The Music (Melbourne) Issue #197 by TheMusic.com.au

12.07.17 Music / Arts / Lifestyle / Culture

Melbourne / Free / Incorporating

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197

THE MUSIC • 12TH JULY 2017 • 3

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PRESENTED BY ARTS CENTRE MELBOURNE AND BANK OF MELBOURNE, IN ASSOCIATION WITH CURATOR SOPHIA BROUS

FESTIVAL OF THE ECSTATIC

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SUPERSENSE FEATURES: SPIRITUALIZED WITH THE AUSTRALIAN ART ORCHESTRA AND THE CONSORT OF MELBOURNE • THE ECSTATIC MUSIC OF ALICE COLTRANE TURIYASANGITANANDA • PUSSY RIOT THEATRE • NAZORANAI • KIMBRA • LULLABY MOVEMENT • OVERGROUND: A FESTIVAL WITHIN A FESTIVAL • BLONDE REDHEAD • ACID MOTHERS TEMPLE & THE MELTING PARAISO UFO • THE MASTER MUSICIANS OF JAJOUKA LED BY BACHIR ATTAR • MEMORY FIELD: WAANGENGA BLANCO + LAURENCE PIKE • EXO-TECH • KEIJI HAINO • ZEENA PARKINS • THE DREAM MACHINE • INGA ‘LOLINA’ COPELAND • OLIVER COATES • STEPHEN O’MALLEY • ÁNDE SOMBY • JG THIRLWELL • DAVE HARRINGTON GROUP • ARRINGTON DE DIONYSO • CLEEK SCHREY • + MUCH MORE!

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THE MUSIC • 12TH JULY 2017 • 5

Music / Music / Arts / Lifestyle / Culture

Race Against Russo

Michelangelo Russo & Hugo Race

Hugo Race and Michelangelo Russo are set to embark on a headline tour to support their John Lee Hooker tribute album, John Lee Hooker’s World Today. The pair will cover Hooker’s biggest hits when their tour commences on 11 Aug.

Broad City

Yas, Queen Before Broad City makes its glorious return for a fourth instalment of hilarity later in the year, Ilana and Abbi’s Season 3 shenanigans are heading to Stan. Pull a sickie and binge the entire series (so far) on 19 Jul.

Rise Against

I have seen SpiderMan rebooted more times than I’ve seen a police officer convicted for murdering a black person @amoudouNDiaye 6 • THE MUSIC • 12TH JULY 2017

All Rise Politically charged punk legends Rise Against have just announced their return to Australia for a seven-stop headline tour next February. California rock outfit SWMRS will be jumping on for the entirety of the Australian/NZ tour. Stay tuned for dates.

Arts / Li Music / Arts / Lifestyle / Culture

Credits

Publisher Street Press Australia Pty Ltd

Meg Mac

Mac Attack

Meg Mac’s debut album is right around the corner and the Aussie artist has unveiled a massive headline tour to celebrate. Her album Low Blows is out on 14 Jul, while her tour kicks off in September.

Group Managing Editor Andrew Mast

National Editor – Magazines Mark Neilsen Editor Bryget Chrisfield

Arts & Culture Editor Maxim Boon

Gig Guide Justine Lynch gigs@themusic.com.au Editorial Assistant Sam Wall, Jessica Dale Senior Contributor Jeff Jenkins

Contributors Bradley Armstrong, Annelise Ball, Emma Breheny, Sean Capel, Luke Carter, Anthony Carew, Uppy Chatterjee, Daniel Cribb, Cyclone, Guy Davis, Joe Dolan, Dave Drayton, Guido Farnell, Tim Finney, Bob Baker Fish, Cameron Grace, Neil Griffiths, Kate Kingsmill, Tim Kroenert, Chris Maric, Fred Negro, Obliveus, Paz, Natasha Pinto, Sarah Petchell, Michael Prebeg, Paul Ransom, Dylan Stewart, Rod Whitfield

Melvins

Senior Photographer Kane Hibberd

Walk On The Melvins Side Melvins are back Down Under for a slew of shows in November. After releasing A Walk With Love & Death, the music veterans are ready to give Australia another dose of punk. LA’s Redd Kross are set to support.

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Game Set Match

— Melbourne

Westside Story marks The Game’s last album before his impending retirement from music, so it’s fitting that he has just announced his last-ever(?) tour of Australia. His farewell tour is set for September, with tickets on sale 10 Jul. THE MUSIC • 12TH JULY 2017 • 7

Music / A Music / Arts / Lifestyle / Culture

GOT Pay TV?

Game Of Thrones

Ladies and gentlemen, ratings juggernaut and pop culture phenomenon Game Of Thrones is finally returning to our screens for Season 7. If you haven’t done so already, mark 17 Jul in your calendars and strap yourselves in - winter has arrived.

Tiny Little Houses

Tiny Little Bins Tiny Little Houses are launching their latest single, Garbage Bin, at Howler on the 17 Aug. In the meantime, you can check out the accompanying video and rewatch it heaps while you wait until the big night.

49 The number of speakers added to BIGSOUND 2017 in their ridiculous second line-up announcement 8 • THE MUSIC • 12TH JULY 2017

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[ Formerly The Hi- Fi Bar ]

Losers Weepers

FRI 14 JUL

ROOM39

Running from the 14 - 16 Jul, Finders Keepers market is a masive three-day event featuring over 250 art and design stalls, as well as food stalls and live music. Head down to Royal Exhibition Building to check it out.

LIVE IN MELBOURNE

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Wherefore Art Thou? A replica of the worldrenowned Shakespeare’s Globe theatre is being constructed behind Sidney Myer Music Bowl. Shakespeare season at the Pop-Up Globe will open its doors to Melbourne 21 Sep through to the 12 Nov.

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SM ELLS LI K E TH E 9 0’S

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THE MUSIC • 12TH JULY 2017 • 9

Music

Wet Lips singer Grace Kindellan and guitarist Jenny McKechnie tell Anthony Carew that if the room’s going to judge you just for being there then fuck that room.

et Lips leaders Grace Kindellan and Jenny McKechnie live in a sharehouse on Brunswick Road. They call the place “Wetopia”. It’s where the band formed, where they used to rehearse (before the cops were called one too many times), where they store their gear, where they write their songs. It was also where the punk trio held the first-ever Wetfest, in 2015. Instead of merely launching their debut EP, Wet Is Best, they staged a mini-festival in their backyard, that included the Pink Tiles and the first-ever show for McKechnie’s other band, Cable Ties. They’ve since staged two more instalments of Wetfest. Not at Wetopia, though, but at The Tote, with bands like Terrible Truths, Loose Tooth, Palm Springs, RVG, and Two Steps On The Water playing. The bills have been filled with acts featuring female and transgender musicians, and have been part of Wet Lips’ greater raison d’etre as a band: creating a community of likeminded musicians, challenging the macho culture of punk rock, and carving out their own space in a music scene that, at first, didn’t welcome them. “When we started Wet Lips, we really just wanted to be in a band, to take up space,” says Kindellan. “Our whole experience of being a band has really been entwined with us being women, and GNC [Gender Non-Conforming] people. That’s what a lot of our songs are about: trying to process that. Expressing some of the feelings that we have about making music in a community full of people that are actively trying to exclude you. Getting so angry about something that you have to write a song about it. And, then, playing that song at a gig, and something happening at a gig that makes you so angry you have to write another song about it.” The band started, McKechnie remembers, as “the 19-year-old girls from the country who were hanging out at all these parties with ‘cool’ punk boys who had just no interest in us beyond whether we’d have sex with them, having the tenacity to get up on stage and be in a band”. Each grew up in regional Victoria: McKechnie on a 90-acre farm outside Bendigo, where she’d often have to go out on horseback and chase in cows that’d wandered over the “falling-down fences”. Kindellan grew up in Foster, in South Gippsland; in town, not on a farm, though her dad was a stock and station agent. Upon arriving in Melbourne, each started going to shows, but found as much alienation as inclusion. “Most

10 • THE MUSIC • 12TH JULY 2017

of the bands we’d see would be men in punk bands,” McKechnie says. “There’d be bands getting up there, being shitheads, just being drunk and falling around the stage, being really messy. [Wet Lips] started off us as just being: ‘well, we could do that’. So, we started doing that.” So, Wet Lips began, in 2012, in classic punk fashion: Kindellan, McKechnie, and drummer Mohini Hillyer starting the band first, learning their instruments as they went. They were scrappy, noisy, funny; with lyrics dealing in all-too-relatable lyrics about nights spent on the tiles in Melbourne (Try It Again boasts lyrical references to The Gasometer, Bar Open, The Liberty Social, The Tote, The Grace Darling, and Johnston Street), or being too broke to take part in Melbourne’s something-on-every-night

We got to a point where we couldn’t take it anymore. So, we said ‘fuck this’.

culture (their anthem I’m So Bored). But, they discovered, the standard comic irreverence of garage-rock was, when wielded by them, enough to disqualify them among the men-in-punk-bands that’d inspired their existence. “We wondered: ‘Why aren’t we given the same respect? Why don’t people see us as some fun punk band?’” McKechnie recounts. “It was more like we were a novelty, or we were just shit. It was a total joke to them.” “We felt like we were always being instantly judged, and never given the same respect as our male peers were,” Kindellan says. “For a long time, we were trying to exist within that space, and trying to get respect from those men. But [it became] clear that the people who

Wet Lips’ LP is the first fulllength release for Hysterical Records. The band’s Grace Kindellan and Jenny McKechnie founded the label with booker/ promoter/publicist Amanda Vitartas, and chose the sulphurcrested cockatoo - McKechnie’s favourite bird - as Hysterical’s logo/mascot. “They’re excellent,” enthuses McKechnie. “They make great screeching noises. They have crests that they can put up and down at any time. They can pick things up with their feet and eat them. They’re funny, and they’re really smart.”

were in bands that we admired didn’t have any interest in including us, or respecting our music. They’d already judged us, the moment they’d seen our band; or, even, the moment we might’ve said to them, socially, ‘oh, we’re in a band’.” They were dealt the “classic” condescending treatment: getting put on first at every gig, getting booked as the token girl band, being literally billed as “girl band”, having other people borrow their gear without asking. “They’re the actual logistical things that happened to us,” Kindellan offers, “but they were representative of this whole culture of masculine garage-punk, and the whole patriarchal music culture, that wasn’t interested in including us. That was, in fact, actively trying to exclude us, and other women that played music. We got to a point where we couldn’t take it anymore. So, we said ‘fuck this’.” Which led to booking shows with other women, to Wetfest, and to the searing Can’t Take It Anymore, a standout jam on Wet Lips’ debut, self-titled LP. The song finds Kindellan tearing apart slumming macho punks (“you’re just another guy in a Bad Seeds T-shirt,” she sings, before spitting the great diss “probably grew up in Camberwell” twice-over). Their music, Kindellan says, peddles “this fabricated idea that they’re alienated from society,” while, really, being an “expression of their privilege and dominance in society”. The song, and Wet Lips themselves, McKechnie clarifies, aren’t just about rebellion, but also representation. “When we started going to gigs, it was in a group of people where all the CIS men in the

audience could watch themselves on stage,” she says. “We didn’t have that. Hopefully, now, when we’re on stage, we can have women in the audience who feel like they’re represented, that it could be them on stage.” Says Kindellan: “Wet Lips is all about being confident, and not giving a fuck. Making music or playing a show that allows people to feel comfortable and excited and entitled to go out in public and live your life.” Their album is the culmination of their half-decade of carving out their own place in Melbourne, with songs like the obnoxious, menstruation-strewn Period and the cash-lending lament Money dating from their 19-year-old beginnings. Hillyer left the band in 2016, after recording the album, to concentrate full-time on making electrobangers in Habits; making the Wet Lips debut feel like a time capsule. “It’s a really nice feeling to have a record of what we have been for the past five years,” says Kindellan. “It’s kind of like your classic first garage-punk album: it’s 25 minutes long, all short, sharp, upbeat songs that were recorded in one weekend.” Now comes the difficult second album, right? “Exactly. But, I went through a break-up earlier in the year, so, I’m ready,” Kindellan laughs. “Now we’re these mid-20s people who feel this existential dread, and drink in front of the TV whilst patting our cat. Maybe it’s good that we made a record full of songs we wrote when we were really confident 19-year-olds who were up for anything, and were just like, ‘Yeah, we deserve to be here, and everyone else can just fuck off’.”

McKechnie, who dreamt of being a wildlife photographer as a kid, has a fondness for birds; she even thinks, if she was an animal, she’d be a seagull (“Is it not the best life: fly around over the ocean, and eat chips all the time?”) Kindellan would be a cat, but, having just played in the Community Cup and gone to the Cable Ties album launch, she’s more-than-happy being a human, here and now. “I just feel so lucky to be alive, in Melbourne,” Kindellan beams. “When Cable Ties were playing I was uncontrollable, jumping up and down, screaming, laughing; a bit hysterical. It was the same... on the sideline watching [the Megahertz], I was just screaming and screaming every time someone touched the ball. When we got a goal, I was jumping up and down... I almost cried when the game finished, but I held it in. Because, I didn’t want anyone to think I was crying because we lost. I wasn’t. I was just overwhelmed.”

What: Wet Lips (Hysterical Records) When & Where: 22 Jul, The Gasometer Hotel

THE MUSIC • 12TH JULY 2017 • 11

Music

Mac & Cheese Cyclone has a chat to Australian songstress Meg Mac about the production behind latest release Low Blows, and the cathartic nature of songwriting.

elbourne soulstress Meg Mac (aka Megan McInerney) has long been hailed as a ‘next big thing’ in Australia and the US. Now she’s delivering a rootsy debut album, Low Blows. And, auspiciously, McInerney describes it as “the next chapter of me.” McInerney is an inherently grassroots singer-songwriter. Raised in an Irish-Australian family, she was exposed to folk and legacy soul - Sam Cooke a childhood favourite. The Sydney-native studied music at the Western Australian Academy Of Performing Arts. On graduating, she coyly uploaded songs composed on piano to triple j’s Unearthed platform - the ensuing praise culminating in her winning 2014’s ‘Unearthed Artist Of The Year’ award. McInerney signed to the independent LittleBIGMAN Records, her eponymous EP revealing a modishly glitchy cover of Bill Withers’ ‘70s classic Grandma’s Hands. She’d be nominated for two ARIAs. Meanwhile, McInerney generated

If I’m struggling with something, or feeling something strongly, I’ll write about it.

buzz Stateside, where she’s gigged extensively since 2015’s SXSW. Hip hop mogul Lyor Cohen nabbed her for 300 Entertainment. McInerney’s pop(ular) single Roll Up Your Sleeves was even synced for the hit TV show Girls. Still, McInerney received the greatest validation when she supported neo-soul icon D’Angelo as he toured North America behind his #BlackLivesMatter-themed Black Messiah. “He’s really nice,” she drawls of their exchanges. McInerney closely observed the Virginian live. “I feel like I just soaked it all up - and I got so inspired... I think the biggest thing was probably his interaction with the audience. You can really feel how powerful his music is and how much it means to the audience. It wasn’t just them watching him as a singer on stage. It was like this magic thing that just happened in the room and everyone was a part of it. Every night was special.”

12 • THE MUSIC • 12TH JULY 2017

McInerney has an aura of bashfulness, being a reticent interviewee. Yet, creatively, she is boss. McInerney lauds her indie status - she’s free of commercial “pressures”. If Low Blows has taken ages, it’s because she sought the “right” (read: empathetic) collaborators. Though McInerney had previously recorded with M-Phazes, she decided to hire the US crew Niles City Sound - comprised of former White Denim members Josh Block and Austin Jenkins, plus Chris Vivion. She’d admired their production on Leon Bridges’ Coming Home. Initially, McInerney travelled to Fort Worth, Texas for a day to “test out” the musicians’ vintage studio. “We recorded one of my songs live to tape,” she recalls. “I’d never heard my voice on tape before - and that whole experience of playing live, it’s a live band, it was so much energy. That’s what got me really excited - and that’s why I ended up making my album with them. I think working with them definitely has influenced the sound of the album.” Ironically, McInerney penned the LP’s title-track (and lead single) back in her Melbourne bedroom as a reminder to be assertive. “I’m a pretty quiet person,” she shares. “Sometimes, when I really need to say something or speak up for myself, I just say nothing - and then later I’m like, ‘Ohhh.’” Indeed, McInerney’s lyrics are largely confessional - and cathartic. “A lot of the songs are really personal to me or from my point of view and about how I feel,” she notes. “I guess each song is kinda a bit different, but [it’s] usually something I’m dealing with. If I’m struggling with something, or feeling something strongly, I’ll write about it. It helps me to get through it or to understand something or let it out. So most of the songs have some sort of emotion, ‘Meg emotion’, attached to them.” Oddly, Low Blows manages to evoke both Adele and Courtney Barnett. Contemporary R&B (and soul) is predominantly electronic - and, as such, old school purists have welcomed McInerney’s organicism. However, she’s reluctant to participate in any cultural debates about music. “I tend to always love vocals and singing and the feeling of a song - and the song,” McInerney states. “If I feel like it’s a cool song, or if there’s an attitude to it, that’s what I react to more than maybe the stylistic stuff.” In fact, she doesn’t necessarily classify herself as ‘soul’. Lately, McInerney has been listening to Father John Misty - and the perennial Bob Dylan (“I really like his songwriting and how he can tell a story”). Brisbane’s Grace Sewell - aligned with RCA and residing in the US - has struggled to break through without an in-depth Australian success story. In contrast, McInerney is adamantly, and wisely, retaining her local base. As it happens, this festival regular will return to Splendour In The Grass fresh from another international jaunt. “I just live to do shows - and that kinda keeps me sane,” she enthuses. “I write songs so that I can sing them. When I don’t get to sing them, it feels really weird.”

What: Low Blows (EMI) When & Where: 8 Sep, Forum Theatre

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THE MUSIC • 12TH JULY 2017 • 13

Music

What A Wonderful World Anthony West and Josephine Vander Gucht of Oh Wonder chat about the bands accidental inception, the weirdness of their rise to fame and touring life with Anthony Carew.

“I

think the technical term is ‘fake it ‘til you make it’,” deadpans Anthony West. He’s one half of English electro duo Oh Wonder, a band who, at conception, was never meant to be a band, let alone a wildly successful one. “It began as purely a writing idea,” explains Josephine Vander Gucht, Oh Wonder’s other half. “We came together for songwriting, building a portfolio of songs that we could present to other artists, labels, managers, and say ‘hi, we’re a writing duo, we’d love to write with your artist’. The whole thing was conceived from a behind-the-scenes perspective. There wasn’t any intention of going on tour

There wasn’t any intention of going on tour or making albums. That’s all been a total accident...

or making albums. That’s all been a total accident... When strangers ask ‘what do you do?’ and I say ‘I’m in a band’, that still feels alien to me.” When the pair decided to upload their first song, Body Gold, online in 2014, everything changed. “It immediately started resonating with people on this unexpectedly global level,” West recounts, “we [were] getting messages from people in Indonesia, Brazil, Mexico, Australia. Within the first week, we knew we’d latched onto something different and more exciting than anything we’d ever done.” “Normally when you’re in a band,” Vander Gucht offers, “you’re sending the [Soundcloud] link around to all your family and friends, saying ‘Please listen to my song! Let me know what you think of it!’ You’re hoping you’ll get, like, 50 plays out of it. But with [Body Gold], we didn’t tell

14 • THE MUSIC • 12TH JULY 2017

anyone about it, we just uploaded it. And it was going into the hundreds of thousands of plays in the first few days, which we thought must’ve been a mistake. It felt like such a fluke, compared to everything else we’ve ever done. But, it just continued to happen that way. So, immediately we knew that [Oh Wonder] was different to anything else we’d ever done before.” From that auspicious beginning, they’ve felt as if Oh Wonder has had its own momentum. “It feels like it’s constantly pulling us, we’re never pushing it,” West says. “It doesn’t feel like we’ve been in charge of anything,” says Vander Gucht. For the next year, they released a song a month; cuts they recorded on a computer, in a studio space they’d built in a granny-flat at the bottom of the garden at Vander Gucht’s parents’ house. The songs would, eventually, add up to the self-titled Oh Wonder LP; the duo estimating that they spent &pound;400 on the entire thing. “We never felt like we were making an album,” Vander Gucht says. “There was no self-awareness. There was no plan.” Despite being conceived with no great ambition, Oh Wonder’s 2015 debut cracked the Top 20 in Canada, and hit #26 in the UK. With its successes, the pair hit the road, hard. This was natural for West, a born traveller whose childhood was split between the Isle Of Man, Canada and England, and involved an annual trip to Australia to visit relatives. Vander Gucht, however, is a homebody, a lover of routine, more used to spending days in her parents’ garden. “Touring is very alien to me, and I’m still learning to deal with everything it entails,” Vander Gucht says. This includes moving in a gang, and effectively relinquishing your privacy for extended stint. “The 12 of us,” West says, of Oh Wonder’s touring party of musicians, managers, and sound techs, “we all wake up together, we’re all travelling together. You’re experiencing these emotional highs and lows together. These aren’t the people that you love, they’re not your close friends or family, it’s this weird little community united by the band.” Dealing with life on the road — “we love touring, but it’s not our natural habitat,” says West — became a key theme for the second Oh Wonder album, Ultralife. The follow-up to their self-contained debut pushes into bigger things: it was half-written in New York, partly recorded in things ‘proper’ studio, and is built on live takes featuring the a ‘prop band’s touring drummer. “We had the opportunity to put project in a whole new place, both figuratively and this pr physicality,” Vander Gucht says. physic “The overarching theme” of Ultralife, Vander Gucht “T offers, “is the extremes of emotion that we all feel as human-beings. Feeling invincible one day, then completely trapped and isolated the next... That’s what touring is for us. Touring is the perfect environment for an emotional roller coaster. You’re experiencing the highest highs: performing songs that you’ve written for thousands of people in a foreign country is ridiculously incredible. But, then you’re back on the bus, in your pyjamas, eating tortilla chips covered with cheese that you’ve made in the microwave. And, that happens on a daily basis. We’re always trying to work our way through that, and make sense of that.”

What: Ultralife (Dew Process/Universal) When & Where: 26 Jul, 170 Russell

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THE MUSIC • 12TH JULY 2017 • 15

Music

Catfish If You Can Catfish & The Bottlemen were always destined for greatness, although, as frontman Van McCann tells Anthony Carew, they already knew that.

“W

hen we first started,” recounts Catfish & The Bottlemen frontman Van McCann, “the van broke down at the side of the road. We were sat there, talking to each other, and to pick each other up we were like, ‘mate, we’re going to be selling out big arenas in fuckin’ Australia in a couple of years, let’s not worry about this! We’re gonna be sweet!’” When Catfish & The Bottlemen began, in Llandudno, Wales, McCann was 14. He’d grown up in Widnes, before his family moved to Wales. They were all Irish and musicians (“my grandad’s nearly 90, and he’s on tour in Ireland as we speak, playing fiddle”), so the young

We wrote a plan like we were writing a film. And it’s all played out the way we thought it would.

McCann was fed his namesake - Van Morrison, the Chieftains, and the Dubliners - from birth. A childhood love of The Beatles, Kinks, T-Rex, and The Doors led to an adolescence in thrall to Oasis, Arctic Monkeys, Sterephonics and Kings Of Leon. “I always loved [music],” McCann says. “The way that, if you’re havin’ a lousy day, you can put a tune on and make you feel class.” Like “that kid who’s just got into football, and wants to be a footballer [who’s] kickin’ a ball up against the wall all day, and when their mum says ‘come in for your dinner!’ they stay outside, still kickin’ a football”, McCann would spend all day on his guitar. He started writing “poor” songs at 13, but, by the time the band began a year later, he already was turning out songs that’d end up

16 • THE MUSIC • 12TH JULY 2017

on Catfish & The Bottlemen LPs. “I’d play them and people would be like: ‘Kid, you’re fucking ace! You’re mint!’” McCann recalls. “Everyone around us could see we were lovin’ it, they encouraged us. So we just threw ourselves into it. We found a new way of life: we’d write these songs, get in the van, drive around the country, and play ‘em, even if there was nobody there, or if it was sold out. We never played a gig where we didn’t think we blew the place away. We’ve felt like we’ve always been good... Me and the lads have been doing this for ten years, and we’re still coming off stage, side by side, buzzin’ every night, laughin’ our heads off.” McCann has reason to laugh. After Catfish & The Bottlemen’s debut, 2014’s The Balcony, cracked the UK Top 10, their second record, 2016’s The Ride, went to #1, and #6 in Australia. He’s about to head to Moscow to play with Richard Ashcroft (“never been, mate, I’ve only seen it in the Rocky films”), before playing a headlining show for 35,000 people in London. After returning to Australia for Splendour In The Grass and more arenasized shows, they’re supporting Green Day on a stadium tour in the US, “we’re doing one at the Rose Bowl, in Pasadena in Los Angeles, which is like where the fuckin’ Stones play. It’s just a mad feelin.” Anyone else in McCann’s shoes might find the whole thing surreal. But the 24-year-old - who enthusiastically offers “I love this business [the music industry]” - sees all this as the natural evolution of his band. From the very beginning, before their tour van ever broke down on the side of the road, Catfish & The Bottlemen were conceived with grand ambitions. “We wrote a plan like we were writing a film. And it’s all played out the way we thought it would,” McCann offers. “It’s nice for your folks to see you sat there as a kid in your backyard saying ‘don’t worry about me, I’m gonna do this, go here, have a #1 album, get a Brit award’. It’s weird to have said something out loud, then have it play out exactly as you said it would.” The band are keeping their nose to the grind, too: their forthcoming album is already done, the rest of their 2017 is filled with shows, and there’ll be no downtime. “There’ll be no disappearin’ and coming back, no stoppin’ and having those big long breaks where you have to grow beards and change your sound and all that. We’ve never done anything different from the start. When we write songs, we always just do it by: ‘Is it hittin’ you? Is it proper hittin’ you? Does it feel like it’s pinnin’ you to the back wall?’ That’s the way we do it. I just love playin’, and writin’ fuckin’ massive tunes. So, we’re just gonna keep plowin’ through. The next album’s in the back pocket. It’s class. We’re already plannin’ next year, plotting with management. It’s only gonna get bigger, mate. We feel like we’re just getting’ warmed up, like we’re still in second gear. There’s a lot there for the taking. We’re just gonna carry on. Keep smashin’ it.”

When & Where: 21 Jul, Festival Hall; 22 Jul, Splendour In The Grass, North Byron Parklands

THE MUSIC • 12TH JULY 2017 • 17

Theatre

You Gotta Have Faith As she prepares her first production for Bell Shakespeare, director Anne-Louise Sarks is tackling a great Shakespearean conundrum. Maxim Boon meets The Merchant Of Venice.

irector Anne-Louise Sarks is facing one of the biggest undertakings of her career to date. Not only is she preparing a production that will travel further and be seen by more people than any of her previous shows, it’s also a prestigious debut with Australia’s premiere purveyors of The Bard: Bell Shakespeare. But beyond the pressure of a 27-theatre tour, or the high expectations of Bell’s Shakespeare-savvy punters, her greatest challenge may, in fact, come from the play she’ll be presenting.

The main thing for me was establishing the great humanity of Shylock.

The Merchant Of Venice has an uncanny, evergreen knack for reflecting the dynamics of our society’s morality, but it’s a text that calls for a courageous and sensitive vision. As a play about a ruthlessly pursued debt, it speaks to the corrupting effect of wealth and the values that should hold more worth than tawdry currency. These economic themes are not so much malleable as they are unerring — it seems fated that The Merchant Of Venice’s warnings about the malignancy of the rich will always be on the money. But alongside this fiscal philosophising is a more problematic idea. Difficult questions linger over this play’s most pivotal and hotly debated role: Shylock, the Jewish moneylender who famously demands a “pound of flesh” to settle a debt, but ends up being stripped of his fortune, family and even his faith. The conundrum is multi-levelled. Is Shylock a villain who eventually gets his rightful comeuppance or a

18 • THE MUSIC • 12TH JULY 2017

victim persecuted for his religion and subjected to a biased trial? Is Shakespeare’s depiction of Shylock a subtle attack on the anti-Jewish sentiment rife in Elizabethan England or was it deliberately, unashamedly anti-Semitic? These questions have been endlessly pondered by scholars from HSC to PhD, but it continues to be a point of complex contention that must be carefully confronted by directors tackling The Merchant Of Venice. Some choose to appeal to purists by contextualising Shylock within the 16th-century anti-Jewish mentality. Others have sought to reposition the audience’s empathy for this character, appealing to their sympathies rather than their schadenfreude. Some have even opted to have this role spoken entirely in Yiddish to galvanise the sense of isolating otherness faced by Shylock. Sarks’ solution is somewhat more secular. “The main thing for me was establishing the great humanity of Shylock,” she explains. “He’s not a comic character, nor is he an outright villain. And my way of interpreting his journey is that things go absolutely too far, but they are a direct result of the kind of history and persecution this man experiences. And I think when you position the play in that way, then you have the ability to ask some really complex questions about the way we treat people now. It allows a kind of contemporary resonance to be felt.” Sarks has sought to amplify the most relatable facets of Shylock’s character, even taking certain corners of plot usually limited to a verbal description and exchanging them for played-out, fully staged action: “We’ve taken these extra steps to create that empathy and to shift the perspectives in the play, because things get very ugly in that courtroom. Things go further than they need to. They go beyond the law and I really want my audience to question that and not be blindly accepting of what is usually played as a victory.” Fundamentally, there’s no avoiding the fact that Shylock is a villain, within the context of this play; if you were to remove the penny-pinching Jewish stereotype, you would still be left with a man bent on a disproportionate level of revenge. The way the term “Shylock” has become common parlance for a loan shark, and “pound of flesh” has come to mean a mercilessly claimed debt, reveals how indelibly etched Shylock’s nature is on our collective, Western culture in spite of its offensive undertones. Sarks does not wish to absolve this character of his less flattering personality traits, but she is embracing a greater level of moral ambiguity than you might usually find in The Merchant Of Venice. “There’s really no way to make the play an allegory for something else. I think that the language, the poetry, the kind of debates with the role of faith in society — it’s utterly entrenched inside this beautiful language. So, I never felt like transplanting the play was an option,” she admits. “This production almost has a fairy-tale look to it at certain points and that was a very deliberate choice. We’re saying to our audience, ‘This is a story — we will tell it to you and you will invest all your imaginary forces just as we have.’ I’m hoping that by allowing that element of theatricality and storytelling to the fore it will open up this production as a provocation, where we’re able to question what we’re seeing and how these characters act.”

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THE MUSIC • 12TH JULY 2017 • 19

Culture

Lashing Out If you’re yet to discover The Music’s hit podcast The Lashes, it’s about time you did your listening holes a favour and hightail it over to our Soundcloud. In each episode, our intrepid hosts, Maxim Boon and Sam Wall, road test a new musttry activity — so clear your weekend plans and give these a go, STAT!

Escape Rooms What is it? If you’ve ever watched a detective movie and fancied yourself a super sleuth, then you’ve come to the right place. Enter into a themed space — anything from a prohibition speakeasy to a vampire castle to a serial killer’s lair — and riddle out the clues. You’ll have one hour to crack the case and, you’ve guessed it, escape from the room. Some places — and there are alot to choose from — will even quiz you at the end to find out if you uncovered the mysteries lurking behind closed doors. Cue spooky laugh: Whaaahahahahaaaa.

Verdict: First thing’s first, there are escape rooms and there are escape rooms, if you catch our drift. Do your homework and make sure the one you’re heading to has earned some kind words from previous visitors, as some are on the crummy side. We hit Escape Hunt on Queen Street, CBD, and were not disappointed with the experience. But remember, gently gently, catchy monkey: figure out the clues, let your minds do the heavy lifting, and whatever your do, don’t smash anything!

Geocaching

Zedtown

What is it?

The thing about your old-timey pirate-styley treasure hunt is that there’s a lot of emphasis on the treasure and not so much on the hunt. But what about the thrill of the chase? Geocaching offers all the fun of hunting for treasure, with none of the riches — unless you call finding off-brand troll dolls and old pencil toppers a worthy bounty. Download the app, follow clues and keep your eagle eyes peeled to join this global scavenger mission hiding in plain site.

We’ve all watched zombie horror movies and screamed at the telly as some apparently clueless dumbass becomes a snack for the shuffling, groaning, easily outmaneuvered undead. But what if you were living through a real zombie apocalypse — how would you fair? Wonder no more, thanks to the good people at Zedtown, an immersive Zombie survival game held at the Melbourne Showgrounds. Load up your Nerf gun try and survive ‘til the evac.

Verdict:

As the saying goes, one man’s treasure is another man’s trash, and some people will no doubt find Geocaching kinda rubbish. However, there’s definitely a harm to it — especially in the way it progressively increases the difficulty of the finds, with increasing levels of trickiness to the hides. But this ain’t a pastime for the squeamish. So, if you’re not particularly jazzed about sticking your hands in dank holes and looking shifty down dark alleyways, we’d probably say give this one a miss.

There are so many reasons to love this one, so damn hard. Firstly, you will see geeks geeking harder than they have ever geeked in the whole geek lives. You’ll also get to live out that zombie fantasy thanks to a team of great actors bringing this scenario to life. If (or really that should be when, unless you’re Steven Seagal or some shit) you’re turned, you’ll get an awesome zombie makeover to look the part. One word of warning, however: tune up those cardio skills before hand — you’ll be running for your life.

20 • THE MUSIC • 5TH JULY 2017

The Break Room What is it? Sometimes you just want to smash the shit out of something — it’s ok, you can admit it. When the red mist descends and the rageahol kicks in, it’s tough to find a constructive outlet that won’t land you in jail or at least blocked by your mates on Facebook. So before you post that grumpy status or fire off those snarky texts, vent that anger at The Break Room in Collingwood. Here, you’ll be handed a baseball bat some stuff to wail on, consequence free. Aaaaand relax.

Verdict: There’s no disputing, this is an awesome way to release your inner Hulk. Even if you’re a placid soul, you’ll be surprised by how much smashing shit up appeals. Pro tip: wear the visor over the biker helmet — that thing steams up real quick! You can also bring your own stuff to obliterate — a good way to dispose of an ex’s stuff after a bad breakup, so we’re told.

Holey Moley Crazy Golf What is it? Puns and putts are the order of the day at Holey Moley mini-golf. With 27 individually themed, carefully crafted holes to take on, each bearing a nifty golf pun, this is an impressively thoughtful sporting challenge. Grab a beer or a cocktail (yes, they’re pun-elicious too), pick up your putter and try and beat the average par.

Verdict: On paper, this is a thoroughly rad concept, and the attention to detail at Holey Moley is amazing (our personal favourite holes were Barbie’s Scream House, and the deceptively tricky I’m Sorry Miss Jackson, I Am Surreal). But we recommend you figure out your tee-time and make sure you avoid peak hours — on our visit, there was a full house and consequently a lot of queuing, for the bar and for the course. Also, with a backlog of impatient customers behind you, the pressure’s on to find your inner Tiger Woods (the golfer, not the sex addict).

What: The Lashes, streaming every Wednesday on The Music Soundcloud and iTunes.

THE MUSIC • 12TH JULY 2017 • 21

Cabaret

Gin Sing One of Mother’s Ruin: A Cabaret About Gin’s gin swilling divas, Maeve Marsden, talks about the juniper spirit and Sydney lockout laws with Rita Bratovich.

f you didn’t already know, gin is delicious. In fact, it’s such a tasty drop that there’s a gin renaissance sweeping the world, which has led to a proliferation of boutique distilleries, new, exotic flavours and fabulous gin cocktails on the menus of bars from Sydney to Shanghai to San Fransisco. But, while gin may have wooed even the most refined palates of today, it’s also a beverage with a less than pristine history. And for two local artists, that’s something worth singing about. Maeve Marsden and Libby Wood are the two gin-swilling divas of Mother’s Ruin: A Cabaret About Gin, which they created with writer and gin aficionado

I don’t think prohibition works, personally.

Elly Baxter. Baxter runs a website called theginstress. com and was regaling Marsden with historic tales and curious trivia one evening over a bottle of the stuff, when the pair hatched the idea for a cabaret show. “Gin’s a really fascinating drink,” says Marsden. “So we researched gin and how it’s travelled around the world through colonialism. The more we researched, the more characters and stories we found.” The show they created is a theatrical montage of song, story, humour and cocktails — a gin-eology of the juniper spirit from the early 1600s to the present day. They’ve selected songs from a variety of genres and adjusted the lyrics to make them all gin-centric. For instance, I’ve Been Everywhere has become ‘I’ve Drunk 22 • THE MUSIC • 12TH JULY 2017

Every Gin’ and the old standard Fever has been re-written to describe symptoms of malaria (which was once treated with tonic water). It’s not just the lyrics that are altered, the songs are reinterpreted to the point where they are unrecognisable in some cases, says Marsden: “Some of them are quite different to the original version. We try to reclaim them for our stories and use them in different ways.” Critics and audiences alike have responded with great enthusiasm to the show, described by Time Out’s Cassie Tongue in her five-star review as, “Proud and unapologetic, beautiful and powerful”. It’s toured nationally and been part of Sydney Festival, Adelaide Cabaret Festival, Melbourne Cabaret Festival and Perth Fringe. Its success has inspired Marsden and Wood to take the show overseas and, to that end, a recent Sydney show at Giant Dwarf theatre was also used as a special fundraiser to help pay for the venture, with a cheekily subversive theme making a nod to Sydney’s anti-nightlife lockout laws. “It’s like a speakeasy-themed event, so people are encouraged to dress up in kind of 1920s speakeasy kind of vibe. There’ll be performances from the show — live cabaret style performances... we’ve also got a couple of surprise guest performers.” Australian boutique gin distillery, Four Pillars is partnering with Mother’s Ruin... for the event and for the tour. They’ll be supplying the essential ingredient for G&T’s and Negronis on the night. The ladies plan to take their show to England and Edinburgh, equally excited about the prospect of new audiences as they are about taking Australian gin to the land that is arguably the home of that spirit. As the tour reaches Victoria — and given its spirited subject matter — the contrast between Melbourne’s thriving bar scene and Sydney’s struggling, lockoutravaged nightlife is certainly front of mind. “I don’t think prohibition works, personally,” says Marsden, who has experienced a direct negative effect on her industry in the NSW capital. “I think the lockout laws are the wrong approach to Sydney’s nightlife. There’s a stifling of the arts.” She cites cities around the world, including Melbourne, that have a diverse and rich artistic personality because of the small bar culture they foster. “I don’t think simply closing the doors on Sydney’s nightlife is the solution,” Marsden concludes.

What: Mother’s Ruin: A Cabaret About Gin When & Where: 19 — 21 Jul, Map 57: St Kilda’s Winter Garden

THE MUSIC • 12TH JULY 2017 • 23

Music

Frontlash Sayonara Suckers

Giant, If True

And hello Kite Patch, a little red square you wear on your clothes that apparently works like a 48-hour invisibility cloak against mozzies.

Isolated & Friendless It was pretty nice to see ABC’s political editor Chris Uhlmaan drop a savage mic on Trump. It would probably be better if the POTUS wasn’t so deserving of the world’s scorn but still, fun to watch.

Lashes

What’s In A Name? Shoutout to photographer Matt Warrell who will be henceforth known as Matt Walter after taking on his wife’s last name.

Backlash Sour Grapes

Ed Sheeran’s stonewalled another chartclimbing hopeful, this time blocking Stone Sour from their debut Aussie #1.

Big Red Nah

Even The Wiggles aren’t safe from scalpers. The skivvy-sporting children’s entertainers recently spoke out against scumbags shuffling their tickets on at a hugely inflated prices.

Rob Kardashian You’re fucking gross, dude.

24 • THE MUSIC • 12TH JULY 2017

The Jungle Giants’ Sam Hales shares with Jessica Dale why album number three has changed everything.

or Sam Hales, The Jungle Giants third album always needed to be something different from their first two — what he didn’t expect was that his whole working philosophy would need to shift to make the change. “The process was completely different. That kind of shaped everything else to change. I would say more time and thought went into everything but with a more relaxed attitude. In terms of the process, I started doing nine to five, as opposed to writing here and there,” Hales explains. “I kind of reshaped how I write and that changed how I look at things, in turn, it changed how much I output as well. What I was doing was I was starting at the same time every day and working on a song until I didn’t know where to take it. “I also screwed off that idea that it’s ‘delivered down to you’ from some exterior source. For me, I fucking hate that. I used to definitely think that was the case, and so I was less responsible for my own output, so I could be like, ‘Oh, fuck today then because nothing is coming to me,’ but then in terms of how I matured was like, ‘Well, I’m responsible for what I’m putting out so if it’s a shit day at least I’m doing something.’ “I was just able to push it every day, and then even if it was for nothing, I was being easier on myself. Just kind of getting back to playing around. It made me really happy.” Quiet Ferocity marks another change for Hales. This time ‘round he took total control

and took to the producer’s chair for the first time. He enjoyed the process so much that he now wants to work with other groups. “Yes, I would love to do that! I love that. Heaps of my favourite bands, writers, they do their own production. You can always tell, too. Chairlift’s Patrick Wimberly, I love that guy because he’s an awesome writer, awesome producer, then he does this really cool thing for other bands. It’s not always specifically what he would do for Chairlift but you can tell there’s an angle he’s bringing. I like that. “What it used to be was all writing for me then I would think, ‘Aw, screw the production, that’s just another thing.’ But then after a little while, I realised that it has to be happening at the same time for what I want to be doing now, or else it’s just all up in the air. “It took me a while to figure out how to slow down, so I could just be like, ‘Oh well, I know this song needs this ride sound.’ But in the past I would be like, ‘I’ll just do that later.’ But then now it’s like, ‘I have to do the ride sound because it’s going to dictate what’s the next part,’ and so I love that and that’s just another thing that I love doing now.” Hales and the band will be taking Quiet Ferocity on the road this August and September. Previous tours weighed on Hales heavily during the recording stage, as he tried to create an album that translated just as well live as in studio. “We’ve already started rehearsing it and it is freakishly easy for some reason, which feels weird to say. It feels like I’ll jinx it. “It’s all seemed to work and click and it doesn’t seem like it’s going to be a big shit fight. Like with Speakerzoid, we had to add a touring member. And for the first record, we just had to figure out how to do anything,” he laughs. “But then with this one, it’s more just, ‘Aw, cool, we have the set-up, it’s perfect, we just have to learn the parts properly.’”

What: Quiet Ferocity (Amplifire Music) When & Where: 26 Aug, The Croxton

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A SUITABLE GIRL OUT NOW THE MUSIC • 12TH JULY 2017 • 25

Indie Indie

Set Mo

Courtney Marie Andrews

Single Focus

Just Visiting

Answered by: Graeme Pogson and Ella Thompson

Answered by: Stu Turner

Why are you coming to visit our fair country? I’m a singer-songwriter coming to perform my songs in performance spaces around Australia. I’ll be opening for the amazing Joe Pug.

Single title? Reflect What’s the song about? Searching inward, when the outward becomes too much. How long did it take to write/record? Around one month from conception to completion, then maybe an extra month to mix/master. Is this track from a forthcoming release/ existing release It’s from our new record — Destiny/Reflect — available on 12” vinyl in approximately a month from now. The vinyl also features a special dub mix of our last single (Destiny), by Haima Marriott. What was inspiring you during the song’s writing and recording? We were inspired by the classic extended disco mixes we adore; featuring a long intro, breakdowns, instrumental solos etc. We let the song take its time to open up naturally. We’ll like this song if we like... Ella — Graeme — GL — funk — etc. Do you play it differently live? You’ll have to come to the show to find out... When and where is your launch/next gigs? 15 Jul, Corner Hotel. With Fortunes, Tees and DJ Andy Garvey. Website link for more info? strictlygl.com

Single title? I Belong Here feat. Woodes What’s the song about? Wondering if you’re heading in the right direction, but realising if you’re following your passion you’re where you belong. How long did it take to write/record? The song came together really quickly, in the span of a few short hours. However, we spent longer tweaking this one that any other song of ours to get it just right! Is this track from a forthcoming release/ existing release? We’ve written more music than ever recently so you’ll just have to wait and see :) What was inspiring you during the song’s writing and recording? We wrote this at Studio 301 where we gravitated straight to their grand piano. The main chord progression was laid down and recorded pretty roughly. This raw recording made the final cut, which we love. We’ll like this song if we like... Uplifting, feelgood house that makes you want to sip a margarita on a beach somewhere hot. Do you play it differently live? We haven’t actually played it out live yet so you’ll have to come along to our show at Splendour In The Grass to find out! When and where is your launch/next gigs? After Splendour we’re heading around the country with the first ever Stamina Sessions tour, where we take over a venue and play all night long for you — 5 Aug, The Foundry; 12 Aug, The Toff In Town; 19 Aug, Metro Theatre. Tix at setmomusic.com Website link for more info? setmomusic.com

26 • THE MUSIC • 12TH JULY 2017

Is this your first visit? This is my second visit. I once came as a back-up singer for Jimmy Eat World in 2011. How long are you here for? I am there for nearly two weeks, 4 - 17 Jul. What do you know about Australia, in ten words or less? I know that it’s very important to wear sunscreen there. Any extra-curricular activities you hope to participate in while here? If I get the chance, I’d love to visit the Opera House in Sydney and see some wildlife. What will you be taking home as a souvenir? I won’t know until I get there! I usually collect a spoon from every country I visit, though. Where can we come say hi, and buy you an Aussie beer? 13 Jul, Spotted Mallard. Website link for more info? lovepolice.com. au/joe-pug-courtney-marie-andrews-2017/

In Focus Djuki Mala

They’ve conquered YouTube and left a slew of rave reviews and cheering audiences in their wake as they’ve toured the country from their native North East Arnhem Land. Now Melbourne audiences will have another chance to see the thrilling dance moves of Djuki Mala, at MAP 57 as they fuse traditional Yolngu with contemporary pop culture and eye-popping storytelling. It’s an uplifting, relentlessly joyous experience, packed full of heart, comedy and more good feels than you can shake an umbrella at. Catch Djuka Mala 18 – 28 Jul at The Box, part of MAP 57, St Kilda’s Winter Garden.

THE MUSIC • 12TH JULY 2017 • 27

Album / E Album/EP Reviews

Album OF THE Week

Waxahatchee Out In The Storm Merge

★★★★½

Katie Crutchfield’s strike-rate is something of a marvel. Exceptionally prolific but remarkably consistent, Crutchfield’s songwriting hasn’t even faltered throughout the runaway success of her most celebrated and scrutinised project. If anything, Waxahatchee has only grown more ambitious and rewarding with every release. Out In The Storm continues that streak. Easily the project’s most polished effort, their fourth album was largely tracked live with Crutchfield’s collaborators under the ears of veteran alt-rock soundman John Agnello (Dinosaur Jr, Sonic Youth) and sounds absolutely beautiful. A remarkable evolution, given the bedroom studio of the project’s first effort.But, in a testament to Crutchfield’s unflappable songwriting, Out In The Storm retains the bruising honesty and intimacy of the band’s rawer recordings and performances. It’s a truly expressive piece of work. Whether awash with distortion and drums in stellar single Silver or floating on a tidal swell of organ in Recite Remorse, it’s an album that swings and moves with true feeling. Crutchfield’s collaborators (which include sister Allison Crutchfield and Sleater-Kinney’s touring guitarist Katie Harkin) are commendably tasteful in their contributions. There’s a great, shuddering sense of space to Sparks Fly, but this never overwhelms the song’s hook.In short, it’s another high watermark from an artist who probably owes the world a dud. Matt O’Neill

The Kite String Tangle

Meg Mac

The Kite String Tangle

EMI

Low Blows

★★★½

Exist. Recordings

★★★★ For an artist who emerged from the notoriously eclectic and spontaneous group Pigeon, The Kite String Tangle’s Danny Harley has always been remarkably precise in his work. In some cases, almost overly so. While understandably widely embraced, Harley’s early solo work seemed almost too delicate and beautiful; bordering on fragile.But his long-gestating debut solo album redresses that potential shortcoming. While equally as considered and precise as his early successes, The Kite String Tangle has a beautiful undercurrent of business ebbing and flowing beneath Harley’s golden vocals. It was hinted at in single The Prize — which moved from a stripped-back pulse into a blissful explosion of shivering electronics with each chorus 28 • THE MUSIC • 12TH JULY 2017

— and the album’s remaining tracks deliver on that promise. Harley has a knack for crafting irresistible, unique grooves from small fragments of colour and percussion. Combined with his yearning vocal style and an eclectic sense of dynamics, this creates an album that’s simply a joy to explore. Opener Waiting has a clean, UK-funky snap to its old-school breakbeats, but Know By Now is decorated with Floydian/Flaming Lips textural flourishes. It’s a record that’s consistently surprising but never jarring.One of the best Australian electronic albums in some time. Matt O’Neill

Meg Mac, aka Megan McInerney, seems to have been on a constant upswing since Every Lie snagged triple j’s Unearthed Artist Of The Year in 2014. Her debut EP got a Best Female Artist nod from the 2015 ARIA Music Awards, the same year that McInerney toured the US with D’Angelo, and she’s definitely aiming higher again with her debut LP. Track Grace Gold makes an instant impression with a mix to match McInerney’s impressive vocal - driven by chest-rumbling drums and bass and shot through quick electric stabs of funky guitar. It would almost be enough to make you wonder how close this album was to being named after the opener if the subsequent title-track Low Blow wasn’t packed with all the same qualities in equal measure.

They are both mega catchy and, most importantly, big without being bombastic. It’s a quality that McInerney has shown from the start and she seems to have just about perfected at Niles City Sound in Texas, showing the confidence and experience to rely on her abilities instead of trying to blow them out of proportion. McInerney keeps delivering on all the neo-soul promise of those first two singles - if this isn’t the cut that makes her an international household name the one that does likely won’t be far off. Sam Wall

EP Reviews Album/EP Reviews

Frankenbok Vicious, Lawless Fair Dinkum Records

Charles Jenkins & The Zhivagos

Oh Wonder

The Vamps

Ultralife

Wake Up

The Last Polaroid

Dew Process/Universal

EMI

Silver Stamp

★★★

★★★★

★★★

★

Perhaps formerly among the most derided of Aussie metal acts, Frankenbok have ignored the sniping and noisily plied their trade for 20 years. Only a couple of original members remain, however, the Melburnians’ modus operandi (hard-hitting grooves, a sizeable leaning towards thrash and occasionally death metal) packs a sonic gut-punch. Some tracks struggle to differentiate themselves from one another and Vicious, Lawless proves a few genuinely incisive hooks shy. Overall the album’s done and dusted in just 34 aggressive minutes, thus, a track like Fuck Off Or Destroy’s as subtle as the title suggests. Ugly, bare-knuckled fare with zero pretension, the ‘Bok can still ock.

Although he often goes off on interesting tangents (like albums built around a 20-piece string section or historical anecdotes about Melbourne), former Icecream Hands member Charles Jenkins here offers a collection of his classicist pop that occasionally longs for simpler times and technologies (such as the instant photographs of the album’s title and the venerable TDK D90 cassette of No Electronic Devices). Elsewhere, there’s the nearperfect suburban romanticism of Barkly Square, the wry self-cautionary tale of Everyone Loves Me and the closing Winter Ball — where sometime Zhivago Davey Lane (yes, the You Am I one) offers a splendid Brian May-inspired spiral for the guitar break.

British baby-faced popsters The Vamps are back with their second album and while their vocal talents can’t be faulted, squeaky-clean production has once again clearly been at their disposal. Whatever additional touches the four lads might have brought to the table have been smothered by Wake Up’s awful lyrics and mundane song structures, then smeared with character-less varnish. The self-titled single is anthemic and probably the most easily digestible, then the ridiculously worded Volcano follows (“Give me a tear drop/I’ll give you an ocean”) and it’s one quick descent into hell from there. One-dimensional at best just about sums up Wake Up.

Brendan Crabb

Ross Clelland

Ultralife is the second album from London-based alt-pop duo Oh Wonder. Josephine Vander Gucht and Anthony West’s voices combine seamlessly on each and every track, complemented by the familiar musical sound that helped earn them their large following — warm analogue synths mixed in with some live instrumentation, driving keys, solid beats and clean production. Album highlights include quirky, upbeat High On Humans; hauntingly beautiful, pianocarried My Friends; and building album-closer Waste. With their eloquence and knack for brilliantly simple and catchy melodies, Vander Gucht and West further prove that together they’re a force to be reckoned with.

Carley Hall

Madelyn Tait

More Reviews Online Integrity Howling, For The Nightmare Shall Consume

theMusic.com.au

Dear Seattle Dear Seattle

Listen to our This Week’s Releases playlist on

THE MUSIC • 12TH JULY 2017 • 29

Live Re Live Reviews

Orsome Welles @ Evelyn Hotel. Pic: Paul Tadday

Orsome Welles, Qlaye Face, Transience, The Valley Ends Evelyn Hotel 8 Jul

Orsome Welles @ Evelyn Hotel. Pic: Paul Tadday

Gavin DeGraw @ 170 Russell. Pic: Lucinda Goodwin

30 • THE MUSIC • 12TH JULY 2017

Melbourne band The Valley Ends open proceedings tonight, and proceed to hold the growing crowd spellbound with their laidback, moody, almost jazzy altrock. Frontman Tim D’Agostino struggles slightly with some of the higher-end notes initially, but then hits his stride after his voice has warmed up and nails it. Their stuff has a semiexperimental feel to it, with strange soundscapes and snaky rhythms, and they provide a lowkey but impressive opening to this special evening of rock. Hard-hitting proggers Transience take the stage and they lift the tempo and vibe immediately with their more traditional take on modern prog rock. Frontman Robert Cuzens is dead on the money, singing, screaming and howling like his very life depends on it, and the band behind combine sweet finesse, technical wizardry and bludgeoning power in equal measures. Closer Ocean is riveting in its intensity and dynamics. The running order of the bands tonight makes for an interesting, down-up-downup dynamic, with Qlaye Face onstage next. After the frontal assault that is Transience, the dark, cerebral ambience of this Melbourne experimental alt-rock four-piece creates another stark contrast. It’s been interesting to chart the development of a band like this over the last year or so, in a live sense. They have come out of themselves a lot more, are less introverted and introspective in their approach to putting on a show for an audience, while maintaining their idiosyncratic

The love in the room this night is palpable, and Orsome Welles’ Melbourne launch is nothing short of a triumph.

sound, and this makes for a more entertaining, more lively live show. The name Orsome Welles is slowly but steadily growing in notoriety and profile in Aussie rock circles, and their current EP and subsequent tour, of which this show is the climax, should only add to that growth. After a brief acoustic intro, the band explodes onto the stage with the classy power that they are known for, and the packed-out Evelyn is enthralled for the next hour plus, right through to the punchy, crunchy closer Home Sweet Home. These guys are becoming consummate entertainers, especially vocalist Michael Vincent Stowers, who conducts band and audience from the front of the stage like a nuggetty bald-headed maestro, and his voice just gets stronger and sweeter the longer this band goes on. And the band behind him are as tight as a clenched fist and punch unfailingly as one. The love in the room this night is palpable, and Orsome Welles’ Melbourne launch is nothing short of a triumph. Rod Whitfield

eviews Live Reviews

Gavin DeGraw 170 Russell 5 Jul

Gavin DeGraw casually walks over and takes a seat at the grand piano on stage. The red curtain draped across the stage wall adds to the loungey feel for this special acoustic evening. DeGraw admits that he’s only ever been here once before, thirteen years ago and has not returned until now. “Let me tell you, it’s fucking expensive to get here!” he exclaims. This intimate show is certainly one for all the fans who have waited out to see him play live, and he treats us to stripped down arrangements of his biggest hits and rarities from his back catalogue.

His vocals blow us away. As a self-confessed hat lover, tonight he’s got his signature fedora on but he asks us to imagine him with an even bigger hat as he sings a country and western song he wrote called Stealing. He dedicates Run Every Time to the single people and for the couples in the room who used to be single. His vocals blow us away. He takes us back to his first record from 2003, when he was in his third apartment in New York City and tried his best attempt to write a song like Paul McCartney, the result is Follow Through. “I put out a new record about 11 months ago... it’s called Something Worth Saving,” he tells us. Despite what his friend speculating how critics could flip it, he makes it clear that he doesn’t write songs

for anyone but his fans and himself. He continues to sing the worthy title track of the album, a superb ballad to really show off his vocal range and songwriting ability. His bandmate brings out the double bass for a verse and chorus of George Michaels’ Faith that then leads into Annalee with a similar jangly piano melody. “Tell me if I keep saying this city name wrong... Melbourne,” he says with great pronunciation. He confesses that he’d already made the mistake of saying it wrong so he learnt how to say it right from some locals before the show. “I didn’t expect this many people to come tonight but I promise I won’t wait as long to come back.” He opens up and shares a song he fell in love with that changed his life as a musician - A Change Is Gonna Come by Sam Cooke. We feel every bit of heart and soul he puts into the powerful rendition with an incredible electric guitar instrumental to really make it soar. The last quarter of his twohour-long set concludes with his biggest hits Soldier, Not Over You and of course I Don’t Want To Be that gives us all of the nostalgic One Tree Hill feels. “I wrote this song to be as anti pop culture as I could and then it actually became part of pop culture! Isn’t it funny how things work out?” Michael Prebeg

Steve Gunn National Gallery of Victoria (NGV) 7 Jul The last weekend of Van Gogh And The Seasons sees this Friday night pulling a huge crowd for both the exhibition and Steve Gunn’s show.

Van Gogh And The Seasons focuses on the pastoral and the coming and going of the seasons. Pesky guided tours see flocks of art lovers cooing in adoration in front of their favourite canvases. Moving through the gallery, we take a journey from the sombre and mysterious shades of autumn through to the chilly desolation of winter and then onto the floral glories of spring, which is where this exhibition starts to explode with colour and light.

Gunn’s fluid guitar sounds like a gentle breeze rustling among the leaves. Summer concentrates on the soft golden hues of the sun and wheat fields being harvested. The exhibition launches this evening on a decidedly pastoral tone, but before we can exit through the gift store many pause to take a selfie with Van Gogh’s rather famous self-portrait. The lights in NGV’s Great Hall are dimmed down to darkness as a spotlight takes aim and bathes Steve Gunn in its soft, fuzzy yellow glow. Tonight, we get an intimate solo show from the prolific singersongwriter. Gunn’s hands slide across the strings of his guitar as he gently strums and nimbly fingerpicks to create the most delicate and dreamy sounds. Gunn’s fluid guitar sounds like a gentle breeze rustling among the leaves. His mellow vocals fade to the back the mix and the

meaning of his words becomes irrelevant as we just sit back and soak up the warm, sunny vibes. It is mesmerising to watch Gunn work his magic and we’re reminded of his origins in Kurt Vile & The Violators even though Gunn tends to stick to dealing folksy Americana these days. Gunn has released so many albums since 2007 that it’s hard to know exactly what he might choose to play. The set starts with Old Strange before settling on cuts from Eyes On The Lines. During Old Strange, Gunn has a ‘shhh, I’m concentrating’ moment, complaining that a bunch of idiots who can’t stop jabbering are distracting. Otherwise, Gunn doesn’t have much to say apart from thanking the crowd for choosing to spend their time with him this evening. The tunes rather seamlessly blend into one other. Giving us just a handful of songs, Gunn plays extended versions with lengthy guitar solos that showcase his ample technical skill. While impressing the crowd, Gunn never strays from the soft, dreamy intent of his music that is at once introspective, meditative and completely immersive. A wildly mild evening with a very talented singer-songwriter. Guido Farnell

THE MUSIC • 12TH JULY 2017 • 31

Arts Reviews Arts Reviews

just as pertinent to live performance. Without knowing a piece by, for example, Pina Bausch, is considered a masterpiece, someone might dismiss her extraordinary but often inscrutable storytelling as artsyfartsy nonsense. Choreographer Natalie Abbott enters into a sparring match with the fraught relationship between reverence and worth in (re) PURPOSE: the MVMNT, a mercurial mix of spoken word, live music and movement. This double-hinged dance theatre piece challenges the innate absurdity of the theatrical, while simultaneously corralling its audience’s experience through misdirection and faux-reality. It offers a narrative conceit played out in reverse — an implosive reaction to an iconic moment of the classical ballet canon, the solo of The Dying Swan. The lexicon of classical ballet is apparent throughout, but released from the taut discipline that usually underpins this dance form. Gone are the delicate, elegant lines, replaced by wild, impulsive flows, sweeping, spooling, spilling forth. This is a show of audacious and sometimes shocking gestures, that crumble and concertina as Abbott abruptly interjects, breaking the tension with requests for different lighting or other seemingly out of place instructions. But the most fascinating details exist in its margins: the sound of distant talking; a conscious, pointed choice of open or closedmouth breathing; a figure slumped in a far corner, or casually walking across the stage. Abbott dares us to question what is real and what is artificial, what is planned and what is spontaneous, in much the same way that we allow our emotional selves to believe in the tragic death of someone on stage, while our rational brain understands it isn’t so. By placing one of the most adored artefacts of mainstream ballet at the centre of this highly experimental work, Abbott poses an important cultural question: why do we place a higher value on one piece of art over another, when both explore the same visceral territory?

(re)PURPOSE: the MVMNT

Vigil

(re)PURPOSE: the MVMNT Theatre Until 9 Jul, Dancehouse

★★★½ Last week, social media was lit up by fans of Twin Peaks, geeking out over the bizarre visions conjured by infamously avant-garde director David Lynch in the latest instalment of the show’s third season. “There’s nothing to point to in the history of television that helps describe exactly what this episode attempts,” declared The New York Times. And yet, for all its impenetrable strangeness, Lynch’s cultural cache was never questioned. This reveals a common conundrum: the way we value and respond to experimental art is as much about psychology and reputation as it is about expression. And what is true for television is

Maxim Boon

32 • THE MUSIC • 12TH JULY 2017

Vigil Theatre Until 8 Jul, Arts Centre Melbourne

★★★★ On paper, Vigil really shouldn’t work. It attempts to weave a brisk hour of cabaret from a torturous tangle of emotional threads — guilt, bravado, heartbreak. It seeks to communicate the wrought yet delicate complexities of grief through a blunt, larrikin, true blue brand of wise-cracking comedy. It offers a flawed, self-centred protagonist, bordering on unlikable, and expects us to open our hearts to her. This is a show that shouldn’t work. But it does. Spectacularly so. And not in spite of these potential pitfalls, but because of them. Steve Vizard and Joe Chindamo’s whip-smart, touching, strikingly true window on the confronting reality of losing a parent doesn’t slather on the poetic sentimentality that Hollywood taps when an intimate loss looms close. Vigil is often crass, undignified, unresolved and inappropriate, because a life of experiences condensed into a single moment of intense, indefinable feeling defies neat, convenient explanation. Artistically speaking, the most remarkable achievement of this show is how complimentary the contributions of its two creators are; there’s never a sense that either has had to compromise or step back to accommodate the other’s demands. But Vigil — if you’ll pardon the pun — lives or dies by the strength of its solitary performer, and there could hardly be a more accomplished, dazzling and utterly captivating talent to helm this production than Christie Whelan Browne. Under the direction of Andy Packer, she effortlessly negotiates the nuances of Liz, a wayward and wandering prodigal daughter, as she attempts to meet the gaze of her mother’s final moments. This is no tome of doom and gloom, however; there’s a surprising number of belly laughs in this evening of song and sorrow. They reveal the imperfections in Liz’s character, and in doing so make her all the more endearing. And her eventual loss all the more crushing. Maxim Boon

OPINION Opinion

Howzat!

Local Music By Jeff Jenkins Picture This It’s embarrassing when you’re an obsessed fan, constantly banging on about how great an act is, and you share the same surname. Some people might think we’re related, but no one in my family is as talented as Charles Jenkins. As one industry heavyweight remarked recently: “Imagine if he lived in the States, he would be rich!” Indeed, Charles is an unheralded songwriting genius, the Jeff Tweedy the world has never heard of. The new Charles Jenkins & The Zhivagos album, The Last Polaroid, is another songwriting masterclass. Charles’ songs are punctuated by glorious twists and turns, with surprising key changes and unexpected instrumental breaks. As he declares in Cartwheels, “I’ve found a way to harness the best of every harvest.” Charles is old school, a throwback to the days when songwriters had something to say and could take you someplace else with their words and music. “And, yeah, I show my age,” he sings on the new record, “the rewinding of the cassette, the 90-minute TDK/No electronic devices can

entertain like laughing with your lover through the summer rain.” Sometimes real-life events provide inspiration. “Once upon a time I was walking near Barkly Square, in the rain, at night, and a girl flew past on her bicycle, singing at the top of her voice, and it put a smile on my face,” Charles recalls. Remembering the song A Nightingale Sang In Berkeley Square, he created Barkly Square, which is now the centrepiece of the new album. Howzat! once wrote that Icecream Hands were the best pop band to never have a Top 40 hit. Perhaps Charles is resigned to the fact that his chances of conquering the charts are now remote. “I’ve become the stay-at-home troubadour,” he sings in Walking On Air. It’s the world’s loss. But how lucky are we to be able to see Charles at a pub - with Davey Lane on guitar!

Charles Jenkins & The Zhivagos

Charles Jenkins & The Zhivagos launch The Last Polaroid at The Gasometer Hotel on 23 Jul at 2pm. As Charles concludes in Winter Ball, “At times you get luckier than you would ever hope to be.”

Hip Hip The birthdate of Australian rock’n’roll can be traced to 60 years ago this month when Johnny O’Keefe released his debut single, (You Hit The Wrong Note) Billy Goat. The single stiffed, but JO’K would soon become our first rock superstar.

Hot Line “Let the radio flood you with music” - Charles Jenkins , High Above The River.

THE MUSIC • 12TH JULY 2017 • 33

OPINION Opinion

The Get Down Funky Shit

he Haggis Horns have triumphantly returned with a new 45 that is positively funky. Featuring UK MC With Obliveus Doc Brown, this is a precursor to their upcoming album and proves these cats have not lost the ability to make rooms sweaty. Take It Back takes us back to the golden era when mumble rap got you kicked off the stoop and wack rhymes lost the battle. Brown’s lyrics have the party on lockdown and obviously, the horns are at the forefront on this peak-time stomper so get it through their Bandcamp page quick like. While I am on the subject of parties, Melbourne’s Lewis Cancut has brought the goods again with his latest release on NLV, Plastic Games. Reminiscent of a Balearic trip into Donkey Kong Junior territory, it is full of bleeps and bops with slight twinges of island drums, acidic overtones and will definitely get you on the dancefloor so get onto this before everyone else does. Back to the 45s and the mighty Mocambo label dropped a new slice of heavenly breakbeat from the Rhythm Snipers a while back, which I forgot to mention. While Standing Rock on the A-side is funky in that spaghetti western/Budos Band vibe, its’ the B-Boy Champions Medley on the flip that made me buy doubles. Going from break to break, if you know an MC, get him or her onto this live and you will have the entire house going bananas. With that, I am outta here.

Wa ke The Dead

Incendiary

Punk And Hardcore With Sarah Petchell

Trai ler Trash

The Haggis Horns – Take It Back

ow that we’re halfway through the year it might be an idea to recap some of the excellent punk and hardcore releases that have been getting some high rotation in my world over the last six months. First and foremost is the new Mindsnare album Unholy Rush. It came out of nowhere: for the lucky few who got their hands on it first, it came with two 7”s that were available to pre-order. It then got a general release

34 • THE MUSIC • 12TH JULY 2017

Geostorm

a little over a month later and proved to everyone why Mindsnare are the best at what they do. Thousand Mile Stare by Long Island hardcore outfit Incendiary is the first straight-up hardcore album Wake The Dead has been obsessed with in a fair while. It’s lyrically political (in the best sense of the word) and musically engaging. The vocals have changed a little since 2013’s Cost Of Living, but Incendiary have improved. While not strictly punk or hardcore, Algiers’ The Underside Of Power is definitely a record to check out. Vocally, it sounds like gospel or Motown, but musically there are so many influences at work that it’s hard to pin down what they actually sound like. Punk and hardcore are definitely in the mix, though. And there’s still more to come. Comeback Kid have released a new track, which will be on their forthcoming album Outsider. The track is called Absolute and features Devin Townsend (of all people) doing guest vocals. Perth’s Cursed Earth will release Cycles Of Grief Volume 1: Growth in August, which will definitely make my bestof-the-year list.

OPINION the

Opinion

Dives Into Your

uch like Fifty Screens And Shades Of Grey bondage Idiot Boxes enthusiast Christian Grey, Trailer Trash’s With Guy Davis tastes are very singular. And while they don’t run to bringing all manner of kinky accoutrements into the bedchamber, they are, one might say, just as shameful and therefore not up for discussion in one’s semi-regular magazine column. But we now live in the era of full disclosure, where it is mandatory to fly your dirty laundry as proudly as you would your freak flag, so allow this columnist to try to explain why, in a year full of miracles and wonders on screens big and small, I am extremely hyped for a motion picture titled Geostorm. There was once a time when a movie marketed as ‘years in the making’ meant that a great amount of painstaking effort was going into every conceivable detail of the production. Nowadays we know that actually making a release date is the goal of many a big-budget blockbuster and is frequently preferable to making a good movie. Reshoots are generally regarded as part of the process, even though they sometimes signal that things may have gone off the rails (just look at the recent kafuffle with the Han Solo project), but when a movie begins production in 2014 and is only just now getting ready to surge into cinemas? Well, that hints that said production has jumped the tracks and is now heading full-tilt towards a kindergarten. Geostorm was never gonna be a gold medallist. I mean, it was co-written and directed by the half of the Independence Day team that’s not Roland Emmerich (Dean Devlin) and its leading man is Gerard Butler at his beefiest and sweatiest (which, if you’ve caught the recent oeuvre of Mr Butler, is really saying something, although I for one eagerly welcome the actor’s ongoing shift into Oliver Reed/Richard Burton hambone territory). And as far as Trailer Trash can discern from its trailers, it has something to do with futuristic weather-modulating satellites causing planetary superstorms after being hijacked by some nefarious bastards, meaning that Butler has to pull off some kind of tricky combo of system hack and manual repair IN SPACE! Meanwhile, Butler’s little bro Jim Sturgess has to KIDNAP THE PRESIDENT assisted by his sexy Secret Service agent gf (Australia’s

own Abbie Cornish, who really deserves better) in order to get the secret codes Butler needs to hack the satellites. All of this while the whole world is getting smacked around by some really inclement weather. HOW ARE YOU NOT LINING UP FOR THIS RIGHT NOW? Geostorm seems to be a movie out of time. (It’s hitting our screens around October.) After all, we’re still aware that climate change is probably gonna be the thing that fucks us all up in the end. But in the time between this movie beginning production and getting a release, the most prevalent threat to the planet and everything on it has become... well, in a word, Trump. (Effective shorthand for a dangerous combo of ideology, ignorance and rapidly dwindling standards. And that’s the end of the sociopolitical commentary for today.) Quite frankly, meeting our maker at the hands of a monster tsunami, as depicted in Geostorm, seems downright quaint when stacked up against the current options for our collective demise. Plus, you know, Butler just might save the world in at least one of these scenarios.

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INLAND CONCERT SERIES at the Incinerator Gallery

INLAND 17.9: ON THE GROUND A FAINT SHADOW Friday, 21 July at 7pm (doors open at 6.30pm) All tickets $15. Bookings prior to the performance essential. incineratorgallery.com or call 8325 1750. 180 Holmes Road, Moonee Ponds

THE MUSIC • 12TH JULY 2017 • 35

Comedy / G The Guide

Wed 12

King Stag

Bohjass + Slipper + Tom Fryer Band: 303, Northcote

Japandroids + Von Stache: Barwon Club Hotel, South Geelong

Two Door Cinema Club

The Music Presents

‘George Best’ performed in full by The Wedding Present: Bella Union, Carlton South Yolanda Brown: Bird’s Basement, Melbourne

The Lemon Twigs: 25 Jul The Curtin

Mellowdias Thump feat. Colette + Melo Felo: Boney, Melbourne

Two Door Cinema Club: 25 Jul Festival Hall

Malcura + Geo + Kill The Darling: Cherry Bar, Melbourne

Sigur Ros: 27 Jul Margaret Court Arena

Milk! Records Residency with Various Artists: Coburg RSL, Coburg

Vera Blue: 8 Aug Tap House Bendigo, 11 Aug 170 Russell, 12 Aug Wool Exchange Geelong

Danny McGinlay: Comic’s Lounge, North Melbourne

Sarah McLeod: 23 Aug The Workers Club Ali Barter: 25 Aug The Workers Club Geelong; 1 Sep Theatre Royal Castlemaine; 8 Sep Corner Hotel Dan Sultan: 1 Sep Wool Exchange Geelong; 2 Sep Forum Theatre Mew: 12 Sep Max Watt’s

Connor Black Harry: Evelyn Hotel, Fitzroy Greg Champion + James Griffin + Suzette Herft: Lomond Hotel, Brunswick East Neeko + Danika Smith: Open Studio, Northcote Arsenic & Old Lace: Retreat Hotel, Brunswick Rebetiko: Spotted Mallard, Brunswick

At The Drive In: 28 Sep Festival Hall Caligula’s Horse: 30 Sep Max Watt’s

Ainslie Wills

Alt-J: 7 Dec Sidney Myer Music Bowl

Snag A Stag King Stag are back with their intense new single, Broken Bones And Garden Gnomes, and you can catch them giving it a live trial run at Bar Open this Friday. Support includes Slim Jeffries, Pockets and The Great Emu War. Streakergate with Sugar Teeth + Moody Beaches + Plyers + White Vans + Closet Straights + The Only Boys + China Beach + Shiva & The Hazards + Fierce Mild + more: The Gasometer Hotel, Collingwood The Tool Time House Band + Porpoise Spit + Muscle Mate: The Old Bar, Fitzroy Weatherboards + Culte + Way Dynamic + Pigmeat: The Tote (Upstairs), Collingwood

Danny McGinlay: Comic’s Lounge, North Melbourne Leaps & Bounds Music Festival Opening Night Party feat. Augie March + Jess Ribeiro + The Pink Tiles: Corner Hotel, Richmond Barry Sunset: Evelyn Hotel, Fitzroy In Hearts Wake + Crossfaith + While She Sleeps + Polaris: Forum Theatre, Melbourne

Moonlover + Broads + Sal Wonder: The Tote (Front Bar), Collingwood DJ Practice + Virgin X + Jannah Quill + Glistening Real + Sportsgeist: The Tote (Band Room), Collingwood

Running Ahead Ainslie Wills is winning big this year. Besides releasing her new single Running Second and wrapping up a 20-date tour of the UK, the singer-songwriter is also jumping straight into a headline tour. See her at Howler on Thursday 20 Jul.

The Indigo Children + Lemonbait + Auntie Leo & The Backstabbers: The Workers Club, Fitzroy Grups + Reverse Butcher + Gibberish: Yarra Hotel, Abbotsford

Thu 13 Therapy Dog + Steph Mang + MF Jones + Gavin Styles: 303, Northcote The Kujo Kings + Loose Moose + Looks Like Rain: Bar Open, Fitzroy The Wedding Present: Bella Union, Carlton South Jesse Valach: Big Mouth, St Kilda

The Nuremberg Code + The Heart Instinct + Rick Grimm’s Illa Turba + Frontier Season: The Bendigo, Collingwood Wine, Whiskey, Women feat. Spiritus + Jess Parker: The Drunken Poet, West Melbourne CB3 + DJ Joey Lightbulb: The Gasometer Hotel (Upstairs), Collingwood

Yolanda Brown: Bird’s Basement, Melbourne Death Disco feat. Resident Kiti + Hysteric: Boney, Melbourne

Cherry On Top Acoustic trio/busking pros Malcura are midway through their Cherry Bar residency and Geo and Kill The Darling are their special guests this week. Catch them this Wednesday (or next Wednesday with different supports, your call).

Juan Vesuvius: Boney, Melbourne Sarah Occhino: Catfish (Front Bar), Fitzroy Lisa Crawley: Charles Weston Hotel, Brunswick Fulton Street: Cherry Bar, Melbourne

36 • THE MUSIC • 12TH JULY 2017

Malcura

Leaps & Bounds Festival feat. Miles & Simone + Liam Linley: Grace Darling Hotel, Collingwood Jumpin’ Jack William: Labour In Vain, Fitzroy

Gigs / Live The Guide

Belle Phoenix: Bella Union, Carlton South

Yolanda Brown: Bird’s Basement, Melbourne

Pest Kontrol with DJ Scotty Pesticide: Boney, Melbourne

Morten Granau: Brown Alley, Melbourne Joe Pug + Courtney Marie Andrews: Caravan Music Club, Oakleigh

Miserable Little Bastards: Labour In Vain, Fitzroy

Jean Claude Sam Dan: The Drunken Poet, West Melbourne

Was E James Band + Max Teakle & his Honky-Tonky Friends: Lomond Hotel, Brunswick East

DEN + Body Maintenance + Lime Lagoons: The Eastern, Ballarat East

Room 39: Max Watt’s, Melbourne Julien Baker + Adam Torres: Memo Music Hall, St Kilda

Leaps & Bounds Festival: Fee B Squared’s Class Of 2018 feat. Loose Tooth + Shrimpwitch + Hi-Tec Emotions + more: The Gasometer Hotel, Collingwood

Clusterfunk: Catfish (Front Bar), Fitzroy

Sin City + The Wash: Mr Boogie Man Bar, Abbotsford

Oliver Francis + Storm Norm + Emelyne + Van Oasis + Cassettes For Kids: The Gasometer Hotel (Upstairs), Collingwood

Get Loud

Knock Off Drinks with Ian Collard: Cherry Bar (5.15pm), Melbourne

Alice Ivy + The Cactus Channel + Braille Face: Northcote Social Club, Northcote

The Eagles Story: The Grand Hotel, Mornington

Melbourne locals GL are following up their critically acclaimed debut album Touch with the launch of their latest double A-side single, Destiny/ Reflect. The duo are heading to Corner Hotel this Saturday as part of Leaps & Bounds festival.

Spencer Vine + The Beggars’ Way + Social Skills: Cherry Bar, Melbourne

Little Captain

Danny McGinlay: Comic’s Lounge, North Melbourne Michael Yule: Compass Pizza Bar, Brunswick East The Undertones + Tyrannamen + Parsnip: Corner Hotel, Richmond Greg Steps: Edinburgh Castle Hotel (Front Bar), Brunswick

Fitzroys 2.0: Lomond Hotel, Brunswick East Anushka + Mikelangelo + Dave Evans + Pete Lyrebird: Open Studio, Northcote Sun God Replica + Stiff Richards: Retreat Hotel, Brunswick

Leaps & Bounds Festival feat. Chris Russell’s Chicken Walk + Spoonful: Evelyn Hotel, Fitzroy The Best Of Mikelangelo: Flying Saucer Club, Elsternwick

British India: Sooki Lounge, Belgrave

Fuzzsucker + The Wax Eaters: Gin Lane, Belgrave

Joe Pug + Courtney Marie Andrews: Spotted Mallard, Brunswick

T Williams: Glamorama, Fitzroy

Cable Ties + Hospital Pass + Bitumen: The Curtin, Carlton Taylor Smith-Morvell + Grace King: The Drunken Poet, West Melbourne

Blake Scott + Leah Senior: Grace Darling Hotel, Collingwood 13th Birthday with Gold Fields + Chapel + Teal Av + Wax Nomads: Karova Lounge, Ballarat

Trash & Treasure Little Captain are throwing a party for their latest single, You’re The Trash...I Am The Bin, so head to The Workers Club on Monday to hear the ‘90s inspired banger. Cookie Baker and The Oh Balters will also be out in full force.

Picket Palace + Swamp + Foggy Notion: The Gasometer Hotel, Collingwood Jules Sheldon + Ciggie Witch + Mares + Weatherboards: The Old Bar, Fitzroy

Teischa

Crystal Myth + Infra Ghosts: The Post Office Hotel, Coburg

La Descarga: Open Studio, Northcote Jack Beats: Pawn & Co, South Yarra

Niine + Jaala: The Toff In Town, Melbourne

Sienna Wild: Penny Black, Brunswick

Oksun Ox + Snacks + Ruff Patch: The Tote (Upstairs), Collingwood

British India: Pier Bandroom (Pelly Bar), Frankston

Teischa: The Workers Club, Fitzroy Cosmic Rain + Funk Dancing for Self Defence + Faux Phoenix: Whole Lotta Love, Brunswick East Le Pine + Twin Pines + Dole Cheque + DJ Dez: Yarra Hotel, Abbotsford

Fri 14 King Stag + Slim Jeffries + Dead Planet 1964 + Pockets: Bar Open, Fitzroy Pugsley Buzzard: Bar Open (Front Bar), Fitzroy

Midnight Hour Teischa is one of those talented self-taught gems who continues to tear up the Australian musical landscape. The vocalist will be playing her debut Melbourne headline show at The Workers Club this Thursday, marking the release of her self-titled EP.

Nemesium + Hadal Maw + Black Rheno: Barwon Club Hotel, South Geelong In Store with Rebecca Barnard: Basement Discs (12.45pm), Melbourne

Geoff Achison + Justin Yap Band: Old Castlemaine Gaol, Castlemaine

Duane Bartolo + Lockdown + Eliza Brayshaw: Kay St, Traralgon Magic Bones: Kubu Studio, Geelong

La Dance Macabre with Brunswick Massive: Rainbow Hotel, Fitzroy Atlas + more: Retreat Hotel, Brunswick Dr Garbanzo + His Human Beans: Spotted Mallard, Brunswick Alleged Associates: Spottiswoode Hotel, Spotswood Lloyd Spiegel: Suttons House of Music, Ballarat Selki + Peach Noise: The B.East, Brunswick East Lairapalooza 2017 feat. Mindsnare + Sewercide + more: The Bendigo, Collingwood

Leaps & Bounds Festival feat. Powerline Sneakers + Stiff Richards + Ute Root: The Old Bar, Fitzroy Martyr Privates + Heat Wave: The Post Office Hotel, Coburg X (Steve Lucas, Kim Volkman, Doug Falconer) + Intoxica + Kill Dirty Youth: The Prince, St Kilda Class of 2018 feat. Vacuum + Kollaps + Simon J Karis + Ollie Olsen: The Tote (Upstairs), Collingwood Nick Anderson: The Westernport Hotel, Phillip Island Willow Beats: The Workers Club, Fitzroy Leaps & Bounds Festival: ShitWiz Trivia: Tramway Hotel, North Fitzroy Tiaryn: Wesley Anne (Front Bar), Northcote Nathan Kaye: Wesley Anne, Northcote Eastbound Buzz + Ra Ra Ruby + Edit the Empire: Whole Lotta Love, Brunswick East

Nyck: The Church Of Bang Bang Boogaloo, Melbourne

THE MUSIC • 12TH JULY 2017 • 37

Comedy / G The Guide

The Dead Lips + Khan + Cash + Creek: Woody’s Bar, Collingwood

Club Lock feat. Bwise + Juicy Romance + more: The Toff In Town, Melbourne

Bag Raiders

The Love Junkies: Yah Yah’s, Fitzroy No Local + Crowman + New Band + more: Yarra Hotel, Abbotsford

A Moment in Time: The North Fitzroy Beat Scene with Primitive Calculators + Use No Hooks + Hot to Trot: The Tote (Band Room), Collingwood

Sat 15

Hannah Kate + Foolish Boys + Cracker La Touf: The Tote (Front Bar), Collingwood DEN + Jazz + Karli White + more: The Tote, Collingwood

Winter Warmer Festival 2017 feat. Creature Fear + Mango Retreat + Wolf & Willow + more: 303, Northcote Sammy Owen Blues Band: Baha Tacos, Rye

Olly & Scuzzi: The Westernport Hotel, Phillip Island

The Wikimen: Bar Open (Front Bar), Fitzroy

Timberwolf: The Workers Club, Fitzroy

Barbarion: Bar Open, Fitzroy

Afternoon Show with Noti + Luboku + Tatafu: The Workers Club, Fitzroy

Ladi6 + Amin Payne + Sean Deans: Belleville, Melbourne

Martyr Privates + Dumb Punts: Tramway Hotel, North Fitzroy

Yolanda Brown: Bird’s Basement, Melbourne

Baggage Not Included

The New Savages: Catfish (Front Bar), Fitzroy

If you missed out on Splendour tickets and still want to see Bag Raiders, 170 Russell is your destination. The Sydney duo, who just recently cracked the US charts with Shooting Star, will be busting out the jams on Sunday.

Boadz: Charles Weston Hotel, Brunswick

Alice Ivy Tanha + Lamine Sonko & The African Intelligence + Muma Doesa + Big Dip + Mono: Evelyn Hotel, Fitzroy Wingspan: Flying Saucer Club, Elsternwick Baby Blue + Leah Senior: Gin Lane, Belgrave New War + Rites Wild: Grace Darling Hotel, Collingwood

Hook Me To An Ivy Alice Ivy has fully recovered from her broken leg and is now launching her latest single, Get Me A Drink (presumably written either during or straight after said leg was broken). Check her out at Northcote Social Club this Friday.

Amped! Festival feat. Dreadnaught + Desecrator + In Malice’s Wake + Taberah + Frankenbok + more: Cherry Bar, Melbourne Danny McGinlay: Comic’s Lounge, North Melbourne Chris Harold Trio: Compass Pizza Bar, Brunswick East Leaps & Bounds Festival feat. GL + Fortunes + Colette: Corner Hotel, Richmond

13th Birthday with CC:Disco! + Crepes + Sid O’Neil + The Second Sex + Neighbourhood Relations + Fitz-E + Barry Sunset: Karova Lounge, Ballarat

Brat Farrar: Retreat Hotel, Brunswick Afternoon Show with Great Aunt: Retreat Hotel, Brunswick Gnohms + Latreenagers + Magpie + Capital Gains: Reverence Hotel, Footscray The Ritual Of Rock with Nikki Nicholls + Lisa Bade: Satellite Lounge, Wheelers Hill Purple Revolution - A Tribute to Prince with Andrew De Silva: Spotted Mallard, Brunswick Hanksaw: Surabaya Johnny’s, St Kilda

Kelly Brouhaha + Rosie Burgess: Wesley Anne, Northcote Abbey Howlett: Wesley Anne (Front Bar), Northcote Alex Elbery & The Strangers + Owen Rabbit + Nitida Atkinson: Whole Lotta Love, Brunswick East Leaps & Bounds Festival feat. Zockapilli + Scraggers + more: Woody’s Bar, Collingwood Yeo + Flower Drums + Kira Puru: Yah Yah’s, Fitzroy Seagull + Mares + Swimmer + Yffer: Yarra Hotel, Abbotsford

Sun 16

British India: Kay St, Traralgon

Greeves: The B.East, Brunswick East

Bag Raiders + Polographia: 170 Russell, Melbourne

Leaps & Bounds Festival feat. Stu Thomas Paradox: Labour In Vain, Fitzroy

A Celebration of Chris Cornell with Various Artists: The Bendigo, Collingwood

Superjuice + Copperhead Brass Band + The Number 19s: Bar Open, Fitzroy

Tank Dilemma: Lomond Hotel, Brunswick East

Cable Ties + No Sister + Loobs + Marville: The Curtin, Carlton

Joe Pug + Courtney Marie Andrews: Meeniyan Town Hall, Meeniyan

Duncan Phillips & The Long Stand + Ciaran Boyle: The Drunken Poet, West Melbourne

The Triumph of Steel - Manowar Tribute + Bestowed + Chaingun: Mr Boogie Man Bar, Abbotsford

A Gazillion Angry Mexicans: The Eastern, Ballarat East

Kisstroyer + Sisters Doll: Musicland, Fawkner

Leaps & Bounds Festival feat. Mayfield + Chelsea Wilson + Zoe K: The Gasometer Hotel, Collingwood

Julien Baker + Adam Torres + June Jones: Northcote Social Club, Northcote

Kill Dirty Youth + Rathead + Mod Vigil: The Gasometer Hotel (Upstairs), Collingwood

Familia Fundraiser feat. Luke Vecchio + JPA + Various DJs: Onesixone, Prahran

Oxsun Ox + Duckbilled Dinosaurs + Julie Burleigh + Violet Crumble + more: The Night Heron, Footscray

Joshua Cook & The Key of Now: Open Studio, Northcote

GOD$ + Barcelos + Culcairn: Ding Dong Lounge, Melbourne

Dean Forever: Penny Black, Brunswick

Leaps & Bounds Festival feat. Hard-Ons + Miss Destiny + Tankerville: The Old Bar, Fitzroy

Roy - A Tribute To Roy Orbison feat. Damien Leith: Drum Theatre, Dandenong

Reactions + Sleep Talk + Ill Natured: Phoenix Youth Hub, Footscray

Afternoon Show with David Grimson + Luke Seymoup: The Old Bar, Fitzroy

Catherine Sietkiewicz: Edinburgh Castle Hotel (Front Bar), Brunswick

Hadal Maw + Black Rheno: Pier Bandroom (Pelly Bar), Frankston

Jon Stevens + Kate Ceberano: The Palms at Crown, Southbank

All Ages Show with Dream On Dreamer: Evelyn Hotel, Fitzroy

Glenn Ford & The Record Machine: Rainbow Hotel, Fitzroy

Fountaineer: The Post Office Hotel, Coburg

38 • THE MUSIC • 12TH JULY 2017

Sean McMahon & The Moon Men + Grand Pine + Fenn Wilson: Union Hotel, Brunswick

Janette Geri: The Skylark Room, Upwey

Michael Yule

Yule Not Regret This Loop wizard Michael Yule is wrapping up a Queensland tour and braving the frozen uninhabitable zone that is Melbourne to play a gig at Compass Pizza Bar. Yule will unleash his cross-genre skills this Friday.

Gigs / Live The Guide

The Devil Goat Family String Band: Bar Open (Front Bar), Fitzroy

Yolanda Brown: Bird’s Basement, Melbourne Baby Et Lulu: Caravan Music Club, Oakleigh Supa Suplex + Valerie Avenue + The Strangers in Town: Cherry Bar, Melbourne Cherry Blues with Heinous Dog Blues Band: Cherry Bar, Melbourne Matinee Show with Greta Stanley + Fenn Wilson: Evelyn Hotel, Fitzroy Tom Walker & The Sick Individuals + James Moloney & The Mad Dog Harrisons + Jackson Phelan + Hugh Fuchsen & The Sauce Sauce Sauce: Evelyn Hotel, Fitzroy

Large No 12s: Royal Oak Hotel, Fitzroy North Julien Baker + Adam Torres: Sooki Lounge, Belgrave

Andrew Nolte & his Orchestra: Spotted Mallard, Brunswick

Roy - A Tribute To Roy Orbison feat. Damien Leith: Swan Hill Town Hall, Swan Hill Lulo Reinhardt + Bart Stenhouse: The Bendigo, Collingwood Deafcult + White Walls + Lowtide + TV Haze: The Curtin, Carlton Alex Burns + Jules Boult: The Drunken Poet, West Melbourne

Nathan Kaye: The Westernport Hotel, Phillip Island

Frontwomxn Fundraiser Pt. 1 feat. Biddlewood + Hannah Kate + Yukumbabe: The Workers Club, Fitzroy Afternoon Show with Klara Zubonja: The Workers Club, Fitzroy

Miles & Simone: Theatre Royal, Castlemaine Peter ‘Blackie’ Black: Tramway Hotel, North Fitzroy Moreland City Soul Revue + Alison Ferrier: Union Hotel, Brunswick

Sharkbait, Brouhaha

Selki + Danika Smith: Wesley Anne (Front Bar), Northcote

Kelly Brouhaha’s solo acoustic tour is well underway, and the Adelaide soul queen continues to dominate. Promoting her single As Long As There’s A Smile, Brouhaha’s next stop will be Wesley Anne this Saturday.

Open Mic Comedy Night with Jess Pearman: Whole Lotta Love, Brunswick East Dave Stevens + Emerald & Alejandro + Jamalade: Whole Lotta Love, Brunswick East

Mon 17 Jimeoin: Comic’s Lounge, North Melbourne Brooklyn’s Finest: Evelyn Hotel, Fitzroy Wind It Up with Simona + Activities of Daily Living: Northcote Social Club, Northcote Imogen Pemberton + Grace Turner + Alice Williams: Open Studio, Northcote Allan Caswell: Retreat Hotel, Brunswick Persecution Blues Screening & 2008 Live Set from Eddy Current Suppression Ring: The Tote (Band Room), Collingwood

Greg Steps

Step Up

Little Captain + Cookie Baker + The Oh Balters: The Workers Club, Fitzroy

Pull up a seat, Greg Steps is ready to tell you a story. The Brisbane native is bringing his guitar, harmonica and folk-tinged anecdotes to Edinburgh Castle this Friday, where quality banter between songs is guaranteed.

Kelly Brouhaha

Boadz

59 Rockers + Jade Nye + Lady Fox: Cherry Bar, Melbourne Jimeoin: Comic’s Lounge, North Melbourne Public High + Horace Bones + Chillers: Evelyn Hotel, Fitzroy Julien Baker + Adam Torres: Northcote Social Club, Northcote Hank Williams sung by Chris Wilson: The Drunken Poet, West Melbourne Leaps & Bounds Festival feat. Caroline Kennedy + Romy Vager: The Gasometer Hotel, Collingwood Skyscraper Stan + Sean McMahon + Maja: The Gasometer Hotel (Upstairs), Collingwood Romy Vager: The Gasometer Hotel (Front Bar), Collingwood Bay City Rollers feat. Les McKeown: The Palms at Crown, Southbank

Geoff Achison + Justin Yap Band: Flying Saucer Club, Elsternwick

Hungry Ghosts + Ninetynine: The Gasometer Hotel, Collingwood

kd lang + The Grigoryan Brothers: The Plenary, South Wharf

Leaps & Bounds Festival: Live Electronica with Corin + Liahona + Lacuna: Glamorama, Fitzroy

Matinee Show with Hello Satellites + On Diamond + Nick Tsiavos: The Gasometer Hotel, Collingwood

Now.Here.This with Bonewoman + Abbey Howlett: The Toff In Town, Melbourne

Leaps & Bounds Festival feat. Roller One: Labour In Vain, Fitzroy

Sime Nugent + Joshua Cook: The Gasometer Hotel (Upstairs), Collingwood

Marty Kelly & Co. + Nick Charles & Blue Strings: Lomond Hotel, Brunswick East

Kelly Brouhaha: The Golden Vine, Bendigo

Mid Winter Open Day with Unclaimed Baggage + Large No 12s: Memo Music Hall, St Kilda Suburban Prophets + The Dead Pharoahs + Little House Godz + Blue Balls: Mr Boogie Man Bar, Abbotsford Unplugged Live feat. Blake Scott: National Gallery of Victoria (NGV), Southbank Matt Wicking + Tilley: Open Studio, Northcote Checkerboard Lounge: Rainbow Hotel, Fitzroy Afternoon Show with The Barnyard Stomp: Retreat Hotel, Brunswick

Pony Face + Local Coward + Alex Lashlie: The Old Bar, Fitzroy Afternoon Show with Sleepy Bear Parade + New Band + Dogood + The Tool Time House Band: The Old Bar, Fitzroy Tank Dilemma: The Post Office Hotel, Coburg Leaps & Bounds Festival - Yarra’s Women of Country feat. Freya Josephine Hollick + Jemma Nicole: The Standard Hotel, Fitzroy Roy Blue + Mike Nolan + Juicy Romance + more: The Toff In Town, Melbourne Black Rheno + Merchant + El Colosso + Wood of Suicides: The Tote (Band Room), Collingwood

This Boadz Well Boadz (aka Dale Boaden) has quickly been making a name for himself over the past couple of years and will continue his upward trajectory by bringing his sleek bluesy stylings to Charles Weston this Saturday.

Blokes You Can Trust Film Screening including a 2008 Live Set from Cosmic Psychos: The Tote (Band Room), Collingwood Cosmic Kahuna: The Tote (Front Bar), Collingwood Gilligan Smiles: The Workers Club, Fitzroy Tim Guy: Tramway Hotel, North Fitzroy

Tue 18 Make It Up Club feat. Various Artists: Bar Open, Fitzroy Phileas Fogg Trio: Bird’s Basement, Melbourne

THE MUSIC • 12TH JULY 2017 • 39

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