: Keystone Festival Bar When: Friday January 27

CANT

By Caitlin Welsh

W

hen the first cut from Chris ‘Grizzly Bear’ Taylor’s solo project CANT found its way onto the internet in 2009 – a track called ‘Ghosts’, which he released as a 7-inch on his own Terrible Records imprint – he gave an interview to Pitchfork where he joked that the name was a taunt to himself; a punning prod at his inability to finish any of his own songs. ‘Ghosts’, he admitted, was the first track he’d ever actually completed.

Just over 18 months later, he released a full-length record, Dreams Come True, under his solo moniker.

Writing solidly through a “really, really, really cold” winter in New York, and then polishing it off many months later, Taylor and pal George Lewis Jr. managed a moody patchwork of clattering RnB, drone-tinged triphop and even hints of the mournful chamber pop that Taylor’s production style has made the hallmark of his work with Grizzly Bear. “It feels weird to have been able to finish a record,” he admits, down the phone from a friend’s Paris living room.

“I’m glad I did though. I really found it challenging, but that’s not for everybody. For some reason it was hard for me... It wasn’t hard to write [songs], but to finish them was tough.”

Taylor won’t be drawn on what might have inspired the eclectic sounds of Dreams Come True; it’s recognisably related both to Lewis’s lugubriously airy record as Twin Shadow, Forget, and Taylor’s work with Grizzly Bear, but falls naturally into no particular genre. “I didn’t set out to make a rock record, or a dance record, or an RnB record. It would just be boring to me to do that,” he shrugs. “There was no

plan, no initial song ideas. We just set everything up and started making sounds, and sounds became songs.

And that’s it.”

As Taylor recalls, he and Lewis wrote around three-quarters of the record in just a week and a half. “I’d never really written my own music before, so I was kind of confused about it.

And what it was supposed to be, and what I was supposed to do with it.

It was a really weird, surprised sort of thing. Like, ‘Is this what it sounds like when I make my own music?’ I dunno. It was really confusing.”

But that natural, let-it-happen style is something that works well for Taylor – he claims to be the opposite of the classic perfectionist. “I think anything I’ve ever liked or been really happy with – I’m much happier with less effort required. I don’t feel like keeping on coming back to something is a good thing to do. I try and avoid that sort of behaviour. So a lot of the instrumental elements on this record were just laid down and never edited again – most things, really. Not even

so much mixing happened – I mixed the whole thing in a week.

Taylor’s distinctive sound has kept him in demand as a producer in recent years, but he confesses that constantly working on other people’s music gave him a desire to be his own boss for once. “It was definitely something I needed to do,” he says.

“I felt a little drained from... I dunno, I hadn’t really stopped working for the last seven years or something. I’d come off tour and then immediately start working on someone else’s record [Taylor’s name can be found in the liner notes of albums by TV On The Radio, The Morning Benders and Dirty Projectors], then go back on tour, then work on another record when I came home. So I haven’t had any down time. I felt like I really needed to check-in with myself and see how I was doing, and just have some selfish time.”

What: Dreams Come True is out now Where: The Famous Spiegeltent When: January 14, 5pm and 7pm; January 15, 5pm

Andrew Weatherall photo Joe Whitney

Andrew Weatherall

All three members of The Stepkids are supreme musicians in their own right; Gitelman himself threw in the towel as guitarist for Alicia Keys so he could concentrate on writing their debut album. But the three members’ credentials as backing musicians for major pop artists were used against them by music website Pitchfork, who said their record sounded like the work of three session players rather than a cohesive band. “It really annoyed me that [the reviewer] tried to pigeonhole us with information about our background that, while being interesting, is not particularly

relevant to the band’s sound or success,” Edinberg says. “We’re not just a one-album band, and I feel that over our career we will prove ourselves as an inspired and varied group. I mean, we have a second album that’s almost done.”

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Music

sydney festival 2012

Sons and Daughters

By Benjamin Cooper

F

ew people are as terrified of cockroaches as Adele Bethel.

The frontwoman of Scottish outfit Sons and Daughters may be able to fearlessly belt out a refrain across the festival hordes, but the thought of Australia’s great survivors encumbers her with fear ahead of their January tour. “Honestly, I would live in Sydney,” she says down the line from Glasgow, “but you have these real, living cockroaches everywhere... In Scotland there are roaches apparently, but you’ll never see them.” Bethel dismisses my assertion that the only bugs to be feared are those from Queensland.

“Nooo, when we were out [in Australia last time], Brisbane was fine, and we got to Sydney and had this lovely apartment, but then when we got to the venue the roaches were everywhere. They were on the rider, watching us... I swear they could sense our fear. As soon as we walked into the room some of them started flying towards me. I was standing there, just getting hit in the face. We were completely over-run.”

Kurt Wagner & Cortney Tidwell

By Mike Gee

T

his is a story of tradition, and breaking tradition; of taking a pre-existing idea and twisting it until it makes sense that a band covering the best songs from legendary country music label Chart Records could also cover the Motörhead/ Girlschool duet ‘Please Don’t Touch’... That band is KORT, the project of Lambchop co-founder and frontman Kurt Wagner, and singer-songwriter Cortney Tidwell – whose grandfather Slim Williamson ran Chart Records.

Her mother, Connie Eaton, was a country singer and her father, Cliff Williamson, a producer and A&R. Wagner, now 53, founded Lambchop about 18 years ago, and has been playing music for over a quarter of a century.

To these ears at least, he’s the American equivalent of England’s Neil Hannon, of The Divine Comedy fame – but where Hannon delivers chamber pop deeply rooted in English musical tradition, Wagner’s Lambchop are a cerebral take on Nashville’s long musical history. There is swing and jazz and orchestra, and cocktail bars, and old footsteps and large halls; the Grand Ole Opry is never too far away.

Wagner and Tidwell, who are speaking to me from a rather cold Nashville, will be in Australia for Sydney Festival – it starts with a couple of KORT shows before a gig from Lambchop, with Wagner playing solo the next day. The latter, Wagner says, he “wisely left to last”. “What I’m trying to do is present an overview of the various things I’ve done over the years.

Even with KORT and Lambchop playing, I think there’s enough songs there. After all, I’ve done eleven records…”

Cortney appears on the latest Lambchop album, Mr. M, which is due for release on February 24.

32 :: BRAG :: 443 :: 19:12:11

The record features a stripped back lineup, with just five of the core musicians plus Wagner and guests – but on the evidence of the song I’ve heard, ‘If Not I’ll Just Die’, it lacks nothing in atmosphere.

From Wagner’s perspective, the songs were informed by the death of his friend, the great American singer-songwriter Vic Chesnutt, who Lambchop backed on his 1998 album, The Salesman and Bernadette. The music also owes much to former full-time band member Mark Nevins, who Wagner says had a concept of a sound and a method that he thought would work with the tone of his writing – something Nevins called a “psycho-Sinatra” sound.

“He’d been listening to all these Sinatra records, and he became fascinated by the way the strings are used, particularly in the sense that they often don’t follow the melody. He thought it would fit with what I was doing,” Wagner says.

“What's interesting is that although there are strings on about half of the songs, when you listen to the record it’s often not noticeable whether a song has strings or not.

Overall, I think the songs are more open and simpler than in the past.”

For Cortney, appearing on about half the songs on Mr. M was simple. “It really was easy to be part of. I just didn’t think about it at all,” she says. “It’s completely different to what I normally do, in that I’m not writing the stuff, so I just came in and did my thing. It was very enjoyable.” It all sounds very civilised, I offer – and they both laugh. “Ï guess you could say it was,” Wagner says, “but we wouldn’t have it any other way.”

What: KORT is playing at The Famous Spiegeltent on January 19 at 7pm, and at City Recital Hall on January 20 at 9.30pm; Lambchop is playing at City Recital Hall on January 21 at 9.30pm; Kurt Wagner is playing at The Famous Spiegeltent on January 22 at 5pm.

If all this sounds like a bit of a British whinge, the Scot is quick to conclude her roach recounting with a disclaimer. “As long as they aren’t flying, the roaches are okay. I just want to take the record and get away from the Scottish winter. I can put up with the bugs if it means I get a nice escape!” The record in question is new release Mirror Mirror, which was produced by friend and colleague J.D. Twitch in Glasgow earlier this year. The album sees Bethel’s fellow songwriter, Scott Paterson, afforded the chance to lean more heavily on his vocal talents. “When we started out, the band was meant to always

have a kind of equality to it, with shared instruments and vocals and such. We wanted the name ‘Sons and Daughters’ to be like ‘voices together’. We always wanted the band to be a musical utopia,” she laughs, “but after a while we realised it also had to be interesting as well...

Scott doesn’t enjoy singing, but I twisted his arm and pressured him, and it sounds great.”

There is clearly a distinction between Bethel’s pressuring and that applied to Paterson by the producer of their previous album, This Gift. “Bernard Butler (of UK act Suede) produced our last record and he was... I don’t quite know how to put this – he was less than keen on Scott singing. Bernard’s very keen on using whatever he thinks your strength is – he decided that Scott and I wouldn’t sing together, which seemed a bit strange as the whole idea of the band was for two voices, for two loves.” For the latest album, the band’s switch to Twitch (aka fellow Glaswegian Keith McIvor, who founded seminal Glasgow club

Optimo) was only natural. “We both have really big love for The Gun Club and X and those really sort of rock and roll bands,” Bethel explains.

Twitch’s influence is writ in both the newer sounds to emerge on Mirror Mirror, and in the current carefree state of the band. “Working with Keith was a very obvious move,” Bethel says, “but it was really good to do. Keith’s always been supportive of our band ... he gave us one of our first gigs when [current record label] Domino came up. And the club, when he first ran it, was just inspirational – you couldn’t go there without getting a bit dizzy. It was the same with recording – every day he’d bring in his iPod and play us songs we’d never heard before," she says.

"With Keith it was different, because he’s our friend. I think we really needed that at the time.”

What: Mirror Mirror is out now through Domino Where: Keystone Festival Bar When: Thursday January 12

41 Strings

By Bridie Connellan

“I

t’s pretty hard to not have an immediate and direct emotional reaction to the sound of strings. There’s just something so melancholic about them that’s so cinematic and evocative, it’s just part of everyone’s DNA. There’s a warmth that everybody feels.”

Cucumber-cool and chilled as fuck, Nick Zinner is in New York, hanging in his apartment after a healthy Wednesday of being Nick Zinner: rockstar, guitarist, composer, arranger, curator, photographer. The multi-tasker is bound for Sydney Festival to present 41 Strings, a composition developed as part of The Creators Project – a creative and tech-savvy collective working with the like of Neon Indian, Jamie xx and other like minds to do generally cool shit. Taking a moment away from being the guitarist of the Yeah Yeah Yeahs, Zinner teamed up with Hisham Akira Bharoocha (Black Dice, The Boredoms) and Ben Vida (Soft Circle, Town And Country) to create a four-part symphonic performance, celebrating both the 41st Earth Day, and that part of himself that loves a bit of emotional grandiosity.

“You hear someone playing a violin and you just immediately respond to it, no matter what your background is,” he continues. “I was just trying to write something that people were really excited to hear. I’m sure if you asked a classical traditionalist, they would be like, ‘This is rock music!’

And that’s alright. There’s definitely a lot of things keeping those two worlds apart. I remember the first time the drummers and guitarists met all the string players, you could just tell they were from two completely different places, so their coming together was just great.”

Zinner’s creation is notably epic.

Themed for each season, each of the four suites takes on its own character, as the piece drives

militaristically through Fall, Winter and Spring, finally arriving at Summer in an inspiring part-Sigur Rós part-Johnny Greenwood roundup. Zinner previously composed scores for Dominic Murphy’s moonshine-laden White Lightnin’, and Spike Jonze’s I’m Here and Where The Wild Things Are – and 41 Strings is equally score-like, and unsurprisingly astounding. “Obviously I wanted to have guitars involved, because that’s something I do and something I can write on. I thought it would be interesting to put [guitar and strings] together in a non-schlocky way.”

The wild-haired stringbean says that the four-season motif isn’t an homage to Vivaldi; he believes weather swings could power anyone into classical fury. “The emotional inspiration for the composition was just about the feeling that I get with each season in New York.

I guess there are strong feelings in Australia, but in New York, [the seasons] truly control everything.

Everything is so affected by the weather, so there’s a lot of universal feelings I was trying to tap into.”

Zinner and Bharoocha jammed out initial ideas before the guitarist

played around in his studio solo, taking inspiration from the likes of minimalist god Steve Reich. But there was a problem. Zinner can’t read music. “Yeah, I have no idea,” he laughs. “But I don’t think you really need to anymore. Composing or creating something, you can get any sound you want just using a computer. It’s not as good as real strings, but it shouldn’t limit anybody to try anything really.” Zinner enlisted the help of friend Gillian Rivers to transcribe his epic sounds, a renowned string arranger and film scorer who managed to turn his ideas into orchestral literature.

“I really wanted to make something that was epic and huge-sounding, but I was writing most of the parts on my shitty computer – even violin and cello sounds,” Zinner explains.

“It really wasn’t until we had our first massive rehearsal that I really heard everything being played. It all just… came together. Having something that you wrote played back to you by 30 real string players is the most incredible sound you could ever hear.”

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Babel

By Dee Jefferson

3

5-year-old Belgian choreographer Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui is one of the stars of modern international dance; growing up on a diet of hip hop and vogueing, he was talentspotted at the age of 15, joined Alain Platel’s prestigious Ballets C. de la B. at the age of 19, and made his choreographic debut a mere two years later. His major breakthrough came with his second work, Rien de Rien, in 2000.

What sets Cherkaoui apart from his peers is his virtuosic inventiveness, unfettered by genres, rules or convention, and his intuitive sense of how movement fits into real life – and how real life, and human relationships, can be ‘described’ through movement. Dancing seems as natural and effortless to Cherkaoui as breathing, and as unaffected. And when you talk to him about dance, you’re not talking about technical aspects or theory – you’re talking about his life philosophy.

What drives him most, as a person and as a choreographer, is connection. On stage, it manifests in works of interpersonal and intercultural exchange – from his assimilation of the Buddhist philosophy and kung-fu fighting forms of the Shaolin monks, in Sutra, to his collaboration with other choreographers, like Akram Khan (Zero Degrees).

Babel, created by Cherkaoui and his choreographic partner-in-crime, Damien Jalet, takes this interest in intercultural and interpersonal exchange to its extreme, drawing together 13 dancers from different countries and cultural backgrounds, to tell the famous Biblical story about the division of humankind into language groups.

“This project was really about territory and language, and how these two relate to each other,” says Cherkaoui. “Very often, language is a way of conquering another territory. One can wipe out another civilisation just by making

them not speak their own language. So for us, language was a very strong weapon.”

When it came to casting the piece, Cherkaoui and Jalet deliberately looked for dancers for whom cultural borders had personal significance – for example, a British Indian dancer, and a dancer who was born in the Philippines but brought up in Norway. “They know what it’s like to be at the border of one culture and another.”

Cherkaoui’s fascination with other cultures and his passion for absorbing himself in them has something to do with his own background. “I grew up as a white man, but with a very Arabic name, learning Islamic prayers but then going to an atheist school, and my mother was Catholic.

I very quickly had to find a place in which I could connect all these things, and find a form of morality that would be inclusive for all these elements [of my life].”

Where: Sydney Theatre, Walsh Bay When: January 9-14

Radio Muezzin

By Simon Binns

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public figure in the Arab world, a muezzin is the chosen person from a mosque who leads the call to prayer. In times gone by, they would climb the minarets of their mosque to reach the greatest number of people; often the blind were chosen, so that they would not peep into windows from their unique vantage point.

These days, with the benefit of microphones, the muezzins stay safe inside the mosque, from where their voice is amplified to the people, the various cries mingling across the cityscape. Except in Cairo, where for the past few years the government has been trying to implement a centralised system with just one muezzin, who will broadcast a single call to prayer over the radio – ostensibly to regulate the time and delivery of the calls to prayer, but at the expense of cultural diversity and the livelihoods of the city's many muezzins.

German theatre collective Rimini Protokoll, who have made a name for themselves by

exploring real situations with real people have created Radio Muezzin to examine the impacts of this apparent step forward, bringing together four muezzins of varying backgrounds.

Unlike the verbatim works that have previously graced our stages (think The Modern International Dead at Griffin, or Stuff Happens at Belvoir) this isn’t actors recreating interviews; these are the people themselves, sharing their own unique stories in what is effectively a live documentary.

Of course there are still some theatrical elements: the suspension of disbelief that the Seymour Centre’s Everest Theatre (which has so often been host to musical theatre) is now a mosque made of carpets and fans, that these four men are sharing their stories for the first time, and that the way everything comes together is spontaneous.

But there are also elements of absolute reality: these men are telling true stories, and the audience is hearing them (and reading them, as the show is performed in Arabic with supertitles) for the first time. It’s a unique offering and that’s what Festival time is about.

Where: Everest Theatre, Seymour Centre When: January 16-21

Beautiful Burnout their rehearsal room on a boxing gym. “It just energised the room in a very different way; there was lots of banter, lots of humour, lots of encouragement.”

Assembly

By Lucy Fokkema

“I remember often looking at crowds and the flow of crowds, interested in how [they] move, rather than the motivation for the movement… maybe that’s a vocational thing about being a choreographer?” Obarzanek muses.

Assembly is Obarzanek’s last work as Artistic Director of Chunky Move, one of Australia’s premier contemporary dance companies. Since co-founding the company in 1995, Obarzanek has earnt a reputation for unlikely collaborations and genre-defying dance pieces: in Mortal Engine and Glow he worked with video projections and new media software that leant an eerie post-human grandeur to his dancers; in Connected, which played at Sydney Theatre in May, he choreographed his dancers around sculptor Reuben Margolin’s kinetic art machine.

For his next challenge, Obarzanek wanted to make an epic work “that didn’t have anything else except people, a lot of people, in it… and when it came to the question of sound or music with the dance, I thought – what if the people themselves made that sound on stage?”

This is how Assembly came to be a partnership between Chunky Move and Sydney Philarmonia Choirs, with Victorian 34 :: BRAG :: 443 :: 19:12:11

As much about sound as dance, Assembly evokes both the “crystalline order and the unpredictable clamour of the mob” through the sound of feet trampling the stage (a steep set of plain wooden steps) and medieval and contemporary choral music sung acapella. In one particular sequence, for example, the rabble and rumble of a football crowd is peeled away to reveal an isolated individual.

Training singers to dance and dancers to sing had its challenges (“in the beginning they sat separately during lunch breaks,” says Obarzanek) but the choreographer soon found a deeper symmetry between bodies and voices. “In the process of dancing, dancers transcend themselves as a person and become a body in space. Singers do the same,” he explains. “To be close to that in the studio is quite magical… It’s not just hearing, your whole body is affected by it.”

“We are often alone in a world surrounded by people; but I think there are also moments when you cease to be an individual in the crowd and become part of something bigger,” Obarzanek explains.

“You can be in a football crowd, madly cheerin, or in a choir, or dancing mindlessly on a dance floor – it’s quite a wonderful thing to experience, a release of self.”

Where: City Recital Hall, Angel Place When: January 11-14

By Dee Jefferson

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oxing is such an inherently theatrical sport, it doesn’t make sense to let cinema have all the fun – and who better to bring it to the stage than awardwinning British physical theatre company Frantic Assembly. Previously in Australia for their Sydney Theatre Company co-production Stockholm, Frantic return this summer with their knockout co-production with the National Theatre Of Scotland (whose Blackwatch played Sydney Festival 2009), about five young Glaswegian boxing hopefuls. Using choreographed movement, pre-recorded video and live feed, and music by Underworld, the show has been described as visceral, electrifying, and both visually and emotionally stunning.

“There’s been too many shows about boxing that have faked it,” says Frantic Assembly's Scott Graham, who developed the piece with co-founder Steven Hoggett. So we knew we wanted very intricate boxing choreography.”

Frantic looked for actors and dancers who displayed an unusual aptitude and eagerness for learning boxing and who responded well to instruction – and then made their cast train as boxers for a few months before rehearsals started. Further than that, they modelled

When they came to write the script, they chose Bryony Lavery (who they’d worked with on Stockholm) because they wanted someone who was totally unfamiliar with the sport, as Hogget had been.

“Our first research took us to what felt like a very scary estate – broken glass everywhere, and all these skin-head boys standing outside this broken-down little community hall, waiting for someone to come and open it up. And we rocked up there with our notebooks hidden, you know, trying to blend in but feeling really conspicuous and a little bit scared. But when [these boys] got inside, it was remarkable – it was all ‘please’ and ‘thank you’ and ‘yes sir’ and encouragement.

“I can absolutely see what people get from [boxing],” says Graham. “It’s an incredibly supportive environment, and it’s seductive; the sweat is seductive, the pain is seductive – and we tried to capture all of those elements in the show.”

Where: York Theatre, Seymour Centre When: January 18-29

Photo credits: Babel photo by Koen Broos, Radio Muezzin by Stephan Kaegi, Assembly by Jeff Busby

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e’re usually within crowds rather than observing them from the sidelines – but in Gideon Obarzanek’s latest work, Assembly, 60-plus performers stomp, roll and sing their way across the stage, teasing out the dynamics of crowds in front of our eyes.

Opera’s Music Director, Richard Gill, wrangling a cast of 60 that includes eight Chunky Move dancers and six principal singers.

Graham was already a boxing fan when he came to the project, but for Hoggett it was a steep learning curve. In fact, the genesis of Beautiful Burnout was his first encounter with the sport, after a friend unexpectedly took him to a boxing gym in New York. “There he was, looking at it with fresh eyes, for the first time,” says Graham, “seeing all this effort, and the ordered chaos of the room, and seeing everyone apply themselves. It really stuck with him.”

sydney festival 2012

A History Of Everything

visual arts

By Simon Binns

Brook Andrew

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etween the genuinely fantastic Next Stage program and main stage shows like Benedict Andrews’ The City, the open, warehouse-style stage of Sydney Theatre Company’s Wharf 2 has hosted some of Sydney’s best theatre over the last few years.

Two theatre-makers who know this better than most are Alexander Devriendt, artistic director of the Dutch company Ontroerend Goed (whose astounding exploration of adolescence Once And For All We’re Gonna Tell You Who We Are So Shut Up And Listen barely left the place standing in 2009), and Cameron Goodall, who since bringing Highway Rock ‘n’ Roll Disaster to the space with Adelaide group The Border Project, has practically set up camp on the stage as part of STC’s acting ensemble, The Residents.

This January, Devriendt and Goodall are teaming up at Wharf 2 for A History Of Everything, an ambitious collaboration between Ontroerend Goed and STC that sees three residents thrown in with four Dutch actors, under Devriendt’s direction.

Ever since Ontroerend Goed brought The Smile Off Your Face to the Sydney Festival in 2009, a show that saw audience members blindfolded, bound in a wheelchair and led around various 'stations' of a performance maze by the actors, STC has been courting

them. The deal was sealed after the success of Once And For All, and working with The Residents seemed an obvious choice. “I wanted to work together. I didn’t want to be here alone as a director,” Devriendt explains.

Presenting an actual history of everything on stage in under 90 minutes is ambitious, but that’s exactly why Devriendt wanted to do it.

“I have this book, A Short History Of Nearly Everything by Bill Bryson – it’s this Christmas gift that everybody reads – but he doesn’t even try! It’s just seven scientists talking about fungi and stars… I wanted to do it from zero to 2012.”

The resulting work takes a layperson’s perspective on a number of scientific works – Richard Dawkins’ texts on evolution, Briane Greene’s writings on cosmology, Sum by neuroscientist David Eagleman, and E.H.

Gombrich’s A Little History of the World – to try and come up with a snapshot of history, from the big bang to now.

For Goodall, one of the most exciting things about working with Ontroerend Goed is their commitment to “live-ness”. “[Their work] has a vitality that comes from the fact that it’s happening right now; if you recorded one of their shows and watched it the next day it would lose its meaning – and this one’s the same: we’re going to have to re-rehearse the first five minutes of the show almost every time we play, because we have to take on the events of the current day.”

Where: Wharf 2, Sydney Theatre Company When: January 13 – February 5

By Bridie Connell

L’Effet De Serge

Photo credits: I Am Eora by Lisa Tomasetti, L'Effect de Serge by Martin Argyroglo Callias Bey, A History of Everything by James Green

By Roslyn Helper

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hat can you achieve in one minute on stage? This is the question theatremakers Phillippe Quesne and Gaëtan Vourc’h, from the experimental Viviarium Studio in Paris, asked themselves when devising L’Effet de Serge (‘The Serge Effect’), about a man who puts on short lo-fi livingroom shows for his friends and neighbours.

A gentle comedy about the importance of art and the power of the imagination in everyday life, L’Effet de Serge is Vivarium Studio’s most widely travelled theatre work to date, having

performed over 150 times in at least 20 countries.

On the phone from Paris, Vourc’h, who co-wrote the show and also plays Serge, tells me he and Quesne started with the idea that just one minute on stage can provide an endless variety of theatrical effects.

“The first rehearsal was very basic. I would come on stage and stay for one minute and then leave. And then I would do that with the music. Then I would come on stage and read a book for one minute and leave. Lots of different things…

“I was first actually rehearsing alone, doing my one minute show for an empty chair. But, it was too sad – very sad, a bit crazy. So a few days before the premiere we decided to invite friends to come and join me.” This is how Serge’s friends became integral to the performance; in each city they tour to, Vivarium employs local actors to play the character's friends. “We just rehearse it with them a bit to give them the idea of what they’re going to do, when they have to come on stage and where they have to be on stage – it’s quite precise,” says Vourc’h.

Citing French director Jacques Tati (the creator of the ‘Monsieur Hulot’ films) as a major influence, Vourc’h notes the importance of the set in L’Effet de Serge. “At the beginning of the play there is a prologue where I’m wearing an astronaut suit… The set is in the dark and I describe it in my astronaut suit [using] a small light. There is a carpet, there is a ping pong table, a TV. I talk about his character through the set, what kinds of objects he has.”

Vourc’h shies away from discussing Serge as a character outside the show, preferring the audience to use their own imaginations – but he says, “I think they will see this guy who has his small group of friends who have agreed to believe in something, to believe in this guy who is doing these one-minute shows. The audience becomes a community that are going to believe in something together.”

Where: Everest Theatre, Seymour Centre When: January 8-11

I Am Eora

By Oliver Downes

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Am Eora seems set to extend the boundaries of Indigenous theatre, incorporating music (including that of desert balladeer Frank Yamma, jazz singer Wilma Reading and hip-hop poet Radical Son), performance and large-scale projections to suggest a story without relying too much on overt narrative.

It’s the brainchild of Wesley Enoch, the first Indigenous Artistic Director of the Queensland Theatre Company. Enoch, who contributed to the opening ceremony of the 2006 Commonwealth Games, describes I Am Eora as being “like an opening ceremony to a big athletics event”, which although celebratory looks “at the underbelly of things, trying to tell another kind of story, not just the obvious stuff.”

Taking as its point of departure the biographies of three historical figures, Barangaroo, Pemulwuy and Bennelong, the piece explores the different Indigenous responses to contact with Australia’s colonisers – ranging from hostile resistance to quiet refusal to conform, and active assistance.

“The dominant narrative is that Aboriginal people just rolled over and let [colonisation] happen,”

says Enoch, “but Pemulwuy resisted, and there’s been a huge resistance in this country since the very beginning... What these figures represent is still manifesting today: the warrior, the nurturer and the interpreter. Many Indigenous Australians experience those three spirits, those archetypes, in who we are in this country today.”

While speaking passionately about the continuities between present and past, Enoch is quick to argue that Indigenous culture is dynamic and constantly evolving. “The people who have a vested interest in creating an image of Aboriginal culture as a static or ‘authentic’ thing from hundreds of years ago are people who cannot deal with the fluidity of even the multicultural Australia... In a pluralist society like [ours], we deserve and should have a pluralist perspective on what Aboriginality is.”

With the show’s title, Enoch (who confesses to having a ‘tortured relationship’ with Sydney) has sought to excavate the meaning of the name traditionally given to the Indigenous peoples around Sydney Harbour: Eora (which translates as ‘people of this place’). “I think it’s actually the people who live in Sydney who are the Eora,” says Enoch. “That’s contentious,” he admits.

“The proposition I’m trying to put forward is that this country can only go forward when we can all say 'I am a person of this place, I belong here'. I’ll get some flack for it, but I love the idea of art being a little bit contentious … There are lots of different ways of being here, and ultimately to be true to an Aboriginal spirit of 'being of a place', people must feel ownership for a place, care for it, feel responsibility for it as well.”

Where: CarriageWorks, Eveleigh When: January 8-14

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nspired by the circus, pop culture and his own Wiradjuri heritage, Australian artist Brook Andrew is world-renowned for his large-scale, site-specific, multimedia installations.

Most will recall his playful black-andwhite patterned jumping castle from the 2010 Biennale of Sydney, and his latest offering, Travelling Colony, promises to be an equally captivating and inclusive celebration of history, community and culture. “Just because you come from Sydney or the suburbs doesn’t mean you don’t have culture," says Andrew, "and I guess Travelling Colony represents that."

Comprising seven hand-painted, customized caravans, the travelling performance-cum-installation will breathe new life into Macquarie Street on Festival First Night, hosting an eccentric sideshow of performers, including fire twirlers, contortionists and a pole dancer.

“The caravans represent the travelling museum or circus,” explains Andrew.

“In a way, Travelling Colony is a comment on objects being collected and taken away from cultures; but it’s also about representing the traditional travelling circus people – the vagabonds and gypsies, those who are different, the outcasts.”

Drawn from traditional Wiradjuri designs and reminiscent of 1960s op art, the bold, zig-zag patterns adorning the caravans will not only be reflected in the costumes of the performers, but also transformed into psychedelic visuals projected across the walls and canopies of Hyde Park Barracks Museum, The Domain and St Mary’s Cathedral throughout the evening. “It will of course be very festive!” Andrew enthuses.

Following Festival First Night the caravans will take up residence in the foyer of CarriageWorks in Eveleigh as part of Black Capital, a new collaborative arts initiative working with the local Indigenous community.

“I’m interviewing seven people from Redfern,” explains Andrew, “letting them tell their stories and showing them on TVs in the caravans. The interviews are really just personal stories. Some are political, others humble. I want to give people an idea of what Redfern is and of its history.”

The casual conversational tone of the interviews is reflected in the interactive choice of installation: “You can actually lay down in the caravans, hang out and watch TV.” When/Where: Saturday January 7 (Festival First Night) / January 8 – March 4 (CarriageWorks – as part of the Black Capital mini-festival) BRAG :: 443 :: 19:12:11 :: 35

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arts, theatre and film news... what's goin' on around town and more...

five minutes WITH JAMILLA

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lack Cherry is celebrating the new year with a crackerbox of bands and burlesque, featuring Jungle Rump’s live Karaoke, one-man crazy-band Bob Log III (USA), rockabilly heroes Pat Capocci Combo, Gay Paris, rock’n’roll heartbreak from The Art, Virginia Killstyxx and The Drey Rolland Band and performances by cabaret chameleon Lillian Starr, Kelly Ann Doll, MC Lauren La Rouge – and award-winning pole queen Jamilla Deville.

What’s your background and training as a performer? I have danced all my life, starting with ballet, then jazz, then a mixture of African dance and yoga, before training in aerials and finally, in pole dancing and adagio. I performed (as an aerialist) at the Sydney Olympics Opening Ceremony in 2000, and I became the Australian pole dance champion in 2005.

What’s your signature routine? Years ago I posted my first YouTube video, my James Bond routine, and a lot of people therefore know me as the Bond Girl. But before that, I was Lara Croft! Basically, my routines are highly athletic and highly mesmerising and sensual.

What are your costume inspirations – and limitations? First and foremost, a pole dancer needs SKIN! The only other option is latex or PVC – we need to stick to the pole! So you’ll see in a pole dancer’s costume a mix of reveal and cover, usually strategically planned to protect and provide maximum stick at the same time. Oh, and there’s usually a good sprinkling of diamantes in there for good measure. I design my own costumes, and have them made

by Georgia Moon here in Sydney.

Right now, I love to wear the leg straps I designed for myself to kind of replace boots (though I’ll never say goodbye to my boots! I love them!).

Performers who inspire you?

Apart from the incredible women

FLICKERFEST 2012

DEVILLE (and now men) who pole dance, who inspire me every day, I take inspiration from burlesquers, flamencos, adagists, aerialists and ballet and contemporary performers...

I’m p studying flamenco right now so I’m watching a lot of that. Pole is all about lightness and lifting out of yourself, if you know what I mean, so any performer showing these qualities is pure inspiration to me.

Any interesting costume fetishes?

Corsets! Which is contrary to what works on pole, so the corset always has to come off quickly.

And if it’s laced properly, I’m left with red marks that don’t look so appealing. Darn it!

What was your first pole performance experience? And how did you get into burlesque?

Well, I come from ‘exotic’ dance

clubs; it was a fantastic training ground for me, because not only was it about getting the moves technically correct and safe, but it all had to be done with sensuality and therefore grace. I discovered the burlesque scene some years later, and have dabbled since then in mixing my roots in strip-style pole with more burlesque-y settings, including Gurlesque (LOVED those nights!

What a crowd! What a show!), the Burlesque Ball in 2006, and then the 2010 Australian Burlesque Festival – an experience I cherish.

I LOVE being challenged to bring more theatricality to my shows.

Is Black Cherry NYE your first?

Yes, I’ll finally be popping my Black Cherry this New Year’s Eve and I can’t wait – I’ve heard great things about the event, and what a way to bring in 2012! My shows will be a surprise on the night, but rest assured they’ll thrill and are a little on the dark side...

One of our favourite parts of Flickerfest each year is taking a tour through the twisted carnival minds of animators like Don Hertzfeldt, Bill Plympton and (this year) Chris Shepherd. So for 2012, we’re presenting Flickerfest’s animation sidebar – World Of Wacky Animation. Featuring a six-strong lineup of shorts from Australia, New Zealand and around the world (including the batshit crazy and totally wonderful Who I Am And What I Want,

by Dave Shrigley and Chris Shepherd, pictured below), it’s a sure thing if you like things like Adult Swim and Southpark.

Flickerfest runs from January 6 – 15 at Bondi Pavilion, and the World Of Wacky Animation showcase plays on Saturday January 14 at 4.30pm and Sunday January 15 at 4.30pm. We have five double passes up for grabs – just email us with your preferred session date, and the name of one other film in the lineup (hint: see our special on pages 38-39). For the full Flickerfest lineup, see the website: flickerfest.com.au

What: Black Cherry NYE When: Saturday December 31 Where: Factory Theatre More: factorytheatre.com.au

QUEEN STREET CALL-OUT

Queen Street Studio are putting out the call once again for applications for their Performing Arts Residency Program 2012, for which ten artists are provided with up to three weeks of free access to a space for rehearsal or development of a project; unfunded projects even get a weekly stipend, which should cover pens, cookies and other essentials. The program has already boosted people like Team MESS, Imperial Panda, Siren Theatre Co. and Tin Sheds – so you’d be in good company. For more info or to apply, hit up queenstreetstudio.com

ST KILDA CALL OUT

Another week, another film festival to keep you busy and inspired... The St Kilda Film Festival is now taking entries for the 2012 competition, including the Top 100 Short Films and SOUNDKilda music video competition. There's

nearly $40,000 worth of cash and in-kind prizes, and it costs a measly $33 to submit a film. Entries close on January 27, which will be here before you know it, so get cracking! stkildafestival.com.au/2012

TROPFEST

And while you’re at it, why not just make another film? Tropfest closes entries in just a few short weeks, on January 5. DON’T PANIC: winners and finalists have been put together in way less time than that (this year’s winner Damon Gameau shot his champion short Animal Beatbox in just two weeks, and as festival founder and director John Polson claims, “We’ve seen entrants submit brilliant work that has been shot over an afternoon…”). This year marks the 20th Tropfest; the signature item, which must appear in each film, is a lightbulb. tropfest.com

Maybe It Was This by Samuel Hodge Miss Polly Rae

SAMUEL HODGE

Next up at SMAC-nominated ARI Alaska Projects – they of the gallery space in Kings Cross Car Park – is a solo exhibition by Sydney photographer and blogger extraordinaire Samuel Hodge (truth-beauty-cock.blogspot.com). Sam is obviously having a good year, with various projects taking him to Berlin and Oslo, and a collab book with Romance Was Born imminent – so prepare to glower jealously (or glow admiringly) on January 11, when the show opens in Alaska’s basement digs. alaskaprojects.com

ARTISTS’ PLAYGROUND

ACTT SCHOLARSHIP

SMACS VOTING

X4 AT 72 ERSKINE

One of Sydney’s most unique festivals, the March long weekend that is Playground Weekender, is putting the call out for artistic contributions. The six-year-old festival, which combines an eclectic but relatively low-key musical lineup with a more rounded cultural experience – spectacular food, late-night cinemas and yoga, and a fancy-dress day, for instance – is upping the creative content of the program, and they're on the lookout for “art installations, people to assist with theming and dressing the site, sign writers and creative types”. Both emerging and established artists are encouraged to apply at creative@ playgroundweekender.com.au Just a reminder not to forget to vote in FBi’s night of nights, the SMAC Awards! It’s your chance to (not quite literally – although we do, coz we’re literally presenting the Best Major Festival award) hand a much-deserved prize to the folks you think are the leading lights of Sydney’s music, arts and culture community (and if you’re reading this, you probably have opinions about said folks), across categories like Remix The City, Best On Screen, Best On Stage, Best Collective and Best Visual Artist, plus all the usual music-focused fare. Voting closes January 4 and you can only vote once, so have a good hard think about 2011 and hop to it! smacawards.com 36 :: BRAG :: 443 :: 19:12:11

Calling all raging thespians: the Australian College of Theatre and Television is offering a new scholarship valued at up to $35,000 for three years’ full tuition in Advanced Diploma of Arts in Stage and Screen Acting.

With Underbelly star (and soon-to-be De Niro co-star) Firass Dirani consulting on the criteria and sitting on the selection panel, the scholarship aims to “unearth another great Australian acting talent” who can match Dirani’s success. The Sydney auditions for the College are between January 23 and 27, with the scholarship auditions on January 30 – for more info about the scholarship and other ACTT programs, head to actt.edu.au Something something ‘doors opening and doors closing’… With The Paper Mill shutting up shop last week (sad face), there’s one less port of call for art. But 72 Erskine is keeping the flame alive this week with the opening of x4, featuring: former China Heights co-owner and now-Tokyobased graphic artist Mark Drew; Moscow-born, Sydney-Brooklyn-Berlin-Moscow-based pop culture manipulator Anton Benois; recent SCA grad Will Cooke, who clashes art history and abstraction with a background in graffiti; and Esjay, who describes art as “the perfect way to distract an adult while you steal their wallet”.

Hop on down to 72 Erskine Street from 6pm on Wednesday December 21. 72erskine.com

HURLY BURLY GIRLYS

Here’s a chance to see some international burlesque royalty live on stage: Miss Polly Rae and her Hurly Burly Girlys are bringing their acclaimed stage show from London’s West End to Sydney this January. The “non-stop pop erotic cabaret” features the all-singing, all-dancing Miss Polly and six Girlys, putting the vamp in re-vamp as they cover recent and classic pop from MJ to Rihanna. And the show is as gorgeous to look at as the ladies, under the keen eye of director William Baker, the man responsible for Kylie’s gold hotpants and Britney’s Circus tour design. An Evening With Miss Polly Rae And The Hurly Burly Girlys runs from January 5-15 at the Factory Theatre, Enmore.

21ST INTERNATIONAL SHORT FILM FESTIVAL

PRESENTED BY ING DIRECT

Flickerfest presented by ING DIRECT, Australia’s premier international short film festival, celebrates 21 years in 2012!

As Australia’s only Academy® accredited and BAFTA-recognised short film festival, we’ll be presenting 100 of the best films from across the seas, handpicked from a staggering 2,200 worldwide entries.

Join us under the stars at Bondi Beach for fabulous parties in our panoramic beachside bar and a sizzling season of brilliant summer cinema!

OPENING NIGHT Screening & After Party Fri 6 Jan 2012 CLOSING NIGHT Awards, Screening & After Party Sun 15 Jan 2012 IN COMPETITION – International

Short Films – Australian

Short Films – Short Documentaries – Greenflicks

Environmental Shorts Primary & High School Shorts

– Flickerup

TICKETING SEASON PASS $140/$125 (Excludes opening and closing nights & workshops)

3 SESSION PASS $45/$40 SESSION TICKET $16/$14 FLICKERLAB $50/$45 FLICKER KIDS $5/Kids/$10 adults/ $20 family of 4 OPENING NIGHT Screening & Party $55/$50 CLOSING NIGHT Screening, Awards & Party $40/$35 (Includes GST. Booking fees not included)

All sessions approx. 100 minutes and rated 15+ except Flicker Kids. Flickerfest presented by ING Direct is an all-weather event.

FESTIVAL INFORMATION 02 9365 6888 OR FLICKERFEST.COM.AU BOOKINGS 1300 306 776 9.30 AM – 5.30 PM OR MCA-TIX.COM.AU FACEBOOK.COM/FLICKERFEST

BRAG :: 443 :: 19:12:11 :: 37

FLiCKER

FEST

From January 6-15, Flickerfest International Short Film Festival offers up a treasure-trove of bite-sized comedies, dramas, documentaries and animations from Australia and around the world, all in the iconic Bondi Pavilion. This year sees the return of the Greenflicks and FlickerUp programmes, and showcases of horror, Oscarwinning, comedy shorts and wacky animations.

Below, we've compiled a list of must-sees, to get you started... For the full lineup and schedule, head to flickerfest.com.au

BEAR

SHOWCASE:

World Of Wacky Animation

By Gerard Elson

This latest from the Bluetongue crew (the loose-knit collective behind Animal Kingdom, Hesher, and awardwinning short films like Crossbow and I Love Sarah Jane) continues the saga of Jack (director and co-writer Nash Edgerton), the incorrigible prankster last seen with a needle in his eye in Spider. Jack has a new girlfriend now, but has he learned his lesson?

Previous screenings/awards: Official Competition – Cannes 2011; Official Competition – Sundance 2012 Session: Best Of Australian 3

PEEKABOO This pint-sized chiller about a mother who thinks her young daughter has been kidnapped is informed by writer-director Damien Power’s own parental anxieties.

With a strong cast that includes Justine Clarke and TV vet Alan Dukes, this looks like a solid calling-card for a debut feature.

Previous screenings/awards: Dendy Awards nominee – Sydney Film Festival 2011; Melbourne International Film Festival 2011.

Session: Best Of Australian 2

The title of this year’s animation sidebar might seem redundant for a form marked by its embrace of the outré and the outlandish; in this case, however, it’s also hard to argue with: the films comprising this year’s slate are indeed pretty zany.

Across the selection of shorts, most new, some retrospective, we meet “inquisitive” E.T.s, witness a human hulk drop his dainty flame’s severed hand through her letter slot (no, that’s not a euphemism), and see an ancient idol make putty of material existence in the tantrumic throes of a jam bender. Kookiness abounds.

Thankfully, talent does too.

First up are two offerings from New Zealand’s award-winning Media Design School. First Contact is a technically impressive CGI-live-action integration that accounts for the decline in UFO sightings from Earth since the 1960s.

This deadpan approach to alien bureaucracy plays like a Flight of the Who I Am And What I Want

JULIAN 36-year-old actor Matthew Moore (Burning Man, Home & Away) directs this short drama about a morning in the life of a nine-year-old boy with a penchant for telling the truth (some call it dobbing – Julian calls it “sharing information). And although he might look diminutive, he is definitely going to get his own way. An amazing punchline, and a cast that includes director Leon Ford (Griff The Invisible), young star-in-the-making Morgana Davies (The Hunter; The Tree) and the multi-talented Christopher Stollery.

Previous screenings/awards: Official Competition – Berlin International Film Festival 2012.

Session: Best Of Australian 3

THE WINKING BOY Alan King (Killing Time) writes and stars in this short comedy inspired by a current affairs special targetting welfare cheats. King takes the idea to its darkly comic extremes: a man whose indolent lifestyle is premised on the pretense that he’s fully (well, almost fully) paralysed – until a mysterious nurse starts working at his clinic, and his elaborate ruse starts to come undone.

Previous screenings/awards: Best Comedy – Amsterdam Film Festival; Best Screenplay – Las Vegas Film Festival.

Session: Best Of Australian 4

THE STRANGER This beautifully oddball short could easily be picked up by an ad agency for any number of commercials: it’s conceptual, atmospheric, quirky-funny and has a bangin' soundtrack. Here’s hoping that VCA grad Rodd Rathjen doesn’t get sidetracked into advertising.

Previous screenings/awards: Melbourne International Film Festival; Revelation International Film Festival Session: Best Of Australian 3

COCKATOO Matthew Jenkin directs this cute rom-com about a lovelorn middle-aged man (Alan Dukes, aka Wayne Swan in At Home With Julia) who engages the services of an agency called Reality Dreams, where actors pretend to be whomever the client desires. Watching any film with Matilda Brown in it is a pleasure; not only can she act, but she has the same impossibly-big almond eyes in a tiny face as her mum, Rachel Ward.

Session: Best Of Australian 5

Paris Lakes

Conchords band-meeting in space.

Elsewhere, Time for a Change further demonstrates the school’s high standards of technical proficiency with its gorgeous CGI wood-puppet animation.

Flash animations Paris Lakes and Animals for Animals share a few aesthetic similarities, with their scrawled, intentionally grotesque designs. The former is the latest work from veteran Australian animator Robert Stephenson, who’s pushed the idea of “idyllic” market housing estates to an absurd, warped extreme in this perverse parody of their breathily-intoned commercials.

Stephenson is an avowed fan of Bill Plympton, Robert Crumb and Mad Magazine; any images currently coagulating in your mind probably aren’t too far off the mark. Tatu Pohjavirta and Mark Ståhle’s Animals for Animals, meanwhile, details the casually violent courtship between a willowy pet shop owner and a jackhammer jockey colossus.

What starts as a darkly comic allegory about the parts of ourselves we give up for love, as per Spike Jonze’s beautiful There Are Many of Us, ends as a surreal, strangely sweet affirmation of the importance of meeting your beau in the middle.

The two retrospective pieces mark acmes of the package – and why shouldn’t they? They come from of a triumvirate of seasoned pros. Who I Am and What I Want employs willfully crude black-and-

SHOWCASE:

Short Bites Of Horror

white Flash line-work not far removed from David Lynch’s Dumbland to give glimpse into the life of a true outsider. The schizoid illustration style is that of David Shrigley, Glasgow’s incumbent lowbrow nightmare surrealist and prolific author/illustrator of such noble tomes as Ants Have Sex in Your Beer and What The Hell Are You Doing?. He co-writes and directs with the great Chris Shepherd (whose readily Googleable Vimeo portfolio is well worth a look for the uninitiated). Lastly, in the multi-award-winning Rabbit, Run Drake digitally disassembles the classic graphics of Enid Blyton illustrator Geoffrey Higham to create, Frankenstein-like, the world and characters of this brilliant cautionary parable. It’s a sterling testament to the malleability of the form, and sends this year’s animation showcase out on a high.

Session: World Of Wacky Animation (full lineup of films at flickerfest.com.au) Times: Sat Jan 14, 4.30pm / Sun Jan 15, 4.30pm

you know, with eerie blue filters and blood everywhere.

It’s traditional to snack on some delicious treats when at the flicks, but if you’re heading to the Short Bites of Horror showcase, maybe eat beforehand. And skip the marinara. There’s enough gore in the four films on show here to make Tarantino blush and a young Peter Jackson drool; while it’s used in varying degrees, clearly the recent fad for movies dripping with viscera is keeping fake blood manufacturers in business, and inspiring short filmmakers as well.

It only gets bloodier from there, with Rotting Hill. Directed by Auckland-based James Cunningham (a technical director on the Lord Of The Rings films), it represents both the level of SFX prowess one would expect from a Weta Digital veteran, and also the unexpected rise of what might be the best sub-genre in the zombie revival: the Kiwi zombie flick. Giving an explicit nod to its brilliant predecessor Black Sheep with the first shot, it’s four minutes of literal zombie romantic comedy that’s part “Awwww”, part “Ewwww” and part “Oooohh”, plus a dick joke. Screamingly funny and visually impressive, it also stars Anna Hutchison, who’ll be seen in the Joss Whedonpenned teen horror feature The Cabin In The Woods next year.

The Horror programme runs the gamut from the sly meta-humour of rom-zomcom Rotting Hill, to the cartoonish, stomach-turning free-for-all that is Brutal Relax. The Australian representative, Dave Wade’s A Tale Of Obsession, is a visual feast – the story of crazy-eyed, chubby Goth chick Ashley, her fixation on food, and how it morphs into a fixation with the perpetually glistening jock Devon, uses a disconcerting combination of inventive camera angles, floridly poetic imagery, and a matter-of-fact voiceover that gives it a Looking For Alibrandi vibe… Except,

Brutal Relax, from the Spanish directing and writing team of Adrian Cardona, Rafa Dengra and David Munoz, takes inspiration from classic B-movies as well as some no-holds-barred, no-limbunsevered grindhouse-schlock-on-steroids fight scenes. Señor Olivares (José Ma. Angorrilla), a clearly unstable gentleman, trots off to the beach with his Walkman on doctor’s orders to relax – easier said than done, as humanoid slime monsters emerge from the ocean and start eviscerating the screaming beachgoers.

Hilarity and brutality both ensue. While

By Caitlin Welsh

Animals For Animals

Brutal Relax

there was some post-production effects work done, word is that almost everything was done with practical effects – from the slime monsters peeling open heads like banana skins, to brandishing spines with still-attached skulls and ribcages, and (fair warning) a disembowelled child being used as a weapon. It’s all lovingly rendered in an almost-psychedelic colour scheme – think neon green slime against rich red guts – that further highlights its debt to the golden age of schlock-horror.

The odd one out in the waterfall of gory giggles is Irish-born Ruairí Robinson’s Blinky™. The gorgeously shot, genuinely chilling short stars Max Records (last seen as Max in Spike Jonze’s Where The Wild Things Are) and an R2D2-esque robot who walks that crucial line between adorable android pal, and creepily human villain. The film doesn’t lean too heavily on its futuristic elements, preferring to use a classic horror plot (e.g. Child’s Play) with a nod to Isaac Asimov’s reflections on the thin line between artificial intelligence and humanity. Robinson scored an Oscar nomination in 2002 for his short Fifty Percent Grey, and with the news recently that he’ll be directing major sci-fi feature Last Days On Mars in 2012, he’s definitely one to keep an eye on.

Session: Short Bites Of Horror (full lineup of films at flickerfest.com.au)

A Tale Of Obsession 38 :: BRAG :: 443 :: 19:12:11

Time: Fri Jan 13, 9pm

FLICKERFEST GUIDE

PROFILE

Anthony Maras (AUS)

STEVE / UK

By Dee Jefferson

The film industry is notoriously fickle, but Anthony Maras is about as much a sure thing as you can imagine. To start with, he blitzed his way through law and film production at the University of California, picking up two President’s Undergraduate Fellowship awards and being elected President of the UCSB Filmmakers’ Cooperative; then there’s the swag of awardwinning shorts under his belt, including Azadi (2005), about Afghani asylum seekers in detention, which won an award at Flickerfest 2006, alongside fellow winners Justin Kurzel (Snowtown), Wayne Blair (The Sapphires) and Warwick Thornton (Samson & Delilah). His 2007 follow-up, Spike Up, refracted an equally large issue, the policing of drug trafficking, through a story of personal relationships and complicated morality. Besides his obvious interest in situations where humanity is put to the test by extreme circumstances, the trademarks of Maras’ films are economical storytelling and a refusal to trade in clichés.

His latest film, The Palace, is based on true stories from the 1974 Turkish invasion of Cyprus. Picking up in the fray of battle, Maras follows a Greek Cypriot family as they try to flee the city and are forced to hide from soldiers in an abandoned mansion. Shot with an international crew,

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Anthony Maras on the Green Line (the UN-enforced buffer zone) in Cyprus – the world’s last divided capital city – this short brings big production values and performances to what could easily be turned into a feature film.

In an interview he did for the Bigpond Adelaide Film Festival this year (where the film premiered), Maras said, “I’d heard different stories about what had happened in Cyprus in 1974, from people who’d lived through it…both Greek and Turkish; and I just found it a really interesting subject matter, that related to what was going on in the world today… There’s many films made about war…you’ve gotta try and bring a new spin, and show the world something new.”

Maras was recently awarded the IF Award for rising talent, and says he has two feature films in development: "a paranoid thriller and an international crime story."

What: The Palace Previous screenings/awards: Dendy Award for Best Live Action Short – Sydney Film Festival; Best Short Film – Melbourne International Film Festival; Audience Award – Bigpond Adelaide Film Festival.

Session: Best Of International 1 Time: Jan 8, 9pm / Jan 9, 4.30pm

Dad's Dead

Dreamboat Rupert Friend (Young Victoria) directs fellow Brits Colin Firth, Keira Knightley and Tom Mison in this comedy about an awkward neighbour whose visits to the young couple upstairs become increasingly frequent and unpredictable… Getting good actors is half the battle with any film, and both Firth and Knightley are under-utilised in comedic roles, so this should be a joy.

Previous screenings/awards: Official Selection – 54th BFI London Film Festival Session: Best Of International 2

IT’S SUCH A BEAUTIFUL DAY / USA

From Don Hertzfeldt – the guy who brought you such incisive lines as ‘I am a banana’ and ‘My spoon is too big’ – comes the third instalment of a bittersweet trilogy that began with Everything Will Be Okay (2006). If you don’t know who/ what we’re talking about, Google ‘Don Hertzfeldt Rejected’ and thank us by attending this Flickerfest session.

Previous screenings/awards: Jury Prize and Audience Award – Sommets du cinema d’animation, Montreal; Official Competition – Sundance 2012 Session: Best Of International 4

SWIMSUIT 46 / BELGIUM

Silence Is Golden

school I was always drawing really weird pictures that were always a bit wrong.”

PROFILE

Chris Shepherd (UK)

By Dee Jefferson

British animator Chris Shepherd is a slightly unusual beast in an animation world populated by loner auteurs and studio hands-for-hire. He's worked largely in collaboration and across varying roles – writer, director, producer and animator – and varying mediums; his signature is the combination of live action with animation.

Flickerfest will screen two works from opposite ends of his stylistic spectrum: his fully-animated 2005 collaboration with artist Dave Shrigley, Who I Am And What I Want, and his most recent work, a live short called Bad Night For The Blues.

They both, however, represent Shepherd’s taste for humour just left of ‘wrong’.

Born in Liverpool in 1966, and graduating with an Animation BA from West Surrey College of Art and Design in 1992, Shepherd came up on the tail end of the animation resurgence that took place in the UK in the late ‘70s and ‘80s, when a combination of punk music, a sudden increase in animation courses, and a cashed-up television industry saw a crop of wild young animators emerge. This was when Channel 4 became a major powerhouse of animation production (which it remains to this day) – and Shepherd got in the Channel 4 door just before the ‘90s downturn, going on to a line of award-winning commissions – including The Broken Jaw (1997), about the changing times of a neighbourhood pub, and the spoof election series People’s Britain (2001).

Shepherd’s breakthrough short was Dad’s Dead (2002), which won a whopping 25 awards internationally for its fusion of live action and animation,

and introduced his offbeat, darkly comic sensibilities to an international audience.

Narrated by a young man (voiced by fellow Liverpudlian Ian Hart) who is reminiscing (from jail) about one of his ratbag teenage friends, it continued a trend of drawing on his Liverpool childhood that Shepherd began in college.

His follow up fusion of live action and animation was Silence Is Golden (2006), which sports a stylised aesthetic from Shepherd ‘70s childhood and pencil animations, and tells the story of a young boy whose nutso neighbour fuels his vivid imagination. It looks like a children’s film at first glance, but is laced with obscenities, animated beheadings, and some genuinely freaky horror-style tableaux, including a screaming gypsy witch, a maniac robot with a fire gun in his chest, burning Mormons, and vomit. The animation calls to mind Don Hertzfeldt – lo-fi pencil figures engaged in surreal and sociopathic behaviour.

Unsurprisingly, Shepherd has said (in a BBC interview in 2006), “when I was in

Shepherd’s latest film, Bad Night For The Blues, is a departure in the sense that it’s all live action, but maintains his interest in the social milieu of his youth, with a tale about a young man forced to chaperone his boozily volatile aunt through her favourite night out of the year: the local Conservative club’s Christmas party. She’s overdressed, over the top, and ready to drink herself under the table. As with his previous shorts, the humour is dark; but there’s also a tenderness for his surroundings, and a slightly melancholic undertone about times past and people left behind.

According to his British agent, Shepherd is currently in development on at least four feature projects, including one with Edgar Wright’s producing partner Nira Park (Shaun Of The Dead, Hot Fuzz etc) – so this is definitely a director to get familiar with.

What: Bad Night For The Blues Session: Best Of International 4 Time: Jan 12, 9pm / Jan 13, 4.30pm What: Who I Am and What I Want Session: World Of Wacky Animation,

Wannes Destoop’s bittersweet tale about an overweight 12-year-old girl who finds refuge in the swimming pool might be heartbreaking if it weren’t so uplifting. Featuring a beautiful performance by its lead, it’s a very simple story about strength of character in the face of bullying.

Previous screenings/awards: Special Jury Prize – Cannes Session: Best Of International 2

BRICK NOVAX’S DIARY / USA

This stop-motion comedy about a washed-up former international super legend comes from Emmy-winning former-Saturday Night Live writer Matt Piedmont – and proves that all you really need is a good concept, a great script, and your childhood toys.

Previous screenings/awards: Winner Special Jury Prize – Sundance 2011 Session: Best Of International 1

CUTTING LOOSE / UK Scotland’s most dangerous prisoners share their dreams and fears in this uplifting short documentary from BAFTAwinning co-directing team Finlay Pretsell and Adrian McDowell, that takes us behind the scenes of the annual Scottish Prison Service hairdressing competition – which, as it happens, is the focus of a whole lotta rehabilitation hopes and career aspirations.

Previous screenings/awards: Special Jury Prize Cannes Session: Best Of Documentary 2

LAS PALMAS / SWEDEN

Time: Jan 14, 4.30pm / Jan 15, 4.30pm

Bad Night For the Blues

Writer-director Johannes Nyholm has been in Cannes three times now, so he obviously knows what he’s doing. That said, this is by far one of the oddest shorts you’ll see at the festival, starring Nyholm’s own one-year-old daughter as the middle-aged tourist from hell, causing unwitting havoc amongst a cast of marionette puppets.

Previous screenings/awards: Official Selection Directors’ Fortnight – Cannes 2011; Göteborg Film Festival Session: Best Of International 2 BRAG :: 443 :: 19:12:11 :: 39

Arts Snap

Film & Theatre Reviews

At the heart of the arts Where you went last week...

Hits and misses on the silver screen and the bareboards around town.

09:12:11 :: China Heights :: 16-28 Foster St Surry Hills

PICS :: KC

08:12:11 :: MART Gallery :: 156 Commonwealth St Surry Hills

cosmic nature by beastman 08:12:11 :: Kind Of Gallery :: 72 Oxford St Darlinghurst 0404 105 030

Arts Exposed What's in our diary...

QUIZMAS @ GOODGOD Wed December 21, 8pm

Opens December 26

Opens December 26

With his 18th feature, Pedro Almodóvar makes it clear that he’s not ready to lounge on his laurels quite yet. The 62-year-old’s newest masterwork, The Skin I Live In, might be the most serenely composed film to his name. But don’t be fooled by the classical surface: as a rumination on the mutability of identity, it’s far more provocative than anything the Human Centipede saga could ever egest – and minus the grisly censor-baiting. Behind We Need to Talk About Kevin, it’s the most fascinating Trojan-horse terror movie of 2011 – and one hell of a riposte to anyone who accused the Spanish maestro of lapsing into vacuous perfume ad chic with 2009’s Broken Embraces.

There’s a scene in The Iron Lady where the dowager Thatcher, during a visit to her doctor, speculates on the difference between the current feelings- and emotions-based politics, and her own predilection for a politics of thoughts and ideas. It crystallizes a number of things about the lady – her strident spirit, sense of humour and conservative politics – and encapsulates this film’s strategy: a marriage of the emotional side of her life story with the fascinating political arguments she put forth, and the exciting times in which she lived.

Vera is the housebound patient of Dr. Robert Ledgard (Antonio Banderas, reuniting with Almodóvar for the first time in over two decades), an Einstein in the field of plastic surgery. Delivering seminars to eminent peers and resisting Vera’s callow advances, he might at first seem respectable – even as his bedside wall illumines into a monumental plasma screen with a view to his charge’s adjacent boudoir. But the actor lets us know he’s a creep by the way he laps at an errant drip on a bottle of breakfast syrup – a subtle, off-puttingly reptilian reflex.

To say this is Banderas’ best performance in years is pointless; the guy’s most memorable role post-Y2K has been the cuddly third-fiddle Puss in Boots in the Shrek sequels. Just like the old days, Almodóvar gives his friend a part he can truly sink his teeth into, and Banderas makes his pensive genius a deeply troubling conduit of torment: part Henry Frankenstein, part Josef Fritzl, all corrosive obsession.

For all of its perverse trappings, though, The Skin I Live In is the Almodóvar we know and admire, further dissecting those notions of transsexual self and illicit desire that have long informed his most interesting work. More even than was the case with the vibrant Volver, he seems thrillingly – even furiously – reinvigorated. It’s nice to have Pedro the iconoclast back.

Gerard Elson

THE IRON LADY

The backbone of Phyllida Lloyd’s biopic is a slice of time in which the former British Prime Minister finds herself slipping into dementia, simultaneously (and perhaps inextricably linked) with the decision to let go the husband who had died almost ten years previously, by physically despatching of his clothes. The sad frustration of a powerful mind weakened by age (and the hallucinatory flashbacks to her past, not to mention the presence of Jim Broadbent in husband duty!) calls to mind Richard Eyre’s 2001 biopic of Iris Murdoch, which also examined a revolutionary woman through the prism of her collapse, rather than in her glory days. It’s a great choice in the sense that it allows you to see the formation of a character – but it’s a daring one, because it’s so heartbreakingly sad.

So you have to add a big dose of drama and humour – which this film does. I’d like to think that Margaret Thatcher really was like an eccentric and humorous aunt – I think the filmmakers probably stretched the truth; but Meryl Streep and Jim Broadbent are fantastic, self-deprecating comedians.

And then of course there’s the fascinating story of Thatcher, Europe’s first female Prime Minister; from a grocer’s daughter who lived through the WW2 bombing raids on London, to the woman of steel who broke Britain’s union movement, prosecuted a merciless war against Argentina over the Falkland Islands, and survived the IRA’s attempted assassination of her in 1984. Reviled by many as being one of the proponents of New Conservatism, it’s nevertheless hard not to feel galvanised by what Lloyd presents as an extraordinary woman – especially when Streep plays her with so much humanity and vulnerability. Lloyd gives you a sense of why a country might fall in behind this kind of leader; but an older generation will remember the crushing poverty that afflicted Britain’s working classes by the end of Thatcher’s reign.

Except for a highly stylised climactic scene in which Thatcher exits politics and Number 10 Downing Street, Lloyd’s extensive opera background is not much in evidence; rather, The Iron Lady’s visual style, narrative tone and content mark it as a viewing companion to The King’s Speech: stories of underdogs overcoming personal and political adversity to become great leaders, that are executed with humour and pathos, using anachronistically modern visual techniques like distorted lens, askew angles, and quick cuts. Add in a rousing soundtrack that ranges from Thomas Newman’s soundtrack to rock-n-roll, punk, and classical music, and this is the unexpected feelgood film of the summer.

Dee Jefferson

See www.thebrag.com for more arts reviews

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Zoe Coombs Marr and Tyson Koh give new meaning to the phrase “silly season” this week with a Christmas edition of their weekly trivia fling, Quizzle Schizzle: “We’ll MARK the herald angels THING with a Saint TICK or a Bing CROSSby and then enjoy a lovely cocktail with RUM (pa pum pum)! So, BE THERE... or ELF!” If you can cope with that, we recommend you head along to GoodGod this Wednesday – and study up on your Chrissie facts so you can sleigh the opposition. Bam.

40 :: BRAG :: 443 :: 19:12:11

■ Film

THE SKIN I LIVE IN

The Skin I Live In takes place in a gently neo-noir story-world not far removed from that sub-Hitchcockian genre riff: guns casually abide in household drawers and, in a Gothic flourish that’s new for the filmmaker, revenge is coolly cultured in medical petri dishes. Pulp tropes have long lurked about the corners of Almodóvar’s work, but by here promoting them from aesthetic inspiration to text, he’s liberated to serve up some of the uncanniest images of his career. The most striking of these is Elena Anaya as Vera: a luminousskinned beauty who’s often sighted bent over yoga balls on CCTV screens, clad only in a flesh-coloured body-stocking and—in flashback—a compression mask of the kind worn by burn victims.

PICS :: KC

christopher doyle: the jezabels

■ Film

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mark drew: no mercy no wife

PICS :: TL

Meryl Street does Thatcher

DVD Reviews Sit back, veg out.

RISE OF THE PLANET OF THE APES

COWBOYS & ALIENS

Paramount Home Entertainment Released December 8

Fox Home Ent Released December 7 If Joe Letteri and his Weta Digital team don’t take Oscar honours for the visual effects here, it will be a travesty; their fusion of live action with CGI and performance capture technology makes possible the kind of film that the 12-year-old you could only dream of.

But the reason this film is so good is because the effects just blend in; you’re never watching pixels, you’re getting to know each character.

And what better story to apply that kind of technology to than this already legendary tale of man versus intelligent ape?

But no matter what you think of modern audiences, people don’t pay to see golden turds – unless there are bonafide stars in them (and while 127 Hours showed he could act, James Franco is no Brad Pitt). People are interested in the Planet Of the Apes story – partly because it has cultural heritage already, and partly because of its ongoing relevance as a cautionary tale about the dark underbelly of ‘civilisation’ and ‘scientific advancement’.

What this film adds on top is an irresistibly primal story that pushes all the right buttons for all the right reasons: a son who outgrows his parents and his home, and is forced to make his own way in the world; the loss of innocence that comes with experience.

Both of these themes are repeated down the generations from Charles (John Lithgow) who has Alzheimers, to his son Will (Franco), who is a genetic biologist who will stop at nothing to find a cure, and finally to Caesar (Andy Serkis), whose realisation that he’ll never belong with humans or apes causes him, like many a great conqueror before him, to change history.

Dee Jefferson

In terms of taste, I’m definitely outside the target demo for this one; but inasmuch as I grew up on Star Wars and the Indiana Jones series, I am all up for seeing Harrison Ford doing his grizzly-bear-with-a-warm-heart thing in an old school action film. I’m also a big fan of Jon Favreau’s Iron Man, and Daniel Craig’s Bond – so I’m already pre-disposed to like the cut of this Cowboys & Aliens jib.

Everyone plays to character and there’s a snappy script that’s got enough laughs, but the kind of family laughs that Lucas and Spielberg (who executive produces, alongside Ron Howard) excelled at – this plays more like a tribute to the westerns and sci-fi flicks of old than the spoof you might expect (given its ridiculous, gimmicky central premise), or the genre subversion you might be hoping for.

Shot in New Mexico, the film sees Craig and Ford face off as equally stubborn gunslingers – The Stranger, and the hardened Civil War veteran Colonel Dolarhyde – who have to team up to rescue loved ones from a band of marauding aliens. They’re joined by a ragtag bunch that ranges from an innocent young boy (Noah Ringer), a feisty female sidekick who refuses to be given the shake (Olivia Wilde), the faithful and longsuffering rancher (Adam Beach) who Dolarhyde treats more like a son than his own feckless teenaged bully (Paul Dano), and a cowardly doctor (Sam Rockwell).

Favreau keeps the action at a cracking pace, and screenwriting team Roberto Orci and Alex Kurtzman (Star Trek) weave in a nice subplot of a developing relationship between Dolarhyde and the boy – which Ford naturally executes perfectly. So there’s no surprises – so what?

This isn’t rocket science, it’s entertainment.

are back!

Celebrating Sydney’s best music, art, eats, events, collectives, performances

Dee Jefferson

and people.

Street Level With Dany Cooper ASE

T

he Australian Screen Editors’ Guild held its awards a couple of weeks ago, so we thought we’d celebrate the occasion by talking to an editor. But not just any editor – the best editor.

Dany Cooper won Best Editing in a Feature for her work on Oranges and Sunshine, but her career runs the gamut from indie Australian (Hey Hey It’s Esther Blueburger) to blockbuster Hollywood (Queen Of the Damned), short films (including Waiting For The Turning Of the Earth, in competition at Flickerfest 2012) and TV (Battlestar Galactica).

How hard was it for you to break into editing? It took me about eight years; I started in documentaries and moved to features. I then cut some long form documentaries and short films. My first feature was Angel Baby (1995).

What was your career breakthrough moment? Well they all are, but the highlights would be winning an AFI for best editing on Angel Baby, and an Emmy nomination for the Battlestar Galactica miniseries, and winning the ASE award for my last three films (Candy, Beneath Hill 60 and Oranges and Sunshine).

My new film The Sapphires (Dir. Warwick Thornton) has also been a lot of fun. It’s not about winning, it’s that every piece of work has a myriad of experiences attached, so it isn’t the end product but the journey to get there that amazes. Getting to know the directors of all my films has been a great pleasure.

What do you see as the main misconceptions? We have a key creative role, but it’s also seen as a support role. I think people think of the editor as someone who collates and organises material but not as a creator – which we are – and a most important part of the film making process. We do the final draft. We help the director achieve the film they

want to make.

Avid or Final Cut Pro? Generally Avid. DNX36 is a good HD medium due to clarity of image etc.

As an editor, what are you most commonly irritated by when you watch films?

I notice continuity, but if the emotional continuity of a cut is working then the physical continuity becomes irrelevant. What I don’t like is boring visual story telling. I'm not talking about fast cutting, but about development of the shot – the eye and the mind get bored if the filmmakers are lazy.

As example of excellent editing, what would you recommend? Warrior, Shame, Fargo, No Country For Old Men, Goodfellas, The Seven Samurai, Crazy Heart, Sideways.

And who are your editor heroes? Pietro di Scallia (Black Hawk Down), Dody Dorn (Memento), Mike McKusker (Walk the Line), Thelma Shoonmaker (Goodfellas), Jon Gregory (Donnie Brasco), Ann Coates (Lawrence Of Arabia), Walter Murch (Apocalypse Now), Kirk Baxter and Angus Wall (The Social Network) and Masahiro Hirakubo (Trainspotting).

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What do you love about being an editor?

Creating a story. Making the characters breathe, collaborating with a team – small but deeply satisfying things.

And what are the hard parts? Crazy politics, non-communication and no window. The strange hours are no issue, but give us light!

What: Oranges and Sunshine on DVD now More: For more information about the Australian Screen Editors and their ongoing events, visit screeneditors.com

BRAG :: 443 :: 19:12:11 :: 41

live reviews What we've been to see...

BELLYACHE BEN AND THE STEAMGRASS BOYS, THE MFW AND THE NOISE

instrumental ability to create a series of shifting textures, elegant but laden with primitive foreboding. Delivered at all times with immaculate control, this was improvisatory string playing at its uncompromising best.

Sydney is now one record label the richer with the beguilingly named Yum Yum Tree being launched at Caravan last week.

Aiming to support the disparate breeds of music cropping up around the warehouses of the inner west, from the jazz-hued pop of the Elana Stone Band to the kitsch retro of The Cope St Parade, the label seems set to wreak havoc – or make a talented group of friends very happy, in any case.

For the last umpteen months, those in the know have been adjourning to Madame Fling Flongs on a Wednesday eve, to sip booze and bourbon-based cocktails, lounge on the comfortingly mismatched comfortable lounges, and listen to the angel-voiced ne'er-do-wells of Bellyache Ben and the Steamgrass Boys. Having completed their case study investigating the “regular gigging is the only way to really nail a sound” rule (turns out it’s totally true), the fellas tonight moved into phase two with the launch of their self-titled debut album, a modest seven-track selection from the dozens of traditional tunes and James Daley (mandolin) originals under their collective picks. Highlights included Bellyache Ben’s (otherwise known as Ben Daley) curmudgeonly rendition of their unofficial theme-tune, Willie Dixon’s ‘You Can’t Judge A Book By The Cover’, the fatalistic stomp of traditional ‘O’ Death’, and the obligatory kazoo solo from bass player John Maddox.

The Steamgrass Boys have come a long way in the year since they came together, and aside from the thrashing they give their instruments, the real attraction here is their vocal chutzpah; the five produce harmonies of unwavering tunefulness and genuine soul.

Expect to see them hitting the folk festival circuit in the coming year.

Caravan, Marrickville Friday December 9

Tucked behind the carwash on Addison Road (smokers hurriedly scattering every time a vehicle rolled through), and with ceilings adorned with spaceman-costume alum, Caravan certainly provided an appropriate atmosphere of roaches (both kinds) and rollerdoors for the evening’s entertainment.

First up was experimental jazz/alt-rock trio The MFW (an acronym of either the artists' surnames or the phrase ‘motherfucking wankers’, depending who you ask) launching their album Sus Scrofa. Aaron Flower (guitar), Evan Mannell (drums) and Ben Waples (bass) seem to have a habit of establishing rather laid back indie pop riffs that are then systematically dismantled into strangely funky, blues-influenced improvisations.

Less funky (though piling on the experimentalism) were second support The Noise, a string quartet (tonight trio) refreshingly unreliant on covers of metal songs, who instead utilise their extreme

MUSECOLOGY: KIRIN J CALLINAN, JUSTICE YELDHAM, FORCES Woolloomooloo PCYC Boxing Ring Friday December 9

The first round of Musecology, a new series of site-based performances, played out on a Friday night in the Woolloomooloo PCYC boxing ring. Unsurprisingly, the gig had a bit of a masculinity-and-violence theme going on.

Although the sun was still up, the room was pitch black when I arrived. After a while someone got the lights and a smoke machine working, and a couple of dudes calling themselves Forces got on stage.

With some synth drums, a mic and vintage‘90s-skinhead outfits, they played the kind of stripped-back industrial electro that made you wish you weren’t sober as a judge on a Friday-not-even-night-yet in a room of chinstroking hipsters. Justice Yeldham followed, bringing a whole new meaning to the term glass jaw... He might be a bit of a one-trick pony but holy hell. What a party trick it is. If you’re not familiar, Justice Yeldham is a hairy old guy who produces intense screeching noises by gnawing on a glass jar. Blood ensues. Nice.

Soon it’s time for Kirin J Callinan – the

Oliver Downes

man everyone is there to see – to get in the ring. I’m not exaggerating: Callinan himself said he knew 95% of the people in the room. And judging by the numbers and concurring titters, I’m pretty sure my friend and I made up the other 5% in its entirety.

Whereas Justice Yeldham can be fairly safely defined as more of a performance artist than musician, Kirin J Callinan sashays along the line separating live music and performance art, in camouflage pants, combat boots and a bare chest. Enviably, he has enough talent and charisma to get away with it. Callinan does this thing where he serenades the audience with pretty, warbling guitar sounds and crooning vocals, and then suddenly cuts in with surprise-attack shrieks and yelps and bombardments of feedback. His lyrics are sparse and evocative – he saves the talking for a break mid-set, when he tells a likely story about how the outfit was bought second-hand from Lifeline in Penrith, and how the spirit of the person who wore it before possessed him a little bit.

Madness, violence, machismo. I felt like all of the artists contributed to the theme without beating any horses to death, which nobody ever wants to witness. It’s just a shame that the audience wasn’t more diverse. A gig like that is wasted on a room full of friends who’ve seen it all before.

Jenny Noyes See the live pics p.46-47

FUTURE OF THE LEFT, DEAD FARMERS, YES, I’M LEAVING

Annandale Hotel Thursday December 8

It’s a hefty risk naming your band Yes, I’m Leaving, but I end up staying for the entire set. This band is a musical time machine that lands you in Nirvana’s Bleach era; a time where the loud/soft dynamic was still unabused and flannies were fashion.

Once I manage to curb my cynicism I’m left liking them, and I notice that the attention of latecomers is drawn stage-wards before getting their first beer.

Dead Farmers are confident, raucous and tight. It’s rock bordering on rawk and it feels familiar. I turn to a friend and ask, “What does this remind you of?” and he replies, “Shit.” I ask another friend, who says he’s busy “making up better bits for the songs in my head.” Something just isn’t working with Dead Farmers tonight, and latecomers are hitting the bar before heading outside for a ciggie.

42 :: BRAG :: 442 :: 19:12:11

Future of the Left start with ‘Arming Eritrea’, ‘Chin Music’ and ‘Small Bones, Small Bodies’ in quick succession, before Andy Falkous quips, “We play the hits first so we can really alienate you later.” It’s the first hint we get that Falkous is a wizard of shit-talking, and the rest of the night is a comedy show disguised as a gig. The gig is amazing. The pit bubbles for ‘Manchasm’ and ‘adeadenemyalwayssmellsgood’, and then boils over for the Mclusky number ‘Without MSG I Am Nothing’. The new song ‘Polymers Are Forever’ brings an epic eeriness to the set, and the unreleased ‘Robocop 4: Fuck Off Robocop’ is drenched in Falkous’s acerbic humour.

The set closes with an extended ‘Lapsed Catholics’, and things get weird. The drum kit comes to pieces, a dilapidated cover of ‘The Pink Panther’ gets murdered, and a bottle of beer is gaffered to a fan’s head. It’s definitely over, but I’ll definitely be back the next time they come to Sydney.

Tyler Broyles

BRAG :: 443 :: 19:12:11 :: 43

live reviews What we've been to see...

KURT VILE & THE VIOLATORS, ROYAL HEADACHE, STEP-PANTHER

impatiently belted out, but the LP’s tracks are near perfect – relaxed, but bristling.

More importantly, their aggressively stately and tuneful new material shows the band’s writing has benefitted from their newfound confidence.

Step-panther have had their name in lights a fair bit since releasing their first single to substantial radio play last year. Live, they sound cleaner than that dingy slacker nugget did back then. The trio confidently pedals through a brief but surprisingly tight set, wide-eyed and clearly grateful to be playing this show. Their muted enthusiasm is quietly affable, and the mostly-full room responds accordingly.

Kurt Vile is quite a presence in this packed room. He’s earnest and gauche as he opens the set alone with ‘Blackberry Song’, clutching on to his acoustic like some neardrowned creature pulling itself from a river.

There’s already a disarming immediacy to his songs – the lyrics seem to address you, personally, as a friend – so this weirdly macho frailty draws the entire room into silence. He’s so quiet, but even the gentle strands of feedback from his instrument lean in to caress the music.

Oxford Art Factory Tuesday December 6

Royal Headache are no longer saplings.

Singer Shogun seems almost business-like in the way he seals their soundcheck with a series of clipped cockney-isms. This air of formality might seem out of place for those familiar only with the charmingly messy soulriven punk of the group’s 2009 7-inch, but an acclaimed debut album and much touring has transpired since then. I was concerned that even the faintest modicum of slickness would strip the band of its passionate chaos, but it hasn’t. Instead of frantically thrashing through still-fresh cuts from this year’s selftitled, they relax into them with a fulsome confidence. Older tunes like ‘Eloise’ seem

FOO FIGHTERS

Sydney Football Stadium Thursday December 8 “Hands up if you’ve never been to a Foo Fighters show before!” bellows Dave Grohl. I know in my rational mind that he can’t see me in the crowd of thousands, but I’m an irrational teenager tonight, and adolescent fan-guilt forces me to raise my hand. “Well, don’t worry, we’re glad you waited – because we used to suck, and now we’re fucking rad.”

I have somehow found myself attending my first ever Foo Fighters show at the totally decrepit age of 25. I can picture myself and my best friend, arch and fifteen, sitting on her bed shaking their heads at me in disappointment; for days before the show I hear comments like “Oh, I saw them at the Hordern, it was awesome, they played ‘Hey, Johnny Park!’ and everything!” and “I saw them on a boat, it was awesome, they played for three hours and did ‘Hey, Johnny Park!’ and everything!” and “Oh, I saw them play in like 1975 or some shit, it was tiny, and they only had like two albums back then so they played ‘Hey, Johnny Park!’ like five times!” A small part of me is deeply cross that I have to see them in a stadium.

No, Virginia, they did not play ‘Hey, Johnny Park!’ this time. They played ‘Monkey Wrench’, and ‘This Is A Call’, and ‘Everlong’, and ‘My Hero’, and even ‘Wheels’, the “new” track on the recent best-of, which Dave Grohl freely admitted to being a bit of a flop everywhere except Germany (which, according to the Hasselhoff Corollary, doesn’t really recommend it to anybody). But Grohl can take the flabby semi-

Luke Telford

See the live pics p.46-47

recent single that only really got played on Triple M a few times, play it acoustic with all the visceral Foos guitar crunch stripped away, and still get a sold-out SFS singing every word. It doesn’t hurt that he does it from a 25-foot hydraulic platform in the very middle of the stadium, or that he’s a rock’n’roll lifer with possibly the best pedigree since anybody who was in the Yardbirds and with even more clownish charisma than hair, or that he writes enormous rock songs with enormous hearts AND enormous balls.

It also doesn’t hurt that Foo Fighters, as a unit, show no sign of fatigue: they are tight and gleeful, with Taylor Hawkins stripping off what may have been a High School Musical singlet after two songs, dripping perspiration onto his kit from already-matted hair, and Chris Shiflett not even breaking a sweat as he solobattles Grohl from opposite ends of the long promenade stage, affecting exasperation with the frontman’s antics. Every number is given the grandiose, shred-happy treatment most bands save for the last song, with Zeppelin-size guitar sounds. ‘Monkey Wrench’ has a couple of hardened rock journos in the row behind me belting out The Screamy Bit because muscle memory kicks in and we can’t not, and by the time they close the encore with ‘Everlong’, they've temporarily stripped away my cynicism about stadium shows and rock bands who work long and hard and well enough to play them.

Foo Fighters might not be Radiohead or Royal Headache or whoever the artistic benchmark is these days, but they’re fucking rad, and worth the wait.

Caitlin Welsh

GANG GANG DANCE, BATTERIE

all those cheesy synth presets and plastic guitar sounds into something so intoxicating and elaborate by way of informal jamming?

Batterie turns out to be a solo act; a single man at a sequencer and drumkit spinning innocuous looms of electronica-by-numbers.

The set feels staid and civilised at first, with textbook arrangements and melodies slung across fairly predictable chord changes. But this is quite some illusion; the longer you spend with this music, the further you get sucked into its polyrhythmic matrices. Layers of counter melody and time signatures become progressively more complex, advancing from the familiar stomp of a 4/4 into a 10/8 piece that’s so rhythmically compelling it prompts bouts of confused dancing among the more inventively bedecked cliques. Pedestrian electronica belies densely layered avant-pop.

The set opens with an ecstatic drone, wrung with cymbal wash and synth noodling.

The intended grandeur of the projections – planetary sweeps and bubbling magma – is defused by the projector settings: a play button hovers across singer Lizzie Bougatsos’s vinyl jacket, and the video’s elapsed time is emblazoned squarely across the seat of guitarist Brian DeGraw’s jeans.

But it matches the informal grandeur of the set well. ‘Adult Goth’ springs to life not as the prickly gem we know on record, but as a slack and loping jam. ‘Mindkilla’ reveals its dubby core before lapsing into distended swathes of sublime, formless grit. It snaps unexpectedly back to the verse at doublespeed, recalling the heady, ADD fizz of African dance genre Shangaan electro. It shouldn’t work, but it does. And throughout, Bougatsos is utterly transfixing, her every syllable both deep within the music and running its tendrils up the nape of your neck.

When their gear isn’t transpiring against them, this band is every bit as impressive as their recordings suggest.

The Studio, Sydney Opera House Saturday December 10

Gang Gang Dance’s music feels like a precariously tenuous proposition. They’re enormously ambitious, splicing countless strands of influence into a kind of tasteful, mutant global prog. On record, they pull this feat off with a startling sleight of hand that implies careful editing and painstaking composition – how could they possibly jam

44 :: BRAG :: 442 :: 19:12:11

With The Violators, it’s a different story.

There’s no bass – each guitarist doubles on baritone guitar – so the electric pieces feel more aggressive for their groundlessness, turning the wry musings of tracks like ‘Jesus Freaks’ into rambling, spitting things. ‘Freak Train’ is perfectly suited to this feel, galloping into squalling saxophone. It’s so tensely euphoric that Vile doesn’t need to overplay the catharsis in his vocals – it’s already fizzing in the air.

Luke Telford

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Lizotte’s Sydney 629 Pittwater Rd Dee Why

Lizotte’s Central Coast Lot 3 Avoca Dr Kincumber

Lizotte’s Newcastle 31 Morehead St Lambton

WWW. LIZOT TES.COM.AU BRAG :: 443 :: 19:12:11 :: 45

snap sn ap up all night out all week . . .

199 launch party party profile

It’s called: 199 Launch Party It sounds like: A whole lot of party. Two bands sound like skateboarding on ecstasy, one like jumping into the water stoned, and the other like rock’n’roll zombies.

Who’s playing? The Death Set, Dune Rats, Doc Holliday Takes The Shotgun, Humans, Chicks Who Love Guns DJs and &Dimes DJs. Sell it to us: This is the only Sydney show for The Death Set’s Australian tour and they’re going to be fucking wild.

The bit we’ll remember in the AM: SLAP SLAP SLAP POUND UP DOWN SNAP, SLAP SLAP SLAP POUND UP DOWN SNAP. Crowd specs: This is a party for the whole family, as long as they like drinking, jumping on each other, strobes and dudes yelling.

Wallet damage: $15 Where: The Standard / Lvl 3 383 Bourke St, Surry Hills

go here go there

PICS :: TL,TP

When: Thursday December 29, from 8pm

howling bells

PICS :: AM

09:12:11 :: FBi Social@The World Bar :: 24 Bayswater Rd 9357 7700

08:12:11 :: The Annandale:: Cnr. Parramatta Rd & Nelson St Annandale 9550 1078

kurt vile & the violators

08:12:11 :: The Metro :: 624 George St Sydney 9550 3666

:: KATRINA CLARKE :: S : TIM LEVY (HEAD HONCHO) POPOV :: TIM WHITNEY OUR LOVELY PHOTOGRAPHER RGE GEO :: Y CHE PEA MAS NS :: THO :: ASHLEY MAR :: DANIEL MUN

46 :: BRAG :: 443: 19:12:11

explosions in the sky 11:12:11 :: The Metro :: 624 George St, Sydney 9550 3666

PICS :: AM

international swingers

PICS :: AM

07:12:11 :: The Red Rattler:: 6 Faversham St, Marrickville 9565 1044

PICS :: GP

future of the left

PICS :: GP

10:12:11 :: The Standard :: Lvl 3/383 Bourke St Surry Hills 9262 4500

snap sn ap up all night out all week . . .

10:12:11 :: Sandringham Hotel :: 387 King St Newtown 9557 1254

It’s called: La Grande Xmas It sounds like: Phatter than Santa, a rollicking jaunt/joint down headbanger lane with three sexy, jangly punk-swamp-rock bands.

Who’s playing? Glitter Canyon, La Mancha Negra & Sparrows + DJs Sell it to us: Sick bands, free entry, $4 Coopers all night! Good ‘n’ cheap, so you can save yer cash for Xmas pressies.

The bit we’ll remember in the AM: Mackin’ on with some broad under the mistletoe.

Crowd specs: All of the subcultures coming together in harmony to worship Santa/Satan.

Wallet damage: Free entry before 10pm / $10 after Where: Oxford Art Factory / 38-46 Oxford St Darlinghurst When: Thursday December 22, from 8pm

musecology

PICS :: TL

guitar wolf

PICS :: GP

party profile

la grande xmas

sade

PICS :: AM

09:12:11 :: PCYC Boxing Ring :: Cnr Cathedral & Riley St Woolloomoolo 9360 5835

08:12:11 :: ANZ Stadium :: Sydney Olympic Park 8765 2000

:: KATRINA CLARKE :: S : TIM LEVY (HEAD HONCHO) POPOV :: TIM WHITNEY OUR LOVELY PHOTOGRAPHER RGE GEO :: Y CHE PEA MAS NS :: THO :: ASHLEY MAR :: DANIEL MUN

unknown mortal orchestra

PICS :: KC

foo fighters

PICS :: AM

09:12:11 :: Sydney Entertainment Centre :: 35 Harbour St Darling Harbour 9320 4200

07:12:11 :: Oxford Art Factory :: 38-46 Oxford St Darlinghurst 93323711

BRAG :: 443 :: 19:12:11 :: 47

SUMMER HOLIDAY GIG GUIDE send your listings to : gigguide@thebrag.com

JAZZ

MONDAY DECEMBER 19

Alison Penney Dee Why RSL Club free 6pm

JAZZ

ROCK & POP Blue Mondays: Frank Sultana Downstairs, Sandringham Hotel, Newtown free 8pm Mandi Jarry Coogee Bay Hotel free 9pm The Nevilles Marlborough Hotel, Newtown free 10.30pm Zac Slater The Observer Hotel, The Rocks free 8.30pm

JAZZ Greg Coffin Trio 505 Club, Surry Hills $10 8pm John Hill Dee Why RSL Club free 6pm

TUESDAY DECEMBER 20 ROCK & POP Adam Pringle and Friends Downstairs, Sandringham Hotel, Newtown free 8pm Andy Mammers Trio Opera Bar, Sydney Opera House free 8.30pm Emily Barker and The Red Clay Halo The Polo Lounge and Supper Club, Darlinghurst 8pm Gemma Ray (UK), Melodie Nelson, Steve Smyth The Vanguard, Newtown $16 (+ bf) 8pm The Gin Club Trio, Matt Banham, Sierra Fin, The Maladies, White City Hong Kong Rock Club, Upstairs, Annandale Hotel $10 (+ bf) 8pm The Jeff Chinky Fan Club, March of the Real Fly, Tim Fitz, Sky Squadron, Colonies Annandale Hotel $10 7.30pm OMG Scruffy Murphy’s Hotel, Sydney free 10pm Rob Henry The Observer Hotel, The Rocks free 8.30pm The Songwriter Sessions Sandringham Hotel, Newtown free 7.30pm They Call Me Bruce Maloney’s Hotel, Sydney free 8.30pm The World in the Basement: Joe West, Lucinda Peters, The Kumpnee, DJ Brent Clough The Basement, Circular Quay $15 (+ bf) 8.30pm Tuesday Night Live: Burning Violet Bridges, Dirty Sweet Beach Road Hotel, Bondi free 8pm

Sleepmakeswaves

Zoltan Mean Fiddler, Rouse Hill free 6pm

WEDNESDAY DECEMBER 21 ROCK & POP Andy Mammers Duo Maloney’s Hotel, Sydney free 9.30pm The Beards, Claire, Matt Andersen (USA) The Vanguard, Newtown $20 (+ bf) 8pm Bernie Segedin Dee Why RSL Club free 6pm Bonny Read, Sinead Burgess Rock Lily, Pyrmont free 8pm Closure in Moscow, Saskwatch, A Lonely Crowd Beach Road Hotel, Bondi Beach free 8pm Dave Seaside Artichoke Gallery Cafe, Manly free 7.30pm Dave White Scruffy Murphy’s Hotel, Sydney free 11pm Debbie Downstairs, Sandringham Hotel, Newtown free 8pm I’m With Stupid O’Malley’s Hotel, Darlinghurst free 9.30pm Jagermeister Presents: Coffin, Bustacap, Fox Valley, Deadbeat & Hazy, Liza Rose Annandale Hotel $8 7.30pm Jamie Lindsay Northies, Cronulla free 7.30pm Jimmy Vargas and the Black Dahlias Blue Beat Bar & Grill, Double Bay $10 10pm Mike Bennett The Observer Hotel, The Rocks free 9.30pm Musos Jam Bald Faced Stag, Leichhardt free 8pm A New York Christmas!: David Raliegh (USA), Bobby Fox, Trevor Ashley, Sally Cameron, Lucy Maunder, Margi De Ferranti, Nathan Leigh Jones The Basement, Circular Quay $25 (+ bf) 7.30pm Nicky Kurta Summer Hill Hotel free 7.30pm Rose of York Brass Monkey, Cronulla 8pm Spaceticket, New Archetypes, Debbie, Snout Cassette, White Knuckle Fever Sandringham Hotel, Newtown $10 8pm Steve Tonge Harbord Beach Hotel free 7.30pm Van The Man- Van Morrison Tribute Lizotte’s Restaurant, Dee Why $28– $70 (dinner & show) 8pm Willtricity, Madman Prophets, Fret Valve Bar, Tempe free 8pm

Inga Liljestrom 505 Club, Surry Hills $20–$25 8pm

THURSDAY DECEMBER 22 ROCK & POP 3 Way Split The Orient Hotel, The Rocks free 9pm Abby Dobson, Steve Smyth Brass Monkey, Cronulla 8pm Adam Black Docks Hotel, Darling Harbour free 8pm Alotta Presha, The Howling Tongues, Children Overboard, Vicious Dickens Gaelic Theatre, Surry Hills $5 (presale)–$7 (at door) 8pm Andy Mammers Harbord Beach Hotel free 8pm Dan Spillane Northies, Cronulla free 9.15pm Darren Hanlon St Stephen’s Church, Newtown 8pm David Agius Dee Why Hotel free 8pm David Sattout Artichoke Gallery Cafe, Manly free 7.30pm Foot in the Wall Bald Faced Stag, Leichhardt $8 8pm Goodnight Dynamite O’Malley’s Hotel, Darlinghurst free 9pm Gospel Love: Darryl Beaton, The D1 Cartel, Buddy Siolo, The Martinez Brothers The Basement, Circular Quay $25 (+ bf) 7.30pm Helpful Kitchen Gods, Call To Color, The Balkan Grill, Thaddeus Clay Valve Bar, Tempe 7pm Johnathan Devoy Downstairs, Sandringham Hotel, Newtown free 8pm La Grande Xmas: Sparrows, La Mancha Negra, Glitter Canyon, S.kobar Oxford Art Factory, Darlinghurst free (early bird) 8pm Late Shift Scruffy Murphy’s Hotel, Sydney free 10pm Liza Rose, Dan Ford And The Goods, Burning Violet Bridges, The Wrecking Room Sanringham Hotel, Newtown $10 8pm Matt Price Panthers North Richmond free 9pm Monsieur Moon, Sui Zhen, Quixotic, Bennie James Kings Cross Hotel, Darlinghurst $10 8pm Pat Drummond Pioneer Tavern, Penrith South free 12pm

Peter Combe & The Newspaper Mama Band, Little Lovers The Vanguard, Newtown $23 (+ bf) 8pm The Postman, Urby The World Bar, Kings Cross free (student)–$5 9pm Sam & Jamie Trio Maloney’s Hotel, Sydney free 9.30pm Sleepmakeswaves, Meniscus, Pirate, Toehider Annandale Hotel $12 (presale)–$15 8pm Speakeasy The Whitehouse Hotel, Petersham 8pm Steve Tonge The Observer Hotel, The Rocks free 9.30pm Zoltan Balgowlah RSL Club, Seaforth free 7.30pm

JAZZ James Morrison Lizotte’s Restaurant, Dee Why $81– $123 8pm Lily Dior and the Soul Contenders 505 Club, Surry Hills $15–$20 8pm Lionel Robinson Dee Why RSL Club free 6pm Vince Jones Blue Beat Bar & Grill, Double Bay $22 (+ bf) 7pm

FRIDAY DECEMBER 23 ROCK & POP The Affairs Trio Mean Fiddler, Rouse Hill free 9pm Andy Mammers Duo Kirribilli Hotel free 8pm Anthems Of Oz Penshurst Hotel free 8pm Ben Finn Duo Ettamogah Pub, Kellyville free 5pm Big Shots - Duelling Pianos Show Club Five Dock, Five Dock RSL Big Village Xmas Party: True Vibenation, Ellesquire, Tuka, Daily Meds, Rapaport, Sketch The Rhyme, Ruthless, DJ Migz, High Tops Brass Band Annandale Hotel $10 (+ bf) 7pm Black Diamond Heart Club Golden Sheaf Hotel, Double Bay free 9pm The Black Sorrows Lizotte’s Restaurant, Dee Why $58– $116 (dinner & show) 8pm The Boogie Boys Overlander Hotel, Cambridge Park free 8pm Bright Young Things, Ginger & Drum, Dream Delay, B Y Tech Spectrum, Darlinghurst $10 (+ bf) 8pm Cambo O’Malley’s Hotel, Darlinghurst free 8pm Closure in Moscow, Marlow Viper Bar, Burdekin Hotel,

Inga Liljestrom Darlinghurst free 8pm Counterfeit Tribute Night: The Glimmer Twins, The Stationmasters, Maxine Kauter, Josh Shipton, Emily Ryan, Woman & Chee, Luna Bugs, Emmanual Brimstone & the Roxettes, Rex Havoc Banned, Dave Sattout, The Candy Cane Quartet, Yule Be Sorry Town Hall Hotel, Newtown free 7pm Dan Lawrence Macquarie Hotel, Liverpool free 4.30pm Dan Lawrence, Alex Cannings The Observer Hotel, The Rocks free 8.30pm Dave McCormack & the Polaroids Sandringham Hotel, Newtown 8pm Dave White Experience, Dan Lissing Duo Crows Nest Hotel free 6.30pm Eve of the Eve Party: Miss Match, Liz Bird, Bex Selina’s, Coogee Bay Hotel $10 9pm Fallon Brothers Engadine RSL & Citizens Club free 8pm Farkin’ OAF Free Xmas Party: I Forget Sorry! Crew, Only The Sea Slugs, Thieves, The Ganaschz, FGMT, Friday I’m In Love DJs vs Hobophonics vs Sosoume DJs vs Brothers Grimm Oxford Art Factory, Darlinghurst free 8pm Fender Benders Matraville RSL Club free 8pm Fiona Leigh Jones Duo Harbord Beach Hotel free 8pm Gary Johns The Grand Hotel, Rockdale free 5.30pm Greg Byrne Cronulla Sharks free 9pm Heath Burdell Castle Hill RSL Club free 6.30pm Hello Cleveland Pioneer Tavern, Penrith South free 8pm Highway To Hell Clarendon Tavern free 9.30pm Hot Damn!: Caulfield, City Lights Fade, Ghosts On Broadway, Divide & Conquer Spectrum, Darlinghurst $15 (guestlist)–$20 8pm Keep The Faith - Bon Jovi Show Bull & Bush Hotel, Baulkham Hills free 10pm King Tide Brass Monkey, Cronulla 8pm KP Palms Nightclub, Darlinghurst free 7pm Mandi Jarry Duo Panthers North Richmond free 6pm Mark Corey Crows Nest Hotel free 10pm Mark Hopper Artichoke Gallery Cafe, Manly free 7.30pm Marty Mulholland Parramatta RSL free 5pm Matt Jones Duo Albion Hotel, Parramatta free 6pm Matt Price Duo Chamberlain Hotel, Sydney free 9pm Mr Breeze Richmond Inn free 8pm

“Manic depression is touching my soul. I know what I want but I just don’t know” - JIMI HENDRIX 48 :: BRAG :: 443:: 19:12:11

g g guide gig g our gig picks for the festive season MUM: The Ruminators, The Pixiekills, Heavy Heads, Carpet, Tainted Fist, Vicious Dickens, Moonbase Commander, MUM DJs The World Bar, Kings Cross $10-$15 8pm The My Tys Xmas Skank Out: The My Tys The Basement, Circular Quay $15 (+ bf)–$22 7.30pm Nicky Kurta Mill Hill Hotel, Bondi Junction free 7.30pm The Paper Scissors, The Walking Who, Steve Smyth Upstairs Beresford, Surry Hills free 8pm Peter Combe & The Newspaper Mama Band, Little Lovers The Vanguard, Newtown $23 (+ bf) 8pm Player Haters Xmas Ball: Joyride & The Accidents, Alphamama, DJ Levins, Shantan Wantan Ichiban, Joyride GoodGod Small Club, Sydney $10 10pm Professor Groove & the Booty Affair Blue Beat Bar & Grill, Double Bay $10 10pm Reckless The Orient Hotel, The Rocks free (early bird)–$5 9.30pm Rip it Up Eastern Suburbs Leagues Club, Bondi Junction free 8pm Snow White Salsa: Salsa, Bachata, Zouk Gaelic Theatre, Surry Hills $18.40 8pm Sons of Mercury Scruffy Murphy’s Hotel, Sydney free 10.30pm Spurs for Jesus Rose of Australia Hotel, Erskineville 8pm Steve Tonge Duo Hillside Hotel, Castle Hill free 8pm Super Best Friends, Vacant Field, Surprise Wasp, Bang! Bang! Rock N Roll, DJ Alley Cats

Lansdowne Hotel, Chippendale free 9pm Tom T Customs House Bar, Sydney free 7pm Xmas Burlesque BBQ: The Strides, Fait Accompli, Xanthopan, Bunni Lambada, Evie Va Vooom, Memphis Mae, Sakura, Mad Cow, Mookie Valve Bar, Tempe $15-$20 3pm Zoltan Castle Hill RSL Club free 8.30pm

Reason8ers Peachtree Hotel, Penrith free 9pm Reckless Marlborough Hotel, Newtown free 8.30pm Sons of Mercury Rock Lily, Pyrmont free 7pm Stormcellar Bald Rock Hotel, Rozelle free 8pm White Brothers Duo Ettamogah Pub, Kellyville free 1pm Zoltan Malabar RSL Club free 7.30pm

Fait Accompli

JAZZ

SUNDAY DECEMBER 25

The Subterraneans 505 Club, Surry Hills $15–$20 8pm

SATURDAY DECEMBER 24 ROCK & POP

2 Of Hearts Canterbury-Hurlstone Park RSL free 7pm Andy Mammers Kings Cross Hotel, Darlinghurst free 7pm Ben Finn Duo Castle Hill Tavern free 10.30pm Brad Johns Harbord Beach Hotel free 8pm Cambo Sir Joseph Banks Hotel, Botany free 7pm Chris Paton Northies, Cronulla free 9.15pm Christmas Ball: Fait Accompli, Bang Bang Rock N Roll, The Beer Baron, Aimee Francis, Daniel Allars, Kieran Morris, Halfway Homebuoy, Particles The Lansdowne Hotel, Chippendale free 9pm Club Nepal: The Axe Band, Bee

Rock, DJ Alex Gaelic Theatre, Surry Hills $28.60 8pm Cyndi Boste & the East Coast Band Crows Nest Hotel free 10.15pm David Agius Castle Hill RSL Club free 8.30pm David McMaster Kirribilli Hotel free 8pm Deep Duo Collaroy Services Beach Club free 7pm Double Whammy Engadine RSL & Citizens Club free 8pm Erin Marshall Duo Ettamogah Pub, Kellyville free 6.30pm Fallon Brothers Brewhouse At St Mary’s, St Marys free 7.30pm Gary Johns PJ Gallagher’s Drummoyne free 10pm Jamie Lindsay Duo Northies, Cronulla free 5.30pm Josh McIvor Mean Fiddler, Rouse Hill 5.30pm

King Tide Brass Monkey, Cronulla 8pm Mark Corey Mean Fiddler, Rouse Hill free 9pm Matt Jones Duo Castle Hill Tavern free 6pm Metallica Show Bull & Bush Hotel, Baulkham Hills free 10pm Millennium Bug Heathcote Hotel free 9.30pm Next Best Thing Caringbah Bizzo’s 8pm Nicky Kurta Duo Oceans Bar Coogee Beach free 7pm Orphans Xmas: The Mountains, Little Bastard, Hazzy Bee, Dan Crestani Annandale Hotel 6pm Orphans Xmas Downstairs, Sandringham Hotel, Newtown free 7pm Outlier Scruffy Murphy’s Hotel, Sydney free 10.30pm Professor Groove & The Booty Affair Blue Beat Bar & Grill, Double Bay $10 10pm

ROCK & POP

Chartbusters Marlborough Hotel, Newtown free 10.30pm Matt Jones Ettamogah Pub, Kellyville free 12pm The Road Crew Canterbury-Hurlstone Park RSL free 9pm Zoltan Cabravale Diggers, Canley Vale free 11.30am Zoltan Revesby Workers Club free 6.30pm

MONDAY DECEMBER 26 ROCK & POP

Adam Black Docks Hotel, Darling Harbour free 8pm After Party Band Marlborough Hotel, Newtown free 10.30pm

wed

wed

21

(9:00PM - 12:00AM)

Dec

28 Dec

(9:00PM - 12:00AM)

thu

thu

22 Dec

(9:00PM - 12:00AM)

fri

23

(5:00PM - 8:00PM)

Dec

29 Dec

(9:00PM - 12:00AM)

fri

30 Dec

(5:00PM - 8:00PM)

(9:30PM - 12:30AM)

s PARTY DJ

(9:30PM - 12:30AM)

DOWNSTAIRS (12:30AM to close)

sat

sat

(4:30PM - 7:30PM)

24

31 Dec

Dec

NYE DJ

(6:00PM - 2:00AM) (9:00PM - 12:00AM)

25 Dec

CHRISTMAS  CLOSED sun

mon

26 Dec

(4:30PM - 7:30PM)

01

(4:30PM - 7:30PM)

Jan

(8:30PM - 12:00AM) (8:30PM - 12:00AM)

tue

27 Dec

SPENCER RAY DUO

(4:30PM - 7:30PM)

THE WILD ARMADILLOS

(9:30PM - 12:00AM)

mon

02

(4:30PM - 7:30PM)

Jan

(8:30PM - 12:00AM)

BRAG :: 443 :: 19:12:11 :: 49

gig guide send your listings to : gigguide@thebrag.com The Basement Goes Greek!: Maria Stavropolous, Krazy Kon The Basement, Circular Quay $25 (+ bf) 7.30pm Blue Mondays: Frank Sultana Downstairs, Sandringham Hotel, Newtown free 8pm Dave White Cronulla Sharks free 8pm Greg Byrne Duo Mean Fiddler, Rouse Hill free 1pm Josh McIvor Harbord Beach Hotel free 7.30pm Mike Bennett, Cambo, Rob Henry The Observer Hotel, The Rocks free 4.30pm Roxing Day #2: Gay Paris, Raise the Crazy, The Celibate Rifles, Dune Buggy Attack Squadron, Sativa Sun, Rust Annandale Hotel $15 (+ bf) 2.30pm

TUESDAY DECEMBER 27 ROCK & POP Adam Pringle and Friends Downstairs, Sandringham Hotel, Newtown free 8pm The Black Hill Ramblers Marrickville Bowling and Recreation Club free 8pm OMG Scruffy Murphy’s Hotel, Sydney free 10pm Songs On Stage - Performers Competition Dee Why RSL Club free 6.30pm Steve Tonge, Rob Henry The Observer Hotel, The Rocks free 4pm Tuesday Night Live: Sierratonin, Julie Stern Beach Road Hotel, Bondi free 8pm They Call Me Bruce Maloney’s Hotel, Sydney free 8.30pm

WEDNESDAY DECEMBER 28 ROCK & POP Andy Mammers Duo Maloney’s Hotel, Sydney free 9.30pm Dan Spillane Mean Fiddler, Rouse Hill free 6pm David Agius Summer Hill Hotel free 7.30pm The Glass Ceiling, Tigertown Rock Lily, Pyrmont free 8pm Jagermeister Presents: Chico Seeds, Lint, Savage Track Record, Partisan Code, Triange Skies Annandale Hotel $8 7.30pm Heath Burdell Coogee Bay Hotel free 9pm Jimmy Vargas and the Black Dahlias Blue Beat Bar & Grill, Double Bay $10 10pm Mandi Jarry Northies, Cronulla free 7.30pm Matt Price Harbord Beach Hotel free 7.30pm Mike Bennett The Observer Hotel, The Rocks free 8.30pm Musos Jam Bald Faced Stag, Leichhardt free 8pm Replika Scruffy Murphy’s Hotel, Sydney free 11pm San Cisco, The Khanz, Tin Sparrow Beach Road Hotel, Bondi Beach free 8pm Spangled Mistress Brass Monkey, Cronulla 8pm Steve Tonge Duo O’Malley’s Hotel, Darlinghurst free 9pm The Thingos Downstairs, Sandringham Hotel, Newtown free 8pm Tim Freedman The Basement, Circular Quay $30 (+ bf) 7.30pm

JAZZ Renee Geyer The Vault, Windsor $51-$76.50 (+ bf) 6.30pm Vince Jones Coogee Bay Hotel, Beach Bar $25 (+ bf) 7pm

THURSDAY DECEMBER 29 ROCK & POP Bring The Cool: The Kumpnee, Empire Rising, Blue Candy, The Yello Canvas Annandale Hotel $8 (+ bf) 7.30pm The Death Set The Standard, Darlinghurst $12 (+ bf) 8pm Hanni El Khatib (USA) FBi Social @ Kings Cross Hotel, Darlinghurst $35 (+ bf) 8pm Jebediah Coogee Bay Hotel $35 (+ bf) 8pm Johnathan Devoy Downstairs, Sandringham Hotel, Newtown free 8pm The Kumpnee, Empire Rising, Blue Candy, Yellow Canvas Annandale Hotel $8 (+ bf) 7.30pm Matt Jones Scruffy Murphy’s Hotel, Sydney free 10pm Peats Ridge Festival: Gotye, Xavier Rudd, Salmonella Dub (NZ), Stanton Warriors (UK), LTJ Bukem (UK), Dum Dum Girls (USA), Mountain Mocha Kilimanjaro (Japan), The Holidays, A-Skillz (UK), Hanni El Khatib (USA), Hermitude, Sietta, Tijuana Cartel, Passenger (UK), The Bird, The Graveyard Train, Chase The Sun, Thundamentals, The Crooked Fiddle Band, Husky, San Cisco, The Paper Scissors, Fire! Santa Rosa Fire!, Marshall

& the Fro, Dead Leaves, Benjalu, Amelia Curran, Montpelier, Inga Liljestrom, Enola Fall, The Trouble With Templeton, The Founds, Ellesquire, Claude Hay, Swamp Thing, Hanggai (China), Jim Ward (USA), Eagle & the Worm, Yukon Blonde, Canyons, Oh Mercy, Ball Park Music, King Cannons, Busby Marou, New Navy, Dubmarine, Yeshe, Nantes, Inland Sea, Pigeon, The Rescue Ships, Cameras, Sleepmakeswaves, The Liberators, Oliver Tank, Rufus, Scott Mellis, Richie Cuthbert, Sam Shinazzi, Los Capitanes, Steve Smyth, I Am Apollo, Youri Blow France, Elizabeth Rose, Gemma Ray (UK), The Paper Kites, Fantme, Israel Canaan, Ben & Beth, Iron And The Lotus Toucan, Rainbow Chan, Anima, Audego, The Townhouses, Loopsnake, Foreign Dub, Bouddibass, Electonic, MSG, Weblet, Roleo, Genius, Gelido, Misha, Oddsox, Poseidon, Ahavamour, Duplex, Bumble, Monkfly, Chapptrate, Ju Ju, Finish Born Sinignn, Da Heethe Jeebies, Drachemann, Cherie Kotek, Jon Scott, Superbeast, Leeroy, Mr Bill, Rumplestompskin, Ryanosaurous, Wahoo, Ilse J, Elliot, Suburban Dark, Elecrocado, Nezbit, Phsins, ConfigSys PROJECT, Vagas, Phil Toke, Soul of Sydney DJs, Nick La Rosa, Dfae Leighton, Brynstar, The Sunset Kids, Bruno Dante, Dale Stephen, Eli Wolfe, Crescent Collective, Dave Sattout, Todd Sibbin & The Opposite Ends, Minnie Marks, The Hazelman Brothers, Matthew Koutnik, Lilyso, Fanny Lumscien, Benjamin James Eastwood, Prem, Chilli Didge, Veil, Leigh Wood, iSOMA, Stuart Ridley-Emagica, Deseven, The Atlas Room, T n A, Oblong Monster Glenworth Valley, Peats Ridge $20 (child)–$320 (+ bf) 4pm

Sean Wayland (USA) Notes Live, Enmore 8pm Speakeasy The Whitehouse Hotel, Petersham 8pm

JAZZ Renee Geyer The Basement, Circular Quay $40 (+ bf)–$88 (dinner & show) 8pm

FRIDAY DECEMBER 30 ROCK & POP 031 Rockshow Scruffy Murphy’s Hotel, Sydney free 10.30pm Collective Sound System, Sinead Burgess, Steve Smyth Upstairs Beresford, Surry Hills free 8pm Johnny Cash Tribute Brass Monkey, Cronulla 8pm Juke Kartel, Syndicate, Sunset Riot Annandale Hotel $15 (+ bf) 8pm Movement: Telefonica Beach Road Hotel free 8pm Papa Pilko & The Binrats, Crossing Red Lines, Ruffle Feathers, DJ Alley Cats The Lansdowne Hotel, Chippendale Peats Ridge Festival Glenworth Valley, Peats Ridge $20 (child)–$320 (+ bf) 10am Professor Groove & the Booty Affair Blue Beat Bar & Grill, Double Bay $10 10pm

JAZZ Renee Geyer The Basement, Circular Quay $40 (+ bf)–$88 (dinner & show) 8pm

Wednesday December 21

Friday January 6

LAUGH YOUR TITS OFF:

RE:ENACTMENT

Comedy Christmas Party

2012

2011

+ DREAM DELAY + ARUNDEL + DJ SUBSEA

8pm, $16 + BF from Oztix / $22 at the door

8pm, $10

Thursday December 22

Saturday January 7

MONSIEUR MOON

Wednesday January 4

+ SUI ZHEN + THE QUIXOTICS + BENNIE JAMES

LUNCH BREAK

8pm, $10 at the door

Friday December 23

KING BROWN + 4TH WALL CITY + HIGH NOON + RISBY 8pm, $10 at the door

Thursday December 29

HANNI EL KHATIB + KILL CITY CREEPS + THE GOOCH PALMS 8pm, $39.80 from Oztix / $40 at the door 50 :: BRAG :: 443:: 19:12:11

presented by Albert’s: MERE WOMEN FREE 1pm

Thursday January 5

YUKON BLONDE LEADER CHEETAH (DUO) TIN SPARROW BRIAN CAMPEAU $15 + bf Oztix / $20 at the door

SURES AND

THE VILLAINARES + SPECIAL GUESTS 8pm, $10

LATE NIGHT SOCIAL DJs from midnight to 3am - FREE!

Sunday January 8 AFTERNOON DELIGHT: LOOSE JOINTS & FOREIGNDUB AIRWAYVZ broadcast live from FBi Social w/ guests!

L2 Kings Cross Hotel www.fbisocial.com

3pm - 9pm, $5

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RRP: SALE: $1199

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$999

9 SALE $37 SALE $199 9 SALE $26 9 SALE $64 SALE $69 9 SALE $25 9 SALE $44 9 SALE $36 9 SALE $279 9 SALE $159 SALE $299

99 AJ 220SCE RRP $4 EPIPHONEOU IC AC ST F310 P RRP $289 YAMAHTAIC PACK S U ACO AJ/DR RRP $369 EPIPHONCEOUSTIC 220S A 99 ASTERBILT RRP $8 EPIPHONE M M 0 0 AJ/DR-5 5L RRP $89 SUZUKI SGICAL 3/4 CLASS SPECIAL RRP $359 EPIPHONE OSRG EB CH 9 CIFICA 112 RRP $59 YAMAHA PA K C PA P GUITAR & AM GUARD RRP $529 N A V ER M KRA MET. S-440S RED AUL RRP $3999 P GIBSON LEIOSNAL TRADIT RRP $2199 1968 GIBSON G V FLYIN A RRP $399 YAMAHA S S RBX170 B

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1 BASS KRAMER DRRP: SALE: $849

C40 YAMAHA

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DR90T EPIPHOENREPACK PLAY ith tuner,

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ORANG 20LDX GUEITCRUSH AR AMP RRP $269 VOX PATH FI 10W BASS NDER RRP $119 AMP BEHRINGER UL TR A BA SS BX4500H AM P HEAD RRP $419 VOX JAMVOX MONITOR + SO FTWARE RRP $299 EPIPHONE VA SENIOR COM LVE R RP $799 BO VOX AC4TV H EA D & V112TV CA RRP $649 B YAMAHA MW 10 C USB MIXER RRP $449 BEHRINGER BX L3 000 ULTRABASS BASS AMP RRP $499 ROLAND CU BE40XL GUITAR AM RRP $369 P ZILDJIAN PLA CYMBAL PANET Z RR P $339 CK VOX 15

W ALL VALVENIGHT TRAIN HEAD + BA G

S CCESSORRIE A F O E S E G N A SP RA

$489ea

RRP $699

SALE $199 SALE $89 SALE $33 5 SALE $199 SALE $59 9 SALE $519 SALE $33 9 SALE $39 9 SALE $299 SALE $249 SALE $55 9

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HOURS: MON-FRI 10:00am - 5:30pm* *THUR 10:00AM - 6:00pm SAT 10:00am - 4:30pm

www.facebook.com/gallinsmps

1800 GALLINS

THE RRP IS THE RECOMMENDED RETAIL PRICE SET BY THE AUSTRA AUSTRALIAN DISTRIBUTOR OF THE PRODUCT AND MAY NOT HAVE NECESSARILY BEEN SOLD AT THIS PRICE POINT IN THE PAST OR SOLD IN THE FUTURE. ALL PRICES WERE CURRENT AT THE TIME OF PRINTING NOVEMBER 2011. WE CANNOT BE HELD RESPONSIBLE RESPO FOR PRICE RISES OR REDUCTIONS AFTER THIS DATE. WE RESERVE THE RIGHT TO CORRECT ANY MISPRINTS. STOCK SUBJECT TO AVAILABILITY. SOME STOCKS ARE LIMITED.

BRAG :: 443 :: 19:12:11 :: 51

guide

send your listings to : gigguide@thebrag.com

NEW YEAR'S EVE 2011

Bob Log III

NEW YEAR'S DAY 2012 SUNDAY JANUARY 1 ROCK & POP

Gotye

SATURDAY DECEMBER 31 ROCK & POP

Apocalypse NYE Music Festival: The Glimmer, Drop Tank, Double Crosses, Through A Glass Darkly, Alex Party Cat Sepansky, The Rock Wankers, Handsome Sons, Lani the Procrastinator Town Hall Hotel, Newtown free 7pm Are You Experienced?: The Mick Hart Experience The Basement, Circular Quay $20 (presale)–$25 7.30pm Black Cherry NYE: Bob Log III (USA), The Art, The Pat Capocci Combo feat. Ezra Lee, Gay Paris, Los Capitanes, Dylabolical, Rockabilly Rhino vs Wolfman Dan, The Black Cherry DJs The Factory Theatre $50 (+ bf) 9pm

Jamiroquai Captain Matchbox Whoopee Band, Hat Fitz, Cara Robinson Notes Live, Enmore $49 (+ bf)–$100 (dinner & show) 8pm The Glimmer, Double Crosses, Drop Tank, Ya-Aha, Through A Glass, Darkly Town Hall Hotel, Newtown free 8pm Hot Damn!: Dream On Dreamer, Sienn Skies, Northlane, The Bride, Never See Tomorrow Spectrum, Darlinghurst 8pm Jamiroquai (UK), Pet Shop Boys (UK), Culture Club, Guy Sebastian, Psuedo Echo, Lyndsey Ollard Glebe Island $198 (+ bf)–$528 (+ bf) 2pm The Last Resort: Royal Headache, DJ King Opp, Shantan Wantan Ichiban, The Gooch Palms, Perfect Snatch, Flash & Crash DJs Goodgod Small Club, Sydney $18 (+ bf) 10pm Little Red, Jinja Safari Rock Lily, Pyrmont 8pm

Mad Season Taren Point Bowling Club free 9pm New Years Eve: British India, Floating Me, Strangers, The Colt 44’s Annandale Hotel $25 (+ bf) 8pm New Years Eve On The Harbour 2011: Architecture in Helsinki, Bag Raiders, Yacht Club DJs, Sampology, French Horn Rebellion (USA), Alison Wonderland, Sosoume DJs, Luke Million, Hey Now, Pedestrian DJs, Frames, Starjumps, F.R.I.E.N.D. DJs, Block Ness Monsters, Stoney Roads DJs, Falcona DJs Cargo Bar, Sydney $115-$178 (+ bf) 8pm New Years Evilution: Darker Half, Elm Street, Taberah, Teratornis, Thundasteel Sandringham Hotel, Newtown $15 7pm NYE: Shy Guys North Sydney Leagues Club, Cammeray $25 8.30pm

NYE Masked Ball: The Snowdroppers, Brothers Grim & The Blue Murders, Kira Puru & The Bruise, Jaded Vanities, DJ Goldfoot The Vanguard, Newtown $90 (+ bf) 8pm Peats Ridge Festival Glenworth Valley, Peats Ridge $20 (child)–$320 (+ bf) 10am SFX: Tonight Alive, Heroes For Hire, Chemical Transport St James Hotel, Sydney $30 9pm Shore Thing 2011: Snoop Dogg (USA), Calvin Harris (UK), Pendulum Bondi Park, Bondi Beach $128-$225 8.30pm sold out Sonny Fodera The Argyle, The Rocks $50 (1st release)–$60 8pm Tonight Alive, Chemical Transplant, Heroes For Hire St James Hotel, Sydney $34.70 (+ bf) 9pm Vanity Paragon Hotel, Sydney $45 9pm

Peats Ridge Festival Glenworth Valley, Peats Ridge $20 (child)–$320 (+ bf) 10am Tim Rogers Annandale Hotel $28 (+ bf) 7pm

JAZZ

The Peter Head Trio Harbour View Hotel, The Rocks free 4pm

Tim Rogers

52 :: BRAG :: 443:: 19:12:11

gig guide

send your listings to : gigguide@thebrag.com

MONDAY JANUARY 2 ROCK & POP

Dum Dum Girls (USA), Cabins, Bloods Oxford Art Factory, Darlinghurst $41 (+ bf) 8pm Fleet Foxes (USA) Concert Hall, Sydney Opera House $55.20–$94 8pm

TUESDAY JANUARY 3 ROCK & POP

CSS (BRA), Catcall The Standard, Darlinghurst $55 (+ bf) 8pm Fleet Foxes (USA) Concert Hall, Sydney Opera House $55.20–$94 8pm Grouplove (USA), The Head & the Heart The Factory Theatre, Enmore $49.50 (+ bf) 8pm all-ages Songs On Stage Performers Competition Dee Why RSL Club free 6.30pm

ACOUSTIC & FOLK Hanggai (China) The Basement, Circular Quay $35 (+ bf)–$40 (at door) 8pm

(+ bf) 8pm Beirut (USA) Concert Hall, Sydney Opera House $49 (+ bf) 8pm Blood Orange (USA) GoodGod Small Club, Sydney $33 (+ bf) 8pm Cambodian Space Project, Thee False Swamis, The Fabergettes The Vanguard, Newtown $15 (+ bf)–$50 (dinner & show) 8pm George Stav, Zelda Smyth The Basement, Circular Quay $15 (+ bf) 7.30pm Hawksley Workman (Canada) Brass Monkey, Cronulla 8pm Illy Narooma Golf Club, Narooma The Jim Jones Revue (UK), The Delta Riggs Annandale Hotel $39.60 (+ bf) 8pm Metronomy (UK), Oscar + Martin Manning Bar, Sydney University, Camperdown $42-$47 (+ bf) 8pm Pete Rock, Rasta Root Upstairs Beresford, Surry Hills 8pm Speakeasy The Whitehouse Hotel, Petersham 8pm Yukon Blonde Kings Cross Hotel, Darlinghurst $15 (+ bf) 8pm

FRIDAY JANUARY 6 ROCK & POP

WEDNESDAY JANUARY 4 ROCK & POP

Aloe Blacc (USA), Electric Empire, Maya Jupiter Enmore Theatre $73.10 8pm Easy Star All-Stars (USA) The Factory Theatre, Enmore $44 (+ bf) 8pm Fleet Foxes (USA) Concert Hall, Sydney Opera House $55.20–$94 8pm Jagermeister Presents: Riley & Donna, Elephant, The Big Dizzy, Feeding Edgar, Kohji Annandale Hotel $8 7.30pm Jean Grae (USA) Goodgod Small Club, Sydney 8pm Jimmy Vargas and the Black Dahlias Blue Beat Bar & Grill, Double Bay $10 10pm Musos Jam Bald Faced Stag, Leichhardt free 8pm Nimeo, Charlie & the Maddox Factory, Dr Kong & The Stem Cells The Vanguard, Newtown $12 (+ bf)–$47 ow) 8pm Swamp Thing Brass Monkey, Cronulla 8pm

JAZZ

Jive Bombers St Marys Band Club free 8.30pm

ACOUSTIC & FOLK Hanggai (China) The Basement, Circular Quay $35 (+ bf) 8pm

THURSDAY JANUARY 5 ROCK & POP

Bad Manners (UK) Metro Theatre, Sydney $50

The Blindfolds, The Cleanskins, Stewart Says Town Hall Hotel, Newtown free 9pm First Friday of 2012: Delorian Tide, Topnovil, Vale of Ah Annandale Hotel $10 7.30pm Hawksley Workman (Canada), 49 Goodbyes, Leroy Lee Notes Live, Enmore 8pm Illy Tathra Hotel, Tathra Jim Ward (USA), The Smith Street Band Sandringham Hotel, Newtown $22 (+ bf) 8pm Joe Robinson The Vault, Windsor $23.50 (+ bf)–$49 (dinner & show) 7pm The Jolly Boys Sydney Festival @ Joan Sutherland Performing Arts Centre, Penrith $45 (conc)– $49 8pm The Kooks (UK) Hordern Pavilion, Moore Park $78.40 (+ bf) 8pm Professor Groove & the Booty Affair Blue Beat Bar & Grill, Double Bay $10 10pm Steve Flack’s Guitar Heroes Brass Monkey, Cronulla 8pm Under Colours, Numbers Station, Steve Smyth Upstairs Beresford, Surry Hills 8pm The Vanguard’s One Man Band Festival: Lewis Floyd Henry (UK), The Dad Horse Experience (GER), Made For Chickens

By Robots, Kirk Special, Blackbear The Vanguard, Newtown $16 (+ bf) 8pm

ACOUSTIC & FOLK

David Myles (CAN), Ashliegh Mannix, Alannah Cherole The Basement, Circular Quay $15 (+ bf) 7.30pm

Holly Throsby NICHE PRODUCTIONS PRESENTS

SATURDAY JANUARY 7 ROCK & POP

1st Blues Platoon Town & Country Hotel, St Peters free 8pm At The Hop Club Merrylands free 7pm Camille & Stuie French Brass Monkey, Cronulla 8pm The Dresden Dolls (USA), The Bedroom Philosopher Enmore Theatre $63.80 7pm The Hondas (Japan) Spectrum, Darlinghurst 8pm Illy North Nowra Tavern, North Nowra Joe Robinson The Basement, Circular Quay $20 (+ bf) 7.30pm Kevin Borich, B-Massive, Harry Brus Annandale Hotel $20 (+ bf) 8pm Professor Groove & The Booty Affair Blue Beat Bar & Grill, Double Bay $10 10pm Sleepwalks Black Wire, Annandale $10 7pm Sydney Festival First Night: Holly Throsby, Norman Jay (UK), Monsieur Camembert, The Jolly Boys, Sirens Big Band, Lewis Floyd Henry Sydney CBD free 3pm

ACOUSTIC & FOLK Steve Smyth, Sativa Sun Landsdowne Hotel, Darlington free 8pm

SUNDAY JANUARY 8 ROCK & POP

Barefoot Divas, Barefoot Divas Sydney Festival @ CarriageWorks, Eveleigh $30 3pm David Myles, Ashleigh Mannix The Vault, Windsor 8pm Elvis’ 77th Birthday Bash: Miss Pia Andersen & Her Lonesome Playboys, Mikelangelo, Frank Bennett, Christian Power, Wes Pudsey, Ezra Lee, Robert Taylor, Drew Fairley The Vanguard, Newtown $25 (+ bf)–$60 (with dinner) 8pm The Jolly Boys Sydney Festival @ The Famous Spiegeltent, Hyde Park North, Sydney $43 5pm Mountain Mocha Kilimanjaro (Japan), Electric Empire Sydney Festival @ Keystone Festival Bar, Sydney $32 8pm Sunday Session: The Raids, Big Bozza Band Annandale Hotel $10 3pm

AN EVENING OF DISCO/HOUSE, DUBSTEP, HIP HOP, LEF TFIELD ELECTRONICA & FUTURE SOUL

GREY GHOST 23 DEC ALL LIVE EVERY FRIDAY NIGHT 8PM TIL MIDNIGHT

presents

NANTES + WINTER PEOPLE

JAZZ

The Peter Head Trio Harbour View Hotel, The Rocks free 4pm BRAG :: 443 :: 19:12:11 :: 53

54 :: BRAG :: 443 :: 19:12:11

BRAG’s guide to dance, hip hop and club culture inside

brag beats

xmas / nye 2012 club guide

our picks for the festive season

pet shop boys

Pet Shop Boys photo by Alasdair McLellan

go (inner) west for Sydney Resolution

+ metronomy • wynter gorden • the revenge • yacht club djs BRAG :: 443 :: 19:12:11 :: 55

dance music news

free stuff

club, dance and hip hop in brief... with Chris Honnery

FREESTUFF@THEBRAG.COM

five things WITH

LTJ Bukem

CARLOS ZARATE [THUG RECORDS] ‘80s – early ‘90s dance traxxx. I also love simple, emotive pop music from any period in the last 30 years.

Your Crew I run Thug Records with Tim Culbert.

3.

We’re a vinyl-only label. We press our records in the US and distribute from there. Still need to work to pay the bills; it’s a labour of love and has been for ten years, but I have a direction. Watch this space.

The Music You Make We are working with acts like Tevo Howard 4.

(Chicago), Simoncino (Italy), Jeff Samuel (Cleveland), and we just dropped an EP from Jimmy Edgar (Detroit) & Suspect (Berlin).

Music, Right Here, Right Now I’m surrounded by a strong crew in 5.

Sydney, and we’re always pushing each other

Growing Up I grew up in Millers Point in a housing 1. commission suburb in the inner city during

pick up an instrument again until I was in my 20s. I’ve been spinning music at parties since I was 15.

the early 1980s. I was learning violin until year four, and then I got kicked out of school.

Unfortunately the new school I went to didn’t have music as a compulsory class, so I didn’t

Inspirations Life, relationships, nature. Musically, early 2.

‘90s hip hop, east coast in particular, and late

OSUNLADE AT CIVIC Kid Cudi

Soulful house proponent Osunlade, the man behind the Yoruba label, will perform a set at the Civic Underground this Friday December 23. An eccentric American expatriate now living in Greece, earlier this year he released what he claimed would be his final house LP, Pyrography, which he says was created with the objective of doing “something more electronic as well as [to] include more ‘songs’… organic meets technology.” So it’s hardly surprising that Innervisions kingpins Âme and Dixon remixed cuts from the record – although Osunlade’s recent collaboration with hipster house poster boys Art Department and Soul Clap on the Crosstown Rebels release ‘We Call Love’ is a bit more of a curveball. As for Osunlade’s eccentricity, the man is a devotee of the African tradition known as Ifá, and can often be seen with a long piece of bone jewellery through his nose – and he’s reported to have produced music for Sesame Street when he was first starting out. Needless to say he’s come a very long way since then. Presale $25 tickets can be procured from houseyoursoul.com

and supporting each other which is good.

Keeps it real. There’s been lots of great stuff happening recently, too – The Thug Nights raves are increasingly blowing my mind, the new Spice Cellar is a welcome addition, Bare Essentials is home away from home and there have been a plethora of great warehouse gigs.

With: Matthew Dekay [All Day I Dream, NL], Murat Kilic, Robbie Lowe, Dean Relf, Steven Sullivan & Christian Verlaan Where: The Spice Cellar When: Saturday December 24

Scali, Sam Roberts and Dean Relf will be on support duties.

BRAXE PISSED OFF

How’s this for a bit of Christmas smut?

French house mainstay Alan Braxe, the man responsible for the mega anthem ‘Intro’ with Fred Falke along with remixes of Röyksopp and Goldfrapp among others, was apparently kicked out of the DNA Lounge club in San Francisco last week for urinating during his headline set.

In a post made on DNA Lounge’s website, the club stated that it “turns out that our headlining

CHINESE LAUNDRY NYE

Some people will tell you that there’s no point going out and partying on NYE. Those people should probably be removed from your Facebook immediately. Or maybe don’t delete them, because how else would they know that you’re going to be spending your New Year’s Eve getting crunk with DnB legend LTJ Bukem and electro maestro Mightyfools at Chinese Laundry, who are spreading the love over five different dancing arenas? If this sounds like your kinda party, BRAG’s got some double passes to whoever can tell us the most outrageous story from a past NYE outing…

DJ last night, Alan Braxe, has a bladder control problem. That’s the generous explanation for why he decided, in the middle of his DJ set, to turn around and piss on our back-wall curtain instead of using the restroom which is twenty feet away. After his set, when we had tossed him out, he was aghast that we chose not to let him back in. We said that we’d be happy to let him in if he paid us what it was going to cost to have the curtain cleaned. He declined.” It’s not the first time Braxe has been involved in a debacle in the DJ booth – in 2008, he came to blows with ghetto-house legend DJ Assault on stage.

Darren Emerson

FLYING LOTUS + MARTYN

HEATWAVE FESTIVAL FT KID CUDI

A new national hip hop festival, Heatwave, rolls into town on January 18 and 19 at The Enmore Theatre.

Headlining the event will be US rapper Kid Cudi, who is known for the hit tracks ‘Pursuit of Happiness’ with MGMT, ‘Erase Me’ with Kanye West as well as his own ‘Day n’ Nite’, and will perform on both the Wednesday and the Thursday. Detroit impresarios D12 and Obie Trice will be taking to the stage on Wednesday with Tech N9ne, who has collaborated with the likes of Snoop Dogg and featured on Lil Wayne’s multi-platinum Carter 3 LP. Thursday’s program features CrazyTown, known for the smash single ‘Butterfly’ from 2001, and Grammy Award winner Chamillionaire on his first tour of Australia. For all ticketing information and further details, head to their website: www.heatwavefestival.com

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On the first Friday of next year, Niche Productions will host a triple bill at The Metro Theatre featuring Warp Records’ Flying Lotus and Africa Hitech alongside 3024/ Brainfeeder’s Martyn. Flying Lotus was behind what was widely regarded as one of the best albums of 2010 in Cosmogramma, which featured a guest spot from Radiohead’s Thom Yorke and continued the Lotus–Radiohead relationship, following an earlier Flying Lotus remix of Radiohead’s ‘Reckoner’. Furthermore, Cosmogramma received the rarest of all beasts, a 5/5 review in this very publication… Martyn, meanwhile, has just released his second album Ghost People on Flying Lotus’ Brainfeeder imprint, while Africa Hitech are the well-known duo of Mark Pritchard and Steve Spacek, who released their debut album 93 Million Miles earlier in the year. Tickets are available through metrotheatre.com.au

SPICE CELLAR FT SCHWA

After living in his Czech Republic home for the past year, Michal Ruzicka aka Schwa is coming back to Sydney for the Summer, and will perform at the Spice Cellar on Saturday January 7. Schwa has been performing around Europe and working with Shades of Gray production partner Nick West on the pair’s debut album, Soul Machine, which was released earlier this month on Beef Records. The album features eleven previously unreleased tracks from the duo, along with eleven remixes of those tracks on a second disc by the likes of The Timewriter, Lexy (of Lexy & K-Paul) and Jef K with Gwen Maze.

Entry to Schwa’s Spice homecoming is free with guestlist before midnight, with the cover charge rising to $20 thereafter. Murat Kilic, YokoO, Nic

CHINESE LAUNDRY JANUARY PROGRAM

Chinese Laundry has unveiled its program for the first month of 2012. On Saturday January 7, the venue will be hosting a bass music garden party in the afternoon comprising international drawcards Noisia, Borgore, Danny Byrd, Netsky and Skism.

That same night, former Underworld member Darren Emerson – who subsequently founded Underwater Records – will be throwing down for a four-hour set. The following weekend, the USA’s 12th Planet will represent on Friday night before Tommy Trash headlines on the Saturday. Fast forward one week to Saturday January 21 and veteran UK duo Plump DJs have headline honours prior to another afternoon garden party on Saturday January 28, featuring Californian dubstep producer Lorin Ashton, aka Bassnectar, and UK robostep producers Bare Noize. Rounding out the night Mad Decent’s Kito will be peddling tunes till the wee hours of Sunday. As with all non-garden party Laundry events, the usual advice to arrive before 10pm applies – and cheaper presale tickets are available online now.

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dance music news

free stuff

club, dance and hip hop in brief... with Chris Honnery

FREESTUFF@THEBRAG.COM

he said she said WITH

ZOË BADWI

M

um says I sang before I spoke. When I was little, Dolly Parton was big in my house – her and Motown. Music was always playing, and that’s a great way to grow up.

At the moment, I am in love with an Australian band called Electric Empire. They are so talented; their music takes me away. You can feel every emotion drip out of every note!

I have worked at some horrid jobs. Who hasn’t?

I remember working as a checkout chick, but the worst was when I thought I would give Brazilian waxing a go for extra cash on the side. That job is not for me...

SPICE AFLOAT NYD

So you plan for days or even weeks to have the GREATEST NIGHT EVER, and then midnight rolls around and rolls away and normally you wouldn’t even be sleepy by now but there’s just nothing to look forward to any more… Fix that feeling by lining yourself up for a sunrise cruise on New Year’s Day. Rock up to the pier across from Star City Casino Wharf at 3.30am, hop on a boat, and sing ‘I’m On A Boat’ for a few hours – or instead, party to The Revenge, Motor City Drum Ensemble, Murat Kilic, Carlos Zarate, YokoO, Nic Scali and Sam Roberts, while the sun comes up on 2012…

If the Spice Afloat Sunrise Cruise sounds like it might float your boat, tell us the best thing you’ve ever done on, near or around a boat – and we might just have one of two double passes sailing your way.

Motor City Drum Ensemble

I love playing live – I cant wipe the smile off my face when I’m on stage. At the moment I have put a little show together with some of my songs and a few surprises. My album Zoë is out at the moment, and it’s going well. I’ve been signed in most countries around the world, so it’s very exciting!

I am loving the music scene at the moment.

Dance music has come so far. Now so many more people get to hear and enjoy it! I would say the best thing about my local scene is that everyone I work with is so supportive and talented. We all help each other out – plus we all love what we do!

With: Wynter Gordon, The Potbelleez, Yolanda Be Cool, Ajax, Beni, Cassian and more Where: Harbour Party NYE @ Luna Park When: New Year’s Eve, from 6.30pm

Hermitude

RONSON FMF CANCELLATION

Mark Ronson has been taken off the Future Music Festival bill due to a scheduling conflict.

“Unfortunately, scheduled engagements, which we had hoped to clear, and opportunities that Mark could not decline, needed to take priority over his performance at Future Music Festival in 2012,” Future Music’s official statement read.

“Future Entertainment however remains in close discussions with his management about another suitable time for him to return.” Given that New Order and Aphex Twin are still on the lineup, I can’t say I’m overly fussed; tickets to the festival, held on March 10 at Royal Randwick Racecourse, are on sale now.

VOID FT MARK N

A man dubbed as one of the most “underappreciated renegade figures in Australian

electronic music”, former DMC champion Mark N, will play a three-hour set for Void this Friday night at The Cellar at Broadway.

Born in Newcastle, Mark N has more notoriety overseas than locally, having toured extensively through North America and Europe, first with his now defunct trio Nasenbluten, and later solo as Overcast.

Having released on labels all over the world, including Industrial Strength, Mark N set up Bloody Fist Records as a result of his frustrations with putting music out on other people’s labels, and used his as a vehicle to only release music from the Newcastle region before shutting it down on its 10th anniversary. Expect the man to play an assortment of DnB and harder-edged dubstep, with support from Victim; entry is $10 on the door after 11pm.

Nervo

HERMITUDE HYPERPARADISE TOUR

One of the leading lights in the Aussie hip hop scene, Blue Mountains duo Hermitude will release their fourth album, HyperParadise, on Elefant Traks this February 3.

HyperParadise purportedly traverses future beats, electronica and of course hip hop soundscapes, and follows the success of lead single ‘Speak Of The Devil’, a collaboration with Sydney vocalist Chaos Emerald that garnered plenty of support from triple j and FBi. Hermitude will be embarking on a national tour with labelmates and triple j ‘Next Crop’ artists Sietta in support of the album, and will perform a Sydney show at the Oxford Art Factory on Friday March 16. Tickets are available through hermitude.oztix.com.au

WORDLIFE DEBUT EP AND SHOWS

Two of Sydney’s most eminent local DJs, Kato and Adam Bozzetto, have spent significant chunks of the past year bunkered down in a studio producing futuristic bass music with the reported mission of bringing “more sex to the raves of Australia and the world”. The fruits of these endeavours have been recorded on the resulting debut EP the pair recently dropped under the alias Wordlife, Birth, Punk, Rap, House, Life, which has just been released on Sydney’s infamous Bang Gang 12 Inches label with remixes from The Bumblebeez, Teki Latex and Anna Lunoe. You can catch Wordlife performing a live set at the Manning Bar in support of the Warp Records double bill of Hudson Mohawke and Rustie on Saturday February 25, for which tickets can be procured via manningbar.com.au

UNDERWORLD TO SCORE OLYMPIC GAMES

The veteran UK dance act of Rick Smith and Karl Hyde, collectively known as Underworld, will add their signature sound to the opening ceremony of the 2012 London Olympic Games on July 27. The UK duo has been appointed by ceremony director Danny Boyle, whose films 58 :: BRAG :: 443 :: 19:12:11

are renowned for quality soundtracks (see Trainspotting, The Beach et al), to score the opening of the world’s biggest sports event.

After being chosen out of over 10,000 other people who applied for the honour, Underworld announced the news on the BBC last week: “It’s a great honour to be asked to do this and one we’re taking very seriously. It’s certainly not something we’ll get the chance to do again.”

According to Boyle, the appointment is “the final piece of the jigsaw”. According to Honnery, it’s a colossal step forward for the Olympics, following Tiësto’s involvement with the Athens event…

RED ROOM NYE FT DJ EKO

DJ Eko is headlining a NYE bash at Red Room, Hotel Chambers, with support from Red Room Resident DJs Pacheco, K-Note and Naiki, with MC Mike Champion hosting the evening. Over the course of his DJ career, the precocious Eko has played alongside the likes of DJ Craze and supported Naughty By Nature, the Pharcyde, A-Trak and Cypress Hill. Eko is also a former winner of the NSW DMC title and a runner-up in the Australian Championship, and has now been signed to Unda K9 (under dog) as a recording artist, as well as being Figg Kidd’s official DJ. $50 tickets must be purchased online in advance, with the event limited to 250-person capacity.

DANCE CLUB BOXING DAY

The Ivy will be hosting two big events this Boxing Day. Dance Club will take over the opulent confines of Ivy Pool for a Boxing Day fiesta featuring UK duo The Shapeshifters and Italy’s Mowgli, the man behind Dead Fish Records. While The Shapeshifters will forever be associated with the anthemic, Johnnie Taylor-sampling ‘Lola’s Theme’, they’ve released several other successful singles on the Defected imprint, as well as overseeing their own record label, Nocturnal Groove. As for attempting to match the success of their biggest track, fuggedaboudit: “You can drive yourself mad with that shit. Just put down what comes naturally and let the world decide its fate,” The Shapeshifters have said. Meanwhile in a separate party in the Courtyard area, the likes of Nervo, Art vs. Science, Trumpdisco, Peking Duck, Glovecats and Nukewood will be performing. For anyone who is not yet aware of them, Nervo are songwriting/modeling twins whose recent single, ‘We’re All No One’, peaked at #8 on the ARIA club charts. Tickets to both events can be purchased through courtyardparty.com

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Pet Shop Boys Left To Their Own Devices By Chris Honnery

N

eil Tennant requires only a slight pause when I ask if he has any regrets from his many years working with Chris Lowe as Pet Shop Boys. “No,” he says with a chuckle.

“No, I can’t think of even a minor regret.” Since their single ‘West End Girls’ hit the top of the charts over 25 years ago – at the time, Tennant compared reaching #1 to “having a cup of tea” – the ‘Boys have carved out their own distinct niche at the forefront of the pop milieu, marrying Che Guevara and Debussy to a disco beat, releasing ten studio albums and a host of chart-topping singles, and collaborating with everyone from Dusty Springfield to Johnny Marr along the way.

But unlike the legions of other bands that have experienced more ephemeral dalliances with pop stardom since the mid-’80s, Pet Shop Boys’ oeuvre has been characterised by an ability to remain ahead of musical trends and develop their sound. “As we go on, we learn more and more about music,” Tennant says. “If you compare the records, I think there’s a consistency of quality, but in fact I think the musical style has changed.”

Listening back to early Pet Shop Boys cuts such as ‘Violence’, ‘Rent’, ‘It’s A Sin’ and of course ‘West End Girls’ – which Madonna

admitted she “paid homage to” on her 2006 single ‘Jump’ – the music of the Pet Shop Boys demonstrates a salience that withstands the rigours of time and technology. “It’s surprising how something can sound dated after five or six years, but after twenty years it ceases to sound dated in a way if you still like it – and it has a new relevance at that point,” the articulate Tennant offers. “I think that for some of our records from the ‘80s that’s happened now, whereas in the nineties you might’ve thought they sounded a bit dated. 25 years later I think they sound quite fresh, actually.”

In recent years, the ‘Boys have demonstrated a readiness to venture far beyond the confines of the pop template that they’ve refined to an art form, with projects like their soundtrack to the 1925 silent Russian film Battleship Potemkin (which Tennant reveals has been on the verge of coming to Sydney Harbour outside of the Opera House on three separate occasions), and their ballet score for The Most Incredible Thing, an adaptation of Hans Christian Andersen’s eponymous fable. “We’re always looking to do something that feels really special and thrills you, and that’s what keeps us going,” Tennant elucidates. “It’s a very interesting process to come into a completely different world, a world of classical ballet and contemporary music. I think we will do another ballet because it’s a very fascinating world.”

“It’s surprising how something can sound dated after five or six years, but after twenty years it ceases to.”

Such projects are vastly removed from the early output of Tennant and Lowe, who were originally touted as a ‘singles band’. Though the label does not account for the quality of many of the lesserknown Pet Shop Boys album tracks, ardent fans will tell you that the band released some of their best material as b-sides throughout their career, collated on the compilation Alternative and its forthcoming sequel Format, which collects Pet Shop Boys b-sides from 1996 to 2009. “We called it Format because when you release a single, you have what the record company calls ‘format’,” Tennant explains, discussing the shift from releasing 7-inch vinyl singles to the iTunes singles packages of the present day. “These formats enable you to use the songs you write that you’re not going to put on the album,” he continues.

“When you’re doing something as a b-side, you don’t have any sense of constraint whatsoever; nobody’s going to say, ‘They’re not going to play that on the radio’ because they’re not meant to be played on the radio... Sometimes [b-sides] are more eccentric songs, and sometimes they’re more dark or macabre kind of songs. They’re the songs that aren’t really meant to be mainstream Pet Shop Boys.” It is on these more esoteric tracks that one can glimpse a different side of the Pet Shop Boys, a side Tennant exhibited in an essay that was published in Details in 1992, in which he declared, “I hate positivity. The problem with positivity is that it’s an attitude that’s decidedly about lying back, getting screwed, and accepting it… sometimes you can only define yourself by what you hate”.

Of the 38 b-sides on Format, Tennant nominates ‘I Didn’t Get Where I Am Today’ – which features Johnny Marr of The Smiths and Electronic on guitar – as one that he wishes had not been culled from the final album. “It was originally on the album Release, and I personally thought it was the most commercial track on the album,” he recalls. “Then we decided that it would be jarring the mood of the album to have this up-tempo, ‘60s-sounding song on it, but actually I think that was a mistake, we should have left it on.”

Tennant’s last remark almost sounds like the most minor of regrets, a fitting segue to return to the moment in our conversation that we first came in on: whether there is anything that one of the true pioneers of pop music wishes he had done differently during his career with Lowe as the Pet Shop Boys. “I know I have a minor regret. The running order of [1996 album] Bilingual I don’t think is right. But I don’t have many regrets in my musical life. I remember in the 1970s I worked for Marvel comics and I did a little series of interviews with pop stars who liked Marvel Comics because I was so pop obsessed. I interviewed Marc Bolan of T-Rex and he gave me a copy of his new album, Futuristic Dragon, and I was too cool to ask him to sign it. I’ve always regretted that.”

With: Jamiroquai, Culture Club, Pseudo Echo, Guy Sebastian and more Where: Sydney Resolution @ Glebe Island When: Saturday December 31 from 4pm, licensed; tickets on sale now 60 :: BRAG :: 443 :: 19:12:11

Hermitude Tour WITH SPECIAL GUESTS

201 2

Friday 16th March

Oxford Art Factory Tickets on sale now from hermitude.oztix.com.au / Oztix outlets / 1300 762 545 and Moshtix outlets, www.moshtix.com.au or 1300 438 849

HyperParadise out February 3 on Elefant Traks / Inertia – featuring the single Speak of the Devil – winner of the j Award for Best Video www.elefanttraks.com /

www.hermitude.com / www.sietta.com

ELEFANT TRAKS & NEW WORLD ARTISTS present

plus

SPECIAL GUESTS

Friday 30 March

MANNING BAR A Thousand Lives Tour 2012

Saturday 31 March CAMBRIDGE HOTEL Newcastle Future Shade out now on Elefant Traks / Inertia iTunes Best Australian Hiphop Album 2011

TICKETS ON SALE NOW theherd.oztix.com.au and OZTIX 1300 762 545 BRAG :: 443 :: 19:12:11 :: 61

The Revenge One Night In The Borough By Tyson Wray No stranger to our shores, later this month will mark Clark’s third Australian visit in as many years. Before his maiden voyage in 2009, Clark held erroneous trepidation about our country, fearing Australia would prove to be something of a “black hole” for his stylised music. “There were so many things that just, well, kind of surprised me,” he laughs through a thick Scottish accent.

“But in a way it was just reassurance, to see that there were people on the other side of the world that were into the same records… I think the culture is different, too – you guys are a bit more laid back. Over here the weather isn’t great, the clubs are dark and we’re kind of in our own little world. But you’ve got this great vegetable sort of culture over there, especially in summer time, which is pretty unique.”

G

raeme Clark has been delving deep within the depths of dusty disco dubs and forgotten funk to create his own brand of skewed hypnotic house since his early teenage years. After relocating to the burgeoning Glasgow scene in 2002, his work has been supported by pioneering labels like DFA, Buzzin’ Fly, MCDE, Dessous and

Delusions Of Grandeur, who’ve released the productions of his various projects, including OOFT Music, Cronk Family Enterprises, 6th Borough Project, and of course, The Revenge.

Revered globally for his revitalising remixes, eclectic edits and original productions, ‘prolific’ would be a daft understatement for his fifteen years of output.

Returning to Sydney for a series of performances both as The Revenge and with 6th Borough Project partner Craig Smith, Clark’s fundamental approach behind the decks remains in-themoment. “I think it’s always just planned in [terms of] being prepared but not, you know?” he offers.

“You can’t really plan any show. I mean, you kind of just have to leave it all up to the moment. You need to see what you’re feeling, and what the crowd is feeling.” But it also depends on if he’s playing with someone else, or going it alone. “It’s always exciting to DJ with somebody else. You can get a vibe off what they’re doing, you can go out the back and get some perspective on the

dancefloor, you know? But when you’re DJing by yourself, it’s just you controlling the groove and the direction of the sound. They’ve both got lots of ups and downs, I guess, but it’s always exciting.”

In a definitive six stop tour that will see Clark welcome in 2012 with four shows within 48 hours, he promises the rest of the year will not be reminiscent of its frantic beginnings. “We’re working on the second 6th Borough Project album at the moment, which will be out at the end of 2012. I’ll also be trying to prepare some live stuff and working on some new Revenge material,” he tells me. “I haven’t done that much original material for what seems like a long time, so I’ve just been working on some of those things, and hopefully can get some out next year.

It’ll be exciting, and I’m actually really looking forward to it – maybe more than I have any other year. There is a lot of new music that I haven’t gotten to trying out yet,” he says, “so yeah, I’m really excited.”

Who: The Revenge, Motor City Drum Ensemble, Murat Kilic, Carlos Zarate, YokoO and more Where: Spice Afloat NYD at Star City Casino Wharf When: Sunday January 1, departing at 3.30am More: 6th Borough Project plays Mad Racket’s New Year’s Eve on Saturday December 31 @ Marrickville Bowling Club

Yacht Club DJs Those Party Guys By Rick Warner eah, I am the whitest, nerdiest man alive,” laughs Gareth Harrison aka Gaz, one half of the Yacht Club DJs. “I’m trying to cover it all up with tattoos but I’m failing.” He’s telling me how his studio work ethic is affecting his tan, not to mention his health. Long stints in a darkened room, stooped over keyboards and laptops, has rendered him incapacitated on occasion, wincing at the sunlight after sweating over a two-minute piece of music which, more than likely, he’ll just throw away. “I’ve given myself repetition sickness a number of times … sitting in a studio for six hours, and then coming out shaking.”

“Y

mix releases, Kleptomania and Demons of Gymnastics, take the boys’ punk and garage rock influences and slaps them together in a pastiche of hip hop, electro-pop and Disney soundtracks. With a myriad of samples pasted together, it’s a trainspotter’s wet dream – just don’t ask either of the guys to help out with the track IDs. “When our mixtapes come out, I get really excited with people trying to go through and pick out everything we’ve done. A lot of the time, because Guy [Chappell-Lawrence, the other half of the duo] and I work independently, neither of us will know everything that’s in the mixtape or in the DJ set. It’s ridiculous.”

This studio dedication and technical intricacy saw them incorporate around 2000 samples into their last mixtape, however this side of the Yacht Club DJs is sometimes ignored, overshadowed by their wild stage show and drunken antics. But it’s this stage show that has been just as responsible for their rise to stardom as their music, and has seen them become mainstays on the Australian music festival scene. Having played Splendour In The Grass, Big Day Out, Southbound, Field Day and Parklife amongst others, I asked Gaz why Yacht Club DJs fit so well to festival life? “I just think it’s the vibe we put out there. We’re sort of like those party guys who’ve never taken themselves too seriously and just want to have fun. Our music and stage performance reflects that, and that’s the sort of thing people want to see at a festival,” he explains. “When the [festival] bookers are like, ‘What’s something crazy that we can put on, that’ll get everyone loose?’, I think we tend to come to mind pretty easily.”

Gaz and Guy are booked to play alongside Bag Raiders and Architecture In Helsinki at Cargo Bar’s New Year’s Eve On The Harbour. Even though Gaz isn’t too enamoured with playing nightclubs – “It’s a bit hard when you’re jammed in a corner in a DJ box, especially with me running around with my shirt off, sculling vodka and doing all sorts of crazy shit” – he’s really looking forward to it. “We’ve caused ruckus at venues like that before,” he says of Cargo Bar, which is known more for its white-collar clientele than wild, trashy party nights. “We take them all as they come, and always try to think the best. I fully plan to do our regular show and jump off everything and hang from the roof and rock around in a boat if they give us one; basically just cause all the same ruckus. I hope the people that see us get really involved, because that’s always the best way.”

But cut through all of the on-stage hedonism and there’s a musicality there that pays homage not to contemporaries like Girl Talk, but more to mash-up pioneers like Z-Trip and 2 Many DJs. The Yacht Club DJs’ two

With: Architecture In Helsinki (live), Bag Raiders, Sampology, French Horn Rebellion, Alison Wonderland, Hey Now DJs, Pedestrian DJs, Starjumps, Sosueme DJs, Frames and more Where: New Year’s Eve On The Harbour @ Cargo Bar When: Saturday December 31, from 6pm

Wynter Gordon Pop Star By Default By Jeremy Williams

B

efore our interview takes place, American pop sensation Wynter Gordon has already been flung into a flurry of fifteen-minute meets with a parade of journalists. With ours scheduled for after her breakfast break, Gordon slumps down on the sofa clasping a mug of tea.

She is understandably tired, but in high spirits nonetheless. Her bubbly personality shines through the exhaustion, making her star quality immediately apparent. Gordon is one of those people who can casually capture your attention and hold it effortlessly.

Apologising for her constant sips of tea, she explains, “It’s slippery elm tea, for the throat. I’ve been having troubles, I have been taking pills. It’s not fun. I am not actually really worn out, I am not really tired. I’m just normal tired. I am in the thick of it all, so this is good for me. I will try to hang on as long as I can.”

Having first come to global attention as the singer who teased with ‘Dirty Talk’, it might be a surprise for those who know little about her to hear that Gordon has, in fact, been an established songwriter for just over half a decade. While she may only be 23 years old, she has written hit singles for everyone from Jennifer Lopez to Mary J. Blige. You may also have noted her high profile collaborations with some of music’s biggest names – notably Flo Rida, Freemasons and David Guetta. So, which came first? Was she always a singer trying to get her lucky break by allowing others to sing her songs? Or did she realise when hearing her songs on the radio that she could just as easily be doing it herself?

It’s a chicken-and-egg question that many might avoid answering, but not Gordon. “I wanted to be an entertainer my entire life, since I was like four years old, but I didn’t have the confidence yet,” she admits. “I knew that was what I wanted

62 :: BRAG :: 443 :: 19:12:11

to do, but getting up in front of people is really hard. So I was like, ‘Well you know what? I am still going to try and do it.’ But this all happened by default; I got into writing first because just by chance I got a song onto Mary J. Blige’s album.

So the label signed me after that, as they heard about this girl who writes. They all brought me up to their labels, and that’s how it happened. I am so glad it took this long for me to come out, as I have built up a confidence in myself now.”

With the credits in her debut album With The Music I Die listing her as Diana “Wynter” Gordon, she seems to be making a conscious effort to separate the shy girl sat next to me from her feisty, fearless on-stage persona. It’s an explanation that certainly makes sense – even Disney picked up on a similar trail when they created the monster that is Hannah Montana – but Gordon’s reasons for an alias are far more personal. “My mum named me after Diana Ross and I was just like, ‘I don’t want to be another Diana.’ I thought I was going to be pretty big back then, and I would say to Mum, ‘I am going to be as big as Diana!’ So I was like, I don’t want to have the same name as someone else who is so iconic.

“There was also Princess Diana, so I thought that name has been run to the ground. I chose something else,” she says. “Me and my management and my friends were just sat around tossing names – they were like, ‘Call yourself Supergirl!’ – but Wynter seemed like the best fit.”

What: With The Music I Die is out now With: The Potbelleez, Zoe Badwi, Ajax, Beni, Yolanda Be Cool, Cassian and more Where: Harbour Party NYE @ The Big Top, Luna Park When: Saturday December 31, from 6.30pm

Metronomy The Festive Spirit By Nicole Ryan

MATTHEW DEKAY CECILLE / ALL DAY I DREAM, NL

SAT 24 DEC

A

fter a year of playing festivals like Glastonbury, T in the Park and Reading, one would expect electro pop band Metronomy to be experts on the festival circuit. Not the case, says lead singer Joseph Mount: “When we did that show at Glastonbury, we were very far away from our comfort zone,” he tells me – and as for main stages, it’s even worse. “It’s very terrifying. But I guess if you do more, you get better at them.”

Despite Metronomy’s reputation for quirky live performances, often featuring dance routines and light shows in the form of chest-mounted push lights, the band tends to prefer more intimate shows. “We do feel more comfortable playing smaller stages or smaller venues for sure,” Mount says. “Sometimes festivals can be really enjoyable and sometimes they can be as stressful as hell, but they’re still good to do just to keep you on your toes.” I suggest that festivals are perhaps like a first date where you have to try and win your companion over, while sideshows are more like the third or fourth when you know they’re already keen. “Exactly!” he agrees.

“Hopefully at the festivals they’re interested, but it’s more of a quest.”

Visiting our shores for the fourth time in three years, the quartet has developed a special relationship with Australia. “There’s definitely a really nice connection,” Mount says. Coming for the first time as a threepiece back in 2009, he says they had no idea what to expect – “and we just ended up having this ridiculously enjoyable time.”

The extensive touring the band have undertaken to promote their new album, Mercury-Prize nominated The English Riviera, has made them nonchalant about travel. “We’ve reached the point where for us, a ten hour flight seems kind of normal.” And despite a hectic Australian schedule, which sees the now four-piece play four huge festivals in four different states over four days (and then sideshows), Mount hopes to be able to add to his fond memories of our country. It will be the first time he has spent New Year’s Eve outside of England, and he’s going to do his best to join in the festivities. “It’s only right that we should be hungover too.”

Considering that the last time they were in Australia The English Riviera hadn’t been released, Mount and bandmates Oscar Cash, Anna Prior and Gbenga Adelekan are looking forward to hearing fans singing along. “The nice thing is that last time we were in Australia, we were playing a lot of the newer songs for the very first time – we used you as guinea pigs. It’s the first time we’ll be playing new stuff and people will actually know the songs.”

Mount says that as the band has toured, they’ve noticed the way that tracks resonate differently with different audiences. “We’d been playing ‘The Bay’ all summer, but the first place we played it and people went crazy was Barcelona, which is by the sea and sunny. Whereas those colder English places go for ‘The Look’ more.” He has been surprised by the way that the new songs have transformed when played live – especially ‘The Look’. “When you’re singing it in smaller parts of rural England,

“Sometimes festivals can be really enjoyable and sometimes they can be stressful as hell, but they’re still good to do just to keep you on your toes...”

NYD NIGHT

2012 22H TILL LATE

it has this weird significance that it doesn’t necessarily have on the record.”

While earlier records Pip Payne (Pay The £5000 You Owe) and Nights Out were filled with dancefloor-friendly singles, The English Riviera is much more focused on creating an atmosphere – so it was always going to be interesting to see how that translated live. “With records, you can sit down and get lost in them,” Mount observes. “When you’re watching a band playing live, you can never quite have that one-on-one connection.” But instead of trying to replicate the sound of the album, Metronomy have committed to creating a unique experience on stage. “When it comes to doing a live show, we always try and make it into something that is entertaining, something that is memorable for different reasons.”

The English Riviera is the first album Metronomy has released since adding the fourth member, but Mount, who writes and produces all the tracks, has remained faithful to the style which brought him success as a solo project. “I’m still writing the way I did when I first started, and I hope that’s why the music is like it is and that’s why people like it. I wouldn’t ever really want to change it for the sake of it… [But] now that there’s four of us, it’s a really nice opportunity to try and write in a different way.”

SCHWA BEEF | CZ

SAT 7 JAN

Mount clearly takes the opinions of his fans seriously. “I’m really happy that we’re in this really lucky position, that people are beginning to trust us a bit more,” he explains.

The frontman confides that as a teenager his goal was to be in a band and travel, and now that he’s doing just that, his goal is just not to lose those fans, and to keep people interested. “There’s nothing crazy [planned],” he says of the band’s future. “Nothing like playing stadiums or anything like that. I think that would probably scare the crap out of me.”

What: The English Riviera is out now through Warner Music With: Justice (live), Example & DJ Wire, Calvin Harris, Crystal Castles, Moby (DJ set), Gotye, Spank Rock, Tiga, Yuksek, Flight Facilities, Totally Enormous Extinct Dinosaurs, Skream & Benga ft. MC Youngman and loads more When: Field Day @ The Domain, New Year’s Day from midday More: Thursday January 5 @ Manning Bar, Sydney University

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BRAG :: 443 :: 19:12:11 :: 63

SUMMER HOLIDAY CLUB GUIDE send your listings to : clubguide@thebrag.com

MONDAY DECEMBER 19 The Lansdowne Hotel, Chippendale Monday Jam Danny G Felix, Djay Kohinga free 9pm Slide Bar, Darlinghurst Monday Night Live Christmas Spectacular 7pm The World Bar, Kings Cross Jazz DJs free 7pm

TUESDAY DECEMBER 20 Establishment, Sydney Rumba Motel DJ Willie Sabor free Scruffy Murphy’s, Sydney Frat House free Scubar, Sydney Backpacker Karaoke 8pm Trademark Hotel, Kings Cross Coyote Tuesdays DJs free 9pm The World Bar, Kings Cross Tuesdays The Postman (UK), Urby free 8pm

WEDNESDAY DECEMBER 21 The Basement, Circular Quay David Raleigh, Bobby Fox, Trevor Ashley, Sally Cameron, Margi de Ferranti, Nathan Leigh Jones $25 (+ bf) 9.30pm Beach Palace Hotel, Coogee Palace Uni Night DJs free 9pm Cargo Lounge, Sydney Menage a Trois 5pm Kong’s Jungle Lounge, Bondi Junction Voodoo DJs free 9pm The Lansdowne Hotel, Chippendale Frat House Friend DJ free 8pm Scubar, Sydney Schoonerversity 3pm Shelbourne Hotel, Sydney Sincopa free 7pm Luna Park Big Top, Milsons Point ID Under 18s Xmas White Party Wasted Penguinz, Stafford Brothers, Timmy Trumpet, Tenzin, Zannon, Skinny, MC Anthony, Ravine, Pulsar, Suae $29.30-$75.40 6pm The World Bar, Kings Cross The Wall Subaske, Glovecats, McAllister, Adrian Gidaro, T-Bo, D-Funk $5 9pm

THURSDAY DECEMBER 22 The Basement, Circular Quay Gospel Love Darryl Beaton, D1 Cartel, Buddy Siolo, Martinez Brothers $25 (+ bf) 9pm Cargo Lounge King St Wharf Thursdays I’m in Love DJs free 5pm GoodGod Front Bar, Sydney Rhythm & Booze Eric Shortbread, DJ Hey Man free 8pm

GoodGod Small Club, Sydney Love Kings – The Xmas H.A.M. Edition Oyster Mag DJs, Paz & Rikki free 9pm Greenwood Hotel, North Sydney Tenzin, Cadell, Zannon, DJ K-Note free 8pm Hugo’s Lounge, Kings Cross Bad Apple DJs $5 8pm Ivy, Sydney Ivy Live DJs 5pm Kong’s Jungle Lounge Easy Lei Convaire DJs, Jen n Erik DJs free 9pm Low 302, Darlinghurst Thursday Switch DJs free 9pm Sapphire Lounge, Kings Cross Flaunt Dim Slm, Troy T, G Wizard, Mistah Cee, Mo Green, Soprano, DJ Rask, DJ Rocboi, MC Jayson 9pm The Sly Fox, Enmore Inhale Foreigndub DJs free 6pm Spectrum, Darlinghurst Hot Damn Hot Damn DJs 8pm The Standard, Surry Hills Pizza Parties DJs free 9pm Theloft, King St Wharf Thursdays at theloft Nad, Stu Turner, Mr Belvedere 9pm The World Bar, Kings Cross Propaganda Urby, Dan Bombings free-$5 8pm

FRIDAY DECEMBER 23 Annandale Hotel Big Village Xmas Party True Vibenation, Ellesquire, Tuka, Daily Meds Rapaport, Sketch The Rhyme, DJ Migz, Ruthless, High Tops Brass Band $10 (+ bf) 7pm Arthouse Hotel, Sydney RnB Superclub G-Wizard, Troy T, Lilo, Def Rok, Eko, MC Jayson $15 9.30pm Beach Road Hotel, Bondi Movement Grey Ghost free 8pm Candys Apartment, Kings Cross Button Down Disco All Stars Kyro & Bomber, @Busy2Kiss, MooWho, Nightmare, Fawkes, WhatIs?, Acid Mouth $10-$15 8pm The Cellar, Broadway Void Sound Mark N, Victim free-$10 9pm Chinese Laundry, Sydney Stanton Warriors (UK), The Mane Thing, Def Tones, J-Mac, J-Trick $20$25 10pm Civic Hotel Underground, Sydney House Your Soul Presents Osunlade, Kristelle Morin (UK), DJMR-X, George Kristopher, Mike Kon $25-$30 9pm Docks Hotel, Darling Harbour DJ Charlie free 6pm Eleven Nightclub, Paddington Studio presents Vicious DJ D, Jorgie Jay, Mista Kay, Jet Fuel $10-$20 9pm Goldfish, Kings Cross Musik Matters James What, Ross Evana, Tom Brereton, Matt Cahill, Amy Fairweather, Ryan Simpson 8pm GoodGod Front Bar, Sydney Yo Grito! King Opp, Daniel Darling, Silky Doyle free 9pm GoodGod Small Club, Sydney Player Haters Xmas Ball Joyride & The Accidents, Alphamama, DJ Levins, Shantan Wantan Ichiban, Joyride $10 10pm

Greenwood Hotel, North Sydney DJ Cadell free 5pm Home The Venue, Sydney Delicious & Sublime Fridays DJs 9pm Hugo’s Lounge, Kings Cross Rat Pack DJs 9pm Jackson’s On George, Sydney Ultimate Party Venue Resident DJs free Kit & Kaboodle, Kings Cross Falcona Fridays DJs $10 8pm Kong’s Jungle Lounge, Bondi Junction W!ldlive Fridays DJs $10 10pm The Marlborough Hotel – Level 1, Newtown Resident DJs free Nevada Lounge, Darlinghurst DJ Hayden free 6pm Oatley Hotel We Love Oatley Hotel Fridays DJ Tone free 8.30pm Omega Lounge, Sydney Unwind Fridays DJ Greg Summerfield free 5.30pm Ruby Rabbit, Darlinghurst Sub Conscious Records Christmas Party Sceptic & Dseeva, Dark Matter, The Henchmen, Kaye One, DJ Skae $10 8pm Sapphire Lounge, Kings Cross Club Onyx Sim Slm, Discokid, Lavida, Peeping Tom, DJ D, Tenkix $15 8pm Scruffy Murphy’s, Sydney Frisky Friday DJs free 6pm Shark Hotel, Sydney Pulse8 Jono free Shelbourne Hotel, Sydney Mixtape free 6pm Space, Sydney Zaia Savvy, Edo, D’Kutz, Em-Tee, Ming, Ace, Flipz, DJ Sefu, MC Suga Shane, Arbee, Suae, Pulsar, Askitz, Jinkang vs Tezzr vs Rhe3, MC D 9.45pm Spectrum, Darlinghurst Twist and Shout 60s Dance Party Mr Chad, Dylabolical $5 11pm The Vault Hotel, Sydney Merry Shrug-mas! Luke Porter, Robbie Lowe, Co-Op DJs, Jordan Deck, Chris Honnery, Trinity, Dave Stuart $15 9pm The Whitehouse Hotel, Petersham Dubstep Pressure $5 (early bird)–$10 9pm

SATURDAY DECEMBER 24 Candys Apartment, Kings Cross Candys Christmas Eve M.A.I.N. St, Boodie Monster, Brosman, Crysist, Diskoriot $15-$20 9pm Cargo Bar, King St Wharf The Institute of Music DJs free 9pm Cohibar, Darling Harbour DJ Jeddy Rowland, DJ Mike Silver free The Cool Room, Australian Hotel & Brewery, Rouse Hill DJ free 9pm Dee Why Hotel Kiss & Fly DJs 8.30pm Docks Hotel, Darling Harbour Cameo Resident DJs free 10pm Establishment, Sydney Sienna G-Wizard, Troy T, Def Rok, Eko, Lilo 9pm

Goldfish, Kings Cross HedKandi Christmas Eve Special The Italian Job, Phil Hudson, Johnny Gleeson, I Am Sam $20 5pm The Greengate Hotel, Killara Heaven & Earth Party Bang Gang DJs, John Glover, Nukewood, Cadell, Ben Morris & MC Losty, The Remedy, Ginger & Drum, Bart, Rated R, Mike Rukus, Kid Crookes free 2pm Home The Venue, Sydney Club Parada 18th Birthday Party Nrgize, Dane, Charger, Dani D, Bogo Royaal, Matt Ferreira, Tony Venuto, Flite 9pm Ivy, Sydney Pure Ivy DJs $20 9pm Jacksons On George, Sydney Ultimate Party Venue – Christmas Eve Edition Resident DJs free Kit & Kaboodle, Kings Cross Kitty Kitty Bang Bang Miss T, Gabby, Cassette, Alison Wonderland 8pm The Marlborough Hotel – Level 1, Newtown Resident DJs free Nevada Lounge, Darlinghurst DJ Hayden free 6pm Oatley Hotel Christmas Eve Bash DJ Tone free 8pm Sapphire Lounge, Kings Cross The Suite Troy T, Joey Kaz, Charlie Brown, Disco Kid, Dim Slm, Jo Funk, Steve S 8pm Shark Hotel, Sydney Pulse8 Jono free The Spice Cellar, Sydney Matthew Dekay (NL), Robbie Lowe, Dean Relf, Steven Sullivan & Christian Verlaan $20 10pm Star Bar, Sydney Situation DJs free 10pm The Watershed Hotel, Darling Harbour Watershed Presents…. Skybar The World Bar, Kings Cross Christmas Creep Party The Postman (UK), Nacho, Creepy Santa, Propaganda DJs free 9pm

SUNDAY DECEMBER 25 Basement Level, 58 Elizabeth St, Sydney Spice Murat Kilic, Carlos Zarate $20 4am Bondi Pavillion Sunburnt Christmas Timmy Trumpet, Bombs Away, Helena, Johnny B, Felipe Cintra $49-$69 (+ bf) 12pm

MONDAY DECEMBER 26 The Basement, Circular Quay The Basement Goes Greek! Maria Stavropolous, Krazy Kon $25 (+ bf) 7.30pm Bella Vista – Man O War Steps, Opera House Jetty High Flyers Boxing Day Boat Party – Funkdafied Top Deck D*Funk, JC $55$75 (+ bf) 6pm

Art vs Science Coogee Bay Hotel Space Mykonos Official World Tour 2011 John Grammatis (USA), DJ Tom Hyper, York, Dimitri Velen, Nick T, Freeagents $15 (+ bf) 8pm Home The Venue, Sydney Halikarnas MC Sedat, Coskun, Ceyhun, DJ Ahmet Polat, DJ Cem & Gurbz, DJ Yusuf & DJ Seroz $30 (+ bf) 8pm Ivy, Sydney Courtyard Boxing Day Party!

Nervo (UK), Art vs Science, The Shapeshifters (UK), Mowgli, Trumpdisco, Glove Cats, Peking Duck, Ember, Nukewood, Will Reckless, Doctor Werewolf, Rubio, Moonchild, Swiss Dub, Durty Mindz, Auto Claws, Jitter, Brown Bear, Tongue In Moo, Hyraulix, Subaske $45 (1st release)–$65 1pm The Lansdowne Hotel, Chippendale Monday Jam Danny G Felix, Djay Kohinga free 9pm The Mean Fiddler, Rouse Hill Sneaky Sound System, Nukewood, Ember, Ben Morris, MC Losty $25 (+ bf) 8pm Oatley Hotel Boxing Day Party DJ Tone free 7pm Soho, Potts Point Starfuckers Versus Usual Suspects Starfuckers, Ajax, Night Dimension, Ember, Narrator VS Ruslan, Trelz, La Dooda, Here’s Trouble, Rogers Room, DJ Oh Boy, Skinny $10-$15 9pm

TUESDAY DECEMBER 27 Establishment, Sydney Rumba Motel DJ Willie Sabor free 6pm Ivy, Sydney Sunburst Nu Fun Crew, Emoh Instead, Zannon, Pembroke DJs, DJ Wrecks, DJ Thieves $20 (+ bf) 4pm Scruffy Murphy’s, Sydney Frat House free The World Bar, Kings Cross Tuesdays DJs free 8pm

WEDNESDAY DECEMBER 28 Beach Palace Hotel, Coogee Palace Uni Night DJs free 9pm Cargo Lounge, Sydney Menage a Trois 5pm Kong’s Jungle Lounge, Bondi Junction Voodoo DJs free 9pm The Lansdowne Hotel, Chippendale Frat House Friend DJ free 8pm The Ranch Hotel, Eastwood Hump Wednesdays Troy T, G Wizard, Nukewood, Steve Frank, DJ Willie, Joey Kaz, DimSim, Motive, Steve Blitz, Louie Love, Mr Bongolicious 9pm Scubar, Sydney Schoonerversity 3pm Shelbourne Hotel, Sydney Sincopa free 7pm The World Bar, Kings Cross The Wall DJs 8pm Stanton Warriors 64 :: BRAG :: 433 :: 19:12:11

The Shapeshifters

club guide g

send your listings to : clubguide@thebrag.com

THURSDAY DECEMBER 29 Annandale Hotel Bring The Cool The Kumpnee, Empire Rising, Blue Candy, The Yello Canvas $8 (+ bf) 7.30pm Cargo Lounge King St Wharf Thursdays I’m in Love DJs free 5pm GoodGod Front Bar, Sydney Rhythm & Booze Eric Shortbread, DJ Hey Man free 8pm Greenwood Hotel, North Sydney Tenzin, Cadell, Zannon, DJ K-Note free 8pm Hugo’s Lounge, Kings Cross Bad Apple DJs $5 8pm Ivy, Sydney Ivy Live DJs 5pm Kong’s Jungle Lounge Easy Lei Convaire DJs, Jen n Erik DJs free 9pm Low 302, Darlinghurst Thursday Switch DJs free 9pm Sapphire Lounge, Kings Cross Flaunt Dim Slm, Troy T, G Wizard, Mistah Cee, Mo Green, Soprano, DJ Rask, DJ Rocboi, MC Jayson 9pm The Sly Fox, Enmore Inhale Foreigndub DJs free 6pm The Standard, Surry Hills Pizza Parties DJs free 9pm Theloft, King St Wharf Thursdays at theloft Nad, Stu Turner, Mr Belvedere 9pm The World Bar, Kings Cross Propaganda Conrad Greenleaf free (student)–$5 9pm

FRIDAY DECEMBER 30 Arthouse Hotel, Sydney RnB Superclub G-Wizard, Troy T, Lilo, Def Rok, Eko, MC Jayson $15 9.30pm Beach Road Hotel, Bondi Movement Telefonica free 8pm Docks Hotel, Darling Harbour DJ Charlie free 6pm GoodGod Front Bar, Sydney Yo Grito! King Opp, Daniel Darling, Silky Doyle free 9pm Greenwood Hotel, North Sydney DJ Cadell free 5pm Hugo’s Lounge, Kings Cross Rat Pack DJs 9pm Jackson’s On George, Sydney Ultimate Party Venue Resident DJs free Kit & Kaboodle, Kings Cross Falcona Fridays DJs $10 8pm Kong’s Jungle Lounge, Bondi Junction W!ldlive Fridays DJs $10 10pm The Marlborough Hotel – Level 1, Newtown Resident DJs free Nevada Lounge, Darlinghurst DJ Hayden free 6pm Oatley Hotel We Love Oatley Hotel Fridays DJ Tone free 8.30pm Omega Lounge, Sydney Unwind Fridays DJ Greg Summerfield free 5.30pm Oxford Art Factory, Darlinghurst Scratch Perverts feat. Tony Vegas & Prime Cuts (UK), Frenzie, Naiki, MK1, The Funk Inc Deejays $15 (+ bf) 8pm Sapphire Lounge, Kings Cross Club Onyx Sim Slm, Discokid, Lavida, Peeping Tom, DJ D, Tenkix $15 8pm Scruffy Murphy’s, Sydney Frisky Friday DJs free 6pm Shark Hotel, Sydney Pulse8 Jono free Shelbourne Hotel, Sydney Mixtape free 6pm Space, Sydney Zaia Savvy, Edo, D’Kutz, Em-Tee, Ming, Ace, Flipz, DJ Sefu, MC Suga Shane, Arbee, Suae, Pulsar, Askitz, Jinkang vs Tezzr vs Rhe3, MC D 9.45pm The World Bar, Kings Cross MUM MUM DJs $10-$15 8pm

NEW YEAR'S EVE 2011 SATURDAY DECEMBER 31 The Argyle, The Rocks New Year's Eve Sonny Fodera, Phil Hudson, Elly K, La Vida, Random Soul, Yogi and Husky $50-$60 7pm Bank Hotel, Newtown NYE Slynk 9pm Bondi Park, Bondi Beach Shore Thing Snoop Dogg (USA), Calvin Harris (UK), Pendulum $128 (early bird)–$225 8.30pm sold out Brooklyn Hotel, Sydney Rave Back In Time NYE Nik Fish, Jumping Jack, Abel, Paul Holden, Shade, Gee Wiz Vic, Gian, KC, Neil Hume, Shade, Drew $50-$60 (+ bf) 8pm Bungalow 8, Sydney NYE 2011 Bungapalooza Carnival DJ Flagrant, Van She Tech, A-Game, Andy B & Jake O’Leary, Captain Finhead $50-$130 (+ bf) 6pm Burdekin Hotel, Sydney Children NYE 2012 Stevie B, Jorgie Jay, Micky D, Steve S, York, DK1, Jay Austin $50 (+ bf) 10pm Candys Apartment, Kings Cross NYE At Candys! Disco Volante, Sherlock Bones, Teez, Stress Less, Hypa, Dirty Cash, In Theory, Blanco Negro, Camo $25 (+ bf) 9pm Cargo Bar, Sydney New Year's Eve On The Harbour 2011 Architecture in Helsinki, Bag Raiders, Yacht Club DJs, Sampology, French Horn Rebellion (USA), Alison Wonderland, Sosoume DJs, Luke Million, Hey Now, Pedestrian DJs, Frames, Starjumps, F.R.I.E.N.D. DJs, Block Ness Monsters, Stoney Roads DJs, Falcona DJs $115-$178 (+ bf) 6pm Chinese Laundry, Sydney LTJ Bukem (UK), MightyFools (NL), The Immigrant, Jeff Drake, Linken & Vertigo, Spenda C, Reload, Slice, Andrew Wowk, A-Tonez, What So Not, Buenos Diaz, Pop The Hatch, Kombat, Autoclaws, Peking Duk,

Hydraulix, Bruxism, Struz, Athson, King Lee, Sushi, Joe Barrs $50 (+ bf) 8pm Coogee Bay Hotel Ignite Your Nite NYE Party 2011 Ignite Your Nite DJs $45 (+ bf) 9pm Docks Hotel, Darling Harbour NYE Glow Party DJs $60-$90 (+ bf) 10pm Establishment, Sydney Sienna – Welcome To Le Mouin Rouge G-Wizard, Troy T, Lilo, Regz $69 (+ bf) 9pm Gaelic Theatre, Surry Hills Girlthing NYE Zombie Rave Girlthing DJs $28.60 8pm Hotel Chambers, Sydney NYE 2011 at Red Room Pacheco, K-Note & Naiki, DJ Eko $50 (+ bf) 7.30pm Hotel Sweeney’s Rooftop, Sydney Bare Essentials NYE Rooftop Party Garry Todd, Carlos Zarate, Claire Morgan, Mattt, Sam Roberts, Robbie Cordukes & Jake Hough $50 (+ bf) 3pm Ivy, Sydney Ivy NYE 2011-12 Erick Morillo (USA), Dimitri From Paris (France), Ian Carey (USA) $100–$300 8pm Jacksons On George, Sydney NYE Fiesta DJ Michael Stewart, DJ Simon Laing $55-$130 (+ bf) 6pm Luna Park Big Top , Milsons Point Harbour Party NYE Wynter Gordon (USA), The Potbelleez, Zoe Badwi, Ajax, Beni, Cassian, Rufus $114$124 (+ bf) 6.30pm Marrickville Bowling Club Mad Racket New Years Eve 6th Borough Project (UK), Ken Cloud, Simon Caldwell, Jimmi James & Zootie $50 (+ bf) 10pm Metro Theatre, Sydney Markus Schulz (US), Marlo, Thomas Knight, Nick Arbor $59 (early bird)-$99 9pm Museum of Contemporary Arts Rooftop, Sydney Harbour Fact NYE 2011 Javi Sampol (Spain), Hugo Marti (Spain) $199-$249 (+ bf) 6pm sold out North Sydney Bowling Club NYE Luau Party Various DJs $145 6.30pm

LTJ Bukem

The Polo Lounge, Oxford Hotel, Darlinghurst Swagger Presents NYE DJ Booth, Boyonce, Gay-Z, Smiley M, Sex Azza Weapon, FML $30 (+ bf) 10pm Pontoon Bar, Cockle Bay Wharf NYE DJ Nic Phillips, DJ DFlat, Nobby Groves and DJ Karey $49.50 (+ bf) 8pm Searock Bar, Circular Quay NYE 2011 Beach Ball DJs $250 8pm Sun Studios, Alexandria New Year Opener Emerson Todd, Ft Mode, Eoin Brosnan, The Amateur DJs $80-$100 (+ bf) 6pm Theloft, King St Wharf NYE 2011 A Night At The Savoy Grover, Pete Dolso, Kristy Lee, Rachel St James $225 6pm Tokyo Hotel at Home Nightlcub, Darling Harbour Privilege NYE 2012 Nick Stylz, Flite, Manny P, Georgie T, Tass V, Mel, Jayp, Riccardo Carrieri, Jorge Marco, Anthony Sajj, Nick Kay, Sajj, Petros, Harry V, Tommy Tsonis $50$70 (+ bf) 6pm Watershed Hotel, Darling Harbour NYE White 2011 Special Ed $79$119 (+ bf) 7pm Snoop Dogg

6th Borough Project

NEW YEAR'S DAY 2012 SUNDAY JANUARY 1

Murat Kilic Justice

The Argyle, The Rocks New Years Day Resident DJs free 4pm Bella Vista, Star City Casino Wharf, Pyrmont Spice Afloat The Revenge (UK), Motor City Drum Ensemble (DE), Murat Kilic, Carlos Zarate, DJ YokoO, Nic Scali, Sam Roberts $100 (+ bf) 3.30am

Cruise Bar & Lounge, The Rocks Get Together NYD DJs $60.40$70.60 3pm The Domain, Sydney Field Day Justice (France), Crystal Castles (Canada), Moby (USA), Gotye, Example (UK), Calvin Harris (UK), Tiga, Busy P (France), Metronomy (UK), Yuksek (France), Jack Beats (America), Skream & Benga, Spank Rock (USA), Cloud Control, The Aston Shuffle, Flight Facilities, Modestep, Foreign Beggars, 12th Planet, Totally Enormous Extinct Dinosaurs, Young MC (USA), New Navy, Motor City Drum Ensemble, Elizabeth Rose, Doctor Werewolf, Anna Lunoe, Ninalasvegas, Alison Wonderland $135 (+ bf)–$230 12pm Greenwood Hotel, North Sydney Space Ibiza presents Kehakuma Seth Troxler, Radioslave, Eddie Richards, Jef K, Remo, Garry Todd, Bass Drop, B-Complex, Chasing Shadows $89 (+ bf) 12pm Home The Venue, Sydney New Years Gay 2012 - Mexico Jayson Forbes, Alex Taylor, Kate Monroe, Adam Love, Dan Murphy, Kitty Glitter $55 (+ bf) 11pm Ivy, Sydney Ministry Of Sound Classics New Years Day Tonite Only, Bang Gang, Kid Kenobi, Tim McGee, Ping Pong DJs, James Taylor, Shamus, Mark Murphy, Simon Caldwell, Nick Law, Trent Rackus $44.95-$59.95 (+ bf) 2pm King St Wharf, Sydney Harbour A New Year’s Day Dream ShockForce (UK), Chris Dynasty,

Seth Troxler Yoshi, DBS, Keely, HArdforze, DJ Husband, Patrix, Yev, JamLeon, Kamikazi, Niuk Import, DJ Flaccid, Brad Lee, Erase MC $40-$50 11.30am Metro Theatre, Sydney Sasha (Wales), Radioslave, In Flagranti $60.86 (1st release)–$71.04 10pm The Spice Cellar, Sydney NYDN 2012 Murat Kilic, Garry Todd, YokoO, Robbie Lowe, Matt Weir, Nic Scali, Sam Roberts free $20 Sun Studios, Alexandria High Flyers Little Secret NYD Crazy P (UK), DJ Maestro, Katalyst, The Owl, Mr Doric, Omegaman Sound System, The Leisure Bandits, JC, Milan, Frenzie, Mr Glass, Mathmatics, Ology, Naiki, MK-1, Saywhut, Toon, Ian Drabble, Mo Funk, Monkey Tennis DJs, Karl Prinzen, Russ Tee, Ollie Brooke, Nicc Johnson, DJ Slynk, Stephen Ferris, Graham Mandroules, The Michael Wheatley Trio $59-$79 3pm

BRAG :: 443 :: 19:12:11 :: 65

club guide

Deep Impressions Underground Dance And Electronica with Chris Honnery

send your listings to : clubguide@thebrag.com

MONDAY JANUARY 2 The Ivy, Sydney She Welcome 2012 Joey Negro $40 2pm The Lansdowne Hotel, Chippendale Monday Jam Danny G Felix, Djay Kohinga free 9pm

TUESDAY JANUARY 3 Establishment, Sydney Rumba Motel DJ Willie Sabor free 6pm Scruffy Murphy’s, Sydney Frat House free The World Bar, Kings Cross Tuesdays DJs free 8pm

WEDNESDAY JANUARY 4 Beach Palace Hotel, Coogee Palace Uni Night DJs free 9pm Cargo Lounge, Sydney Menage a Trois 5pm Enmore Theatre Aloe Blacc, Electric Empire, Maya Jupiter $73.10 7.30pm GoodGod Small Club, Sydney Jean Grae (USA), Frenzie, MK-1, Bad Ezzy $16.50 (early bird)-$22 8pm Kong’s Jungle Lounge, Bondi Junction Voodoo DJs free 9pm The Lansdowne Hotel, Chippendale Frat House Friend DJ free 8pm Scubar, Sydney Schoonerversity 3pm Shelbourne Hotel, Sydney Sincopa free 7pm The World Bar, Kings Cross The Wall DJs 8pm

THURSDAY JANUARY 5 Cargo Lounge King St Wharf Thursdays I’m in Love DJs free 5pm GoodGod Front Bar, Sydney Rhythm & Booze Eric Shortbread, DJ Hey Man free 8pm Greenwood Hotel, North Sydney Tenzin, Cadell, Zannon, DJ K-Note free 8pm Hugo’s Lounge, Kings Cross Bad Apple DJs $5 8pm Ivy, Sydney Ivy Live DJs 5pm Kong’s Jungle Lounge Easy Lei Convaire DJs, Jen n Erik DJs free 9pm Low 302, Darlinghurst Thursday Switch DJs free 9pm Sapphire Lounge, Kings Cross Flaunt Dim Sim, Troy T, G Wizard, Mistah Cee, Mo Green, Soprano, DJ Rask, DJ Rocboi, MC Jayson 9pm The Sly Fox, Enmore Inhale Foreigndub DJs free 6pm The Standard, Surry Hills Pizza Parties DJs free 9pm Theloft, King St Wharf Thursdays at theloft Nad, Stu Turner, Mr Belvedere 9pm Upstairs Beresford, Surry Hills Pete Rock (USA) $47 (+ bf) 8pm The World Bar, Kings Cross Propaganda Propaganda DJs free (student)–$5 9pm 66 :: BRAG :: 433 :: 19:12:11

FRIDAY JANUARY 6 Arthouse Hotel, Sydney RnB Superclub G-Wizard, Troy T, Lilo, Def Rok, Eko, MC Jayson $15 9.30pm Chinese Laundry, Sydney A-Skillz (UK), Spenda C, Mike Big FX, Def Tonez, Brosman, Cheap Lettus $20-$25 10pm Docks Hotel, Darling Harbour DJ Charlie free 6pm GoodGod Front Bar, Sydney Yo Grito! King Opp, Daniel Darling, Silky Doyle free 9pm GoodGod Small Club, Sydney Slow Blow DJs Greenwood Hotel, North Sydney DJ Cadell free 5pm Home The Venue, Sydney Area 51 John Dahlback (SWE), Uffie (FRA), DJ Falcon (FRA), Loops of Fury, Tom Deluxx (FRA), Bumblebeez DJ Set, Ajax, Fake Bratpack, Redial, Smacktown $40 (early bird)-$65 9pm Hugo’s Lounge, Kings Cross Rat Pack DJs 9pm Jackson’s On George, Sydney Ultimate Party Venue Resident DJs free Kit & Kaboodle, Kings Cross Falcona Fridays DJs $10 8pm Kong’s Jungle Lounge, Bondi Junction W!ldlive Fridays DJs $10 10pm The Marlborough Hotel – Level 1, Newtown Resident DJs free Metro Theatre, Sydney Flying Lotus, Martyn, Africa Hitech $45 8pm Nevada Lounge, Darlinghurst DJ Hayden free 6pm Oatley Hotel We Love Oatley Hotel Fridays DJ Tone free 8.30pm Omega Lounge, Sydney Unwind Fridays DJ Greg Summerfield free 5.30pm Sapphire Lounge, Kings Cross Club Onyx Sim Slm, Discokid, Lavida, Peeping Tom, DJ D, Tenkix $15 8pm Scruffy Murphy’s, Sydney Frisky Friday DJs free 6pm Shark Hotel, Sydney Pulse8 Jono free Shelbourne Hotel, Sydney Mixtape free 6pm Space, Sydney Zaia Savvy, Edo, D’Kutz, Em-Tee, Ming, Ace, Flipz, DJ Sefu, MC Suga Shane, Arbee, Suae, Pulsar, Askitz, Jinkang vs Tezzr vs Rhe3, MC D 9.45pm

SATURDAY JANUARY 7 Cargo Bar, King St Wharf The Institute of Music DJs free 9pm Chinese Laundry, Sydney Garden Party Noisa (HOL), Borgore (ISR), Netsky (BEL), Danny Byrd (UK), Doctor Werewolf, Glovecats, Gabriel Clouston $55-$80 (+ bf) 2pm Chinese Laundry, Sydney Darren Emerson (UK), Spenda C, Emoh Instead, Raull, King Lee, Ramske, Brothers Grimm, Mike Hyper $15-$25 10pm The Cool Room, Australian Hotel & Brewery, Rouse Hill DJ free 9pm Dee Why Hotel Kiss & Fly DJs 8.30pm Establishment, Sydney Sienna G-Wizard, Troy T, Def Rok, Eko, Lilo 9pm Docks Hotel, Darling Harbour Cameo Resident DJs free 10pm

GoodGod Small Club, Sydney Festival First Night After-Party Jack Shit Home Nightclub, Sydney Homemade Saturdays DJs $20-$25 9pm Ivy, Sydney Pure Ivy DJs $20 9pm Jackson’s On George, Sydney Ultimate Party Venue Resident DJs free Kit & Kaboodle, Kings Cross Kitty Kitty Bang Bang Miss T, Gabby, Cassette, Alison Wonderland 8pm The Marlborough Hotel, Level 1, Newtown Resident DJs free Metro Theatre, Sydney New York’s Finest Block Party GZA (USA), Pharoahe Monch (USA), Jean Grae (USA), Rahzel (USA), JS-1 $44 (+ bf) 8pm Nevada Lounge, Darlinghurst DJ Hayden free 6pm Sapphire Lounge, Kings Cross The Suite Troy T, Joey Kaz, Charlie Brown, Disco Kid, Dim Slm, Jo Funk, Steve S 8pm Shark Hotel, Sydney Pulse8 Jono free The Spice Cellar, Sydney Schwa (CZ), YokoO, Nic Scali, Dean Relf free-$20 10pm Star Bar, Sydney Situation DJs free 10pm Watershed Hotel & Cohi Bar, Darling Harbour Evropa Superclub – The Beach Party Balkan Sound System, Tonka, Nick Nova, Mr Evropa, Tony Shock, Dim Slm, Stevie J, Laz, Bexx, Nikki K, Goz, Authentix $20 (+ bf) 9pm The World Bar, Kings Cross Wham! DJs $15 8pm

SUNDAY JANUARY 8 Basement Level, 58 Elizabeth St, Sydney Spice Murat Kilic, Sam Roberts $20 4am The Beachcomber Hotel, Toukley Sounds Of Summer Calvin Harris (UK), John Dahlback, Burns, DJ Falcon, The Potbelleez, Stafford Brothers, Tenzin, Timmy Trumpet, Tom Deluxx, Ajax, Nadisko, Redial $50-$75 12pm The Beresford Hotel, Surry Hills Beresford Sundays DJs free 3pm Docks Hotel, Darling Harbour Salsa Caliente DJs free 8.30pm Goldfish, Kings Cross Martini Club free 6pm Hugo’s Lounge, Kings Cross Sneaky Sundays DJs 8pm Jackson’s On George, Sydney Aphrodisiac Industry Night Resident DJs free Kit & Kaboodle, Kings Cross Easy Sundays Stu Turner, NAD, Mr Belvedere, Murray Lake, Pat Ward 6pm Kudu Lounge, Darlinghurst Timeless Sundays Dan Copping, Ravi Ravs, Thomas Waldeier free 2pm Name This Bar, Darlinghurst Sunday Sets Flight Deck, Mashed, Ben Mitchell, Kate Weston, Adam Kain 5pm Oatley Hotel Sunday Sessions DJ Tone free 7pm Sapphire Lounge, Kings Cross Sapphire Sundays DJs free 8pm The Watershed Hotel Afternoon DJs DJ Brynstar free The World Bar, Kings Cross Dust DJs free 7pm

Matthew Dear

T

he Australia-bound Matthew Dear will release a new album next year entitled Beams on the Ghostly International label, his first since his accomplished 2010 album, Black City. Though details about the new record from the Detroit-born singer and producer are scarce, there’s plenty of salacious information concerning its lead-off EP, Headcage, which is slotted for a January release. To cater for readers who appreciate a bit of flowery language – I daresay that’s a prerequisite for enduring this column on a weekly basis – it’s worth quoting from the accompanying press release, which takes me back to my arts degree days, describing Headcage as a “dense, mutating cluster of breaths, whispers and assorted technicolor [sic] sounds” that “coalesces into a hearty chug”. For those of you merely after the facts, here you go: Headcage’s title track was co-produced by Van Rivers & The Subliminal Kid, a Swedish partnership notable for work on albums like Blonde Redhead’s Penny Sparkle, Glasser’s Ring and Fever Ray’s self-titled record. The EP also includes ‘In the Middle (I Met You There)’, the first duet in Dear’s decade-long career, which features Jonathan Pierce of Brooklyn outfit The Drums. Dear stands out as something of an anomaly in the present musical environ in that he’s revered by both the Pitchfork-reading crowd for his indie output – his Asa Breed album is a must for anyone who hasn’t checked it out – and the techno cognoscenti for his work as Audion, False and Jabberjaw. And although Dear will be in offbeat pop mode on Beams, he will be indulging his techno proclivities aboard the AGWA starship for Pulse Radio’s Australia Day boat party.

For anyone craving an encore helping of outdoor techno after the magnificent experience of the Subsonic Music Festival, your next target ought to be the annual Rainbow Serpent Festival, which is being held in the Victorian wilderness on the Australia Day long weekend, January 27-30.

Along with Subsonic, Rainbow Serpent is known as one of the few places you can get proper crazy in Australia – it is an alternative, outdoor bush party for alternative, outdoor types. But as with Subsonic, the hedonism is underscored by compassion and respect, and consequently the event is devoid of the aggressive angst that underlies your typical inner-city festivals. (How’s that for a hippie interlude?) The 2012 Rainbow Serpent Festival will feature techno drawcards such as Niconé and Dapayk, James Harcourt, Gabriel Ananda, Principles Of Flight, Spoonbill, Peter Horrevorts, Loud, Protonica, Hedflux, Robert Rich, Secret Cinema and Tipper among plenty of others.

Further festival information and tickets can be obtained by visiting rainbowserpent.net Following on from the efforts of Tiefschwarz on Watergate 09, Upon You label boss

LOOKING DEEPER FRIDAY DECEMBER 23 Shrug ft Luke Porter The Vault, Pitt St

SUNDAY JANUARY 1

Seth Troxler, Radioslave et al Space NYD @ Greenwood

FRIDAY JANUARY 7 Eddie Richards Goldfish Bowl

THURSDAY JANUARY 26 Matthew Dear AGWA Boat Party

Marco Resmann will release the 10th instalment of the Watergate nightclub mix compilation series in the new year.w Resmann started out as the third man in Pan-Pot, these days a duo, and also as Anja Schneider’s producer. While producing under the pseudonym Phage, he won critical acclaim as half of Luna City Express, before founding the Upon You imprint back in ’07. As one would expect from Resmann given his lofty club pedigree, Watergate 10 looks like one damn solid mix.

Bookending the release are some small audio snippets devised by Resmann, but the meat is supplied by classics such as Ricardo Villalobos’ ‘808 The Bass Queen’ and Soulphiction’s ‘I’ve Got A Feeling’, Resmann’s own exclusive collaborations with Kiki and Mike Shannon, along with cuts by Guillaume & The Coutu Dumonts, Anonym and one of my favourite tunes of the year, the Zimbabwe Mix of Jichael Mackson’s ‘GTI’. Watergate 10 will be released in mid-February, but there’s nothing like getting excited well in advance, right?

As it’s the final BRAG issue of the year, it’s fitting to end on a slightly soppy note and say thank you for reading Deep Impressions for another year. The support and interaction with readers is what makes writing this column worthwhile – well, that and the ability to stride to the front of a club queue and gain entry by uttering three magical words to the clearly impressed doorgirl: “Deep Impressions, babe.” And for anyone who has not made contact yet but feels compelled to for whatever reason – to give me my overdue comeuppance, for instance – I’ll be as close as the below email address in 2012. Play safe over the New Year period, and I look forward to continuing the electronic music excavation in a few weeks’ time.

Marco Resmann

Deep Impressions: electronica manifesto and occasional club brand. Contact through deep.impressions@yahoo.com

BRAG :: 443 :: 19:12:11 :: 67

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how to dress well

PICS :: KC

up all night out all week . . .

wham!

10:12:11 :: World Bar :: 24 Bayswater Rd Kings Cross 93577700

PICS :: SW

slowblow

hed kandi nye It’s called: The Glitter Ball It sounds like: A freestyle mix of Kandi Loung e, house classics, disco and Back To Love.

Who’s spinning? DJs Sean Doyle (UK), Phil Hudson (UK), Mo Funk (Ibiza), Tim Whitney, Danny Velicious, Aron T (Japa n), IAM SAM, Frankie Romano, Ben Vickers, Nick Vidal; and live: The Italian Job, Reel Sessions and Chris Luder.

Three songs you’ll hear on the night: ‘Some Kinda Rush’ – Booty Luv; ‘Can’t Top the Dutch’ – Olav Basoski & Grego r Salto; ‘Disco’s Revenge (David Jones Mix)’ – Hed Kandi Glitterarti.

And one you definitely won’t: Anything by Justin Bieber Sell it to us: Hed Kandi will entertain you acros s five bars, split over three levels, with floor-to-ceiling windows – right on the waterfront, with spectacular views of Sydney Opera House and the city skyline. Make this NYE one of glitz and glamour!

The bit we’ll remember in the AM: Amazing vibe, great views, fireworks and dancing the night away…

Crowd specs: 1,800 party people over three levels Wallet damage: $116.30- $259.10 Where: Overseas Passenger Terminal / Circul ar Quay West When: Saturday December 31

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party profile

09:12:11 :: Goodgod Small Club :: 53-55 Liverpool Street Sydney 9267 3787

far too loud

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07:12:11 :: Goodgod Small Club :: 53-55 Liverpool Street Sydney 9267 3787

propaganda

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10:12:11 :: Chinese Laundry :: 111 Sussex St Sydney 82959958

luke mcd

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08:12:11 :: World Bar :: 24 Bayswater Rd Kings Cross 93577700

10:12:11 :: The Spice Cellar :: 58 Elizabeth St Sydney 68 :: BRAG :: 443: 19:12:11

:: KATRINA CLARKE :: ASHLEY S : TIM LEVY (HEAD HONCHO) OUR LOVELY PHOTOGRAPHER PEACHEY :: GEORGE POPOV :: TIM WHITNEY MAR :: DANIEL MUNNS :: THOMAS

BRAG :: 443 :: 19:12:11 :: 69

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hat party

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up all night out all week . . .

09:12:11 :: Oxford Art Factory :: 38-46 Oxford st, Darlinghurst 93323711

hermitude

It’s called: Sienna NYE – Welcome to Le Mouli n Rouge It sounds like: The hottest fully-themed party that New Year's Eve has to offer!

Who’s playing? The masters of the DJ game : DJ G-Wizard, DJ Def Rok, DJ Troy T, DJ Lilo and DJ Regz, backe d by the country’s sexiest burlesque dancers!

Three songs you’ll hear on the night: Why just three? We can guarantee that you’ll hear hours of the hottes t RnB and house mashups all the way into 2012!

And one you definitely won’t: ‘Bat out of Hell’ – Meatloaf.

Sell it to us: What’s to sell? Sienna is Sydne y’s event every Saturday night – and did we menti premium full house on that the venue is fully themed and decked out in the finest Parisian Moulin Rouge interiors?

The bit we’ll remember in the AM: Hopefully nothing, after a few too many of our delicious Green Fairy cocktails!

Crowd specs: Sydney’s sexiest people in Sydne y’s premium venue.

Wallet damage: $69+bf from Moshtix and Ticket ek (or at Sienna each Saturday, which gives you free entry on the night of purchase!)

Where: Establishment / 252 George Street, Sydney When: Saturday December 31

PICS :: TL

08:11:11 :: Australian Brewery :: 350 Annangrove Rd Rouse Hill 9679 4555

party profile

the cool room

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sienna nye

xzibit

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09:12:11 :: The Standard :: Lvl 3/383 Bourke St Surry Hills 9262 4500

chali 2na

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the exchange hotel 11:12:11 :: Oxford Art Factory :: 38-46 Oxford st, Darlinghurst 93323711 70 :: BRAG :: 443: 19:12:11

PICS :: TL

10:12:11 :: The Factory Theatre :: 105 Victoria Road Marrickville 9550 3666

09:12:11 :: The Exchange Hotel :: 34-44 Oxford St Darlinghurst 93601375 :: KATRINA CLARKE :: ASHLEY S : TIM LEVY (HEAD HONCHO) OUR LOVELY PHOTOGRAPHER PEACHEY :: GEORGE POPOV :: TIM WHITNEY MAR :: DANIEL MUNNS :: THOMAS

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