12.08.15 Music / Arts / Lifestyle / Culture
Issue
99
Brisbane / Free / Incorporating
film
Guy Ritchie
tour
...Trail Of Dead
The
l e ng
Ju
1
Giants
“We Do Fucking Get Aggressive”
books
Michael Gudinski
in focus
MofoIsDead
2 • THE MUSI MU MUSIC C • 12TH AUGU AUGUST US ST 2 2015 015
THE MUSIC 12TH AUGUST 2015 • 3
AUGUST THURS 20TH
XAVIER RUDD AND THE UNITED NATIONS FRI 28TH
JAMES REYNE SAT 29TH
JAMES REYNE SEPTEMBER THURS 3RD
TYLER THE CREATOR SAT 5TH
SCOTT BRADLEE’S POSTMODERN JUKEBOX SAT 12TH
THE GANGSTERS BALL SUN 13TH
THE SMITH STREET BAND SAT 19TH
AN EVENING WITH KEVIN SMITH, 2 SHOWS - EARLY SHOW 5PM, LATE SHOW 8:45PM SOLD OUT WED 23RD
PENNYWISE OCTOBER FRI 9TH
NEEL KOLHATKAR WED 14TH
LIFEHOUSE TUES 20TH
JOHN BISHOP WED 21ST
LAURA MARLING THURS 22ND
CANNED HEAT FRI 23RD
AL MURRAY THE PUB LANDLORD SAT 31ST
RICHARD CLAPTON THE LONESOME VOYAGER NOVEMBER THURS 5TH
THEY MIGHT BE GIANTS SAT 14TH
UB40
FRI 27TH
ALEX WILLIAMSON
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THE MUSIC 12TH AUGUST 2015 • 5
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THE MUSIC 12TH AUGUST 2015 • 7
Music / Music / Arts / Lifestyle / Culture
Waifing Around
The Waifs return this year with their seventh LP, Beautiful You, and now they’re playing it across the whole nation – having already announced WA dates they have now added east coast shows.
The Waifs
Marc Maron
Marc My Words Beloved US comedian and podcast host Marc Maron has announced he will be heading to Australia this October for The Maronation Tour. The New Jerseyborn personality will kick off the Aus tour in Sydney on 15 Oct, before hitting Melbourne and Brisbane.
For all gig and event details check out theMusic.com.au
Mew
Yesterday Tomorrow There is a lot of buzz around Tim Wheatley’s upcoming triumphs, as he is set to release his new single Valerie, followed by his new album, Cast Of Yesterday. He’s celebrating with a national tour. 8 • THE MUSIC • 5TH AUGUST 2015
Tim Wheatley
Arts / L Music / Arts / Lifestyle / Culture
Bit O’ Brit
British India DD Dumbo
Prolific Melbourne rockers British India have announced a mammoth tour to round out an already impressive year. The band have confirmed 19 headline dates around the country, kicking off 18 Sep.
The Phoenix Foundation
Rising Again Kiwi indie rockers The Phoenix Foundation hopped over the ditch for a short visit this April, but the six-piece have just announced they’ll be back for an east coast tour this October following the release of their new album, Give Up Your Dreams.
Seeya Green Frog Allen’s Green Frog will no longer be available after the company discontinued its production late last year due to poor sales. Also facing the axe are the similarly controversially and equally green Spearmint Leaves, though we can rest easy knowing that the holy grail of confectionery, the Red Frog, is safe, outselling its green counterpart ten to one.
Yew For Mew Danish progressive rockers Mew have not managed to get themselves Down Under in 20 years, that is, their entire career – but all that’s changing. They’re playing three headline shows in December.
Allen’s Red Frogs
THE MUSIC 5TH AUGUST 2015 • 9
ifestyle Music / Arts / Lifestyle / Culture
Lost Then Foundry
The Foundry. Pic: Markus Ravik
Nascent live music venue and collaborative creative hub The Foundry will make its long-awaited return to Brisbane’s Fortitude Valley with a party on 20 Aug after it was unexpectedly forced into hiatus within weeks of opening back in March.
#1 Dads
Flight Facilities
Share And Care Not-for-profit charity Youngcare, dedicated to providing choices for young Aussies with high care needs, have announced their line-up for their Tenth Anniversary Benefit Concert in October, led by Bernard Fanning, along with Melbourne’s #1 Dads and sixpiece Mosman Alder.
Marlon Reprise Set to sign major agent and label deals in North America, with tours there and across Europe in October, Marlon Williams isn’t forgetting his homeland. With special guest Ben Salter, he’ll be taking The Yarra Benders to stages in November.
Update: mundane activity @joelmchale must have been watching his own tedious new show, comments section
Marlon Williams
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e / Cultu Music / Arts / Lifestyle / Culture
Reel Big Fish
Reelin’ In Jake
Venerated third-wave ska veterans Reel Big Fish and Less Than Jake are no strangers to Australian shores, but that doesn’t mean we’re tired of welcoming them. They’re embarking on a co-headline tour of the east coast; kicks off 1 Oct.
Flight Added
The Stance. Pic by Fenlan Photography
The organisers of the Maroochy Music & Visual Arts Festival 22 Aug at Horton Park Golf Course have announced the addition of the Flight Facilities lads to the already impressive lineup as the previously secret headliner.
Dance The Stance explores protest and activism through dance and sound on Thursday at 10am and 7pm at King George Square. Emma Donovan & The Putbacks
Mullum Fest 2015 Over four big days, 19 – 22 Nov, Mullumbimby will once again be filled by the gumbo of musical delights that is the annual Mullum Music Festival. Ron Sexsmith, Ben Ottewell, Hauschka, Trinity Roots, Cornerstone Roots, Emma Donovan & The Putbacks, Bullhorn, Tinpan Orange, All Our Exes Live In Texas and stacks more are on the bill. Presented by The Music.
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Music / Music / Arts / Lifestyle / Culture
JONSON STREET BYRONBAY FRI 14 AUG
DEMON PARADE
DD For Laura
DD Dumbo
Victorian singer-songwriter DD Dumbo will join celebrated chanteuse Laura Marling as support act for her impending run of shows around the country this October.
SAT 15 AUG
MOSES GUNN COLLECTIVE SUN 16 AUG
TRAIL OF DEAD (USA), THE RED PAINTINGS
For a regular hit of news sign up to our daily newsletter at theMusic.com.au
FRI 21 AUG
MAR HAZE SAT 22 AUG
TIJUANA CARTEL FRI 28 AUG
Foals
IMMIGRANT UNION SAT 29 AUG
UPSKIRTS THURS 1 OCT
THE JUNGLE GIANTS FRI 2 OCT
THE SMITH STREET BAND TICKETS AVAILABLE ONLINE WWW.THENORTHERN.COM.AU
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Northlane
Node For You Northlane have invited a couple of American acts in August Burns Red and Like Moths To Flames to join them as they hit Australia’s highways in November to showcase their new album, Node, and local buddies Buried In Verona and Ocean Grove are also joining.
Arts / L Music / Arts / Lifestyle / Culture
Joel Creasey
Jaakko Eino Kalevi
Jreamy Jaakko
Finland’s Jaakko Eino Kalevi will be displaying his dreamy soundscapes to Aussie audiences when he visits for three shows across the east coast in early October.
All That Glitters
The 2015 Glitter Festival is the first-ever celebration of the LGBTIQAP+ community held on the Gold Coast. The official program that begins 28 Sep, featuring cabaret, art, theatre and more. Highlights include a screening of Neil Armfield’s Holding The Man and a stand-up set from Joel Creasey.
Irish Wave
The Riptide Movement
They only signed their major label deal last year, but Irish four-piece The Riptide Movement are already scoring goals on the back of first Australian single, All Works Out. The Riptide Movement tour here in October.
Falling For Falls Falls Music & Arts Festival have announced the first acts for their coming fest. They include Foals, Birds Of Tokyo, Bloc Party, Disclosure, Kurt Vile & The Violators and more. See theMusic.com.au for the full line-up.
The Darkness
Let There Be Darkness British glam rockers The Darkness have had a few quiet years but 2015 is a loud one – the band are crashing back into your consciousness with a new album, Last Of Our Kind, and a tour here this November.
THE MUSIC 5TH AUGUST 2015 • 13
Music
To read the full interview head to theMusic.com.au
GIANT STRIDES No second album blues for Brisbane indie kingpins The Jungle Giants! Frontman Sam Hales and guitarist Andrew Dooris sit Steve Bell down for a coffee and school him on their band’s desire to evolve alongside - rather than away from - their early-adopting followers.
I
t’s been a steadily skywards pointing career trajectory to date for young Brisbane four-piece The Jungle Giants. Their carefree brand of pop-infused indie rock has really touched a nerve with the Australian music public, with substantial radio play for their breezy tunes quickly translating into not only large crowds for their own live shows but also consolidating them a role as firm festival favourites, the band rocking the stages of high profile local events such as Splendour In The Grass, Big Day Out, Groovin’ The Moo and One Night Stand (as well as some esteemed overseas gatherings like SxSW). Now, having gained a swag of traction with their debut long-player Learn To Exist (2013) - which debuted at #12 on the ARIA Album Charts and #1 on the AIR Chart - they’re back with follow-up album, Speakerzoid (which aptly takes its strange title form a misheard Sonic Youth lyric). Overseen once again by esteemed producer Magoo (who helmed their debut), it’s an assured evolution of The Jungle Giants’ aesthetic, with a focus on upbeat, dance-inducing rhythms and their trademark rampant melodies - it’s still very much the same band, they’ve just taken one seismic step forward. “We definitely didn’t want to do the same thing again,” reflects frontman and chief songwriter Sam Hales. “We didn’t want to get pigeonholed as a band who would do exactly the same thing every time, because we’re not actually like that - we just started with one thing and now we’re going somewhere else - so Speakerzoid is like a step towards where we want to be going. After Learn To Exist I went through a little block there where I didn’t write as much as I usually would; I kinda just thought about it a lot. It wasn’t really writer’s block because I was still writing, but I was looking for something else to start working on - something a bit different and a little more challenging. “So in the year after Learn To Exist came out I was just writing and thinking about what I wanted to do, and then I decided to go on a writing trip and just went to Paris for a couple of weeks and
I hope what Speakerzoid will do is give people an idea that we do fucking get aggressive live
14 • THE MUSIC • 12TH AUGUST 2015
locked myself in an apartment. It was just to shake things up a bit and figure out what I was looking for in terms of a new project, and we ended up with Speakerzoid. We like music that you can dance to and sing along to - pop music basically - but I wanted to put a twist on it. The span of influence in terms of what I was listening to just exploded after Learn To Exist; before Learn To Exist I had never heard Jeff Buckley or Beck or Caribou or fucking anyone!” “[Sam] picked up heaps of jazz influences as well, and Latin and folk music and stuff like that,” continues guitarist Andrew Dooris. “[He] got deep into music and had a new band he was excited about every second day. Sam just wrote and wrote and wrote, but it wasn’t so much writing songs as making coherent ideas - he’d come to us with coherent ideas even though they weren’t fully-fledged songs. So coming into the album Sam probably worked more on the pre-studio side of things whereas the rest of us probably worked less, and we worked harder in the studio to make it all sound connected. I think production really played a huge role in this album; we took more of a focus on creating interesting sounds that would mesh together.” Despite this shared input, Dooris draws the line at claiming that Speakerzoid’s genesis was wholly collaborative. “That might be taking too much credit,” he laughs. “Sam is basically a genius in my brain, but between Keelan [Bijker - drums], Cesira [Aitken - guitar], myself and Magoo we’re all refiners, and we’d try to simmer down the core of everything and try to make it stomach-able and make sense.” “This time around we did less with the pre-production, because the idea was that we would bring all these blocks of songs that we’d bring to the studio - we had a list of songs that we wanted to work on,” Hales offers. “With Learn To Exist we did a lot of pre-recording work, we just played every song a thousand times and then just went into the studio and recorded it. This time we kinda went, ‘Let’s do all this pre-production while we’re doing it’, so we went in and we’d play the song and then we’d go, ‘I want to put this in here, I want to rework this bit’, so it was way more collaborative in that way. Also the album this time came out sounding like all the songs were from the same album, unlike Learn To Exist - we wanted to make it sound like an album rather than ten songs just cobbled together.” Despite the success of their lauded debut, neither Hales nor Dooris believe that The Jungle Giants felt any more pressure when it came time to making Speakerzoid. “We knew that we could just do the same album again,” the singer muses. “We could follow that same structure and just do Learn To Exist 2, but we didn’t really want to so for us it just became the simple decision, ‘Let’s
Locals Only
make good music again, just new good music’. So one decision was to not make it the same and not pigeonhole ourselves but still make fucking good music.” “I actually think pressure-wise there was way more leading into the initial release, because with Learn To Exist I think all of us freaked out at maybe different points, thinking, ‘This is our debut album and you only get one chance to make your debut album’, and I think that was a way bigger stress than the second release, ‘Oh no, we’ve got to do this again’,” the guitarist offers. “I think at the end of the day we had a lot of trust in our fans, and we’ve always connected more with our fans in a live setting anyway. “The shows that we played after the first album were such a confirmation, and what it really meant to us was that we had to keep doing it for them and for us - we have to keep growing with these people. We wanted to stay connected to them, and the only way to do that was by being proud of the work that we’re doing, and we would never have been proud doing that same album twice. Also it was a relief getting that first album out and knowing that it just happened as it happened; we didn’t become number one hits or anything like that, we did exactly what we needed to do and it was a relief just knowing that it was possible. That was ultimately more liberating than anxiety-inducing.” And even from their earliest forays the live realm has been an important part of The Jungle Giants’ armoury.
“I think a big thing with Speakerzoid - which for me anyway is something I think it can do and should do and will do - is give something more to expect when they come to our shows,” Hales admits. “I remember for the first two years of touring Learn To Exist a friend of ours would see us for the first time - or someone would see us for the first time - and every single time they’d be, like, ‘I had no idea you guys played so hard, or didn’t just play soft’. So what we were essentially doing - especially with songs like [2011 first single] Mr Polite, which is a sugary kinda song - we would just put a shitload of beef on it when we played and we’d be quite aggressive, and that would surprise people. So I hope what Speakerzoid will do is give people an idea that we do fucking get aggressive live, and it adds to our repertoire with these long, building songs that you can just kind of jive to the whole time.” Of course an album needs lyrics, and fortunately Hales had plenty of recent inspiration to draw upon. “I guess there was a theme, because a lot of the lyric writing happened in the studio,” he smiles. “I guess a big theme was about my new girlfriend Grace; we’d been going out long-distance for a year-and-a-half because she was living in Sydney, but she just moved to Brisbane. A lot of the lyrics are about finding a proper girlfriend who isn’t just a stupid, 17-year-old fuck up - it was, like, ‘Wow, I’ve become a human now!’ - so there’s a lot of lyrics about that I guess.”
What: Speakerzoid (Amplifire) When & Where: 1 Oct, The Great Northern, Byron Bay; 3 Oct, The Triffid (U/18 matinee and 18+)
The Jungle Giants are more than proud to be a product of the thriving Brisbane music community, indeed it’s infiltrated their whole lives. “Fuck yeah!” Hales thunders. “Me and Cesira share a house with eight people, and every single dude in the house except one in is in a Brisbane band. Lewis [Stephenson] is the extra live member in our band, and he plays guitar in The Moses Gunn Collective and he’s lead singer for The Belligerents and plays in a few other bands as well, including [Orphans] who I drum for. And then Spencer [White] is in Orphans and Morning Harvey; the only person [in the house] who’s not in a band is Simon who’s an insurance lawyer who fits in perfectly, weirdly enough. We’re always showing each other our songs, and our group just goes everywhere together. We’re all best friends; if we ever go to a party it feels like a college movie!” “And we all hang out with heaps of other bands like Last Dinosaurs, The Jensens, the Dunies every now and then, The Creases, Millions when they were still here,” Dooris enthuses. “And Zoe [Davis] from Cub Sport is moving into my house soon!” “Everyone’s super-connected,” Hales laughs. “If they have a party we’ll go and if we have a party they all rock up. And we definitely influence each other musically a lot, it’s awesome.” THE MUSIC 12TH AUGUST 2015 • 15
Film
A Touch Of Class Guy Ritchie continues to eschew period tropes with his film reinterpretation of ‘60s spy show The Man From U.N.C.L.E. Ritchie, Henry Cavill, Armie Hammer, Alicia Vikander and Elizabeth Debicki chat with Brendan Telford.
N
ot a stranger to taking on licensed and very much loved material and making it his own, British director Guy Ritchie has followed up his stylised megablockbuster Sherlock Holmes franchise with a revisionist take on the 1960s Cold War espionage show The Man From U.N.C.L.E. With the central focus on spies from either side of the Iron Curtain, American fugitive-cum-CIA wunderkind Napoleon Solo (Henry Cavill) and Soviet soldier Illya Kuryakin (Armie Hammer) form an unlikely alliance in the hunt for a missing Nazi nuclear scientist. “We felt the world of this film was occupying a place that no other film was [at this time], which is what we saw as the golden era of the spy thriller genre,” Ritchie explains. “It feels like an amalgamation of those but with
“If you become a parody the stakes no longer mean anything.”
our unique view. There are so many things that you are subconsciously motivated by, so when hearing the title The Man From U.N.C.L.E. in about ten seconds you can cross-reference all the things you find inspiring and interesting. You are never sure how you can make it all work, but you have enough kernels of interest to get things firing. ‘Americans, Russians, ooh the ‘60s! I like the cars and the costumes - not those costumes, get rid of them - the architecture is beautiful! How can I make it contemporary? The male relationship between the two spies!’ When the cake goes into the oven, does it come out as something that I’d like to eat? I’d say that except for about 15% of the film, what you see now is what I came up with in the first tensecond idea two, three years ago.” The constant headbutting between Solo and Kuryakin provides the lion’s share of screen time in the film, as the debonair risk-taker Solo incessantly rubs the set-in-hisways Kuryakin the wrong way. Cavill (a Brit playing an American) and Hammer (an American playing a Russian)’s repartee lends the film its comedic gravitas. “It really was a tightrope where sometimes Guy would walk in and say, ‘You know what? Funny, but a little too smug,’” Cavill laughs. “You have to trust your director 16 • THE MUSIC • 12TH AUGUST 2015
in those moments because it’s hard to notice how you’re coming across. You can walk away from something where it’s in tone with how you are feeling, but not with the feeling of the movie, so that an audience could be sitting there and thinking you’re a bit of a dick. It was harder than the stunts.” “I know - we have Superman over here sitting in the backseat of a car while I am running after it for hours,” Hammer counters. “It’s funny watching people put into situations that they simply aren’t equipped to deal with, and that is all of Kuryakin’s life outside of spying. To sell all of those moments, you had to find the truth in the situation, no matter how preposterous, otherwise it would become very slapstick. Even with my accent I just wanted to lend it that air of authenticity. If you go back and watch old spy films or ‘80s action movies, every Russian character is arch. They are Boris from Rocky & Bullwinkle. ‘NATASHA!’ That’s not how Russians speak. Hollywood just wanted their bad guys to sound bad. I wanted to be as universally Russian as possible, and although I have Russian heritage through my uncle, I also listened to a lot of YouTube, which is seriously one of the actor’s greatest research tools.” In many ways though The Man From U.N.C.L.E. is a threehander, as the spies’ link to the Nazi scientist is his niece Gaby Teller. Rising star Alicia Vikander sees her strength. “I didn’t even see Gaby as a strong female character, I just saw it as a strong part, which goes to Guy and Lionel’s writing,” she says. “Gaby is fearless and yet there is this ambiguity there as to what her plans are throughout the film. She goes on a journey from behind the wall to then be a part of revolution and style. I was aware that audiences would come to the film with a certain idea on who I would be playing within the story, and those perceptions are likely to flip quite a few times. For Guy to have these elements in an actioncomedy, and to inject it all with his sense of humour and style, it’s quite special.” Rounding out the international carousel of players is the unlikely villain Victoria Vinciguerra, played by Australian Elizabeth Debicki. Vinciguerra is a woman who knows what she wants and knows how to get it. “I watched a lot of Fellini and [Catherine] Deneuve films, Italian ‘60s cinema, and a lot of that for me really helped shape Victoria,” Debicki says. “I don’t want to label her - she lacks empathy, shall we say - and yet there is a strength and pragmatic nature to her that helps steer it away from a straight-up master villain situation. She works the best when she really enjoys what she is doing.” Ritchie had to be very careful when walking the tightrope between comedy, nostalgia and parody - The Man From U.N.C.L.E. is no Get Smart. “We didn’t set any parameters on what people could do because everyone knew what the line was; it was about getting as close as we could without crossing it. With comedy you’re playing with your stakes and are constantly on thin ice. If you become a parody the stakes no longer mean anything; but I also don’t like to take things too seriously, because in the end it’s entertainment. So you have to somehow keep the reins on essentially a wild animal while also letting things take their own unique course. In the end we more or less did it in three takes: the straight way, the taking the piss way, then somewhere down the middle, because then you have some latitude on where to take things.”
What: The Man From U.N.C.L.E. In cinemas 13 Aug
THE MUSIC 12TH AUGUST 2015 • 17
Credits
Publisher Street Press Australia Pty Ltd Group Managing Editor Andrew Mast
Music
Body Count
National Editor – Magazines Mark Neilsen Editor Steve Bell Arts Editor Hannah Story Eat/Drink Editor Stephanie Liew Gig Guide Editor Justine Lynch gigs@themusic.com.au Contributing Editor Bryget Chrisfield Contributors Alice Bopf, Anthony Carew, Baz McAlister, Ben Marnane, Ben Preece, Benny Doyle, Bradley Armstrong, Brendan Telford, Brie Jorgensen, Carley Hall, Chris Yates, Cyclone, Daniel Cribb, Daniel Johnson, Danielle O’Donohue, Dave Drayton, Guy Davis, Jake Sun, Jazmine O’Sullivan, Kane Sutton, Lochlan Watt, Madeleine Laing, Mandy McAlister, Michael Smith, Mitch Knox, Neil Griffiths, Nicholas Atkins, Paul Mulkearns, Roshan Clerke, Sam Hobson, Samuel J Fell, Sean Capel, Sky Kirkham, Sophie Blackhall-Cain, Tessa Fox, Tom Hersey, Tyler McLoughlan, Vicki Englund Interns Elijah Gall Photographers Freya Lamont, John Stubbs, John Taylor, Kane Hibberd, Markus Ravik, Rick Clifford, Sky Kirkham, Stephen Booth, Terry Soo, Tessa Fox Sales Trent Kingi sales@themusic.com.au Art Director Brendon Wellwood Art Dept Ben Nicol Admin & Accounts Jarrod Kendall, Leanne Simpson, Loretta Zoppos, Niall McCabe, Bella Bi accounts@themusic.com.au Distro distro@themusic.com.au Subscriptions store.themusic.com.au Contact Us Phone: (07) 3252 9666 info@themusic.com.au www.themusic.com.au Street: Suite 11/354, Brunswick Street Fortitude Valley QLD 4006 Postal: Locked Bag 4300 Fortitude Valley QLD 4006
18 • THE MUSIC • 12TH AUGUST 2015
To read the full interview head to theMusic.com.au
Conrad Keely has been one of the chief architects of Texan rockers ...And You Will Know Us By The Trail Of Dead for more than 20 years now and tells Steve Bell that they were always in it for the long haul.
F
or over two decades Texan-bred artrockers ...And You Will Know Us By The Trail Of Dead have been marching resolutely to the beat of their own drum, melding punk rock intensity with prog-leaning tendencies and unbridled artistic ambition to create a brand of rock’n’roll quite unlike anything seen or heard before or since. The ...Trail Of Dead aesthetic has changed significantly between albums across their career - as on most recent effort, 2014’s IX - but founding multi-instrumentalist/ vocalist Conrad Keely explains this has been more accident than design. “We’re never actually looking for directions in that sense. It’s not like there’s ever a conversation where we’re sitting down saying, ‘What direction should the next record go?’” he explains. “We always just use wherever our lives are at or whatever we’ve been listening to and whatever’s been inspiring us musically as the cue for whatever music we’re writing. It’s always been a really organic process; it doesn’t really start with any kind of concerted effort to try to do something we haven’t done before. “Every album we do, if anything, starts with an idea for an experiment. And the experiment that we wanted to try with this
one is to see what would happen if we came to the recording session with no songs at all. Unlike [2012’s] Lost Songs when we’d gone to the recording session having had nearly all the songs demoed prior to starting, for this session when we showed up we didn’t have anything - we didn’t have any music. So we spent the first three days just improvising. “But it was a stressful process because in that sense we didn’t have any idea how the music was going to turn out - none at all. So it was a little bit more frightening, but the way it turned out is how it turned out. We just built on the improvisations and the songs came out of those. Originally we’d even considered the idea of leaving them all instrumental but we’re not really an instrumental band, and when it comes down to it we have something to say with our lyrics. I know I was going through a lot at the time with my personal life, and the lyrics came - there were no two ways about it, I had stuff to sing about and stuff to write about.” Keely concedes that after 20 years the band’s trajectory isn’t quite what his younger self might have expected. “I probably would have been disappointed if anything because I’m extremely ambitious, and I’ve always dreamt of massive arenas and stuff like that,” he chuckles. “But in a way with the music that we ended up deciding to make, that path would have made no sense. At least in the modern landscape of what pop music is these days, I would never have compromised the music that we make in order to get some superficial success that making pop music would have afforded us.”
When & Where: 15 Aug, The Triffid
THE MUSIC 12TH AUGUST 2015 • 19
Music
Frontlash Dead Brother
Friendly Sounds
They’re dismantling the Big Brother house at Dreamworld, meaning that (touch wood) the horrific show will never again pollute our airwaves. No RIP.
Drop The Needle Finally spied the preview of the muchanticipated Martin Scorsese/Mick Jagger HBO music drama Vinyl, and it looks like the wait has been worthwhile. Drugs, excess and rock’n’roll as bedfellows, who woulda thunk it?
I May Be Crazy Check out online footage of Titus Andronicus being joined by The Hold Steady’s Craig Finn to smash a raucous cover of Billy Joel’s You May Be Right (as well as others including The Replacements’ Bastards Of Young). Strange but rad.
Most people would be tossing and turning, nerves and anxiety running amok, but catching up with Jan Skubiszewski aka Way Of The Eagle over coffee the morning his first full-length is released, it’s plain to Dylan Stewart that he’s well rested.
Au Revoir Pup
Backlash Ashes To Ashes Hand up if you were expecting the Poms to hand us our asses on a plate in the cricket, don’t think many saw that coming. Farewell Pup, nasty way to finish up but that’s this sporting life...
Pot Kettle Black? That a “street artist” is suing a fashion house for copyright infringement is hilarious on so many levels. ‘Cos people into graffiti are usually just so careful about protecting other people’s property rights and all, intellectual or otherwise...
Tragic Kingdom Kinda sad that No Doubt’s Gwen Stefani and Bush’s Gavin Rossdale are divorcing after 13 years – their relationship made you think anything is possible in life... 20 • THE MUSIC • 12TH AUGUST 2015
H
e’s something of a veteran on the scene and obviously has his shit together, yet Jan Skubiszewski, aka Way Of The Eagle, seems surprisingly relaxed the day his debut album is released. It helps, though, when you’re allowed a decent night’s sleep. “We’ve got a nine month old baby girl and she’s just started sleeping through the night, so I slept very well,” he laughs. Skubiszewski spent time as a visual artist before turning his attention to audio production. Since then he’s worked with John Butler Trio and The Cat Empire among others, and worked on TV and film projects like Serangoon Road and Bran Nue Dae, but says there’s naturally something different about releasing his own record. “I’ve obviously worked on records for quite a few artists over the last few years, but I’ve always had this bubbling away and wanted to finish it. It’s different doing things on your own because you have to take care of so many of the details by yourself.” With a swag of collaborations across KODO, the album is quite varied. This is in
part down to the production studios Skubiszewski worked in – Los Angeles, New York, London and his hometown, Melbourne – and the relationships he has with his collaborators – “a lot of the artists on the album are people that I’ve already worked with, but then there are others like Bobby Saint who I never knew before” – but also the way that individual tracks were created. “Dan (Sultan) and I wrote Rattlesnake together in a day and then I took it away to work on the production. Then there were other songs [like What I Want featuring Benji Lewis] that I worked on and were pretty much complete before Benji came in. “I find that after an hour or two, any nerves or intimidation that might come from working with a well-known artist are gone. Artists are often coming from the same spot; they’re very sincere people who are looking for ways to get their story across.” Talking of his newest love, his daughter Sophia, Skubiszewski’s face lights up. “She’s come to a few festivals that I’ve played at and worn those big earmuffs, and I play guitar for her most nights. She really likes the blues. Well, I think she does. That’s what she gets. “I found learning an instrument a fantastic focus, but I get it that kids often kick and scream their way through practice. I’m just going to do what my dad did; he was a musician himself and gave me a lot of opportunities [Skubiszewski learnt classical guitar growing up]. I’d never push her into something that she didn’t want to do. Hopefully she’ll love it.”
What: Kodo (Sony) When & Where: 14 Aug, The Triffid
Film
Raising The Stakes Lally Katz drinks peppermint tea and talks about ‘having it all’, with Hannah Story.
“I
guess it’s like one woman’s,” Katz begins, “that woman being me, struggle to have work and love, and sort of the imaginative space that that takes up, and the ups and downs that go with trying to achieve that, which unfortunately I still haven’t achieved in real life.” Sound familiar? It’s the plot line for many women’s lives: trying to ‘have it all’, ‘all’ being love and a career. It’s also the story of Lally Katz’ acclaimed stage show Stories I Want To Tell You In Person, which has been adapted for the screen by ABC Arts, and premieres
Stories I Want To Tell You In Person. Pic: Meredith O’shea
If I had to go through heartbreak or whatever but not use it as writing, what’s the point of it?
at MIFF in August. The stories Katz tells about her relationships, in particular with a man she calls The Full Jew, are taken directly from her real life. “I think there’s still part of me that still has that way of thinking that’s like: ‘ I can only have one or the other.’ And my shrink tells me that’s not true, but I think it is harder for women.” Katz says she doesn’t “feel bad about being exposed”: “I connect with people quite easily. I like people. I’ve always confessed everything to strangers.” We too, sitting at a cafe in Sydney’s Ultimo, connected easily with Katz, who is refreshingly frank. She speaks quickly, hands always moving, maintaining eye contact and sharing anecdotes as though we’re old friends. Katz is a warm person, a curious person, the characters for her next, or last, show always whirring away at the back of her mind. “Often the stakes in art feel higher to me than the stakes in life. I’ll do anything to make something work or to connect with an audience, so it never feels that strange.”
Her writing technique is to live her work. She says that means sometimes she dwells too long on past relationships, especially in the case of Stories I Want To Tell You In Person, which Katz has been performing across the globe, and for the film, since its premiere in Sydney in 2013. “By the time I was doing the show I had broken up with my boyfriend which the whole thing was kind of about. For about a year after he and I broke up I was still doing the stage show, and writing these scripts, and filming the show, and so I couldn’t really get over the relationship because I was sort of living in it all the time. In my mind, when I was playing myself, I had to still be in the moment of being in love with him, and being in this sort of world with him. It made me really sad in a way. And also it would make it not make sense to me: ‘Why did we break up? Because everything seems great between us in this. What happened?’ And then I’d call him and he wouldn’t pick up and I’d be like, ‘Right, right, oh right, ok, I remember now.’ Also the writing is really particular moments and times, and it’s not the whole relationship or whatever, but I sort of believe, even though everything in it is true everything’s versions of everything in life - and I started to believe the version I’d written. I’d be like, ‘That was what it was, so how did...’ “For a long time I was always like, ‘Everything has to go to writing,’ and then the minute that gets threatened, I couldn’t live without that. I think what I realised as time goes on that I get along quite well with myself, and living in my world of writing, and it’s great to have adventures and meet characters. It would be great if sometimes I could see relationships as not just being a source of that, or they get mixed up in that because I think that’s what ruins them sometimes. “My aunt actually said to me when I was in New Jersey, because I was in New Jersey at the beginning of the year, and I’d been seeing this Mexican guy in Texas and it had busted up really bad, and I was in New Jersey heartbroken, and my aunt said, ‘You need to start falling in love with boring people you don’t want to write about because you keep having these disastrous relationships.’ I said the problem is a lot of the time the guys that I get obsessed with, we don’t actually have that much to say to each other, I’m just really interested in them as a character. And often when I have a lot to say to a person I don’t feel the need to write about them because we can talk to each other. And she said, ‘Maybe you should try and be with someone you can actually talk to.’ When I sort of feel like something’s going to make writing not happen or work, that’s a worse feeling I think. Now I feel really loyal to that and I think, ‘Whatever, heartbreaks will come and go and they’re quite useful in some ways,’ but as long as I can write, it’s ok. “If I had to go through heartbreak or whatever but not use it as writing, what’s the point of it?” Katz is still open to having it all: “Now my feeling is just follow your life, follow what it is that you love, and then if you can kind of have things work outside of that then great, they will, probably, but not to try and force it to happen, because that doesn’t seem to hold.”
What: Stories I Want To Tell You In Person 9.30pm Tuesdays on ABC THE MUSIC 12TH AUGUST 2015 • 21
Music
Stage Crafted
Releases
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Hugo Race & True Spirit The Spirit Rough Velvet/MGM
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Bullet For My Valentine Venom Sony
The Basics The Age Of Entitlement The Three Basics
22 • THE MUSIC • 12TH AUGUST 2015
UK band The Maccabees’ new album is about “the night time, the inner-city stripped back, and about the band dynamic again”, frontman Orlando Weeks tells Samuel J Fell.
A
lbum number four for UK guitar band The Maccabees is a different beast - and it was always going to be. Marks To Prove It, with its more strippedback, bare-bones sound, a fair step away from their Mercury Prize-nominated third cut, Given To The Wild - is, as frontman Orlando Weeks explains, an album of songs made for the stage. And listening to it, you can see he’s right. The songs build slowly yet end as behemoths, seemingly designed for a festival stage, after dark, big light show, anthemic. The reason? A direct reaction to the multi-layered, complex songs from this album’s predecessor, songs that, while on disc, were complete, on stage became too much to handle. Marks To Prove It is the obvious artistic reaction. “With the last record, one of the things it let itself down on was that some of the [songs] were just so layered and lush that when played live, they just seemed underwhelming, so we ended up having a backing track we played along to... playing to a click, it just didn’t feel like we were playing as a band. “So when we were a little way into the recording process with this record, we realised that this could be something that could help us put a bit of structure into what we’re making, it needed to work in the room - if something
didn’t work with one guitar, on the last record we’d layer it and layer it and layer it... but on this one we thought, if one guitar can’t do it, then one guitar and a piano, or one guitar and a saxophone or something. That became a bit of a rule of thumb.” The result is, as mentioned, a more sparse sound, songs that can be more faithfully replicated live, which is where the band truly shine. Another aspect in which this album differs from Given To The Wild, is in its ethos, so to speak, the way it “became about the night time, the inner-city stripped back, and about the band dynamic again,” as guitarist Felix White says in the album’s accompanying release notes. “Yeah, more often than not, the stuff we agreed was working, worked when we played it back at night,” Weeks concurs. “The stuff I was writing, and the music, they both informed each other, and how I pictured things... was more often than not, at night. It took care of itself, really.” As Weeks goes on to explain, this album was more about the everyday, the inner-city real life. It comes across in his honest delivery, in the songwriting, as a whole. The reception garnered by Given To The Wild has given the band confidence. “Yeah, that record [had us as] not just an indie band from London, but as a band,” Weeks explains. “Not that we got taken more seriously, but we got to start again a bit, and it proved to ourselves that we could make something different to what we’d made in the past.” And it’s this confidence that in the end truly fuels Marks To Prove It.
What: Marks To Prove It (Fiction/Caroline) When & Where: 31 Dec - 3 Jan, Falls Festival, North Byron Parklands
THE MUSIC 12TH AUGUST 2015 • 23
Film
Star Spotter In his latest film, acclaimed US filmmaker Judd Apatow teams up with Amy Schumer. Apatow tells Neil Griffiths how listening to popular radio jock Howard Stern’s show in 2011, in which Schumer appeared as a guest, opened the door to his latest film.
J
udd Apatow has worked with some of Hollywood’s biggest and brightest talent - Adam Sandler, Steve Carell, Seth Rogen, Paul Rudd, Jonah Hill; the list goes on. In his latest film, Trainwreck, he worked with arguably the biggest name in comedy right now, and that’s quite possibly changed the stand-up comic’s life. “I just had a gut instinct that she was a real storyteller,” the 47-year-old recalls of listening to Schumer on Howard Stern’s radio show back in 2011. “Her act had a lot of great jokes, but not long stories, and when I heard her on Howard Stern, I thought, ‘I don’t think she realises how good a storyteller she is.’” After meeting with the actress and encouraging her to write something for him to look at, Apatow was shocked at
It was thrilling to get pages from her.
just how impressive her work was, given she’d never starred in a feature film before. “From the very beginning all of her writing was really strong and it was thrilling to get pages from her. She was very willing to write from a personal place; sometimes you ask people to do that and they refuse. She was really brutally frank and open and vulnerable right from the start and you have to do that to write well.” The new romantic comedy stars Schumer as the lead character - a commitmentphobic woman who falls for a sports doctor, played by popular comedian and Saturday Night Live alumnus, Bill Hader. While the actor is one of the best comedic talents going right now, this is the first film in which he plays a romantic lead rather than the outlandish, eccentric characters he was best known for on SNL. Initially, Apatow only called Hader in to read for the film, without any intention of casting him in the role. “I always wanted him to do it, but I wanted to make sure the chemistry with Amy was great. Bill and I had developed a movie for years; we never got it to a place 24 • THE MUSIC • 12TH AUGUST 2015
where it was ready to shoot and I always wanted to find a project that would show off what he’s like in real life; he’s an incredibly charming, likeable, hilarious person and just as funny being subtle as playing broader characters. “When Amy started writing this, in the back of my head, I thought, ‘I think this could be the one for Bill Hader,’ but I can’t force that on Amy, I had to make sure she feels like there’s chemistry and that this would be something special.” As well as the two strong leads and supporting roles from notable stars such as Colin Quinn and Vanessa Bayer, a special mention must be given to athletes WWE superstar John Cena and basketball living legend LeBron James, who also feature in the film. Cena, who plays a sexually confused boyfriend of Amy, and James, the sensitive best friend to Hader’s character, Aaron, arguably steal every scene in which they respectively feature, surprising even Apatow. “I thought they would be good, but I didn’t know they were that good. John Cena really made me laugh. His audition was very, very funny and then we did a table read and he was even funnier... but then he just tore it down. LeBron completely blindsided us with how hysterical he was. He showed up and was just as loose and hilarious as anybody we work with.” With news that the Cleveland Cavaliers star has signed a film deal with Warner studios, rumours are rife that James is planning to star in a sequel to the 1996 comedy hit, Space Jam. It’s fair to say Trainwreck is to thank for it. “I’m one of the few people that’s found a way to make LeBron James more money,” laughs Apatow. Apatow’s directorial work has very often featured stars who were on the rise. Carell’s The 40-Year-Old Virgin came out in 2005 20 just as the Oscar-nominated actor began to fame for his TV show, The Office, and receive international in a lead star in Apatow’s 1999 series Freaks & Rogen, while w Geeks, put pu his name on the map with 2007’s Knocked Up. Schumer seems to be in that same field and while it isn’t intentional, Apatow admits he does love working with fresh intention talent. “I jjust like helping people try to figure out how they can go to the next level; that’s just interesting to me. It’s especially interesting when they don’t know at all how they would come across as a lead in a movie and it’s fun to try and help people define their personae. It’s also fun to work with people when they care so much - when you’re trying to break through, you’ll never care as much as that moment.” Meanwhile his latest book, Sick In The Head: Conversation About Life & Comedy, is an homage to his love of comedy, interviews the director has conducted with massive names like Jerry Seinfeld, Steve Martin, Chris Rock and more over some 30 years. As an aspiring teenage stand-up, Apatow felt the only way he could learn the tricks of the trade was by meeting and interviewing some of his biggest comedy heroes. His ambition resulted in his lying to publicists to obtain interviews, which included a visit to Jerry Seinfeld’s New York apartment in 1983 - Apatow was still just 16 years old - and even a three-hour train ride to meet Weird Al Yankovic. “I just so wanted to meet comedians that I was fearless due to my need to understand how comedy worked. I loved talking to them, I couldn’t have been more excited. I just had to know what they knew.”
What: Trainwreck In cinemas
ON SALE NOW STORE.THEMUSIC.COM.AU
THE MUSIC 12TH AUGUST 2015 • 25
Eat / g n i t t e G Eat/Drink
Chicken Sweet ‘n’ sour: Soak your chicken in a brine of salt, brown sugar, water and white vinegar, then dry rub with brown sugar, paprika, chilli powder, pepper, garlic, cumin, nutmeg and salt. After roasting, sauce with honey and cider vinegar. Tangy: Rub with sumac, chilli powder, oregano, garlic cloves, olive oil and lemon juice. Serve with shredded spinach mixed with Greek yoghurt and lemon wedges. Masala: For a Masala roast, add lemon juice, minced ginger, minced garlic, green chilli, salt, coriander, garam masala and butter to your rub, pop the bird in foil and cook for 45 minutes on medium heat.
y t s a o R Pork
Italian-inspired: Coat pork with balsamic vinegar, leave to soak, then add olive oil and chunks of garlic into the flesh. Rub the meat with salt, pepper, rosemary leaves and fresh thyme sprigs to cook for 20 minutes.
Fragrant: Rub with garlic, crumbed bay leaves, paprika, salt, chilli and olive oil. Turn regularly during the roast and baste each side with a mixture of coconut milk, olive oil and minced garlic.
Decadent: Rub the pork with oil, rosemary, salt and pepper, sear for about four minutes. Cook in foil in the oven for 15 minutes whilst melting butter, garlic, red onion and red wine to a pan to make a jus.
Vegos and vegans, sorry, nothing to see here. Omnis, it’s all about roast meats. And some seasoning ideas. Lamb
Illustrations Brendon Wellwood
Classic: Cover your lamb with salt, pepper and olive oil, then rub on fresh thyme, rosemary, lemon and garlic. Stick the cloves into the skin as well as rub. Refreshing: Olive oil to start, then rub on brown sugar, mint, lemon rind and oregano. Sweet ‘n’ savoury: Combine salt, pepper, Dijon mustard, orange rind, honey and crushed basil together for a wet rub.
26 • THE MUSIC • 12TH AUGUST 2015
Fruity: Mix sliced apple, fennel, onion, olive oil, salt pepper and cider vinegar to the pork, cover with foil and bake for 45 minutes. Add extra oil after about 30 minutes.
Beef Rich: For a dry rub, combine paprika, garlic powder, salt, cinnamon, cumin and dried parsley together. Spicy: For a spicy wet rub, add pepper, garlic powder, onion powder, rosemary leaves, thyme, oregano and cayenne pepper to olive oil and leave on the beef overnight. Asian-inspired: Add to soy sauce some fresh lemon juice, minced fresh ginger, lemon peel, honey and minced garlic. Leave overnight for a more tender result.
/ Drink Eat/Drink
Foodie News
Golden Gaytime Now Comes In Tubs If you haven’t heard the news yet, Australia’s iconic ice cream Golden Gaytime is now available in tub form. Yep, you can now share the yellow/brown/white deliciousness with all your mates - after all, “It’s hard to have a Gaytime on your own,” but this solves that problem.
Streets released the 1.25L tub version following a grassroots social media campaign by Sydney bloke Jesse James McElroy - who many have pointed out works at an advertising agency - but Streets have denied any link between the Gaytime tub release and McElroy’s campaign, saying the timing was just a coincidence. Look, we DGAF either way as long as the GG tub’s here to stay.
And Now, It’s Time For A Roast Roasts are amazing any time of year, but particularly in winter.
Hot Spot
Their very name screams, “YOU WILL EAT ME AND I WILL WARM YOU AND STRENGTHEN YOU, SO THAT YOU MAY MAKE IT THROUGH THE HARSH COLD AND BURST FORTH INTO SPRING, NOURISHED.” Or something like that. Pubs and restaurants often still do a Sunday roast, because that’s what the people want. Isn’t it weird that your simple olive oil, S&P, garlic and herb seasoning can produce a result just as delicious as some super fancy, 20-ingredient marinade? It’s truly a versatile dish that holds a lot of ritualistic, cultural, historical and familial meaning. Trends will come and trends will go, but roasts are forever.
Lostboys
LostBoys cafe bar is setting itself apart in more ways than one. Words Kim Everson. Take one step in the door and the childlike, Peter Pan atmosphere will immediately capture your attention. With the menus placed inside fairy-tale books and a treehouse-style bar out the back - which will soon be selling all organic ciders, beers and spirits - this place is truly unique. Deciding what to eat? Chatterboxes scattered across the tables will help you decide between the delicious corn fritter and halloumi stack or the classic eggs benedict for your next brekkie. As well as being all organic and vegetarian, Lost Boys donate a portion of their proceeds to charities including Climate Friendly, which raises awareness for the prevention of global warming. What’s particularly cool about this cafe is their support of the local music industry. Recently introducing the concept of free meals for touring artists passing through Brissy, owner Pixie is paying it forward in the best way she can, through delicious, organic food for the struggling artist, acknowledging that it’s a “long and peasanty road to success!” Lost Boys: where you will feel good not just about the food, but about your entire visit. 694 Ann St, Fortitude Valley
THE MUSIC 12TH AUGUST 2015 • 27
Visual Arts
Big Ideas There more to Amanda Parer than giant illuminated rabbits, as Cyclone discovers.
A
ustralian multi-disciplinary visual artist Amanda Parer creates spectacular and playful installations that nonetheless prompt serious conversations about capitalism, post-colonialism and environmentalism. She’s best known for her giant illuminated, inflatable rabbits which, collectively titled Intrude, first appeared at 2014’s Vivid Sydney. Intrude has since travelled globally. “I currently have three sets of the art installation kit Intrude,” Parer reveals. Now the kitsch bunnies are bound for Maroochy Music And Visual Arts Festival on the Sunshine Coast. “It’s great that such a
intrude
My visual language has been taken from the environmental beauty and drama that is there.
interference with fragile habitats. Yet Parer’s concern crystallised when, at 27, she travelled to the Galápagos Islands with her uncle, David Parer, a natural history filmmaker. One day she went diving among whale sharks and reef fish. The next morning Parer was horrified to see an illegal fishing trawler in the same area. “My perception of this incident was that it was an example of our arrogance as a species in not being able to demonstrate forethought to our effect on the environment while being stewards of the planet.” Intrude tackles that “arrogance” from another angle. Parer chose the rabbit as an allegory because of its status as an introduced, now feral, species in Australia - yet traditionally it’s also sentimentalised. “I use the idea that the bunnies of Intrude would be initially considered ‘cute bunnies’ as a hook to get people into the more serious themes within the piece. Upon approaching the installation from a distance, viewers see white, glowing rabbits. As they get closer, the viewer becomes dwarfed - and they might feel a slight air of menace in the forms. “My main concern in making an installation art work is to create a spectacle to entice the viewer. I enjoy changing people’s usual space. When these works are installed, viewers seemingly do not want to just take a quick photo and run - they want to take time and sit among the pieces, involve themselves or even socialise among them... As a result, people being creative with their digital photos and video they have taken of my art installations, and sharing them on social media is art creating art. I love it!”
What: Intrude When & Where: 22 Aug, Maroochy Music And Visual Arts Festival, Horton Park Golf Course
Entitle
beautiful part of the world is going to host a festival of such high calibre. I am very excited.” Parer grew up in the NSW Blue Mountains, majoring in painting at Sydney College Of The Arts before relocating to Tasmania, seeking natural surrounds for raising a family and tp, crucially, concentrate on her practice. The move proved “beneficial”. “The work I was producing in Sydney was inspired from internal ideas. Since living in Tasmania, my visual language has been taken from the environmental beauty and drama that is there.” Her art examines the impact of humanity’s 28 • THE MUSIC • 12TH AUGUST 2015
Music
Bigger Brighter World
Thomas Calder from The Trouble With Templeton - last year’s winner of the esteemed Grant McLennan Fellowship - explains to Steve Bell just why the prestigious award is such a boon for local songsmiths.
S
ince 2007 Queensland songwriters have been eligible for the Grant McLennan Fellowship, the prestigious $25,000 award which allows the lucky winner to relocate to New York, London or Berlin for up to six months to further their artistic pursuits. Named in remembrance of Grant McLennan - the much-missed co-founder of The GoBetweens who sadly passed away in 2006 the Fellowship is an incredible opportunity for local artists, as Thomas Calder from The Trouble With Templeton found after being victorious in 2014 and decamping to London for a life-changing sojourn. “It was incredible, I achieved everything that I would have hoped that I would get from an experience like that and more,” Calder marvels. “When I went over there I knew it would be amazing, of course, but I didn’t know exactly how it was going to be amazing; whether it would be an industry focus or a personal growth. For me it ended up being a really big personal journey, and as clichéd and terrible as it sounds I think I came back a different person than what I went over as, which was great.”
Having entered the award primarily as a big fan of The Go-Betweens, upon winning Calder chose London mainly because his UK label was based there, but it seems that the main benefits were gleaned by the introspection that the Fellowship afforded. “I was over there for three-and-a-half months and having such a long time over there enabled me to spend the first part of it really being solitary, which I found was really, really good for me,” he admits. “Having the opportunity to get away from where you live and the people you’re surrounded by - just the life that you live normally - is a really good way of clarifying things and getting some perspective on who you are and the life that you live at the moment. For me that was a really nice way to start the trip, just being really self-reflective and solitary and taking some time to think about myself and my art and what I want to do with my art was a really beautiful thing. It was never a plan but it ended up that way, and I think it was a perfect way to explore things and really get excited about music and art and life.” And naturally these personal insights seeped into Calder’s creative endeavours. “I never really stop writing, but the type of things I was writing over there were great as well,” he enthuses. “If you apply those lessons to a genre then you’re not being held back by what you think your music should be or how you define what your music is. It can be really freeing and allow you to explore all different types of sounds, knowing at the end of the day that it’s all coming from you so you can’t really do anything wrong in terms of how your music sounds, or what genre it is, or what you’re writing about.”
Brisbane Cafe Offers Free Food To Touring Musicians The reality for 99% of musicians is more akin to swigging from the bottle than bathing in champagne. One Brisbane café is taking the initiative to “feed the starving artist.” Literally. LostBoys offers free food for visiting tour acts – and not just any ol’ pleb grub either. It’s fresh, vegan, vegetarian, local and organic sustainable nourishment. Inspired by the lack of cash flow to her “successful” muso friends, venue owner Pixie decided to take action. “To the outside world [they’re] this really great, successful band, but I know that they’re struggling, and it sucks,” she said. “It’s been a struggle at the best of times, especially financially, so if we can support a touring band with a free feed… everything makes a difference.” Still in its very early stages, the responses have been uniformly positive. It’s clear this is a cause that runs near and dear to the hearts of not just the community-minded entrepreneur but her support team too. “We don’t expect anything in return; obviously, if they like it and post on Instagram about it, that works for us too … but, I mean, it’s about helping those guys out how we can.” To read the full interview head to theMusic.com.au
Head to www.qmusic.com.au for full eligibility requirements and guidelines. Applications close 31 Aug. LostBoys
THE MUSIC 12TH AUGUST 2015 • 29
Industry
Back From The Dead
With The Foundry returning to the live music front after an enforced layoff it made us think of some other high profile music rooms which enjoyed a second lease on life;
The Second Coming
The Fillmore, San Fransisco The Foundry Bar. Pic: MarkusRavik
Iconic San Fran venue The Fillmore was made famous by promoter Bill Graham at the height of the ‘60s as a hub for the thriving counter-culture and housed every cool band of the era from venue mainstays The Grateful Dead through to Hendrix, The Who, Pink Floyd and The Doors. It was extensively damaged by the Loma Prieta earthquake in 1989 and laid dormant for five years, before reopening with a surprise show by The Smashing Pumpkins in 1994.
Stubbs BBQ, Austin Anyone who’s been to SxSW will attest that Stubbs BBQ is an amazing band venue with a great vibe, but it actually started out as a BBQ restaurant in Lubbock, Texas which became famous in the ‘70s and ‘80s for hosting everyone from Johnny Cash to Willy Nelson. When that room burned to the ground in 1984 owner Charles Stubblefield pulled up stumps and relocated the whole venue to Austin.
The Tote
The Tote, Collingwood At the beginning of 2010 infamous Collingwood venue The Tote was forced to close its doors due to increased security costs caused by bureaucratic bungling. This sparked rallies, petitions, public debate and eventually an amendment to liquor licensing laws which led to The Tote officially reopening to live music in June, 2010 after five months of enforced quiet. 30 • THE MUSIC • 12TH AUGUST 2015
When The Foundry launched in Brisbane back in March, it was heralded as a game-changer for the local music industry. It wasn’t to be - setbacks scuttled the nascent venue before it could fulfil its potential - but now it’s back and ready to make good on its promise, Pat Balfe and Martine Cotton tell Mitch Knox.
I
t’s been 230 years since Scottish poet Robert Burns first wrote about the bestlaid schemes of mice and men and their tendency to go completely tits up, but it’s a caution that remains as relevant as ever in 2015, as the organisers of Brisbane’s new venue and creative hub, The Foundry, found out following their all-too-brief emergence onto the city’s scene a few months ago. The venue may be just about ready to return to the Valley with a relaunch party featuring Dune Rats, Palms, Orphans Orphans and Major Leagues on 20 August, but the wound cut deeply at the time. “Obviously, it was pretty stressful and pretty upsetting, because we’d all just put so much into it, and we were all so fuckin’ excited about it,” The Foundry booker Pat Balfe tells The Music of the team’s discovery that the venue’s building required further structural work before they could stay operational. “Like, the first couple of nights were sweet; the industry night was a real good one to do, and then Velociraptor, like, even though the floors were fuckin’ shaking and going crazy and we had to kind of cancel it, they still got to play most of their set and everyone had a fuckin’ sick time.” Despite the heartbreak of having to
shut things down, however, Balfe is philosophical about the situation, and believes the obstacle was something of a blessing in disguise. “I also think, like, the time that we’ve had in between March and now has really given us a chance to solidify our systems and all our backend stuff, and really, really come back into it 100% perfect, because we had a pretty short turnaround time between January and March to get that stuff together,” he says. “So it’s given us some perspective and given us an opportunity just to really nut everything out and figure out what we want to do and how we want to do it.” Among the latter developments to have come out of The Foundry’s forced hiatus is, arguably, one of its greatest new strengths - the addition of the ground-floor Foundry Records store/cafe/hangout/venue, to be managed by Music Industry Inside Out founder and community mainstay Martine Cotton, with a little launch assistance from ex-Skinny’s head honcho Simon Homer - a prospect about which Cotton is delighted. “I think it’s going to be an incredibly exciting project, because it’s going to become a part of that big community that The Foundry is building, and I think The Valley has been lacking a good central spot to go to in the daytime,” she says. “It’s just going to create a really beautiful scene, I think.” “I’m really hoping to support as much local music as we can through record sales and merch sales ... and we’re gonna be opening till 7pm, which means people can come through after work or on their way to gigs and browse through the records and maybe have a beer before they set off for their adventures a bit later on.” That’s presuming, of course, they even want to leave in the first place - after all, as Cotton explains, “There’s a stage, and we’re gonna have a proper PA set up, so we’re going to feature a lot of regular in-stores - live performances and signings - so that’s going to be a big part of what we do.”
When & Where: 20 Aug, The Foundry
THE MUSIC 12TH AUGUST 2015 • 31
Music
British India’s Declan Melia’s Conflicting Thoughts On Apple Music
Sacred Songs
Have Apple finally been beaten to the punch? I never used Spotify. This wasn’t to do with some protest against loss of royalties associated with music sales, I actually just didn’t like the interface. You have all the music in the world at your fingertips, but it never felt like it was actually yours. Besides, I liked iTunes. Even in my
Oscar Dawson and Tim Carroll from Holy Holy recorded over their labelmates’ old tapes when money was tight. Bryget Chrisfield hears their confession. refusal to embrace Spotify I knew that the way people consume music was going to change enormously. When Apple announced Apple Music, it was clear that the age of streaming wasn’t coming, it was here and, as an avid music consumer and listener, I didn’t want to be left behind. After using Apple Music for only a few moments I concluded bluntly that there is no foreseeable reason that anyone using it should ever purchase, or even own, music again. As a music consumer this was appealing. As a musician it was sobering. The age of musical entitlement is over. Music was a product and now it’s a service. And like all other services it comes with a monthly bill. Apple Music isn’t perfect. The ads you see about it being the “perfect home for both music lovers and musicians” are both false and manipulative. However, sign-up figures are, naturally, astounding. It seems then that music streamers (ie. most people in the Western world) will have to choose a side on the Spotify and Apple Music battle lines.
To read the full story head to theMusic.com.au 32 • THE MUSIC • 12TH AUGUST 2015
H
oly Holy’s Tim Carroll and Oscar Dawson first met as volunteer English teachers in Southeast Asia during their gap years. Carroll reminisces about carefree afternoons spent playing “sixa-side soccer on this basketball court” with the locals before they “moved around and went right up to the north”: “We were staying at a Buddhist monastery both meditating with monks at, like, 4am.” Dawson interjects, “That only lasted for me for a coupla days,” blaming his lack of flexibility and “the wooden floor” for the uncomfortable nature of this activity. “There was one funny technological relic that we made use of over there, which was the mini-disc,” Dawson remembers. “Our old friend who we were travelling with, Marcus, had this mini-disc [player] and he had a microphone so we could record onto mini-disc. And so we had a couple of guitars and we recorded a few songs whilst we were over there, which, I don’t know where those mini-discs would be now, but they’re definitely not Holy Holy songs and I don’t think that we’d ever want them to see the light of day.” Carroll laughs nervously. This outfit relies heavily on the wonders of modern technology for their songwriting because they’re based in different states:
Dawson lives in Melbourne and Carroll has moved to Tasmania. “In terms of our preproduction, we’ll quite often do a thing where I record a sketchy little idea just straight onto an iPhone - just with, like, one verse and a chorus idea - and then I’ll send it to Oz [Dawson] and then maybe about two weeks later Ozzie’s reply will come, and that will be multitracked with guitars and bass. And then I’ll kinda have a think about that, and then go back and adjust it or put vocals on it. And then we’ll send it to our drummer [Ryan Strathie] in Brisbane and then he’ll add drums to it and we can get to a pretty nice position within that process.” Dawson believes that “the povertystricken way” they initially recorded tracks “actually works out best for the music”. “We do a take and if we decide we’re gonna do another one, we just record directly over it,” he explains. Carroll elaborates, “We’d be recording over Ball Park Music and, like, Emma Louise records, which was kinda funny ‘cause you’d be hearing these songs and you’d go, ‘Oh, yeah, just erase that now we’re going on top.’ And sometimes we’d be like, ‘Oh, we’ve got this much left on the tape,’ and it would be influencing how long we could play for - how long the songs could be. Looking back on it now it’s kinda funny, ‘cause I’m sure if we asked Sony for some more tape they would allow us to record a bit longer.”
What: When The Storms Would Come (Wonderlick/Sony Music) When & Where: 21 Aug, Elsewhere, Surfers Paradise; 22 Aug, The Zoo
Literature
Godfather Complex
Michael Gudinski may be the most important figure in the Australian music scene, but author Stuart Coupe tells Steve Bell that he doesn’t always get what he wants.
S
tuart Coupe’s new biography Gudinski: The Godfather Of Australian Rock’N’Roll tells the fascinating life story of Australian music mogul Michael Gudinski, a man who for decades has cast such a huge shadow over Australian music via his touring companies, record labels and booking agencies. The tome paints the picture of a passionate and driven man who loves his music, but also one not without his foibles, and along the way shines a light on the behind-the-scenes machinations of the industry - the partying and hedonism is all there, but it’s the human condition and relationships which prove most fascinating. “Michael has never wanted a book, for reasons I still don’t know he’s just totally opposed to one,” Coupe explains. “I first started talking to him back in 2003 because he was a big figure in The Promoters book, and I said, ‘What about a whole book about you?’ He was, like, ‘There’s never going to be a book. Don’t want a book’. This went on for about ten years, and then about 18 months ago my publisher and I just decided that it’s too important a story - I don’t think there’s any question that he’s anything other than the most significant figure in the Australian music industry in the last 50 years.” Gudinski was granted the right of perusal of the manuscript to correct factual errors (he
eventually made only minor corrections) - did the fact that he and Coupe have a history together contribute towards an element of trust? “He knows that I’m fond of him, and he claims that he read it all, and when he called up he said, ‘There’s a few things that I’m pretty fired up about’, and I said, ‘Michael, if you’d called me up and said, “I love every page of this book” then I wouldn’t have done my job,” Coupe chuckles. “You’re not meant to like all of it. People aren’t going to take a book seriously if it’s 350 pages of ‘Michael Gudinski is God, Michael Gudinski does everything right, Michael is a genius’.” I said we can deal with 185 pages of ‘Michael is God’! I had to remind him with all due respect that I kind of like him and asked whether he’d like me to send him a list of people who were less affectionate about him who can string a sentence together. I said to him, ‘Not only can I spell defamation but I know what it means. It’s going to be okay’.” And this wart-and-all approach is partly why Gudinski... ends up such a fascinating rendering of this larger-than-life character. “I’m hoping that people get some insight into the machinations - ‘How does this all happen? How do you build an independent label up to the point where you can sell it for tens of millions of dollars to Rupert Murdoch? How do you negotiate with The Rolling Stones?’” Coupe tells. “Michael’s gone through numerous times where things have been really precarious, and I’m hoping it’s both entertaining and that I’ve captured a semblance of the erratic craziness that is Michael.”
6 Key Michael Gudinski Moments
St Kilda Saints
1966 Attends St Kilda's first (and so far only) premiership
1972 Opens Mushroom Records
1975 Signs Skykooks and Split Enz
Michael Gudinski & Kylie Minogue
1987 Reluctantly signs Kylie Minogue
1998 Sells remaining Mushroom Records shares to News Corp for rumoured $40M
The Rolling Stones. Pic: Stephen Booth
2014 What: Gudinski: The Godfather Of Australian Rock’N’Roll (Hachette)
Promotes The Rolling Stones' tour of Australia
THE MUSIC 12TH AUGUST 2015 • 33
In Focus MofoIsDead Pic: Terry Soo
Member answering/role: Paul Galagher - guitar/vocals How long have you been together? Formally about four years, over a seven year period. It’s a long story. Luke joined about a year ago. How did you all meet? I met Juddy onstage; I jammed with his band for a few songs and then watched him sack his drummer mid-gig, but the drummer finished the gig, like a pro. I met Luke side of stage at a gig he played with Juddy... a long time after that other gig. You’re on tour in the van - which band or artist is going to keep the most people happy if we throw them on the stereo? Iron Maiden. Would you rather be a busted broke-but-revered Hank Williams figure or some kind of Metallica monster? I guess the Metallica monster just to try something new. Which Brisbane bands before you have been an inspiration (musically or otherwise)? For me, The Veronicas and Violent Soho. Juddy says Powderfinger. Luke says The Butterfly Effect. What part do you think Brisbane plays in the music you make? A very substantial part in our new EP titled BRISNEYLAND. The highs and lows - finding a great milkshake, and reading great reviews of milkshakes only to discover first hand they are in fact terrible. It’s heartbreaking. Is your band responsible for more make-outs or break-ups? Why? I have no evidence of us being responsible, but I have noticed a lot of people making out at our shows. Sexy riffs I suppose. What’s in the pipeline for the band in the short term? New single in August, new EP in September, some live shows, some videos, then we start work on the next record. Rinse and repeat, always repeat! MofoIsDead play The Zoo on Saturday 15 August.
34 • THE MUSIC • 12TH AUGUST 2015
THE MUSIC 12TH AUGUST 2015 • 35
Music
FALLS MUSIC & ARTS FESTIVAL
The waiting is over, with Falls Music & Arts Festival laying out a massive line-up for this year’s event, boasting the likes of Foals, Bloc Party and Disclosure headlining a massive bill.
Taking Their Time
The first artists confirmed to perform at the picturesque Byron, Lorne and Marion Bay sites don’t disappoint, with the multi-day music, arts, comedy and camping festival covering all genres with homegrown and international talent.
YOB frontman and guitarist Mike Scheidt tells Jonty Czuchwicki that it’s all about the riff. Disclosure
Here’s the moment you’ve been waiting for:
Alpine, The Avener, Birds Of Tokyo, Bloc Party, Børns, Courtney Barnett, Disclosure, Django Django, Foals, Gang Of Youths, Gary Clark Jr, Halsey, Hiatus Kaiyote, Hilltop Hoods, King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard, Kurt Vile & The Violators, Little May, The Maccabees, Mac DeMarco, Meg Mac, Oh Wonder, Paul Kelly & Merri Soul Sessions featuring Clairy Browne, Dan Sultan, Kira Piru, Vika & Linda Bull, Rufus, Seth Sentry, Toro Y Moi, Young Fathers with more to be announced.
And the band’s locked in for the Boogie Nights component of the festival are: Art V Science, El Vez, Fleetmac Wood, ‘Weird Al’ Yankovic and more.
Falls is happening at Lorne, 28 Dec – 1 Jan; Byron Bay, 31 Dec – 3 Jan; and Marion Bay, 29 Dec – 1 Jan . 36 • THE MUSIC • 12TH AUGUST 2015
“I
f I need to put on some modulation or tricks to make a riff work then the riff’s not good enough.” The statement is stark yet profound, but for YOB vocalist and guitarist Mike Scheidt, of arguably one of the most profound doom bands in the world, crafting good riffs is the epitome of what makes their music great. “The riff should sound great on a fucking acoustic guitar. It should just work… at that basic level. If different kind of effects and weird things can add a lot to it then great, but for me I just want songs that work.” Scheidt’s songs are obviously working, as YOB’s most recent record, Clearing The Path To Ascend, has been universally lauded, but, if the band has been kicking since 1996, why has it taken so long to reach Australia? At this point Scheidt is introspective. “It took us a long time to get to Europe too. I mean we just released our sixth record by the time we got to Europe. We always moved really slow.” The reality is a mirror image of the band’s trundling sound, but there’s reason embedded within YOB’s history that explains why their international exposure is branching out slowly. “I mean, ten years ago, twelve years ago, fifteen years ago doom shows had very small crowds even for the big heavy legendary bands. There just weren’t big shows. We pretty much had to max out our credit cards to go on tour
and you lose your job. For all of us in YOB with kids and stuff it just wasn’t a scenario.” It may come as a surprise, but YOB have never written a record for the purpose of getting out on the road. “We’ve never really done anything that wasn’t at our pace. The music that we’ve written has been primarily to satisfy ourselves and satisfy that inner need to write and play… Everything that’s good, that’s come to us, has really come to us out of that music. It’s come out of us working on our rehearsals and living our lives.” If you had been on the line the authenticity in his voice would’ve burnt a hole through your heart. Scheidt has collaborated on the design of his own distortion pedal, which he has found “works really well with a number of different kinds of amplifiers,” but on finding the perfect guitar rig, “I don’t think there is any guitarist out there that is going to tell you ‘Oh I have the perfect rig, it’s the perfect one hundred per cent everything I want.’ We’re all way too neurotic and hard to please for that. I think it happens sometimes if you’re lucky; once in a while you’ll have a moment where your tone is perfect. You go ‘Ah oh my God!’… and then it goes away.” While Yob will perform material old and new, the duration of their set is not absolute. “Usually we will play for an hour… sometimes we play for an hour and half or even an hour and forty-five minutes… It’s usually at the request of the people there.”
When & Where: 23 Aug, Crowbar
Indie Indie
The Getaway Plan
Plini
Eden Mulholland
Avaberee
Album Focus
Have You Heard
Single Focus
EP Focus
Answered by: Matthew Wright
When did you start making music and why? When I was about ten I used to record guitar on cassette tape, put it in a different player and play it back while recording a new layer. I thought I’d invented multitracking.
Single title? River Of Hurt
Answered by: Genevieve Bufalino
What’s the song about? This song is about heartbreak, how it runs like a river through the course of our lives.
EP Title? In Your Arms I Found My Secrets
Album title? Dark Horses Where did the title of your new album come from? It was taken from the title track of the same name. The meaning of the term sits perfectly with where we’re at musically and as people at this point in time. How many releases do you have now? We have three full-lengths: Other Voices, Other Rooms (2009), Requiem (2011) and Dark Horses (2015). How long did it take to write/ record? We’re always writing. There are a few songs that are six-seven years old. The recording process took us just over three months which is pretty good for us. Was anything in particular inspiring you during the making? Mainly the drive to come back and make a name for ourselves again. We’ve been away for a while so we were very focussed on making the biggest and best impact we could. What’s your favourite song on it? The title track, Dark Horses. Without sounding egotistical, I think it’s the most perfect song we’ve ever written. When and where is your launch/ next gig? Woolly Mammoth, 2 Oct; The Spotted Cow, Toowoomba, 3 Oct. More dates on our website. Website link for more info? thegetawayplan.com
Sum up your musical sound in four words? Music for all people. If you could support any band in the world - past or present - who would it be? Present: Dream Theater, past: Led Zeppelin. If you could only listen to one album forevermore, what would it be and why? At the moment probably Corinne Bailey Rae’s self-titled album, because it’s my “I don’t know what to listen to” go-to right now and never fails to be awesome! Greatest rock’n’roll moment of your career to date? I did a powerslide in rehearsal and left a black shoe mark on the pale timber floor - probably the most disrespectful thing I’ve ever done to someone else’s property in my life. Rock’n’roll. Why should people come and see your band? Troy Wright is a ridiculously good drummer. The rest of us are pretty good too, and there’ll be free water. When and where for your next gig? Crowbar on Sunday 16 Aug. Website link for more info? facebook.com/Plini
How long did it take to write/ record? I’ve had the verse from the song since 2009 and not found the right chorus to match until now. Recording the album took two weeks pre-production, two weeks recording and three weeks mixing/ mastering.
How many releases do you have now? We currently have four singles released and now a fivetrack EP. Was anything in particular inspiring you during the making? We were fortunate to record this EP in LA. The setting and the people helped us to get inspired about the arts and really find our sound.
Is this track from a forthcoming release/existing release? This is the first single from my new album Hunted Haunted out on 3 Sep. Produced by Victor Van Vugt (Nick Cave, PJ Harvey) and Neil Baldock (Neil Finn).
What’s your favourite song on it? It would be between Can’t Get You Off My Mind and Doubt, which are the two singles we have released.
What was inspiring you during the song’s writing and recording? Originally I was in a pretty bad mood to write this song, it started as an angry rant and became inspired by songs like ELO’s Don’t Bring Me Down and Bryan Ferry’s Let’s Stick Together.
When and where is your launch/ next gig? We’re launching 27 Aug at The Triffid, followed by an East Coast Tour gracing Sydney, Melbourne, Adelaide, Byron and the Gold Coast throughout September.
We’ll like this song if we like... Queen, David Bowie, Bryan Ferry, ELO.
We’ll like this EP if we like...: Dreamy girl harmonies, bass lines and beats.
Website link for more info? facebook.com/avaberee
Do you play it differently live? Exactly the same as the album version. Although there is potential for a lead break. When and where is your launch/ next gig? Black Bear Lodge 14 Aug to celebrate the release of River Of Hurt. Supported by Greg Chiapello and Little Sleeper. Doors at 8pm. Website link for more info? facebook.com/ edenmulhollandmusic THE MUSIC 12TH AUGUST 2015 • 37
Music
You Could Be Watching… Web Series? With the rise of YouTube and streaming services, and the amount of people watching TV online, the web series is coming into the spotlight. Here’s some of our faves.
Cheap And Nasty To read the full interview head to theMusic.com.au
Words Vincent Story. Cracked: After Hours The premise is simple: four friends at a diner argue over whatever stupid (almost exclusively pop culture-related) thought comes to mind. With debates ranging from ‘Why are movie cops terrible at their jobs?’” to why “Disney’s Aladdin is secretly terrifying”, no pop culture staple is safe from the, at times twisted, minds of Cracked editors Soren Bowie, Daniel O’Brien, Michael Swaim and Kate Willert. Comedians In Cars Getting Coffee So what is Jerry Seinfeld doing now that “the show about nothing” has been over for 17 years? he’s getting coffee with comedians in classic cars, and the results are hilarious. Ever wondered what happens when Jerry Seinfeld, goes on a Sunday drive with Stephen Colbert or Louie CK or Tina Fey? Jokes! Jokes is what happens. Friendlyjordies Australians can be funny too...And Sydney local Friendlyjordies proves it. The YouTuber’s political rants provide humor for even those who aren’t even interested in Australian politics, poking fun at any politicians he can. When he’s not having a dig at Tony Abbott, he’s impersonating every Australian stereotype. From lads to the posh, no one is safe from the wrath of Friendlyjordies.
Comedians In Cars Getting Coffee
38 • THE MUSIC • 12TH AUGUST 2015
Regurgitator’s new live album perfectly encapsulates the rough and ready nature of their renowned stage show; frontman Quan Yeomans unveils his plan for a ‘Sobriety Warning Sticker’ to Steve Bell.
F
or over 20 years Brisbane-bred rockers Regurgitator have proudly positioned their frenetic live show as a cornerstone of their franchise, an element of the band far removed from their relatively slick studio incarnation and one reliant as much on blood, sweat and a seemingly boundless supply of expendable energy as it is their ever-expanding cache of catchy, oft-irreverent tunes. Now after eight studio albums and a waft of EPs and compilations the ‘Gurge have finally deigned to drop a live album capturing this force of nature in full flight. Nothing Less Than Cheap Imitations was taped over two nights at Melbourne’s The HiFi Bar (now Max Watt’s) in late 2012, and the warts-and-all recording manages to capture their epic and unrelenting stage show in all its indubitable pomp and glory. It’s an experience unlike any other, and 100 per cent Regurgitator. “It’s a balls-and-all thing,” frontman Quan Yeomans admits with a chuckle. “We did basically nothing to it - no overdubs or anything like that - so it’s pretty raw, and when hear yourself without too much going on in terms of mixing and production it’s kinda scary, I think.
“I don’t think Ben [Ely, bass/vocals] even listened to the mixes, he was just, like, ‘Nuh, I can’t do it!’ I had to go through them and go, ‘That one’s probably not acceptable. That one’s okay, we can let that pass.’ So we were a little bit tender about it I guess - or perhaps a little bit frightened and tentative maybe - but I think it’s a good thing that it’s pretty much how we sound. I wanted a sticker put on the front saying, ‘Only listen if you’ve had four or five drinks or a lot of drugs,’ just to make it sound a little better! But I think it’s good that we didn’t go out of our way to pretty it up like a lot of bands might.” Furthermore Yeomans is acutely aware that the live realm is an inherently important element of the Regurgitator experience. “Yeah, I think it definitely is. I think we still put a lot of energy into it, even though we’re old bastards, and I think that people really appreciate the energy that we give out. We’re not the most slick live band out there, but we’ve been doing it for a long time and I think we know our material pretty well. It’s fairly simple and not particularly complex, but we try and put a lot of energy into it and I think the crowds really appreciate it. In some ways it’s kinda a ‘90s aesthetic as well. You see a lot of people who just stare at the ground and that’s fine for whatever genres that’s appropriate for, but our music is fun and ‘up’ kinda music so we try and put a lot of energy into it. Hopefully the bodies will hold out enough for us to be able to keep doing it for a while.”
What: Nothing Less Than Cheap Imitations (Valve/MGM) When & Where: 27 & 28 Aug, The Zoo
THE MUSIC 12TH AUGUST 2015 • 39
Album / Album/EP Reviews
Dead Letter Circus Aesthesis UNFD
★★★★
eek W e h T f O m u b Al
It’s a very fine line for records that attempt to hold their integral sound and bridge into mass popular appeal, but stepping up for their third studio album, Brisbane’s Dead Letter Circus have built on their previous two records with a fresh approach of soaring soundscapes in monumental stadium-esque rock style that still manages to keep its head within the progressive roots of the band. The expansive sound of Aethesis sees the band’s use of heavy dynamic shifting paired up with tracks bolstered with uplifting pop melodies, brash guitar riffs and a soaring vocal delivery from Kim Benzie that manages to achieve a perfect cohesion. Openers In Plain Sight and While You Wait take on grandeur through a charging harmony and lofty vocal layers that in true Dead Letter Circus style feels unmistakably aggressive without wandering down a path of token metal riffs and blasting drum beats. Conversely, the slowstepping beat introduction of Silence creates a devastating effect as the meteoric rise of Clint Vincent’s dazzling guitar work crashes into a choral bridge of excellence, all with the clean, crisp production that emphasises the frantic energy that the band excel at on stage. Aethesis is a record that is fantastic on the first listen and will grab full attention with most tracks, but the depth of the band’s intricate nature of instrumental flow and absorbing lyrics will leave you even more hooked with each new listen. Mark Beresford
Jess Ribeiro
Bullet For My Valentine
Kill It Yourself Barely Dressed/Remote Control
Venom
★★★★ Soulful, ominous, edgy and ethereal all rolled into one, Jess Ribeiro’s new release unravels personal stories that show how much she’s grown as an artist. Her soothing vocals shine through, evoking an emotional connection to every track. Album namesake Kill It Yourself combines desolate lyrics that contrast with angelic vocals, gentle instrumentation and ambience removing the song’s harsh meaning about our disconnection from how society prepares its food. Changing up the mix, Rivers On Fire adds another dimension by including saxophone and heavy guitar riffs, which unleash the roughness of the track together with repetition of the song’s title and slurred words within. Unfamiliar Ground recalls a dishevelled love story that is accompanied by minimal percussion and guitar, which leaves the lyrics to resonate 40 • THE MUSIC • 12TH AUGUST 2015
Sony
★★★½
wildly within. Hurry Back To Love is a standout, as Ribeiro’s vocal dynamic shifts so dramatically, layered with a grungy guitar and cymbals. If You Were A Kelpie goes back to her country roots and rounds out the album’s natural happy-go-lucky feel. Ribeiro collaborated with Mick Harvey on Kill It Yourself to produce an album that incorporates elements of subtle and psychedelic rock, ambience, folk and alternative country. An enlightening storytelling experience you’ll want to cherish forever Maria Coiro
After six months of writing, Bullet For My Valentine have produced their most aggressive and complex studio album, their fifth, reuniting with producer Colin Richardson and co-producer Carl Bown, who worked on their previous albums 2005’s The Poison and 2008’s Scream Aim Fire. The sound is heavier than their previous work, with rapid drumming from Michael Thomas, while Michael Paget’s guitar riffs are intense and Matt Tucks belts out complex, aggressive lyrics. No Way Out is a look into Tucks mind, áll riffs and intense lyrics, but he can’t leave the past behind him. Army Of Noise has some phenomenal riffing between Tuck and Paget while screams in The Harder The Heart (The Harder It Breaks) are extraordinary. The guys’ skills are incredible, especially in the opening of Hell
Or High Water and Broken. You Want A Battle? (Here’s A War) is a stand-out track; a balance of heavy and mellow sounds with powerful lyrics delivered by Tuck. Venom is a more mellow song that shows their softer side, the lyrics emotional, giving off a gloomy sound. The final track, Pariah has a strong, rapid guitar and drumbeat, giving off an overpowering energy, an impressive end to the album. The album feels like Bullet has taken a step back rather than forward, revisiting the built-up pain from their beginnings instead of thinking about the future. The sound may be heavier and more intense, but the concept behind the lyrics has let them down. Aneta Grulichova
EP Reviews Album/EP Reviews
Sweet Baboo
The Basics
Quarter Street Quarter Street
The Spirit
The Age Of Entitlement
Rough Velvet/MGM
The Three Basics
★★★
★★★
★★★★
★★★★
Sweet Baboo’s latest suggests comparison to any number of mellow fellows currently doing the rounds with an acoustic guitar. Unashamedly wearing his heart on his sleeve, the lead single Sometimes offers straightforward love song balladry that surprises with strange woozy, almost orchestral, interludes. As the album rolls itself out, Sweet Baboo allows his eccentricity to shine, matching slightly oddball lyrics with ambitious Beatlesesque arrangements that could have been dreamt up by George Martin. While this comes together beautifully on whimsical cuts like Walking In The Rain and You Got Me Time Keeping, overall Sweet Baboo leans towards the saccharine and impossibly twee.
If there’s a dark, deserted laneway in some cold, rainy city that needs a soundtrack, Hugo Race & The True Spirit have it covered with The Spirit - a bluesy, brooding collection of songs by a talented singersongwriter with three decades of musical prowess behind him. Hugo Race and his band stick to their guns and deliver their sound with gusto. It’s a little onedimensional, Race’s whispering voice never really challenged, but he’s certainly not the first singer with such an approach to make it work. The Spirit is sure to please existing fans, but perhaps not win too many new ones.
The album title’s straight from Joe Hockey but don’t be put off for The Basics have crafted one of 2015’s best Aussie releases. Setting aside Gotye, Wally de Backer again teams up with Kris Schroeder and Tim Heath to deliver an awesome slice of ‘60s pop rock. Against the sunny melodies, though, this album seethes with anger at the state of Australian life and politics, as shown by rocking rev-ups like Ashleigh Wakes and Time Poor. Highlight Tunomba Saidia even adds African flavours while raging against offshore detention. There’s big choruses aplenty, but it’s the message that lingers.
Analog sounds are still on the upswing, and have been for the past decade. The Bamboos, Saskwatch, The Cat Empire and of course the Melbourne Ska Orchestra are all examples of the exciting things happening down in Melbourne’s thriving scene. Add to that frothing pile Quarter Street, Latin American imports who bring real heft and a gritty machismo to an otherwise sunny sort of genre. Right from the first punchy bass/piano riff their debut self-titled effort is a record with a hard edge to it, piston-like rhythms propelling the solemn brass section forward. Latin music bursts at the seams with life, and this is no exception; it’s just a little angrier than most.
The Boombox Ballads Moshi Moshi/[PIAS] Australia
Hugo Race & The True Spirit
Dylan Stewart
Hope Street Recordings
Paul Barbieri
Guido Farnell
Matt MacMaster
More Reviews Online Kucka Unconditional
theMusic.com.au/music/album-reviews Voltaire Twins Milky Waves
Deaf Wish Pain
Golden Rules Golden Ticket
THE MUSIC 12TH AUGUST 2015 • 41
Album / Album/EP Reviews
Buried In Verona
The Rubens
Vultures Above, Lions Below
Hoops
Ivy League/Liberation
UNFD
The Jungle Giants
The Phoenix Foundation
Speakerzoid
Give Up Your Dreams
Amplifire
Caroline
★★★
★★★★
★★★½
★★★½
This album carries sizeable sonic weight, the band expanding on their previous electronicinflected, string-infused scope. There could be suggestions of seeking a Bring Me The Horizonesque crossover within the more accessible fare. Post-hardcoremeets-rock-ballad Can’t Be Unsaid, Hurricane and Pathways are admittedly memorable; the latter perhaps their most honest outpouring yet. Unbroken’s aggression is tempered by a hook that may convert Amity Affliction devotees. They can revert to tired chugging and gang vocal conventions though, and also a penchant for banal nu-metal overtones. Whether this record elevates Buried In Verona above mid-tier status is uncertain but they’ve clearly exorcised some personal demons.
Reuniting with producer David Kahne (The Strokes, Paul McCartney), The Rubens wanted to infuse their latest record with their boisterous live sound. Doused in filth, lead single Hallelujah is a massive rock anthem heaving with bluesy licks and ragged-edged vocals that’ll have you hooked from the get-go. Throwbacks to their latenight benders, The Night Is On My Side and Hold Me Back are guitar-laden tunes overflowing with gutsy growls that’ll have you swaying until the whiskey runs dry. Stepping up the soul, Hoops, Switchblade and Bitter End reminiscence about love’s woes. Smothered in roots-influenced rockabilly and Margin’s impassioned croon, these are downright drown-your-sorrowsat-a-lonely-bar tunes.
At times sparse, at others employing sonic colouring to blur the space between guitarpop and synthesised electro, Speakerzoid is an interesting mix. More focused tracks like What Do You Think hark back to Stephen Malkmus’ halcyon days as a solo artist. The 90-second highlight Mexico channels fellow wunderkinds San Cisco with its effervescent flute trills. Sam Hales and Cesira Aitken’s competing guitar lines interweave well. The band’s rhythm section, however, is where The Jungle Giants get their groove. There are occasional lapses, including the spoken-word lyrics of Every Kind Of Way that begin the record on an uneven path, but overall Speakerzoid presents the Giants as an intelligent collective.
One of those fabulous Kiwi entities, like Aorangi Park, or Mallowpuffs, that have been around forever but most of us internationalists would barely have heard of, The Phoenix Foundation’s sixth studio album is a joyous rummage through harmony-layered peppy pop. Animal Collective’s collective catalogue is an obvious touchstone, albeit with much less arty tomfoolery. Bob Lennon John Dylan and the title track (tucked away at the end, despite deserving a more pedestal position) are both fabulous expositions of classic radiofriendly pop that sounds like if Crowded House had taken the electronic route and clubbed more.
Brendan Crabb
Cara Oliveri
Dylan Stewart
More Reviews Online Caulfield Outcast
42 • THE MUSIC • 12TH AUGUST 2015
Mac McNaughton
theMusic.com.au/music/album-reviews The Demon Parade Stone Circles
We Lost The Sea Departure Songs
Tommy Emmanuel It’s Never Too Late
THE MUSIC 12TH AUGUST 2015 • 43
Live Reviews
Jon Spencer Blues Explosion, Hits The Zoo 6 Aug
Jon Spencer Blues Explosion @ The Zoo. Pic: Stephen Booth
The Grates @ The Triffid. Pic: Freya Lamont
The Grates @ The Triffid. Pic: Freya Lamont
44 • THE MUSIC • 12TH AUGUST 2015
The Grates @ The Triffid. Pic: Freya Lamont
It’s a relatively early start for rock reprobates HITS and they seem in fine fettle from the get-go, a recent bout of southern shows no doubt responsible for their strong form. As per usual manic frontman Evil Dick wanders the stage spewing forth his vindictive diatribes flanked by mayheminducing guitarists Tamara Bell and Stacey Coleman, while the rhythm section of bassist Andy Buchanan and prodigal drummer Gregor Mulvey - finally back behind the kit following an injury-enforced layoff - lay down a thunderous bed for them to spew forth the rock upon. It’s slightly incongruous seeing them play in front of a massive American flag draped behind them - obviously belonging to the headliners - but upon even a cursory listen to tracks like Jesus F Christ, Bitter And Twisted, Take Your Pills, Disappointed and Never Sing A Song Again is enough to betray this mob’s fine-tuned Aussie heritage and sensibility. They throw in a brand new number which is scabrous and scathing but typically catchy, before finishing with an incendiary take on Peter And Paul - nothing out of the ordinary for HITS tonight, merely another world-class set of debaucherous rock’n’roll of the highest calibre, just par for the course really. Soon enough New York rock lifers Jon Spencer Blues Explosion take the stage and kick straight into one of their notoriously sleazy grooves, the sound immediately pristine as they set sail on a rock’n’roll odyssey encapsulating all angles of their storied career. As they throw in Get Down Lover and their cover of Beastie Boys’ She’s On It, the snaking guitars of Jon Spencer and Judah Bauer and the unrelenting drum barrage
courtesy of Russell Simins make them one of those guitar bands that just demands dancing, with archetypical showman Spencer up front grunting and exhorting and throwing down the gauntlet to the crowd to get their rock on with his constant cries of ‘Blues
They still go super hard given their vintage. Explosion!’ or homilies like ‘Are you ready?’ punctuating the maelstrom at regular junctures. They’re here promoting recent album Freedom Tower - No Wave Dance Party 2015 and tracks like The Ballad Of Joe Buck and Cooking For Television sound brilliant in the live ream, with old classics like I Wanna Make It All Right still packing a punch and Simins lending his guttural voice to What Love Is. It’s an unrelenting and powerful barrage of precision groove-based rock with some cool effects thrown in for good measure, and they still go super-hard given their vintage, Spencer sermonising like a man possessed throughout tunes like The Feeling Of Love, Tales Of Old New York: The Rock Box and Down In The Beast before throwing down the mic stand and stalking the stage manically as they finish the set proper with the fast and furious Cowboy. They return for an extended second helping - highlights including Blowing My Mind and Bauer voicing the primal Fuck Shit Up - and then they’re gone from whence they came, leaving behind just the dormant American flag as evidence of tonight’s tasty trans-Pacific rock’n’roll accord. Steve Bell
Live Reviews
The Bellrays, Street Pieces, Tyrone Noonan The Zoo 7 Aug The first time Californian rock’n’rollers The Bellrays played in Brisbane about a decade ago they were wedged in between Radio Birdman and Giants Of Science and it suited their firebrand version of soulful rock’n’roll perfectly. Tonight they’re preceded by a solo Tyrone Noonan and Brisbane four-piece Street Pieces and it just doesn’t work, no offence to either opener. Noonan is an ARIA winner with former band george and has oodles of runs on the board in numerous capacities, but his solo acoustic material is just too safe for tonight’s bill with its preponderance of strong but sappy love songs like Tight Black Dress and Forever Girl, while Street Pieces are at least a rock band but they’re super slick and far too much of a commercial proposition, their songs like True Tomorrow, Shiver, Weaker By The Second and even their cover of Led Zep’s Good Times Bad Times lacking the edge to make them appropriate for tonight’s festivities. Both give their all, it’s just a shame when there’s so many Brisbane bands out there who could have owned tonight’s opportunity. All of which doesn’t diminish the performance by The Bellrays one iota, the four-piece entering the fray and laying down their garage-soul manifesto immediately with a string of propulsive numbers like That’s Not The Way It Should Be and Maniac Blues; Lisa Kekaula unleashes that massive, soul-infused voice as her husband and partnerin-rock Bob Vennum lets loose with his snarling guitar lines. The relatively recent rhythm pairing of Justin Andres (bass) and Stefan Litrownick (drums) team wonderfully and bring a muscular,
ragged edge to proceedings but as ever it’s Kekaula who proves the captivating jewel in this band’s crown, her constant pillioring of the crowd to embrace the fact that it’s Friday night and lose their inhibitions seeming to actually work as the throng gets rowdy for Anymore and Good Behavior (which in turn finds Vennum unleash a killer duckwalk across the stage). Their decades together have provided a plethora of fine cuts such as Living A Lie, Everybody Get Up and Coming Down, Kekaula stalking the stage with a tambourine affixed perpetually on her arm but only used strategically in anger, as her band pull and build towards that awesome rock’n’roll communion that one only tends to experience once in a blue moon. They unleash a soaring rendition of Led Zep’s Whola Lotta Love seemingly in a tit-for-tat payback for the earlier cover, kudos where they’re due - before smashing back into originals territory with a stream of robust rockers such as Sun Comes Down, Voodoo Train and the epic Black Lightning. They take the briefest of breaks and return with more Kekaula exclamations about the enduring supremacy of the weekend before ending with a thunderous take on Revolution Get Down which they segue into pièce de résistance Blues For Godzilla via some weird soul revue version of Twinkle Twinkle Little Star, schooling us in the way things should be done until the bitter end. Seems she was right about the power of Friday night all along. Steve Bell
Jordie Lane, Marlon Williams, Husky Gawenda, Fergus Linacre QPAC 30 Jul The last time the Beatles Live
production company put on one of their tours it featured four of the biggest names from the Australian contemporary rock scene - Tim Rogers, Phil Jamieson, Chris Cheney and Josh Pike - performing The White Album. For this tour though, they’ve changed their approach and conscripted up-and-comers from further outside the rock scene to tackle the Rubber Soul and Revolver albums. But it’s apparent from the first notes of Drive My Car that the vocalists - Marlon Williams, Jordie Lane, Husky’s Husky Gawenda and Fergus Linacre from Kingswood - are all going to be able to hold their own with the material. But that doesn’t mean tonight is without teething pains. As its the first show of the Rubber Soul Revolver tour, there’s a fair amount of awkwardness from the four vocalists as they work through Rubber Soul. You take the guitar away from these singer-songwriter types and they immediately become ill at ease Year 8 boys with a fear of public speaking giving an oral presentation to their English class. The awkward hunching and shuffling detracts from the music. This however, is fairly easy to forgive when the six-piece backing band adroitly revive the lush interpretations of numbers like Nowhere Man and I’m Looking Through You. After intermission, the singers come back having shed some of their Rubber Soul selfconsciousness. As the screen (something which seemed under-utilised during the first half of the evening) behind them alights with psychedelic visuals, they seem more comfortable with what they’re here to do. They’re working with, arguably, better material on Revolver and there are some numbers here where they really hit it out of the park. Marlon Williams’ handling of its haunting melancholy makes Eleanor Rigby far and away the song of the night and
Fergus Linacre brings a touch of Kingswood’s stomp to Got To Get You Into My Life. The over-50 portion of tonight’s crowd are especially engaged, and there’s a very visceral pleasure that the rest of us can derive from watching a group of sexagenarians headbanging and smiling like idiots as they sing every single word.
There’s a fair amount of awkwardness. Tonight is clearly targeted towards this section of the crowd, the ones who don’t know Paul McCartney as that dude who was lucky enough to collaborate with Kanye West, so everything is just about a note-perfect reproduction of the album. While this doesn’t give the vocalists a chance to show off their individual styles (especially Marlon Williams; you’re not going to find a more unique and arresting singer going around today than Marlon Williams) it does respectfully pay homage to these iconic pop songs. Tom Hersey
The Grates,Straight Arrows,Pleasure Symbols The Triffid 8 Aug The soundtrack to a section of a John Hughes film is playing when we enter the hangar. You can easily picture the scene - it’s that moment where Molly Ringwald has already had a brief dalliance with her beau, but now she’s all confused and emotionally
THE MUSIC 12TH AUGUST 2015 • 45
REVIEWS Live Reviews
disjointed with regards to how she should proceed. Local two-piece Pleasure Symbols are responsible for the moody synth-driven nostalgia, and with only a bass line and some vocal drone to accompany the keys they transport us to a time lined with beauty and pain. They’re easy to like, though it’s hard to tell if they like us. When it’s all over they can’t get off the stage quick enough. Energy levels jack up almost instantly as Straight Arrows deliver the garage goodness from the get-go. Al Grigg’s red beanie is launched from his mess of curls before the first song has concluded; Owen Penglis is wearing a ‘bad to the
boner’ shirt. That’s where we’re at. The pair seem to share a bloodline, connected by glittery red guitars and a chemical bond, while the overall performance is rough and tumble, fun and undeniably tight. During their set, the Sydney four-piece batter us with a series of buzzsaw nuggets - Petrified, Bad Temper, Make Up Your Mind - full of transgressive guitar solos and shared howls. They even throw in a bit of tragic harmonica, for the purists out there. The love affair between The Grates and their hometown Brisbane is longstanding and unmovable. It’s a romance built on raucous, relentless indie pop, and maintained by
the enthusiasm of Australia’s answer to Karen O - Patience Hodgson. She holds court centre stage like some sort of supernova, rocking a fuzzy canary yellow jacket pinned with all sorts of craft toys and trinkets, while the boys in the band - including her baby poppa John Patterson on keys (playing with a broken arm no less) and long-locked metronome Ritchie Daniell - engulf her energy with bouncy musical bliss. As a beach ball and inflatable kangaroo are passed around the crowd, the five-piece give us end-to-end favourites, from 19-20-20 and the divine Sweet Dreams to Aw Yeah, Science Is Golden, Call Me and
Burn Bridges. Patience remains a vocal powerhouse, while the musicianship is flawless, even with some fresh faces in the 2015 line-up. Patience takes the time to share in silly banter, sing with mega-fans and even throws in a few cheeky high kicks, ‘cause why the hell not, right? The riotous Holiday Home eventually wraps up the main set, before a costume change sees Hodgson - version psychedelic Chinese dragon - emerge to shower us in imaginary kisses and finish the night leading us through a looselimbed Turn Me On. Benny Doyle
ARTS REVIEWS Arts Reviews
Last Cab To Darwin Film In cinemas
★★★ In 2001, Reg Cribb and Jeremy Sims drove from Broken Hill to Darwin researching the true story of Max Bell, a terminally ill cab driver. Soon, the story became the award-winning play, Last Cab To Darwin. Now they reunite to bring it to the big screen for a whole new audience. The film follows Rex (Michael Caton), an elderly Broken Hill taxi driver. On discovering he has terminal stomach cancer, he embarks on the aforementioned epic roadtrip to Darwin, to die in his own way
Last Cab To Darwin
46 • THE MUSIC • 12TH AUGUST 2015
courtesy the newly legalised euthanasia law. This film is a wonderful, sharply written piece with richly drawn characters, Australian humour and deeply moving drama. The Australian landscape is beautifully filmed and the country culture, particularly Aboriginal, is embraced. Also, the very pertinent issue of euthanasia is dealt with thoughtprovokingly. The cast present excellent, engagingly layered performances. At the core is Caton giving his all as Rex. Overall, Last Cab To Darwin is entertaining, heartfelt and lifeaffirming Australian cinema. Sean Capel
Girlhood
Film In cinemas 13 Aug
★★★★½ Girlhood, otherwise known as Bande De Filles, is a raw drama focusing on 16-year-old Mariame (Karidja Touré), who lives on the outskirts of Paris faced with technical school or a cleaning job after having to repeat Troisieme, disqualifying her from high school. Director Céline Sciamma presents Mariame’s defiance against what she views as the banal, disempowering existence of following rules. Marieme strikes out on her own, changes
Girlhood
her name to Victory and joins a ratpack of vivacious, rulebreaking teenage girls who wear denim and black leather exclusively. There are various phases of Mariame that we see: a dogooder who plays gridiron; a rebel in a sisterhood; then she inevitably starts screwing up and going down more serious roads. In each section, Mariame/Victory changes her look, her identity and way of being until she finds the right fit. This film shows the real Paris, the Paris with grit, the multicultural Paris, the city where not everything looks perfect. Sarah Barratt
THE MUSIC 12TH AUGUST 2015 • 47
The Guide
Laura Marling: 21 Oct, The Tivoli
Wed 12
Mark Seymour & The Undertow
Josh Pyke: Black Bear Lodge, Fortitude Valley SNFU + Wolfpack + Army Of Champions + The Flangipanis + Midwife Crisis: Crowbar, Fortitude Valley Som De Calcada: Lock ‘n’ Load Bistro, West End Loosen Up Wednesdays: Royal Exchange Hotel, Toowong Open Mic Night: Solbar, Maroochydore Transvaal Diamond Syndicate: Sonny’s House of Blues, Brisbane
The Music Presents
Urban Sounds: The Beer Garden, Surfers Paradise
Oh Mercy: Woolly Mammoth 4 Sep
Josh Pyke: The Foundry, Fortitude Valley
The Cactus Channel: Motor Room 4 Sep
Triffid Seeds feat. Neon Tiger + Shag Rock: The Triffid (Upstairs), Newstead
Brisbane Festival 2015: Brisbane 5-26 Sep An Evening With Kevin Smith: The Tivoli 19 Sep Red Deer Festival: Mt Samson 3 Oct Bad//Dreems: Woolly Mammoth 16 Oct, Miami Shark Bar 17 Oct Laura Marling: The Tivoli 21 Oct The Phoenix Foundation: Woolly Mammoth 23 Oct
Thu 13 Open Mic Night: Bay Central Tavern, Urraween Mecha Mecha + Average Art Club + Neon Underground + Regular Band: Beetle Bar, Brisbane
Gig Of The Week Mark Seymour & The Undertow follow the release of their ninth studio album Mayday with a long-awaited national theatre tour. Spend an evening with the gentlemen, 15 Aug at Old Museum.
Ziggy Alberts: Black Bear Lodge, Fortitude Valley
Andrew Garton + Brad McCarthy Trio: JMI Live, Bowen Hills
Pat W Farrell Group: Brisbane
Michael David Thomas + Bree Bullock: Junk Bar, Ashgrove
Mumford & Sons: Brisbane Riverstage 7 Nov
Jam Night: Koala Tavern, Capalaba
Mew: Max Watt’s 4 Dec
Des Reid: Loving Hut, Mount Gravatt
Bluesfest 2016: Tyagarah Tea Tree Farm 24-28 Mar
Pat Shortt: Max Watt’s (formerly The Hi-Fi Brisbane), West End
Sleeper: Black Bear Lodge, Fortitude Valley Ash Howell: Breakfast Creek Hotel, Albion Russell Bayne + Ben Gilgen Connection: Brisbane Jazz Club, Kangaroo Point Kitty Flanagan: Brisbane Powerhouse (Powerhouse Theatre), New Farm TGIF: Buderim Tavern, Buderim
Mooncoin + Alan Kelly Trio: Noosa Reef Hotel (Flanagan’s), Noosa Heads
The Ninjas
Cara Digs It When model/actress Cara Delevingne found out Brisbane’s The Ninjas named a single after her, she told The Music, “It’s the weirdest thing in the world! It’s so sweet, holy fuck. It’s the highest form of flattery!” So yeah, go check The Ninjas out when they play Alhambra Lounge, 14 Aug.
Nicole Brophy: Solbar (Lounge Bar), Maroochydore Xavier Rudd & The United Nations + Bobby Alu: Tanks Arts Centre, Edge Hill Lyall Moloney: The Bearded Lady, West End DJ Brett Allen + James Toddman: The Beer Garden, Surfers Paradise Tyrants! + Wildheart + Misguided + Sentiments: The Brightside, Fortitude Valley James Teague: The End, West End Open Mic Night: The Four Mile Creek Hotel, Strathpine Patrick Kenny + Holly Tollis + Dana Lowrey: The Milk Factory Kitchen & Bar, South Brisbane
Jazz Club, Kangaroo Point
Fri 14
Kitty Flanagan: Brisbane Powerhouse (Powerhouse Theatre), New Farm
The Ninjas: Alhambra Lounge, Fortitude Valley
Witchgrinder + Malakyte + Asylum + Gorefield: Crowbar, Fortitude Valley
Goldstool + Viper Syndicate + The Boho Mofos + Every Good Noise: Beetle Bar, Brisbane
Impy Idol - 1st Semi Final: Imperial Hotel, Beenleigh
48 • THE MUSIC • 12TH AUGUST 2015
Slacksmiths + Trigger: Ric’s Bar, Fortitude Valley
Eden Mulholland + Greg Chiapello + Little
Miami Horror. Pic: Clare Hawley
Oh The Horror The synthtastic Miami Horror are playing Woolly Mammoth on 15 Aug as part of their Australian album tour for All Possible Futures, with help from support acts Joy., Cleopold and Young Franco. Sounds like a party.
Brew Jams: Burleigh Brewing, Burleigh Heads Fridays Classics RNB Gold feat. DJ Chrispi + Marty James + BennyK: Captain Cook Tavern, Kippa-Ring
(including members of The Paradise Motel)
“God Is Drunk In Charge” Album Launch Tour Thursday August 27 No. 5 Church St, Bellingen NSW Friday August 28 The Loft, Surfers Paradise QLD Saturday August 29 The Treehouse, Byron Bay NSW Sunday August 30 The Junk Bar, Brisbane QLD
“God Is Drunk In Charge” out August 28 www.outlandbrothers.com
THE MUSIC 12TH AUGUST 2015 • 49
The Guide
Black Stone From The Sun
Pat Tierney: Solbar (Lounge Bar), Maroochydore
Four Mile Creek Hotel, Strathpine
Markets, Hamilton
Storm The Sky + Harbours: The Lab, Brisbane
The Demon Parade: Grand Central Hotel, Brisbane
Ingrid James & Julian Jones Duo: The Lido Cafe & Restaurant, Ascot
Smokin’ Pistol & Slim: Greaser Bar, Brisbane
Ryan Nebauer: Statler & Waldorf, Brisbane
Double Lined Minority: Johnny
Lyall Moloney: Taps Australia, Mooloolaba
Wasabi: Springwood Hotel, Springwood
Jack Carty + Jordan Millar: The Milk Factory Kitchen & Bar, South Brisbane Lyall Moloney: The Spotted Cow, Toowoomba
Smoking Ends Perth duo Black Stone From The Sun are dragging their latest and second EP, Death Threats And Cigarettes, across the Nullarbor to play at Ric’s Bar on 16 Aug.
The Toxic Garden Gnomes + On VHS + Micropsia: The Triffid, Newstead TGIF with The Lazy Valentines: Victory Hotel, Brisbane British India: Wharf Tavern (The Helm), Mooloolaba Capre: Woolly Mammoth, Fortitude Valley Juice with DJ J-Tok + DJ Blitz: Wynnum Tavern, Wynnum West
Akova: Cardigan Bar, Sandgate
Sat 15
The Hard Aches + Hannahband + Greg + The Dark Clouds: Chardons Corner Hotel, Annerley
The Dark Clouds + The Strums + Ironside + Feeling Dave: Beetle Bar, Brisbane
DJ Robbie Rob: Club Tavern, Caboolture
Vernas Keep: Black Bear Lodge, Fortitude Valley
BNS + Styli$$h: Deception Bay Tavern (Public Bar), Deception Bay The Mad Mariachi + Izalco: Eat Street Markets, Hamilton DJ Brooklyn: Eatons Hill Hotel, Eatons Hill DJ Panda + Dru K: Forest Lake Tavern (Sports Bar), Forest Lake Bertie Page Clinic: Greaser Bar, Brisbane Danny Widdicombe: Habitat Restaurant & Bar, South Brisbane
The NBC + Nick Cunningham: Boardriders Coolangatta, Coolangatta James Johnston Duo : Breakfast Creek Hotel, Albion Dan Quigley Quartet: Brisbane Jazz Club, Kangaroo Point Kitty Flanagan: Brisbane Powerhouse (Powerhouse Theatre), New Farm
HANNAHBAND
Double Lined Minority
Major Minor Gold Coast suit-and-tie rockers Double Lined Minority launch their new single, Get Around, on 15 Aug at Johnny Brown’s and 16 Aug at Shed 4 on the Sunshine Coast.
Brown’s, Fortitude Valley
Gloss + BCBG + Scraps + DeadShred: The Bearded Lady, West End
Ham: Lock ‘n’ Load Bistro, West End
Inkaza: Lock ‘n’ Load Bistro, West End
Elvis - The Prime Years: Logan Diggers Club, Logan Central
Black Majic: Logan Diggers Club, Logan Central
Ghetto Superstar: 90s/00s/10s Hip Hop Party with Ur Boy Bangs: The Brightside, Fortitude Valley
Mark Seymour & the Undertow: Lonestar Tavern, Mermaid Waters
The Biscuit Factory feat. Downlink + Trolley Snatcha + Tha Trickaz: Max Watt’s (formerly The Hi-Fi Brisbane), West End
Whitny + The Rashomons + Fat Picnic + Deena: The Milk Factory Kitchen & Bar, South Brisbane
Maids + Von Villains: Miami Tavern (Shark Bar), Miami
...And You Will Know Us By The Trail Of Dead + Solkyri + The Red Paintings: The Triffid, Newstead
Stealing Lincoln: Mary’s Commercial Hotel, Dalby Booster Trio: Newmarket Hotel, Newmarket The Robertson Brothers: Royal Mail Hotel, Goodna Recharge with Various DJs: Russell Tavern, Dalby Agnes J Walker & The Cry Babies + Fieu: Solbar, Maroochydore Thump: Solbar (Lounge Bar), Maroochydore James Teague + Ella Fence + Angharad Drake + Danika Smith: Soundlounge, Currumbin
Ouch Rock
Irish Sessions with Ger Fennelly: Mick O’Malley’s, Brisbane
Showcasing debut album, Pheromones, Adelaide twopiece The Hard Aches, together with Sydney’s HANNAHBAND, pictured, take on Chardons Corner Hotel on 14 Aug and Beetle Bar on 16 Aug.
The Electric 80s Show: Noosa Heads Surf Club, Noosa Heads
Phil Smith: Statler & Waldorf, Brisbane Ejeca: TBC Club (The Bowler Club), Fortitude Valley Jack Flash + Paddy McHugh + Sian Evans: The Bearded Lady, West End
Deraign + Those Who Endure + Eternalist + Killers Creed + Blood of the Lannisters + Secondheart: Chardons Corner Hotel, Annerley
Lulu & The Cutthroats + Deena + Asha Jefferies: The Brightside, Fortitude Valley
Witchgrinder + Azreal + The Black Swamp + Wurmzer: Currumbin Creek Tavern, Currumbin Waters
TGI Fridays with Jonny Laytex: The
The Good Ol’ Boys: Eat Street
50 • THE MUSIC • 12TH AUGUST 2015
Mark Seymour & the Undertow: Old Museum, Fortitude Valley
Gatherer + Guards Of May + MofoIsDead + Freethought: The Zoo, Fortitude Valley Caillin Malley + Acoustic Moose + DJ Mikey: Victory Hotel (Beer Garden) , Brisbane
The Molotov + Love Hate Rebellion + Smoking Martha: Ric’s Bar, Fortitude Valley
Brisbane Bluegrass Festival 2015 feat. The Company + Starboard Cannons: West End Uniting Church, West End
The Bella Reunion + Pat Nicholson: Royal Mail Hotel, Goodna
Steve Grady + Megan Cooper + The Mighty Kind: Windsor School of Arts, Windsor
Recharge with Various DJs: Russell Tavern, Dalby
Miami Horror + Joy. + Cleopold + Young Franco: Woolly Mammoth, Fortitude Valley
Concrete Jungle with Astro Travellers + The Brains Trust + Dubmarine + The Golden Age of Ballooning + Go Van Go + MKO + The Mouldy Lovers + Nonsemble + Omegachild + Quintessential Doll + The Rocketsox: Serafini Chains, Bowen Hills The Hi-Boys + Brothers + Sahara Beck: Solbar, Maroochydore
Sun 16 Claude Hay: Advancetown Hotel, Advancetown Sunday Session: Anglers
THE MUSIC 12TH AUGUST 2015 • 51
The Guide
Arms Hotel, Southport The Hard Aches + Hannahband + Gonzovillain + Lifeboat: Beetle Bar, Brisbane
Tavern, Urraween
Natalie De Jager
Natalie de Jager: Brisbane Jazz Club, Kangaroo Point
Sunday Session: Blue Pacific Hotel, Woorim
Kitty Flanagan: Brisbane Powerhouse (Powerhouse Theatre), New Farm
James Johnston: Breakfast Creek Hotel, Albion
Travels + El Monstro + Blind Girls + Feast: Crowbar, Fortitude Valley
Acoustic Guitar Spectacular: Brisbane Jazz Club, Kangaroo Point
Impy Idol - 2nd Semi Final: Imperial Hotel, Beenleigh
Kitty Flanagan: Brisbane Powerhouse (Powerhouse Theatre), New Farm
Mel Lathouras + Toby Wren Trio: JMI Live, Bowen Hills
Sounds of Sunday: Broadbeach Tavern, Broadbeach
Glenn Skuthorpe + Cameron Milford: Junk Bar, Ashgrove
Sunday Session: Capalaba Tavern, Capalaba
Jam Night: Koala Tavern, Capalaba
Plini + Helix Nebula: Crowbar, Fortitude Valley
Des Reid: Loving Hut, Mount Gravatt
Sunday Sessions with One Eyed Pilots: Dublin Docks Tavern, Biggera Waters
Project 62 + The Astronaut Headdress + Therapy of Noise: New Globe Theatre, Fortitude Valley
The Baton Jukes: Eat Street Markets, Hamilton
Mooncoin + Alan Kelly Trio: Noosa Reef Hotel, Noosa Heads
Harry Kemp: Kamel Bar (KB’s), Noosa Heads
Claude Hay: Sonny’s House of Blues, Brisbane
The Sky Church Experience: Lock ‘n’ Load Bistro, West End
DJ Brett Allen + James Toddman: The Beer Garden, Surfers Paradise
TJ McKay: Lock ‘n’ Load Bistro, West End
Awaken I Am + Acrasia + Skies Collide + The Wisher & The Well + What We’re Worth: The Brightside, Fortitude Valley Relaunch Party with Dune Rats + Palms + Orphans Orphans + Major Leagues + more: The Foundry, Fortitude Valley
Next Stop NYC
Witchgrinder
She’s off to New York City to record and perform her new album, but 20 Aug, Brisbane gets a preview when Natalie de Jager takes to the Brisbane Jazz Club stage.
We Grindin’ Pallet Bar & Brew, West End
Melbourne industrial thrash metal group Witchgrinder have released their second album Haunted and are now taking it on the road, stopping by Crowbar on 13 Aug with Malakyte, Asylum and Gorefield; then Currumbin Creek Tavern, 15 Aug, with Azreal, The Black Swamp and Wurmzer.
Irish Sessions with Ger Fennelly: Mick O’Malley’s, Brisbane Blues Jam with Mark D’s Big 3: Morrison Hotel, Woolloongabba Sunday Sets: Noosa Reef Hotel (Irish Garden), Noosa Heads Lazy Sun Dayz: North Lakes Tavern, Mango Hill Sunday Sessions: Oxford 152, Bulimba Artists In Conversation feat. Van Larkins + Glenn Skuthorpe:
52 • THE MUSIC • 12TH AUGUST 2015
Maids + Caroline + Black Stone from the Sun: Ric’s Bar, Fortitude Valley Decked Out Sundays: Royal Exchange Hotel, Toowong Brodie Graham + Dear WIllow: Solbar (Lounge Bar), Maroochydore Open Mic Jam Session: Springwood Hotel, Springwood Fugitive + The Vegabond + Ken Kunin: The Milk Factory Kitchen & Bar, South Brisbane Smackdown Improvised Comedy: The Milk Factory Kitchen & Bar, South Brisbane Triffid Roots feat. Marcus Blacke + SueAnne Stewart: The Triffid (2pm), Newstead Sunday Arvo Social Jam Session: Waterfront Hotel, Diddillibah
Mon 17 TJ McKay: Lock ‘n’ Load Bistro, West End Les Wilson Swing Force Big Band: Southport Bowls Club, Southport Ingrid James Duo: The Lido Cafe & Restaurant, Ascot
Tue 18 Brazilian-Backpacker-Uni Night: The Beer Garden, Surfers Paradise
Open Mic Night: The Four Mile Creek Hotel, Strathpine Hellions + Capsize + ‘68: The Lab, Brisbane Wandering Eyes + Celestial Serpent: The Milk Factory Kitchen & Bar, South Brisbane Xavier Rudd & The United Nations + Bobby Alu: The Tivoli, Fortitude Valley
Xavier Rudd & The United Nations
Wed 19 Quazi-Smith + Goldhearts: Black Bear Lodge, Fortitude Valley BJC Club Nite: Brisbane Jazz Club, Kangaroo Point Gang Of Youths + I Know Leopard + Zefereli: Coolangatta Hotel, Coolangatta Stealing Lincoln: Kamel Bar (KB’s), Noosa Heads
Flag This
Xavier Rudd & The United Nations + Bobby Alu: Moncrieff Entertainment Centre, Bundaberg
Xavier Rudd & The United Nations are heading out on their Flag tour across the nation, named after the second single from their acclaimed album Nanna. See ‘em Tank Arts Centre, Edge Hill, 13 Aug; The Venue, Townsville, 14 Aug; The Tivoli, 20 Aug; with more dates on theMusic.com.au.
Loosen Up Wednesdays: Royal Exchange Hotel, Toowong Urban Sounds: The Beer Garden, Surfers Paradise Hellions + Capsize + ‘68: The Brightside, Fortitude Valley
Thu 20 Open Mic Night: Bay Central
The Guide
Gang Of Youths + I Know Leopard + Zefereli: The Triffid, Newstead
The Swamp Stompers: Greaser Bar, Brisbane
Jonny Laytex: The Four Mile Creek Hotel, Strathpine
Glockenspiel + Numbers Radio + Fuzz Pilot: The Zoo, Fortitude Valley
Danny Widdicombe: Habitat Restaurant & Bar, South Brisbane
Thirsty Thursdays: Victory Hotel, Brisbane
Australian DMC DJ Championships: Hot Gossip Nightclub, Fortitude Valley
Interim + Project 62 + The Astronaut Headdress + The American Frauds: The Grid, Toowoomba
Fri 21
Family Affair: Logan Diggers Club, Logan Central
Emma & The Hungry Truth: The Judith Wright Centre (Performance Space), Fortitude Valley Feeding Fauna + Winternationale + Vinnie La Duce: The Milk Factory Kitchen & Bar, South Brisbane
Lyall Moloney. Pic by Jodie Downey
Tea Society + Hemingway: The Motor Room, West End Gang Of Youths + I Know Leopard + Zefereli: The Spotted Cow, Toowoomba Thirteen Seventy + Galapogos + Silver Sircus + Balloons Kill Babies: The Zoo, Fortitude Valley TFIF with The Lazy Valentines: Victory Hotel, Brisbane Passport to Airlie Beach - Battle of the Bands 2015: Villa Noosa Hotel, Noosaville Juice with DJ J-Tok + DJ Blitz: Wynnum Tavern, Wynnum West
Sat 22 The Busymen + Happy Times + Some Jerks + The Wrong Man : Beetle Bar, Brisbane Lost Movements X feat. The Rocketsox + Cordeaux + House Of Giants + The Goon Sax + Feet Teeth + more: Black Box, West End
Molonely Lyall Moloney is performing on Aussie stages in support of his debut album, Only Lonely. Keep him company when he plays The Bearded Lady, 13 Aug; The Spotted Cow, 14 Aug; Taps Australia, Mooloolaba, 15 Aug.
Two Way Street: Breakfast Creek Hotel, Albion Kitty Flanagan: Brisbane Powerhouse
Heads Of Charm
321 BRUNSWICK STREET MALL FORTITUDE VALLEY
WED 12TH AUG
EKKA PUBLIC HOLIDAY (NO BANDS) THU 13TH AUG
STUDENT NIGHTSLACKSMITHS (10:30PM)
TRIGGER WARNING (9:30PM)
FRI 14TH AUG
HEROICTALES (10:00PM) GUEST (9:00PM)
SAT 15TH AUG
THE MOLOTOV (10:00PM) LOVE HATE REBELLION (9:00PM) SMOKING MARTHA (8:00PM)
SUN 16TH AUG Former Angels + Upsize + Stone Vandals: Albany Creek Tavern, Albany Creek Banff + Machine Age + Denpasar: Black Bear Lodge, Fortitude Valley Paul Bain Duo: Breakfast Creek Hotel, Albion
TGIF: Buderim Tavern, Buderim
Jack Whittaker: QPAC, South Brisbane
Brew Jams: Burleigh Brewing, Burleigh Heads
The Shakin Steamrollers: Royal Mail Hotel, Goodna
Fridays Classics RNB Gold feat. DJ Chrispi + Marty James + BennyK: Captain Cook Tavern, Kippa-Ring
Recharge: Russell Tavern, Dalby
Giants of Science + Tape/Off + Barge With An Antenna On It + Heads Of Charm + more: Crowbar, Fortitude Valley BNS + Styli$$h: Deception Bay Tavern (Public Bar), Deception Bay Holy Holy: Elsewhere, Surfers Paradise DJ Panda + Dru K: Forest Lake Tavern (Sports Bar), Forest Lake
(8:30PM)
Booster Trio: Newmarket Hotel, Newmarket Test Pattern: Prince of Wales Hotel, Nundah
DJ Robbie Rob: Club Tavern, Caboolture
GUEST
4zzz Nowhere to Run Radiothon Launch Party: New Globe Theatre, Fortitude Valley
Kitty Flanagan: Brisbane Powerhouse (Powerhouse Theatre), New Farm
Oscar Lush: Cardigan Bar, Sandgate
MAIDS (9:30PM)
Andrew McMahon + Mike Waters: Max Watt’s (formerly The Hi-Fi Brisbane), West End
Tijuana Cartel + The Brains Trust + The Dawn Chorus: Solbar, Maroochydore Preston: Sonny’s House of Blues, Brisbane
MON 17TH AUG
Charmed I’m Sure Crowbar is putting on a show of epic proportions on 21 Aug, with Giants Of Science, Tape/ Off, Barge With An Antenna On It, Heads Of Charm, and more playing on the night.
Darren Percival + Mark Moroney: Soundlounge, Currumbin Jebediah: Tanks Arts Centre, Edge Hill Mojo Webb: Taps Australia, Mooloolaba Paces + Leon Osborn: The Brightside, Fortitude Valley Love Signs + Emerson Snowe + Cheers G’day + Full Flower Moon Band: The Foundry, Fortitude Valley
(Powerhouse Theatre), New Farm Bluesville Station: Brooklyn Standard, Brisbane The Wet Fish: Cardigan Bar, Sandgate 4ZZZ Radiothon feat. The Flangipanis + Release The Hounds + Spitfireliar + Mouthguard + Crooked Face + Le
HAYDEN JOHN (9:30PM) STEVE P (8:30PM)
TUE 18TH AUG
THE(9:30PM) PATSY GUEST (8:30PM) FREE LIVE MUSIC & INDIE DJS
WANT TO PLAY? EMAIL BOOKINGS@RICSBAR.COM.AU
WWW.RICSBAR.COM.AU THE MUSIC 12TH AUGUST 2015 • 53
The Guide
Murd + Boned + Laura Mardon + Hanny J + Emmy Hour + Millie Ivaschenko + Cowboy Bob: Crowbar, Fortitude Valley
Astro Travellers
James Teague
Jebediah: Dalrymple Hotel, Garbutt Trainspotters feat. Wireheads + Thigh Master: Grand Central Hotel, Brisbane Mojo Webb Band: Greaser Bar, Brisbane Maroochy Music and Visual Arts Festival feat. Flight Facilities + Alpine + Gang Of Youths + DZ Deathrays + Harts + Hermitude + Hiatus Kaiyote + The Kite String Tangle + Marlon Williams & The Yarra Benders + One Day + WAAX + more: Horton Park Golf Club, Maroochydore
Taste Of Heaven Perth-born poet, singer and songwriter James Teague launches new single, Heaven, 13 Aug at The End and 14 Aug at Soundlounge on the Gold Coast, with guest Danika Smith.
Jackie Ryan Band: Logan Diggers Club, Logan Central OXJam feat. Karl S Williams + Hussy Hicks + Robbie Miller: Mason Wines, Tamborine North Irish Sessions with Ger Fennelly: Mick O’Malley’s, Brisbane Interim + Glass Ocean + Down Royale + Kodiak Empire + The Halls: New Globe Theatre, Fortitude Valley Mashd n Kutcher: Noosa Reef Hotel, Noosa Heads Keith Hall & Pat Dow + The Demon Drink: Royal Mail Hotel, Goodna
A Concrete Thing Kitchen & Bar, South Brisbane
Brisbane’s hip warehouse alternative music showcase, Concrete Jungle, is happening at Serafini Chains on 15 Aug. See Astro Travellers, The Brains Trust, Dubmarine, Golden Age Of Ballooning, Go Van Go, MKO and more performing, plus AV sets and live visual art.
Recharge with Various DJs: Russell Tavern, Dalby Alex Lloyd: Solbar, Maroochydore The London Cartel: Springwood Hotel, Springwood
DJ Paprika + Atlast + Rob Longstaff: The Bearded Lady, West End
Brothers: Taps Australia, Mooloolaba
Chelsea Grin + Boris The Blade + Graves + Bayharbour + Consider Me: The Brightside, Fortitude Valley
International Edition feat. Nina Las Vegas + Djemba Djemba + Monki + Mssingno: TBC Club (The Bowler Club), Fortitude Valley
Emma & The Hungry Truth: The Judith Wright Centre (Performance Space), Fortitude Valley
The Francis Wolves + Kerbside Collection + Soul Mechanics + Master Wolf +
Smaal Cats + The Dinlows + The Skinnie Finches: The Milk Factory Kitchen & Bar, South Brisbane
Jack Carty
Animaux: The Motor Room, West End Northeast Party House + Morning Harvey + Good Boy: The Triffid, Newstead Holy Holy + Fractures: The Zoo, Fortitude Valley Caillin Malley + Acoustic Moose + DJ Mikey: Victory Hotel (Beer Garden), Brisbane Paces: Wharf Tavern (The Helm), Mooloolaba
Millar Milk Fact Jack Carty & Jordan Millar are going on an ‘intimate and by-request’ national tour. Every pre-sale ticket sold comes with a free download of a live album, Jack Carty & Jordan Millar – Live @ The Front Gallery. Carty & Millar stop by The Milk Factory, 14 Aug.
Hiatus Kaiyote + Jaala + Vulture St Tape Gang: Woolly Mammoth, Fortitude Valley
Sun 23 Sunday Session: Anglers Arms Hotel, Southport Passport to Airlie Beach - Battle of the Bands 2015: Balaclava Hotel, Earlville Jared Porter: Blue Pacific Hotel (Beer Garden), Woorim Dagsville: Breakfast Creek Hotel, Albion Kitty Flanagan: Brisbane Powerhouse (Powerhouse Theatre), New Farm Sounds of Sunday: Broadbeach
54 • THE MUSIC • 12TH AUGUST 2015
Tavern, Broadbeach Sunday Session: Capalaba Tavern, Capalaba Yob + Hope Drone + Frown: Crowbar, Fortitude Valley Sunday Sessions with Bone Lazy: Dublin Docks Tavern, Biggera Waters Zac Gunthorpe + Emma Bosworth: Junk Bar, Ashgrove Elvis Meets The Beatles: Jupiters, Broadbeach Taylor Moss: Kamel Bar (KB’s), Noosa Heads
Weird & Beard 2 feat. Electric Beardaloo + For Richer or Moorer: The Milk Factory Kitchen & Bar, South Brisbane 4ZZZ Pleasant Valley Sunday feat. Mosman Alder + Tempura Nights + Zefereli + The Phoncurves + The Ninjas: The Triffid, Newstead Sunday Arvo Social Jam Sessions: Waterfront Hotel, Diddillibah Hiatus Kaiyote + Jaala: Woolly Mammoth, Fortitude Valley
Mon 24 Bloodlust Ball 2015: The Tivoli, Fortitude Valley
Tue 25 Brazilian-Backpacker-Uni Night: The Beer Garden, Surfers Paradise
Xavier Rudd & The United Nations + Bobby Alu: Miami Marketta, Miami Irish Sessions with Ger Fennelly: Mick O’Malley’s, Brisbane
Love Hate Rebellion
Blues Jam with Mark D’s Big 3: Morrison Hotel, Woolloongabba Sunday Sets: Noosa Reef Hotel (Irish Garden), Noosa Heads Lazy Sun Dayz: North Lakes Tavern, Mango Hill Sunday Sessions: Oxford 152, Bulimba Cool Coda: Prince of Wales Hotel, Nundah The Wet Fish: River Quay, South Brisbane Decked Out Sundays: Royal Exchange Hotel, Toowong Open Mic Jam Session: Springwood Hotel, Springwood Chelsea Grin + Boris The Blade + Graves + A Night In Texas + Hand of The Architect + Promethean: The Lab, Brisbane Shaun Kirk: The Milk Factory
Fire It Up The Molotov are playing at Ric’s Bar for the first time on Saturday, and warming up the crowd will be Love Hate Rebellion and Smoking Martha. It’s gonna be a loose one.
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