June Issue | 2019
Melbourne | Free
Polish club “It’s just us against ourselves.”
From superfans to reality trolls — how social media is expanding toxic fandom
The many moods of the genre-fluid Kelsey Lu
Clowns’ twisted adolescent-punk study of the human condition
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Credits Publisher Handshake Media Pty Ltd Group Managing Editor Andrew Mast National Editor – Magazines Mark Neilsen Senior Editor Sam Wall
Andrew Watt, Founding Publisher of InPress Magazine, pays tribute to Rowena Sladdin (Webber). Together they established the masthead that evolved into The Music.
Editors Daniel Cribb, Neil Griffiths Assistant Editor/Social Media Co-Ordinator Jessica Dale Editorial Assistant Lauren Baxter
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Arts Editor Hannah Story
n 13 July 1988, the first edition of InPress hit the streets of Melbourne. The editor of that publication, and one of two directors of the start-up publishing company behind it, was Rowena Sladdin, then known as Rowena Webber. On 25 May 2019 Rowena passed away, another devastating example of the cruelty of cancer. She was only 55. In close to a decade as the Editor In Chief of InPress, Rowena’s generous personality and her skilled and inspired work touched so many Melbourne lives. She was responsible for providing hundreds of musicians, DJs, authors, artists, actors, comedians, theatre producers, filmmakers and other members of the arts and creative communities with their first (and sometimes only) recognition and publicity. Under her guidance, hundreds of wouldbe writers were published for the first time, many of who went on to long and illustrious careers in the media. Other InPress staff members evolved from their positions at InPress and the opportunities provided by Rowena to meaningful careers in business, particularly in music and the arts. And it is no exaggeration to say that millions of Melbourne punters had their lives and appreciation of the arts enriched by the words ushered into print by Rowena and her team of enthusiastic staff and contributors. Her impact was profound and lasting. Rowena lived and breathed her work — she was a fine interviewer and talented writer herself and steered InPress is a direction that saw it become respected and yet never staid or complacent. She pushed the envelope with content that was sometimes controversial but always vital and yet ran an open church — no art was undeserving of attention, and no artist was disrespected. Rowena was also a pioneer. In 1987 there were not too many women at the head of companies in the media and music industries and even now in 2019 when women in those industries are still fighting for fair recognition and equality, Rowena stands as a torchbearer for that cause. She emerged as a student editor, and an ambitious young woman from country Victoria, to become both a champion and a champion for others. In 1997 when the founders of InPress sold the title (where it came to find a sympathetic home at Street Press Australia) Rowena focused on her family — husband Paul and children Zoe, Darby and Oliver, and the community around Mansfield where they made their home. Both Rowena and Paul became pillars of that community, active in community affairs and politics and incredibly caring and supportive parents. She leaves her family and a wide community much the richer for her presence. Rowena never sought plaudits or acclaim but in 2018 on the 30th anniversary of the first edition of InPress, the State Library Of Victoria ran a panel discussion entitled The Origins Of InPress, as part of Melbourne Music Week. Rowena was already undergoing treatment for cancer at that time but she bravely made the trip from Bonnie Doon with her children to take her place at the forefront of that discussion. It was a proud event for her and one that she deeply appreciated having shared with her friends, family and her InPress colleagues. The Melbourne music, entertainment and arts media scene has many unsung advocates and legends and Rowena Webber belongs in that hall of fame. She will be sadly missed by many, but the richness of her lasting impact in that world and in her subsequent years stands as testament to a life well lived.
Gig Guide Henry Gibson gigs@themusic.com.au Senior Contributors Steve Bell, Maxim Boon, Bryget Chrisfield, Cyclone, Jeff Jenkins Contributors Nic Addenbrooke, Emily Blackburn, Melissa Borg, Anthony Carew, Uppy Chatterjee, Roshan Clerke, Shaun Colnan, Brendan Crabb, Guy Davis, Joe Dolan, Joseph Earp, Chris Familton, Guido Farnell, Donald Finlayson, Liz Giuffre, Carley Hall, Tobias Handke, Tom Hawking, Mark Hebblewhite, Samuel Leighton Dore, Keira Leonard, Joel Lohman, Alannah Maher, Taylor Marshall, Anne Marie Peard, Michael Prebeg, Mick Radojkovic, Stephen A Russell, Rod Whitfield Senior Photographers Cole Bennetts, Kane Hibberd Photographers Rohan Anderson, Andrew Briscoe, Stephen Booth, Pete Dovgan, Simone Fisher, Lucinda Goodwin, Josh Groom, Clare Hawley, Bianca Holderness, Jay Hynes, Dave Kan, Hayden Nixon, Angela Padovan, Markus Ravik, Bobby Rein, Barry Shipplock, Terry Soo Advertising Leigh Treweek, Antony Attridge, Brad Edwards, Jacob Bourke sales@themusic.com.au Art Dept Felicity Case-Mejia print@themusic.com.au Admin & Accounts accounts@themusic.com.au Distro distro@themusic.com.au Subscriptions store.themusic.com.au Contact Us Mailing address PO Box 87 Surry Hills NSW 2010 Melbourne Ph: 03 9081 9600 26 Napoleon Street Collingwood Vic 3066 Sydney Ph: 02 9331 7077 Level 2, 230 Crown St Darlinghurst NSW 2010 Brisbane Ph: 07 3252 9666 info@themusic.com.au www.theMusic.com.au
Andrew Watt InPress Founding Publisher
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Our contributors
Shit We Did: Going Platinum Blonde Guest editorial: Comics Bec Charlwood and Alex Jae, hosts of The Ladies Guide To Dude Cinema podcast
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This month’s best binge watching
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Polish Club
Toxic fandom A detached realm of zeroconsequence
Sharon Van Etten Ditching the negative and focusing on the positive
Pic:
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Ryan Pfluge
This month
Alex Jae
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teen-pop sensations Hanson.
Jonsi & Alex Somers
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Country & B
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Album reviews
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The Arts
Bec Charlwood
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Film & TV reviews
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an Laidla Pic: I
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n d ra K i n leksa c: A Pi
Catfish & The Bottlemen
Kelsey Lu
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Two Door Cinema Club All the better for putting the brakes on and stepping back
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Bec Charlwood has established herself as
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comedy clubs across the country, perform-
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one of the most exciting new voices on the Australian comedy scene and is a favourite at ing at MICF, Sydney Comedy Festival and Fringe World. She is also the co-host of The Ladies Guide To Dude Cinema podcast.
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Nancy & Beth
cast member of Channel 10’s upcoming and is also a huge non-ironic fan of 1990s
Wake In Fright
Clowns Scratch below the surface to find genuine substance
actor based in Sydney. She is a writer and Saturday Night series with Rove McManus,
The best arts of the month Dungeons & Dragons From out of the basement to the wider world
Alex Jae is a stand-up comedian, writer and
Winter solstice The longest night = an excuse to party
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Your gigs
Howzat!
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This month’s local highlights
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The end
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After Anna Rose met the devil in her teens, she pledged her soul to rock‘n’roll. She writes on all things rock and metal for publications across Australia. A Diet Coke connoisseur, she harbours a not-so-secret crush on Alter Bridge frontman Myles Kennedy.
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Toy Story 4
Minor Adventures With Topher Grace
Podcast of the month: Minor Adventures With Topher Grace Ever wondered where Chelsea Peretti sits in the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator? Or how Paul Scheer would go as a telemarketer? So has Topher Grace, a man with clearly too much time on his hands. Each episode he takes a new guest out of their comfort zone and on a, well, minor adventure.
Barking up the wrong Sentry Seth Sentry will be heading out on tour this month on the back of his first new music since 2017. The Wrong One tour kicks off at The Valley Drive In in QLD on 7 Jun before stopping in VIC, NSW, WA and SA.
Seth Sentry. Pic: Michelle Grace Hunder
Thandi Phoenix. Pic: Cybele Malinowski
Whozits and whatzits Fresh from dropping their third studio album, And Now For The Whatchamacallit, Psychedelic Porn Crumpets are hitting the road for a five-date tour starting this 12 Jun. The kaleidoscopic outfit are also bringing RAAVE TAPES along to support.
Thand-tastic
Psychedelic Porn Crumpets
Sydney-based singer-songwriter Thandi Phoenix is going out on her first-ever national headline tour. Catch the artist and her pop electronica in Adelaide, Brisbane, Sydney and Melbourne from 7 Jun.
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Toy with my heart
Stream dreams
The tiny toys with the big problems are back again to break and warm our hearts in equal measure. Toy Story 4 sees the gang take a road trip, suffer deep existential crises and make friends with a spork. In cinemas from 20 Jun.
This month’s best binge watching
I’s on the prize Tales Of The City, Season 1
Pic: Nino Munoz
Directed by Artistic Director Richard Tognetti and playing around the country from 14 Jun, ACO’s Indies & Idols concerts take the music of Jonny Greenwood, Bryce Dessner, and Sufjan Stevens and present it alongside their shared inspiration, Polish composers Karol Szymanowski and Witold Lutosławski.
First adapted back in 1993, Armistead Maupin’s beloved Tales Of The City series is being revived for a mini-series revolving around central character Anna Madrigal’s 90th birthday. Cast members Laura Linney and Olympia Dukakis will return in their original roles alongside Ellen Page, Charlie Barnett and more.
Richard Tognetti
Streams from 7 Jun on Netflix
City On A Hill, Season 1
Built to Last Electronic duo Lastlings are backing up their US/Australian run supporting RÜFÜS DU SOL with a headline tour for recent single I’ve Got You. The siblings, who also have a debut LP in the works, hit the road 22 Jun.
It’s 1992 and Assistant District Attorney Decourcy Ward (Aldis Hodge) has just arrived in the Massachusetts capital via Brooklyn. One look at the city, rife with violence and police corruption, and he wants to “rip out the machinery”. To do so however, he needs the help of crooked FBI veteran Jackie Rhodes (Kevin Bacon)..
Lastlings. Pic: James Simpson
Streams from 17 Jun on Stan
Perpetual Grace LTD, Season 1
James (Jimmi Simpson) is looking for a way to
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get his life on track, and thinks he’s found it in a safe owned by Pastor Byron Brown and his wife Lillian (Ben Kingsley and Jacki Weaver). It imbi the girl
Ascendant Sydney R&B poet imbi the girl is taking their SUPEREGO-featuring single I Used To on tour this month. They’ll play three dates from 20 Jun with Brisbane-based electronic producer Azura on support duties.
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doesn’t take long though for the young grifter to realise he’s set his sights on much more dangerous marks than he had anticipated.. Streams from 3 Jun on Stan
B-A-N-A-N-A-S A madcap murder ballet played out in Matrix-style bullet time, My Friend Pedro’s complete lack of physics, common sense or decency makes for a wildly good time. Mow down underbelly types at the behest of a sentient banana named Pedro this month on Steam, Nintendo Switch and PC.
Washington
My Friend Pedro
Empress Of. Pic: Cara Robbins
Empressive Alt-pop, R&B singer-songwriter Empress Of is coming our way to perform at Dark Mofo, but she’ll also be stopping for sideshows in Sydney and Melbourne. Catch the LA artist on 19 & 20 Jun respectively.
Washington’s DC
I Like to Watch: Arguing My Way Through The TV Revolution
Celebrated singer-songwriter Washington is taking her recent single Dirty Churches out for a three-date tour this month. Catch the artist’s intimate sets in Melbourne, Brisbane and Sydney from 21 Jun.
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TV guide The New Yorker’s Pulitzer Prize-winning culture critic Emily Nussbaum has long tried to find a new lens through which to view television. Her new book of previously unpublished essays, I Like To Watch, continues to wrestle with the way we perceive the ‘idiot box’. Out 25 Jun.
Anna Calvi. Pic: Maisie Cousins
Sh*t we did With Maxim Boon
Hunter traveller English singer-songwriter Anna Calvi is bringing last year’s much-praised Hunter set to our shores this month. As well as appearing at Dark Mofo this 15 Jun, Calvi will perform in Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane.
Going platinum blonde Blondes have more fun, so saying goes, which certainly seemed the case for the OG bombshell herself, the late, great Marilyn Monroe. On the other hand, that chick was on a shitload of a Barbiturates, so maybe the high life didn’t have that much to do with her highlights. But whatever truth may reside in that famous adage, hitting the peroxide has largely been a female pursuit, until recently that is. In the ‘90s, frosted tips and blonde highlights had their moment as a male style must-have, but over the past couple of years, going gungho on the bleach has once again become an in vogue look for gents thanks to celebrity Black Mirror. Pic: Pedro Saad
advocates like Adam Levine, Zac Efron and that ultimate arbiter of finger-on-the-pulse trend-setting, Kanye. But it’s not enough, seemingly, to go a natural hue of sandy yellow. True aficionados of this look have signed on with devilmay-care attitude to scalp scabs by going full platinum. So, is it true, the lighter the hair the greater the fun? Me thinks it’s time for a trip to the salon to find out…
The Verdict I’ve always been a bit of wimp when it comes to strong style statements, content to admire from afar, daydream about the possibilities, but ultimately wuss-out of getting on board. So, being able to explain away my debut venture into the wild world of hair bleaching as a noble sacrifice in the name of journalism was a handy get-out-of-jail-free card if the results were more hair-raising than I bargained for. Taking my seat in a swanky Melbourne salon, my first observation is that hair profes-
Screen time Black Mirror is back this 5 Jun with three more stories that’ll leave you feeling panicked and paranoid. Andrew Scott, Anthony Mackie, Miley Cyrus, Yahya Abdul-Mateen II and Topher Grace all star in Charlie Brooker’s latest attacks on the 21st century.
sionals don’t much like wild choices that may prove a massive mistake. After requesting the most drastic of bleachings, my well-intentioned hairdresser attempts to talk me out of it. “It’s for an article,” I insist, and so with objections duly noted, we get down to business. I’m warned to expect some pain, or possibly a lot of pain. After all, I’m having strong bleach smeared all over my noggin and left to fizz for an hour. In reality, I feel nearly no discomfort at all. I wonder if this is my shit secret superpower: an invulnerable scalp? If so, it’s come in handy for the first time, as my new bleached
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and toned locks are revealed with barely a hint of scalp damage. Making a change this dras-
What if The Beatles never existed, except in the memory of a failing musician living an anonymous life in a small, seaside English town? In Danny Boyle’s charming new flick, Yesterday, Jack Malik (Himesh Patel) is going to find out. In cinemas from 27 Jun, but Sydneysiders get an early sneak peak as it’s closing out the Sydney Film Festival on 16 Jun.
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tic is kind of a binary state: it’s either a total success or an abject failure. And as far as I’m concerned, I’ve managed to land on the better side of that scale. I stride out of the salon living my best Roger Stirling/Draco Malfoy fantasy while ticking one off from the bucket list.
What is Dude Cinema? And why won’t some men stop talking at us about it? Sydney comics Bec Charlwood and Alex Jae, hosts of The Ladies Guide To Dude Cinema, teach us about the never-forgotten genre.
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the way down to niche crowdfunded Swedish martial arts action comedy shorts like Kung Fury, the dudes of the world just absolutely can’t believe we haven’t seen their favourite movies. In late 2018, over a glass or two of white wine, we stumbled across this phenomenon and realised that not unlike the #MeToo movement, it is a shared experience among many women and also super yucko. We mused, “Wouldn’t it be great if someone had a podcast watching all these movies for us so we don’t have to?” We then realised, WE are two comedians who somehow don’t have a podcast of our own, why don’t WE do that podcast? Then we forgot about it for several weeks until we were approached by friend, podcaster (Mike Check, Total Reboot and ABC’s Finding Drago) and known cinephile Alexei Toliopoulos who offered to produce the podcast for us, and The Ladies Guide To Dude Cinema was born. Each week - episodes drop Thursdays - we review the movies that we have been shamed for not seeing or have been aggressively recommended to us by dudes, along with the movies our listeners request for these same reasons. (A note for the dudes: we do NOT take recommendations in list form of your favourite movies. Take your hands off the keyboard - you’ve missed the point of this entirely and your submission will be thrown in the bin and reported to ASIO). So why is it that dudes are always shocked to find out we haven’t seen movies like Psycho, a film about a man who murders women and has severe mummy issues? Why do dudes always feel compelled to aggressively recommend movies to women regardless of our disinterest or objections? Why is it that we’ve all met a man who considers himself a movie expert despite a complete lack of qualification or training? Could it be that 99% of cinema is made from the male perspective? That historically most movies have been written by dudes for dudes? Maybe. Honestly, we don’t know, but we vow to find out. This podcast is a journey to discover what emotionally ties dudes to these movies, and to provide the service of watching them so YOU don’t have to. So next time Joel can’t BELIEVE you haven’t seen Pulp Fiction, you can tell him exactly why you haven’t and why he should stop talking about it and just for God’s sake go down on you already. Apart from being your new favourite podcast, our goal for this project is to give women like us the confidence to talk about and have opinions on these movies, and assert ourselves in conversations about them that have historically largely been dominated by men. Above all, however, this is a comedy podcast, and more than anything it’s going to make you laugh and bring you one step closer to receiving the best-ever cunnilingus. That is our mission statement, and we vow to succeed or die trying.
t’s Friday night, you’ve had a long week and the couch is calling your name, but you’ve been texting with Joel for several days and tonight your schedules have finally lined up and you can meet for the first time. He hasn’t been the best at conversation, but he’s responded to every message you’ve sent, and you can see most of his face in his profile photos. You meet at a bar at 8pm. Conversation flows. He’s fun, he’s charming and he even agrees to split the bill with you. You’ve got a bit of a buzz and the night is coming to a close when he asks if you’d like to go back to his place for a nightcap. You excitedly agree but also text two of your closest friends his address, because you’re 60% sure he’s not a murderer. You get to his apartment. It’s a mix of IKEA and hand-me-down furniture with a clearly new 80-inch Smart TV taking up most of the living space. You like Joel. You want to have sex with Joel, because Joel is attractive and not the worst guy you’ve ever met. After some hot’n’heavy making out on the IKEA couch, the night proceeds to the bedroom. As he prepares for the cunnilingus he earlier promised he was “the best at”, you look up and notice a large framed poster of Pulp Fiction. He follows your gaze. He chuckles and says “Royale with cheese”. You’re confused because you assumed the only thing on the menu tonight was your pussy. You pause and he asks, “You’ve seen Pulp Fiction, right?” You dread the words about to escape from your mouth, but you know you have to say it: “No, I haven’t seen it.” He’s horrified and responds, “You haven’t seen Pulp Fiction?!” It’s at this exact moment your pussy is taken off the menu and a copy of Pulp Fiction: Anniversary Edition is put into the DVD player instead. Yes of course Joel still owns a DVD player, but it’s actually a Blu-ray if you were wondering. Which you weren’t. The 10/10 sexy time Joel promised earlier will have to wait. For the next two hours and 58 minutes you watch Pulp Fiction, while Joel watches you watch Pulp Fiction. You leave his house at 2am, tired, unsatisfied and blaming Quentin Tarantino for everything that sucks in your life. This is Dude Cinema. Dude Cinema is any movie a dude has a heavy emotional connection to, is personally offended when you haven’t seen it, and feels no shame in making you feel bad about that. And it has to be stopped. Who are we? We are two comedians who don’t know anything about cinema outside of just watching it. Bec has Actor Face Blindness (AFB), and Alex has seen Dumb And Dumber 21 times. For as long as we can remember, we have been shamed for not watching the movies that dudes have unhealthy obsessions with. From big blockbusters like Die Hard all
“You’ve seen Pulp Fiction, right?”
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Guest Editorial
Allensworth•Alysha Brilla•Amaru Tribe Ash Grunwald•Brekky Boy•The Cat Empire Charlie Collins•Claire Anne Taylor Clare Bowditch•The Delta Riggs Dubarray•Fools•Hiatus Kaiyote Merpire•Missy Higgins•Newton Faulkner Paul McDermott&Gatesy•Steve Poltz•Stevie Jean Tim Finn•Troy Cassar-Daley•The Waifs
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Working day jobs, moving back in with the olds, and second album syndrome — Polish Club experienced it all while recording their latest record. But singer David Novak assures Carley Hall that there’s always fun to be had. Cover and feature pics by Tommy Thoms.
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haotic live shows around the globe, a run of releases that have been loved and lauded, and soulful rock that inspires hoarse singing from sweaty mosh pits: that’s Polish Club. Their 2018 hit Clarity even scored a slot in last year’s triple j Hottest 100. By all appearances, the Sydney duo are living the high life. But the reality for any modern band is not quite the heady lifestyle of old. The newfound joys of contract work are keeping singer David Novak busy after wrapping up the recording of their forthcoming second album Iguana. It’s the same for drummer John-Henry Pajak, who has worked at his full-time day job throughout Polish Club’s existence. Novak says it is what it is — a way to allow this hardworking, fun-loving band to keep at it. “My job isn’t super glamorous but it’s got free booze,” he laughs. “It’s minimum investment for long-term gain. I just dive in and put out fires and then I’m out. It just allows us to reinvest anything we make into the band for touring and albums, which is a necessity. “John has worked full-time most of the time we’ve been in the band. I don’t know how. He’s a graphic designer and works stupid hours and goes straight from work to a photo shoot and [to] do a bunch of ads and stuff for the band. Being what it is, it’s not a sustainable machine for mental health and not conducive to creativity. It’s really hard to monetise a creative passion. But we all make it work. “I also broke up with a long-term girlfriend last year and found myself going, ‘I don’t want to pay $350 a week for a place that I’m gonna be away from with shows and touring.’ So I bit the bullet, and fortunately my mum is a musician and my dad is a wannabe musician, and were totally understanding and open to me coming back home and eating all their food and using their washing machine.” Despite living without the cliched rockstar charms in their everyday lives, Polish Club have kept themselves close to the good times since their self-titled debut EP dropped in 2015. A soulful slant amid basic but boisterous drums and guitar was
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all that was needed to prick the ears of listeners who welcomed some cheeky rock among the indie onslaught. In 2017, their first LP Alright Already garnered critical esteem with an ARIA nomination for Best Rock Album. With the band’s fanbase growing, thanks in part to their face-melting live shows, it seems like it might be difficult to maintain a skyward trajectory. When it came time to notch up their second record with touring band member and long-
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time producer, Wade Keighran, Novak admits he and Pajak had to push past the inevitable internal pressures of second album syndrome. “We hit a few roadblocks, and a lot of it was to do with trying to find the next single or writing songs that fit a specific purpose,” Novak explains. “As soon as we stopped doing that and went back to writing songs as if it was fun or they were what we wanted to do, it became easier. “John was talking about it the other
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day and he said, ‘Dude, I think we wrote over 100 songs for the album.’ We tried writing pop songs, punk songs, R&B songs, electronic songs — all this stuff. I think it’s what we had to do to find what made sense and what we could pull off when added to the context of this band and what people expect from us, but also what we can get away with, how far away from expectations can we go without it being totally disingenuous and having change for the sake of it.
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“It was a nightmare, to be completely honest. Because after spending so long trying to come up with new ideas and rehash old ideas with the perspective of what is actually valuable and what makes sense, it was like, ‘These are all the songs and I don’t know what I like anymore because I just hate everything.’ The process became not fun anymore, and so to that end you just kind of have to go into the studio, and it was only towards the end we had two big sessions where the bulk of the album was done.
“No matter what we do or how crazy and experimental we get... it still sounds like our band.”
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“It made us realise that no matter what we do or how crazy and experimental we get, it’s got my voice and guitar on it and John’s drums and our songwriting, and it still sounds like our band. So we were a lot less precious about trying to find one thing that we could latch onto, and the result is that it sounds more free and fluid.” It would be completely reasonable after such an intense process for some cracks to appear in the band, let alone one made up of two longtime friends. Bands with more members can bounce frustrations off each other, and solo artists often go to war with themselves. A duo has the danger of becoming make or break, but Novak said he and Pajak rarely cracked the shits with each other. “And if we do, it never comes from an emotional thing — it’s always something logical or a difference of opinion, so it’s very easy to talk that out,” he says. “There’s usually a consensus that forms and we’re all going for the same end result, and our tastes are not that disparate from each other. We don’t really come to disagreements where it stops us from progressing — the only thing that stops both of us is not feeling productive as a unit. It’s just us against ourselves. “Otherwise it’s true love, what can I say? We do it because it’s fun — I mean, why else would you do it? We’re not rich, we’re not famous, we’re doing it because it’s fun for us, and fortunately it’s fun for other people. “We’re incredibly lucky, because every time we’re vibing or being stupid on stage or with a cover, it’s always elicited a positive reaction from people on the outside. Long may that continue — rather than having to think about what this is and why we’re doing it.”
Iguana (Island) is out this month. Polish Club tour from 8 Jun.
Behind enemy lines: the toxic side of fandoms
The increased power and prevalence of social media has taken mob mentality global. Maxim Boon looks at different ways toxic fandoms have mushroomed online. Illustration by Felicity Case-Mejia.
F
andom can toe a fine line. On the one hand, it can be a glorious expression of admiration and joy: getting a Pickle Rick tattoo; being able to recite word for word the entire script of Withnail And I; devoting hours to learning fluent Klingon; owning every item of merch from T-shirts to coffee mugs to straight-to-DVD movies featuring Grumpy Cat (RIP). But that pure-hearted enthusiasm can all too easily reach a tipping point and curdle into a big steaming pile of unhealthy obsession. And as has predictably proven the case all too often in the digital age, social media has enabled this toxic fandom to wreak uncontrollable levels of damage. In fact, it seems to be the fate of anything that reaches a critical mass of popularity, through the sheer numbers of aficionados engaging with it, that an element of toxicity will find a foothold. In decades past, before digital interfaces severed our face-to-face humanity from our opinions, the ardent commitment of superfans might have manifested itself as heated debate among kindred enthusiasts. In fact, sharing the nerdtastic scale of their fandom in everyday life would have largely been met by ridi-
cule or judgement, making even the most hardcore of fans self-conscious about their geekery. But social media has since allowed a strange cross-breeding of online behaviours to occur, splicing diehard zeal with red-hot trolling in a dehumanised, detached realm of zero-consequence. Dissenting opinions are all too often met by breathtaking levels of abuse, and can be escalated exponentially as mob mentality emboldens likeminded fans to get stuck in. Ironically, the embarrassment felt by the superfans of old might well have been the X-factor that kept their emotions in check. Online, it seems, those flood gates are wide open. But not all toxic fandoms were created equal. Several subsets of the phenomena have emerged from this grim sludge of human behaviour, each with its own psychological profile. Here, we’ll take a look at three of the most prevalent forms splurging their way around the internet.
The biggest fan
A perfect storm of entitled superiority, competitiveness and die-hard pedantry combine in superfans who believe their love of [insert pop culture reference of your choice here] is greater and therefore more valid than anyone else’s. This manifests in a possessive, Alpha-level aggression towards any who dare challenge the top wonk’s reign as the biggest, bestest, most committed devotee. Newcomers perceived to be jumping on a bandwagon are also in the firing line, because the biggest fan was into their ultimate passion “before it was cool”. This form of toxic fandom could be best described as broad-spectrum, as it can be found thriving across all manner of genres, art forms, formats and mediums, although true juggernaut franchises — Harry Potter, Star Wars,
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Star Trek for example — boast the greatest numbers. Investing the hours of dedication needed to cement a truly encyclopaedic knowledge of something doesn’t necessarily make someone this type of toxic fan. Where the toxicity infiltrates tends to be in the degree of possessive entitlement at the heart of this fan culture. This can even extend to the creative talents behind the object of the biggest fan’s true love, going so far as to challenge additions or developments to existing canons, such as the backlash experienced by JK Rowling after revealing Dumbledore was gay. Sorry Potterheads, if it’s said by JK, it’s no jk. Ok?
Reality trolls
The evolution of reality TV has become something of an arms race, as showrunners have scrambled to find the next scandalising twist to pull in viewers in an increasingly crowded genre. Many reality shows are now discussed in terms of “narratives” with careful editing used to amplify storylines in a way not too dissimilar to a soap opera. And as with any good yarn, there are heroes and there are villains. Positioning a reality star as a baddie makes for great telly, but it’s also the source of this fandom’s toxicity. As producers have gone to greater and greater lengths to manipulate and edit character development, positioning some reality stars as the rankest, most inhuman bullies, it has pegged them as fair game for online retribution, and within the great echo chambers of social media, this can result in truly shocking examples of widespread abuse. Often this is inspired by a misguided sense of vigilante justice, a simple case of bad sorts getting their karmic comeuppance. However, what is often overlooked is the devastating toll this can take on the very real, thinking, feeling people on the receiving end. Some are forced to leave social
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media, driven into digital hiding by the sheer weight of the hate being directed at them. In other instances, the results have been far graver. The suicides of two former Love Island contestants in the past year, Mike Thalassitis and Sophie Gradon, have been linked to online trolling and the pressures of fame in the reality TV zeitgeist, highlighting the corrosive effect reality celebrity, and the intense fandom it draws, can have on mental health.
The minions
Sometimes, toxic devotion can be weaponised, both intentionally and by accident, by wayward celebs. This form of fandom is perhaps the most established. Screaming hoards willing to defend their idol at any cost have been around since Elvis and The Beatles. The tools now at their disposal is where the toxicity level has risen in recent years. The slightest perceived slur against a celebrity with this kind of following can provoke a swift and usually wildly disproportionate response via social media. Take for example, the “ratty facial hair” fiasco of 2017, in which Aussie radio host Ash London used less than flattering terms to describe former One Directioner Louis Tomlinson’s attempt at growing a beard. London was subjected to a high-pressure torrent of abuse and threats, demanding apologies for the “disrespect” she had shown the hallowed pop twink. London went to ground, setting her socials to private, and this is where the barrage may have been subdued had it not been for Tomlinson’s own input. Ominously tweeting, “Probs best to stay private for a bit longer love!” along with a middle finger emoji, this was the green light for the Tomlinson faithful to really pile on. And all this, for one off the cuff comment, which is really all it takes to set off this powder keg variety of toxic fan.
Five artists you need to hear this month.
Allara
Pirritu
Lady Lash
vmdo.com.au/blaksound
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BUMPY
William Elm
Dungeons & Dragons & Aussies & artists More and more, Dungeons & Dragons seems to be becoming a spectator sport — even right here in Australia. Joel Burrows looks at the burgeoning creative industry surrounding tabletop gaming.
D
ungeons & Dragons is a game in which you can fight owlbears, save mermaids, or even fall in love with a gnome. It’s shocking to no one that this game has risen in popularity in recent years. However, it may surprise some of you to discover that this game has spawned a completely new genre of fiction. That’s right, Dungeons & Dragons podcasts, recordings and performances have become so ubiquitous that you can now unpack their tropes and conventions. Don’t believe us? Then roll a DC 15 Insight check! Or, you know, just keep reading the article. From CollegeHumour’s Fantasy High getting millions of views to Critical Role crowdfunding millions of dollars to animate their adventures, the Dungeons & Dragons genre is everywhere. Even HarmonQuest, another popular title from Rick & Morty/Community creator Dan Harmon, has been renewed for its third season. All of these shows star excellent improv, gripping dice rolls, and stories that fans can’t get enough of.
Part two: on the other hand.
Part one: if it ain’t broke... Both Roll For Intelligence and Dragon Friends have many of the same elements that you’d find in a regular game of Dungeons & Dragons. They both have Dungeon Masters, describing the world and conducting the story. They both have players, pretending to be characters inside this universe. They both have dice, which decide the fate of the characters and whether their actions succeed or fail. However, using the language of Dungeons & Dragons to create a story isn’t necessarily a bad thing. In fact, both Roll For Intelligence and Dragon Friends use this very language to their advantage. One of the most unique elements found in Dungeons & Dragons, and the shows adopting its mechanics, is the use of improvised dialogue and plot. You see, Dungeons & Dragons doesn’t follow a script. The characters are reacting to problems in real time and making it up as they go. This lack of structure can lead to the performers tailoring each story to the interests of the audience. As Morgan Little, the previous producer for Roll For Intelligence, told The Music, “If something really resonates with the audience, we can do more with that. There’s no huge hurry to push on.”
Both Dragon Friends and Roll For Intelligence have an edge that separates them from most of their competitors. And this edge isn’t rooted in the mechanics of Dungeons & Dragons. Rather, what separates these shows is their use of Aussie vernacular and their local sense of humour. Roll For Intelligence originally advertised itself as an adventure where “hordes of hoons with goons” attacked Canberra. And remember that pelican from Dragon Friends? Later in the program, he refers to Bobby Pancake as “a real loose unit”. Both of these shows embrace modern Australianisms and cheeky banter with open arms. It’s refreshing to have fantasy characters sounding like they’re not from Game Of Thrones. It’s great to have one’s voice represented in the media. Dragon Friends and Roll For Intelligence feel organic because of their ‘loose unit’ inflections, not in spite of them. They both feel authentic and special. To be clear, neither of these shows are solely successful because of these vocal shenanigans. However, they certainly haven’t hurt getting the audience and their bums into seats.
Part three: the end (of the article) is nigh
“It’s refreshing to have fantasy characters sounding like they’re not from Game Of Thrones.”
But it isn’t just US creators getting in on the action. Australia has its own thriving Dungeons & Dragons scene with some of the best storytellers in the biz. Two of our favourite performance troops are the Canberra-based Roll For Intelligence and Sydney’s Dragon Friends. And even though these live podcasters don’t have Critical Roll’s budget or HarmonQuest’s star power, in some respects they more than make up for it. Want to know why? Well then, buckle up your d20s and your old spell scrolls. Because we, my friends, are going on an adventure. An adventure of critical thinking.
This tailoring of content can definitely be seen throughout the adventures in Dungeon Friends. During the first episode of season five, David Harmon, the show’s Dungeon Master, forgets the word for “mug” and admits he was instead thinking about a Flintstones-esque pelican. The live audience belly laughs at this and halfling rogue Bobby Pancake (portrayed by Simon Greiner) demands that his drink comes in a giant aquatic seabird. Naturally, his wish comes true. The pelican becomes the star of the episode. Dungeon Friends is a better show for embracing its mistakes, the audience’s feedback and the mechanics of Dungeons & Dragons.
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Wow. What an adventure of critical thinking that was. Not only were there multiple discussions about pelicans, but you read about some series to Google or revisit. However, this isn’t to say that Roll For Intelligence and Dragon Friends are the only two shows in existence. There’s a plethora of Aussie Dungeons & Dragons content waiting for you. Yes, my friend, it’s out there. It’s hiding in the depth of the iTunes charts. It’s being performed in your local. All it takes to discover them is the tiniest bit of research. Or, you know, a DC 10 Investigation check.
Dragon Friends is on the second Tuesday of every month at Giant Dwarf. Roll For Intelligence is on the second Friday of every month at Smiths Alternative.
As Melbourne punks Clowns reignite the ‘nature versus nurture’ scientific debate regulating human behaviour on new album Nature/Nurture, frontman Stevie Williams tells Steve Bell about the band’s ongoing desire to do whatever they want.
The laws of nature
F
or years now Melbourne punks Clowns have been recognised around the world for the abrasive power and intensity of both their riotous live shows and their equally raucous recordings. On fourth album Nature/Nurture though, a whole new dimension to the five-piece has been uncovered, now visible through the chaos. On the sonic front there’s a steadfast determination not to be pigeonholed as the band examine just how far they can stretch their sound within the tight constructs of the punk genre. This is offset by a newfound willingness to lyrically explore concepts and topics which work the cerebral as hard as their music hits the physical. It’s a brave and potentially risky move but one they’ve handled with typical aplomb. All the facets that first made them so beloved by their rabid fanbase are still abundant but now augmented by this new sense of artistic ambition — primarily manifesting in the eternal ‘nature versus nature’ behavioural debate which conceptually ties the album together — that offsets their usual unruly aesthetic perfectly. “We just wrote a couple of songs, not really sure what we were doing but knowing that we wanted to make another record, and then the idea just kinda surfaced to call the record Nature/Nurture and to have each
about the world that they hold strongly but there are always exceptions to those rules and ways in which they contradict them. It’s getting pretty cryptic at this point, but I guess it’s just a study of the human condition in our own little twisted adolescentpunk kinda way.” Williams concedes that while strong lyrics are always aspirational for any decent band, they aren’t always imperative in punk music. “I love all kinds of music, so I definitely wanted to make this record seem like something which finds us lyrically on top of our game,” he reflects. “And being our fourth record and how much of the creative process we’ve put into this band collectively — but also all our other side projects and stuff — we’re definitely at the point now where we really want to challenge ourselves, and bring stuff out that does really make you think. “But at the same time I love adolescent music — I love [Descendents’ 1982 classic] Milo Goes To College, that’s one of my favourite records, and I love all that early Silverchair stuff — and I think that really plays a part too in the Clowns aesthetic. Certainly it’s nostalgic but it speaks to a more adolescent side. “Plus I think with this record too being a particularly strong batch of songs lyrically — in terms of Clowns back catalogue I focused a lot harder on the lyrics on this one — but it does have an adolescent side to it. Like on the song Prick the final line of that one is, “. but he’s such a prick!” and I can’t imagine too many scholars will be quoting me on that down the track, or that too many people will be using vernacular like that in their university theses. “But also at the same time with Prick I’m taking a bit of an irreverent, light-hearted swing at dickheads, and it does have a pretty strong message behind it even if the words are just things you’d hear any old schmuck use down at the pub. “The tone of that song has a theme that runs much deeper than just skin level, and that’s what we were trying to do over the entire record — if anyone just wants to listen to it once, it has great listenability. But the more you listen and start to scratch below the surface, you discover that it’s a real study on humankind with genuine substance.” On recent single I Wanna Feel Again — a moving exploration of mental health issues — Clowns even throw vulnerability into the mix, although it too ends up a typical Clowns noisefest eventually. “I think that’s our first emo song, and probably our last emo song,” Williams laughs. “It was good to
open up a more vulnerable side in the lyrics, which we’ve probably neglected in the past. I was stoked with how that song came out, and I guess for anyone following the lyrics if it speaks to them and encourages them to speak out or get something better in their lives then I’m really glad we did choose to be a bit more vulnerable than the usual ‘tough guy’ machismo thing we do.” And while Clowns’ third album Lucid Again (2017) did take some different musical tangents, Nature/Nurture is even more experimental in nature, which the vocalist explains was the plan all along. “It’s definitely conscious,” Williams offers. “We always want to be forever growing as a band and forever experimenting with new sounds, and continue to mix the genre of punk with all kinds of wacky instruments and wacky genres because punk music is just so awesome and we don’t want to be confined to
just one area of punk and paint ourselves into a corner. “Like just because our first record [2013’s I’m Not Right] was a The Bronx-style punk record doesn’t mean that we can’t do a seven-minute long synth-laden sitar-punk track — we want to be able to leave the door swinging and do whatever we want. “And just from my own observations the best bands are the ones that continue to reinvent themselves and make records that sound fresh and interesting, and they’re not making the same record over and over again. For us it’s a calculated effort to keep things interesting.”
Clowns tour from 1 Jun.
Check The Guide on theMusic.com.au for more details.
“I guess it’s just a study of the human condition in our own little twisted adolescent-punk kinda way.” side of the record represent those two separate ideas,” explains frontman Stevie Williams. “We also knew we wanted to have the two songs on there called Nature and Nurture, and I guess the aim as well was to make songs which juxtapose and contradict each other with their messages and ideologies, songs which ideologically clash heads but at the same time are clearly part of the same record and pieces of the puzzle that make up the sounds and messages. “At the end of the day it just becomes a symbol of what we all are internally, an amalgamation of nature and nurture intertwined into one massive juxtaposition with opinions. “We’re a mess of contradictions and that’s kinda the idea — everyone’s got views
Pic: Ian Laidlaw
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Pure joy Megan Mullally and Stephanie Hunt tell Daniel Cribb that Nancy & Beth is a “confusing and intriguing” experience.
“P
unk vaudeville” is about as concise a description you’ll get of Nancy & Beth from the sum of its parts, Hollywood talent Megan Mullally of Will & Grace fame and indie-rocker Stephanie Hunt. The duo is in New York rehearsing for an upcoming show when they answer the phone in the back of car. Despite performing together since 2012, the duo are yet to find the perfect way to sum up the experience that is Nancy & Beth. “Now, you can’t compare this band to any other band,” Mullally enthuses. “Sometimes we call it our travelling tent show, sometimes we call it punk vaudeville. It’s different from anything else. And it’s a band, not a show. I mean, it is a show, it’s a performance, but it’s very much a band.” While they’re still touring 2017’s Nancy & Beth LP, which will bring them to Australia for a run of headline shows in June, they are quick to reveal they’ve completed production on a follow-up. “It kind of surpassed our wildest expectations, I think is the first thing I would say,” Mullally offers, with an affirmative “Mmm-hmm” from Hunt. “We’re really excited about it,” Mullally adds, but they’re not releasing it until 2020, “because we’re using this touring season to build up a little bit more.because we think it’s so strong”. Mullally was last slated to visit Australia with her husband, Parks And Recreation’s Nick Offerman, in 2016, but had to withdraw last minute due to filming commitments alongside Bryan Cranston and James Franco in Why Him?. “Ohhh, that is why,” Mullally says. “Yeah, I was shooting a movie. I’ve been telling the other journalists that I was sick, but in fact I was shooting that movie. Oops,” she laughs. It’s no coincidence that Offerman’s upcoming Australian stand-up dates are around Nancy & Beth’s tour. “We had our tour together and he said, ‘Well, why don’t I do some dates over there too?’ I was like, ‘Great! Bring home the bacon,’” Mullally tells. “We planned the entire tour so we’re never playing on the same night.” Live clips of Nancy & Beth in action are mesmerising, with Mullally choreographing intriguing dance moves to a mix of genres, all layered with captivating harmonies. “I think it’s a compelling dynamic for audiences to see Stephanie and I together,” she says. “You kind of think, ‘Huh, what’s that all about?’” “It’s a little confusing and intriguing,” Hunt adds. With a 30-year age gap between the two and a mixed setlist (Gucci Mane, Rufus Wainwright and Doris Day, just to name a few), Mullally notes there’s “a timelessness factor to the whole thing”.
“It’s kind of like time doesn’t exist, almost like your time travelling through all of the songs. We like to move, we dress the same and we dance the same, so it’s like the same, but different. “It’s totally impromptu, it’s not scripted in any way, but it’s not like any other band that I’m aware of.” Hunt is an established talent in her own right, founding The Ghost Songs with The Black Angels’ Alex Maas and Christian Bland, and starring in Friday Night Lights, Californication and more. Yet she approaches Nancy & Beth differently to other projects she’s been involved with in the past. “Sometimes when you’re singing your own songs and performing them there’s a certain amount of ego that comes into it that I’m not a huge fan of, or the songs are slightly melancholic, which is great, but as a performer, it’s not always fun to sing,” Hunt explains. “Not that we don’t do sad songs in Nancy & Beth, but sad songs that you’ve written about yourself can feel a little bit masochistic at times. “So, it’s really nice to be able to celebrate all these genres from all these different eras and there’s not really any other place that you can do that except for Nancy & Beth on the stage and you have to be either Megan or I, so it’s pretty small ratio of probability and it’s really an honour to be able to do it.” It’s certainly not a project they thought would take them to venues such as Sydney Opera House, which Mullally describes as a real honour. “I feel like the audiences in Australia are really suited for this band, I really do,” she says. “I feel like people are going to respond so well to what we do.” Hunt adds: “We look at each other and think ‘What?’ almost every day that it’s actually a thing because we didn’t really set out with ambitions.” That easygoing formation and progression are what Mullally attributes in part to their success. “We didn’t have ulterior motives,” she says. “We’re doing it for just the pure joy of doing it. I think that’s what translates to the audience. “It’s very celebratory, but it’s very pure. It’s like two little girls playing, and I think that the audience picks up on that almost immediately and that’s why they’re so on board.”
Nancy & Beth tour from 6 Jun
Pic: Emily Shur
“It’s not like any other band that I’m aware of.”
Check The Guide on theMusic.com.au for more details.
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Back in business
Check The Guide on theMusic.com.au for more details.
From wagging school and travelling to Scotland to see The Mars Volta, to surviving a hiatus brought on by succumbing to “the rock’n’roll cliches”, Two Door Cinema Club do life together, Alex Trimble tells Bryget Chrisfield. Feature picture by Aleksandra Kingo.
H
ow good is Two Door Cinema Club’s
with the booze and the drugs and it turns into
current aesthetic!? Skivvies, matching
addiction and you’re kind of numb to every-
duds and that Lego man hair! Who
thing that’s going on around you, because
came up with this new look for the band?
everything’s moving so fast and you’re hav-
“That was my idea,” lead singer/multi-instru-
ing success. And you’re afraid to say no to all
mentalist Alex Trimble enthuses. “I’m a huge
of these offers that are coming in next for you,
fan of Kraftwerk and I loved how they always
because you don’t wanna lose people’s atten-
presented themselves not as themselves; they
tion, right?
were these robot versions of themselves. And
“But I think it was in 2013 and we did this
I wanted to do a similar thing, with this record,
horrible, horrible tour of North America — we
where we presented ourselves as these clean-
were hating every second of it and everybody
cut [laughs], more perfected versions of
was fucked up in some way or another, and
ourselves; I wanted the perfect hair and the
nobody was talking to each other. We’d fin-
make-up and the [clothes] with not a crease or
ished the tour and we all went home and I
not a wrinkle. But Kraftwerk was, like, the origi-
sent an email to the guys and I just said: ‘I can’t
nal inspiration for the hair, for sure.”
do this for a while,’ like, we needed to talk. And
Trimble and his bandmates — Sam Hal-
we didn’t! We didn’t
liday (lead guitar, backing vocals), and Kevin
talk for probably close
Baird (bass, synths, backing vocals) — have
to a year and it took
been playing music together since they were
maybe even two [years
about 14, but it wasn’t until they formed Two
for us] to start mak-
Door Cinema Club in 2007 that things started
ing music again, but
to happen for the trio. “We had to move to
we needed that. We
London, because that’s where the action was,”
had to put the brakes
Trimble recalls. “We lived in a tiny flat togeth-
on and step back, and
er for a year, and it was horrible, but we were
we’re a lot better for it
never there and after that year we gave up our
now; we kind of know
flat and didn’t live anywhere for another two
what’s up and to pay
years; we put all of our belongings in storage
attention and we look
and we just lived on the road. And when we
after
came home — well, I said ‘home’, but when we
look after our relation-
came back, or if we had a few days off, we’d
ships. And I would like
just be staying with friends. Or if we were lucky
to hope we’d see the
enough and we could afford the plane ticket
signs if anything like
we could always visit our parents or see family
that was happening
or something like that. But there was no con-
again, but it’s such an easy trap to fall into.”
ourselves,
we
“Things were going so bad that there was a chance that some of us could’ve ended up dead if we had kept going.”
Is it hard to identify when one of your
cept of home for a very long time.” Living in each other’s pockets eventually
bandmates is struggling, because if they’re
took its toll on the band. “Especially doing that
quiet you just presume they’re knackered? “I’d
from such a young age. When you’re at school,
been depressed for a few years — like, after we
everybody’s kind of in the same boat and you
were on the road — and I didn’t even know
bond over the same interests, but then you
what it was at first and then, you know, I start-
leave that and you go out into the world and
ed finding that out. And I spoke to the guys
you develop as a person, you evolve; you find
and I said, ‘This is what I’m dealing with,’ and
out what you’re really interested in. And we
they said the exact same thing, they just said,
were never given that opportunity to do that,
‘Oh, I thought you were just tired all the time,’
because we were always doing the same thing
or, ‘I thought you were just in a bad mood,’
and it was like we had to always be the same;
or whatever. And it’s so easy [to do], because
because we were in a band together, we were
you don’t wanna accept that it’s happening to
always together and nothing new happens.
you.
You never have exciting conversations and
“’Cause that’s the other thing, you’re
eventually you stop talking. And it’s dangerous
always told what a privileged position you’re
— no matter how much you can love some-
in and you have no right to complain — or to
“unashamedly talked about everything that
they just said, ‘Watch out, because it’s gonna
body, you need time apart to appreciate it.”
not enjoy what you’re doing — and for years
[they] had been through”. “One of the most
happen.’ But when we were 20 years old, we
It wasn’t until Trimble collapsed at Seattle
there’s always been that perception of being
important things that you can discover if you
said, ‘Nah, it’s never gonna happen to us; we’re
Airport in 2014, before boarding a flight, and
a rockstar, whatever it is: you’re living the life
are going through something like that is the
too smart for that, we’re above that,’ and then,
wound up in hospital that the band realised
and everything’s great so how could you pos-
simple fact that you’re not alone in it and that
BAM! There you are!”
they needed to take some time out. “We were
sibly be sad? But the truth is that a lot of it is
so many people are there with you. And that
very lucky, in fact, that we kind of caught it
hard work, a lot of it is lazing ‘round just doing
could be the first step: talking about it and
before it was too late,” Trimble reveals. “I mean,
nothing, a lot of it is having to do things that
eventually getting out of it, you know?
things were going so bad that there was a
you don’t really wanna do and it takes its toll,
chance that some of us could’ve ended up
it really does.”
“Like, when we were kids and we started doing this we got warned from other people
dead if we had kept going, because it’s all the
Once Two Door Cinema Club regrouped
in bands, or other people who were in our
rock’n’roll cliches, you know: you get involved
and released Gameshow, Trimble says they
crew, who had experienced all of this stuff and
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False Alarm (Prolifica Inc/[PIAS]) is out this month. Two Door Cinema Club tour from 23 Nov.
W
Balance of power Catfish & The Bottlemen’s Van McCann and Johnny Bond tell Anthony Carew about the crowd’s going “apeshit” in the rain during their 2016/17 Falls stint, and finding The Balance.
“When we came out for what, a 20-minute set, they were just goin’ fuckin’ nuts.”
hen Catfish & The Bottlemen say they can’t wait to come back to Australia, it’s not just lip service. For the increasingly huge Brit rockers, their previous local tours have brought good times, wild shows and sweet memories. “Every time we get there it just feels like a holiday,” says guitarist Johnny ‘Bondy’ Bond. “A holiday with gigs attached to it. Great gigs.” “There was one festival we did, Falls [in 2016/7], in Byron Bay, and it got rained out,” recounts frontman Van McCann. “Just as we were about to walk on stage, we got told we can’t go on, because there was this torrential rain, comin’ right through the roof, onto drums and onto microphones and everything. So, we head back to the dressing room, and after half an hour we got a tap on the shoulder, sayin’, ‘The crowd’s still there.’ They’d stayed there the whole time. It was like they got even wilder. As the weather got worse, they started enjoying it more. When we came out for what, a 20-minute set, they were just goin’ fuckin’ nuts.” “They were already as wet and a muddy as they were gonna get,” Bond chips in, “so they just went apeshit, sliding down the hill in the mud. There was this crazy atmosphere in the air.” For McCann, there’s also a personal connection. “Australian shows always mean so much to us,” he offers. “My folks got married over there, so it’s always a big thing to be able to ring home and be like, ‘Guess what, we’ve sold out Perth,’ or Sydney, or wherever it is.” It’s a similar thrill to when Catfish & The Bottlemen get to play “back home”, McCann enthuses. “The [shows] close to where we all grew up, that’s always big. There was one [show] we played where it was 15 minutes away from my grandad’s house, up in Liverpool Arena. To do that for the family, with all of them there, that was amazing.” “I remember when we got announced, last year, in Newcastle,” Bond offers, of his own hometown. “Doing a big outdoor one up there, aside from the guestlist being an absolute nightmare, once that was sorted, it was great. I’d look down the River Tyne, and know that I was playing for family and friends.” Their latest Australian tour follows the release of the third Catfish & The Bottlemen LP, The Balance. The album builds on the sound minted on their 2014 debut, The Balcony, and polished on their second record, 2016’s The Ride: big riffs, rock’n’roll swagger, and a sound seemingly built to fill stadiums. With Jacknife Lee serving as its producer, The Balance was recorded in Grouse Lodge, a rural studio located in the Irish Midlands. “We knew we wanted to record it somewhere freezin’, ‘cause we made the last one out in LA,” McCann says, with a laugh. The band lived at the studio, literally, while making the record. That didn’t feel entirely new: “We’ve never, like, live lived together, like, in a home, where we’ve gone out together
to do the weekly shop,” McCann says, “but we’ve spent so much time together on the road.” Still, living in the studio together did cement a bond between them and colour the resulting record. “It was a nice experience, to have that isolation,” says Bond. “It made the days have a certain nice quality, where you were either recording or just sat around chatting for hours. There was no Wi-Fi signal, no want or need for it. There was a beautiful simplicity to that, and it was an experience that bought us all closer together.” “[We were] engulfed in it the whole time,” McCann says. “Our bedrooms were above the studios, so every day when you woke up, on your way to breakfast or whatever, you’d pass the studio, and get excited first thing. I think you can hear that excitement on the songs... We were just havin’ a laugh making it. There was never some bit where it was like, uhh, bangin’ our head up against a wall, can’t come up with something. The first thought that everyone was comin’ up with is what you’re hearing. “Recording is always a fun thing for us, because you know what’s coming at the end of it. You know you’re gonna get to play those songs for the people, live. You know you’re gonna get out there. So, you know how with [Bob Dylan’s] Blonde On Blonde you can hear the band’re havin’ a good time, they’re enjoying themselves, I think that [this] album sounds like one o’ those, to us. We sit around and listen to it and laugh our heads off about it.” Unlike a self-effacing indie-rock outfit, Catfish & The Bottlemen are genuinely ambitious, openly harbouring biggest-band-inthe-world dreams. “I don’t know why we’ve always been so ambitious, it’s just always felt natural to us,” McCann offers. “There’s always that feeling where, like, you’re going to America for the first time. And you’re lookin’ ‘round, thinkin’: ‘Wait, we’re out here making music, and the reason that we got put on this plane was that song?’ The ambition comes from that. Like, you do something you’ve always dreamt of doing, and, then, there’s something else you see, like, there’s this arena across the road, and wouldn’t it be great to come back and do that? With what we’re doing, there’s so much to be ambitious about.”
The Balance (Island) is out now. Catfish & The Bottlemen tour from 19 Jul.
Check The Guide on theMusic.com.au for more details.
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Maybe tomorrow Sharon Van Etten speaks to Hannah Story about the way motherhood shaped her latest album, Remind Me Tomorrow.
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I was finishing the lyrics and everything, I realised that I was talking to this kid, and all the things that I wanted for him — and not just what I wanted out of my relationship but what I wanted to instil in this human being.” Returning to university in 2016 to train to become a therapist, Van Etten began learning about how different styles of therapy approach the way your past influences your present: “I got intrigued by the idea of how the past plays a role in your life and in moving forward.” She explains that some therapeutic styles don’t address people’s pasts, focusing on living in the present, while others reach deep into and linger in people’s memories, or use
he world is a dark enough place
people’s experiences to help them make
already,” Sharon Van Etten begins.
plans for the future.
She’s telling us about the sense of
Van Etten says reflecting back on her
optimism that seems to flow through her lat-
life in that way made her realise that she’s
est album, Remind Me Tomorrow, released in
“at peace with most of [her] past”, which has
January this year. She thinks the hopefulness
in turn brought a sense of immediacy to
of the new album comes down to her “trying
her music. “Whenever I look too far ahead I get anx-
to be positive” since the birth of her first son
ious, whenever I look too far in the past I get
Pic: Ryan Pfluger
in 2017. “Before I had a kid it was easier to bitch
sad, and whenever I’m at the most calm in my
about what was going on in the world and
life it’s because I’m present. And I try to write
in politics, and I was thinking about human
that way.”
nature and things like that. But now I’m just
There’s also a sense of humour to much
trying to be a good role model for my son, and
of Van Etten’s lyrics, which isn’t often spoken
live in this world that can be so negative and
about, critics instead focusing on her confes-
try to still be myself.”
sional mode or the specificity of her imagery.
She speaks in an almost airy way — while
Sure, Van Etten conjures pictures with her
she’s precise with her answers, her voice kind
writing — but sometimes those images are
of seems to float along, stopping abruptly
quite funny. “I think I insert [humour] here or there, just
when she’s made her point. She says that some of the songs on
to remind people that I don’t take myself too
Remind Me Tomorrow started off as love
seriously. But I also try to write in a way that it’s
songs, but their meaning transmuted as her
kind of normal talk, things that I’ll actually say,
life changed — she started work on the album
words in my vocabulary. I’m not pulling out
before she was pregnant, but didn’t finish it
a thesaurus. “I’m just trying to perfect the way I speak
until after her son was born.
You had me at cello Cello wizard Kelsey Lu is heading back Down Under for Vivid LIVE. In this interview/”therapy session” she tells Anthony Carew about how she’s hoping her phone will fare better this time around, and that there’s not enough time to discuss her sex life.
T
“Stay originally was meant to be a love
in my writing, if that makes sense. I like com-
song to my partner,” she explains. “But when
edy, I like romance, I like drama — I like all
a James Turrell sculpture at Mona Foma. Her imminent Austra-
Lu doesn’t write songs with any intent;
lian tour will find her playing across the harbour from Taronga
instead, she intuitively feels them out. “It can
Zoo at Sydney Opera House. Her Vivid visit follows the release of
feel more spiritual,” she offers. “I’m guiding
her long-awaited debut LP, Blood. “I’ve been pregnant for three
myself, and listening to myself, and essentially
years, making this album,” Lu says, “I’m so ready for it to pop out.”
playing a game with myself, where I’m creat-
“Each song was thinking on a different point in time, over a
ing melodies that become words, and only
course of a few years,” Lu says of Blood, which found her working
then figuring out what I’m actually trying to
with Rodaidh McDonald, Jamie xx, and Skrillex. “In the end, it felt
say; where I’m obviously articulating some-
like a story that played out in three acts. My favourite part, actu-
thing, subconsciously, but I may not know
ally, was sequencing the album. I never knew how it was going
what that is until I actually dig into it, and try
to work, but, then, it made so much more sense to me when I
to work that out.” She sees Blood as being about “home,
could lay it all out on a timeline.” Lu’s timeline dates back to when she was four, and she first
the core of existence, sexuality, beauty, pain,
picked up a violin. Born Kelsey McJunkins, she grew up in a strict
heartache, the meaning of life”, but she works
Jehovah’s Witness household in North Carolina, with classical
out what those themes are after the fact, often
music at the centre of her life. After leaving behind her faith, and
through interviews. “It’s like a therapy session,”
becoming disconnected from her family, she turned to music.
she says, of promo conversations. “People are
She moved to New York, played on records by Wet, Here We
asking questions of me that I may not ask of
Go Magic, Blood Orange, Solange and Lady Gaga, all the while
myself. So, it allows me to reflect on things
fashioning her own idiosyncratic sound, where she sings over
that I may not otherwise reflect on. At times,
looped cello, in songs that feel both pop and avant-garde, ambi-
it can be enlightening. Other times, it can be
ent and soulful.
monotonous, answering the same questions
he last time Kelsey Lu was in Australia, early in 2017, the
Where her 2016 EP Church was recorded live in a church,
29-year-old American cellist/songwriter visited Taronga
Blood is a glossy studio work. “When it comes to genre-defin-
Is there anything, then, that she’s never
Zoo on a day off. There, things got real hairy. “I dropped my
ing, or categorisation, I’m very fluid. I’m genre-fluid. If someone
been asked about in an interview? That maybe
phone into an enclosure,” recounts Lu with a laugh. “I was taking
thinks I’m one thing, then I could be that, but I can also be so
she wants to talk about? “No one’s ever asked
a video, and it like fell over the side. I can’t remember the name
many other things,” Lu says of her music. “It’s coming from me,
me about my sex life,” she says, slyly. Well, um,
of the animal, they were these gazelle-like creatures with giant
it’s coming from a real place. There’s a large spectrum of sound,
does she want to talk about that? She laughs:
horns, and they were jumping around, butting heads with each
and it’s dense, in many ways, both lyrically and musically. I think
“That’s ok. We haven’t enough time.”
other. They were not friendly, and they were definitely not into
that everyone can find something that they like, can grasp on
me reaching in. It was this whole ordeal.”
an idea. And, then, in turn, get a sense of how my mind works.
Lu was eventually reunited with her phone, a highlight on a tour that found her performing at Sugar Mountain and under
[The album] isn’t linear, it isn’t singular. It’s not one thing. It’s many moods.”
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over and over.”
Blood (Columbia/Sony) is out now. Kelsey Lu tours from 1 Jun.
Check The Guide on theMusic.com.au for more details.
aspects of the human condition. So I try to remind people that I’m funny too.” That hopeful lens from the record extends to Van Etten’s latest shows — she’ll be touring Australia in June with sets at major festivals like Vivid LIVE and Dark Mofo — where she’s made the decision to ditch some of her darker material, because she found that she couldn’t “be ok” and keep performing songs so mired to her past self. “On the new tour I’ve taken out all of the songs that I feel like are negative and I’m focusing on the songs that are more positive. I just feel like in the past I got through breakups and dark times by writing and they helped me out of those moments, but after a while I realised that I couldn’t keep performing those songs anymore and be ok. “I’m glad they exist for other people but I found it hard playing some of those songs night after night and not having it affect me emotionally on a daily basis.” Van Etten says she’s “excited” to return for her third Australian tour this year: “I like being exposed to new music and new people.” She reminisces on her first trip Down Under for Falls Festival in 2012, reflecting that visiting Australia is a world away from her life at home in New York, and soon to be Los Angeles. “I was just kinda bright-eyed and bushytailed and people were showing me the ropes. We went to Tasmania and Byron Bay and I got to see the Mona and I got to go to Manly Beach. And it’s just super diverse and really beautiful and a weird parallel universe compared to here.”
Sharon Van Etten tours from 1 Jun.
Waking up Riceboy Alex Somers talks to Belinda Quinn about how recording an acoustic instrumental record with his partner, Sigur Ros frontman Jonsi, encapsulated the first years of their relationship.
W
hile most couples keep digital photo albums in order to look back on the early stages of their relationship, Maryland-raised film composer Alex Somers and his partner, Sigur Ros frontman Jonsi, have encapsulated the beginnings of their relationship in a record: the 2009 instrumental acoustic album Riceboy Sleeps. “As soon as we first met, we were making music together,” explains Somers over the phone. He remembers strolling past a piano store with Jonsi after meeting each other. “There was a horn outside playing piano music.” The next day they returned with a field recorder, capturing the ambient noise in the street that meshed with the sounds of the horn. This moment became the foundation for the gently meditative tracks Happiness and All The Big Trees. “We’d go home and listen to these recordings and slow them down a lot — like way, way, way a lot — until they just sounded like noise. Then we built songs over the top of them,” Somers says. The process of writing Riceboy Sleeps was something that felt sweet and easy. “We didn’t decide to make an album; we didn’t know we were making an album.” The title reflects a period that would feel familiar for many musicians and artists. “It’s kind of ridiculous,” explains Somers. “It was at a time where I was like, really poor, and eating not very much. I’d often go to the grocery store and just buy these huge bags of rice. Like, as big as I could carry. And then I’d walk home like some kind of weird peasant. I probably didn’t have very much nutrition in my diet so I was sleeping quite a bit — so, it’s just a joke.” Riceboy Sleeps was largely written in their kitchen and living room, and was then mixed in a raw food commune in Hawaii. “It’s like a time capsule,” he explains. Somers met Jonsi while Sigur Ros were touring in Boston, and he was
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studying at the Berklee College Of Music. “Everyone there [was] like, ‘Oh, I want to do music, but I’ll never be able to do music.’ It’s like built into the experience of being a musician. Society says that’s unrealistic. You can’t make music and live a normal life. But there are actually a lot of people that do. And it’s just totally realistic. You just, like, do what you fucking want to do.” It’s one of the biggest lessons Somers has learnt from Jonsi. “He only wants to do what matters in life. He just doesn’t want to waste any of his time on things that are shallow or meaningless, whereas I can totally get bogged down by like, normal life, boring stuff. But he just doesn’t. It was really radical for me to meet him at such a young age — because he’s nine years older than me — and see how he lives. Like, you should just do what you want to do kind of all the time.” Asked why they decided to make the album completely acoustic, Somers replies, “I very much work in a way that electronic musician works, that’s how I build music. But my palette is acoustic, you know? We like acoustic instruments because there’s more chance for error, there’s more fragility... Sometimes that leads to interesting patterns.” Somers is frank and direct, but his voice is grounded in gentleness. He has reverent curiosity for sound, how it functions and how it reflects his identity. “[I can] be a bit of a control freak, and, like, get obsessed with making everything perfect. Like, I definitely struggle with that and I think recording real people playing real instruments with microphones, that’s just imperfect,” he explains. Somers has since accomplished a lot throughout his career: he composed the ephemeral instrumental soundtrack for Black Mirror’s Hang The DJ episode, scored the soundtrack for the 2016 film Captain Fantastic, and produces records out of his theatre-turned-studio in Reykjavók. But, he feels that over the past ten years sustaining a career in music has become more challenging. To survive, he says, “we need to get more weird, get more freaky, whatever that means. It doesn’t mean your music has to sound weird or freaky, but if you’re being true to yourself and finding that inner voice, that’s really valuable. And it’s lifelong, it’s not something you find overnight”.
Jonsi & Alex Somers tour from 11 Jun.
From left to right: Beyoncé, Nelly, Whitney Huston, Wyclef Jean, Lil Nas X, Khalid, Charley Pride, Kenny Rogers
A brief history of country’n’B 2019 may be the year of the yeehaw but as Cyclone investigates, country’n’B goes far deeper.
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he Atlanta rapper/singer Lil Nas X (aka Montero Lamar Hill) has revived country-rap with his mega-hit Old Town Road (I Got The Horses In The Back). Yes, country-fusion is in vogue... again. Yet the response to Old Town Road has prompted a discussion about the erasure of black artists from the country and western canon and how the music industry perpetuates cultural segregation. In fact, in the same way that black auteurs have questioned rigid — and racially coded — R&B and hip hop formats, they are defying the very binarism between ‘urban’ and ‘country’ music. Crucially, streaming platforms have rendered genre classifications increasingly mutable, radio now lagging. This is the era of hyperhybridisation. But how did we get here?
A horse song with no genre: is Old Town Road country or rap? Lil Nas X laid down the country trap Old Town Road after leasing the beat from Dutch producer YoungKio’s online store — the track sampling the banjo sequence of 34 Ghosts IV, off Nine Inch Nails’ instrumental LP Ghosts I-IV. The rapper circulated his song in late 2018, tagging it ‘country’ on SoundCloud. He promoted Old Town Road on the TikTok video-sharing app, where it went viral in tandem with the cowboy-themed Yeehaw Challenge meme. Nevertheless, while Old Town Road eventually debuted in the top 20 of Billboard’s Hot Country Songs, it was controversially eliminated the following week for not being sufficiently ‘country’. Pundits speculated that the decision was racial (which Billboard denied). Old Town Road has since topped the Billboard Hot 100 and, here in Australia, the ARIA Singles Chart. Lil Nas X aired a remix with input from Billy Ray Cyrus — the Achy Breaky Heart hitmaker proclaiming him a fellow “outlaw” on Twitter.
The tea on Beyonce’s Daddy Lessons
Urban cowboys: the new crossover
The gamblers: disrupting country
Of course, three years ago Beyonce inadvertently exposed the country music scene’s latent racism. The Houstonian embraced country on her spectacular visual album Lemonade with the down-home ballad Daddy Lessons. Alas, country fans raged on social media when a woke Beyonce symbolically performed Daddy Lessons at the 50th Country Music Association Awards alongside the Dixie Chicks — themselves shunned by conservative audiences because lead vocalist Natalie Maines lambasted President George W Bush over the looming invasion of Iraq in 2003. In the interim, Beyonce’s team submitted Daddy Lessons to The Recording Academy for consideration in the Grammy Awards’ country categories, but it was dismissed (she got a nomination in the rock arena for her stompin’ Don’t Hurt Yourself with Jack White). Queen Bey conspicuously didn’t include Daddy Lessons in her 2018 Coachella setlist.
The ‘80s ushered in renewed cross-cultural exchange. The smooth Texan Kenny Rogers enjoyed one of his biggest mainstream hits with Lady, composed by Lionel Richie. It cracked both the US country and R&B charts — Rogers afforded a liberty denied to Lil Nas X. Prince gave Rogers You’re My Love. Whitney Houston recorded an epochal gospel-soul rendition of Dolly Parton’s vintage I Will Always Love You for The Bodyguard OST. Beyonce has sung the now R&B standard live. In the ‘90s, acoustic R&B pervaded quiet storm — and pop. Detroit’s Tony Rich, initially rostered to Babyface’s LaFace Records in ‘Hotlanta’ as an in-house songwriter/producer, orientated the style in a country direction. Working as The Tony Rich Project, he premiered with 1996’s acclaimed album Words — its lead single Nobody Knows. Rich scored a Grammy, albeit predictably in the R&B field.
Beginning in the ‘80s, country attracted creatives from divergent genres intent on experimenting with, or transgressing, it. In wider urban music, country tropes would be reclaimed, subverted and ironised. The role of the Fugees’ Wyclef Jean in countryrap has been consistently neglected — and not only over his sampling choices. He showed his affinity for country in writing the orchestrated epic Gone Till November — peak countrypolitan. Jean intuited that hip hop and country share a narrative bent. The genres also have a common preoccupation with ‘authenticity’. Ironically, country has allowed urban acts to disengage — and fantasise. In 2002, the Long Island MC Lady May connected with Blu Cantrell for Round Up. The lavish video was inspired by the road movie Thelma & Louise, but offered a victorious ending. The Atlantan Young Thug, a Wyclef Jean stan, heralded the current country-rap boom with 2017’s subliminal mixtape, Beautiful Thugger Girls.
Country Grammar:
The black roots of country
the rise of country-rap
The country music world is often perceived as a white space, linked to racism in the American South. But black musicians have been pivotal. The banjo was invented by enslaved African people in the Caribbean and North America, only for white performers to later co-opt it. Country originated as ‘hillbilly music’ in the South during the 1920s, the term deemed pejorative of impoverished rural white folk. Indeed, the story of country is about race, class and capitalism. In 1925, the Nashville, Tennessee radio station WSM commenced broadcasting a weekly barn dance show — now an institution known as The Grand Ole Opry. Harmonica-player DeFord Bailey would be its first black star. In the ‘50s, country developed into a big business, Nashville the capital. Still, marketing aside, there was an apparent fluidity between genres. Charley Pride would be the first black act to win a Grammy in a country music category in 1973. Over time, music became more stratified — invariably along racial lines.
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More than country, urban music transcended geography in the US. Through the ‘90s, Southern rappers disrupted the regional domination of the East and West Coasts in hip hop. Significantly, they accentuated their twang. This paved a path for the Midwest’s artists. Detroit’s Kid Rock, from an affluent family, godfathered country-rap with the raucous Cowboy off his 1998 breakthrough album, Devil Without A Cause. Georgia’s credibly blue-collar Bubba Sparxxx put an innovative spin on the nascent country-rap in the early 2000s, collaborating extensively with Timbaland. St Louis’ Nelly, a trailblazing rapper-singer, duetted with Tim McGraw on the sincere Over And Over. Paradoxically, country has long simultaneously accommodated white regressive politics and rebellion — Cyrus’ ‘outlaws’. But, in replicating that, country-rap thwarted its crossover appeal — urban listeners suss. Kid Rock estranged himself from Black Americans by parading the Confederate flag — a white supremacist symbol. He endorsed Trump. Country-rap is overdue for a revolution.
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Hey bro: country in the post-genre era With urban music acknowledged as the new pop, rising major label country stars inevitably leaned into it so as to maintain relevance. Always slick, Taylor Swift solicited Kendrick Lamar for a Bad Blood remix. Hip hop and R&B have impacted on country, as has EDM. Florida Georgia Line — high-profile Lil Nas X supporters — typify bro-country: hedonistic hoedown fare, also hated by traditionalists. The duo released a mega remix of their 2012 breakout Cruise with Nelly. Today, country has opened up with progressive figures such as Kacey Musgraves and Sturgill Simpson. More importantly, there are prominent Black American stars like Darius Rucker, sometime frontman of Hootie & The Blowfish, Kane Brown and Jimmie Allen. Already this year, Khalid has disseminated a remix of his Saturday Nights with Brown and accompanied him at the Academy Of Country Music Awards. Regardless, though country-fusion may be on-trend, it’s no fad.
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Album Reviews
Every band can stop now, the album of the year is here. The Beautiful Monument are about to shut down the industry with their sensational new album, I’m The Reaper. Angstridden anthems, powerful ballads, techno-laced alt-rock, synthesised depths, beauty and brains — this is the band with a gift that keeps on giving — finding words to do this album justice is difficult, this is a release you simply must listen to to fully understand. That, indeed, is the unmatchable power The Beautiful Monument have compared to their contemporaries. Their raw songwriting talent and natural prowess for multi-textured instrumentation have been so well refined, every note does the talking and pulls heavy on your heartstrings. There’s just something that TBM simply get. Heck, you’d be forgiven for thinking this was being reviewed by an angsty teen, but it’s true; The Beautiful Monument are an everyman band whose powerful renditions of love, loss, and every melancholic experience out there are best explained with riveting rhythms and powerful lyrics. Though there’s only seven notes in the scale, The Beautiful Monument have put them together in sequences that crash through tales of life’s afflictions and adventures with a creative manipulation that gifts each track with a standalone character and no evidence of a mess made. Raw, clever, concise, distinctive, this is a band who have an unprecedented talent for their craft. Like a really great film you watch over and over again, with every listen you’ll discover new, wonderful elements that keep the magic inspired. Opener Give Up
The Beautiful Monument
I’m The Reaper Greyscale Records
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is an almighty banger as it breaks down the gates of the powerful album, while Deceiver, slightly gentler, is stunning and heart-breaking in its lyrics. Stay, with its synth intro, is unbearably beautiful, and Cursed is the kind of angst-ridden track that’ll make you curl in a vulnerable ball of emotions. Standout track Kintsugi plays with punkrock undertones without The Beautiful Monument running dry on ideas for their signature sound, and shows off some very impressive drum runs to boot. If there’s a track by an Aussie band that stands to be an anthem exemplary of a resilient spirit, it’s this song. The feels are real, all of them, from elated drifting on gritty guitars to angry throwdowns, to soaring sensations of hope in some truly powerful vocals. Listen carefully and heavy plodding on piano keys add some earthy tones to the tracks, not only rounding out their depth of character, but pushing home a point that nothing in life, or this band, is one-dimensional. Major-minor shifts, bends and breaks in sound and emotion, there’s so much to unpack in I’m The Reaper, and The Beautiful Monument prove they are indeed a beautiful fixture in the Australian music scene. The melodic lovechild of Flyleaf, In Flames and Sleeping With Sirens after a scientifically improbable threesome, this album is a major contestant for heavy release of the year and should win all the awards. Anna Rose
Emeli Sande
Baroness
Bruce Springsteen
Silversun Pickups
EMI
Abraxan Hymns / Cooking Vinyl
Columbia / Sony
New Machine Recordings / Warner
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With Real Life, Emeli Sande presents 11 tracks to uplift and inspire. Her third album, this four-time BRIT Award winner again provides an antidote to all that ails at the moment, with tracks like the catchy Extraordinary Being presenting upbeat, unreserved joy — with some disco-era strings for good measure. The whole album works on a pop/soul bent. The title tune adds a gospel chorus to provide depth, while opener Human draws on a kind of late-night electro palate — all held together by Sande’s powerful vocals and a gorgeous soundscape.
Gold & Grey is perhaps less cohesive than records past, and the psychedelic flourishes found on the magnificent Dave Fridmannproduced Purple are missing. That said, the album is still bursting with fist-pumping passages of inspired riffage, and there’s lots of detail to explore. Gold & Grey ultimately feels, for better or worse, like a Baroness album still in development phase — a dynamic exercise in feeling in the dark for their boundaries and mapping their current potential. It’s looser, shaggier, and perhaps grittier around the edges, but their dedication to size and scope hasn’t diminished.
The man affectionately known as “The Boss” returns with the wonderful Western Stars, his first solo album since 2005’s Devils & Dust. Taking influence from Californian pop of the ‘70s, Western Stars finds the New Jersey troubadour returning to his roots with a collection of songs steeped in classic Americana. This is a record with a strong focus on Springsteen’s character-driven, everyman lyrics, with themes of community, hope and heartache flowing through the 13 tracks. It’s another incredible chapter in the career of Springsteen and further proof he’s the greatest American singer-songwriter alive.
Liz Giuffre
Matt MacMaster
Tobias Handke
Widow’s Weeds, the fifth studio album from the LA alt-rockers, Silversun Pickups, is an utterly unimaginative and forgettable release. A little instrumental extension with some strings is about the only interesting thing in It Doesn’t Matter Why. Any movement from the path of mundane is distinctive. Take vocalist Brian Aubert as he breaks into Freakazoid — the record has been so bland up until this point that when Aubert drifts higher up the octave, you’re acutely aware of the change. Ultimately Widow’s Weeds is like eating stale crackers — dry and uninspiring.
Real Life
HHH½
Gold & Grey
Western Stars
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Anna Rose
For more album reviews, go to www.theMusic.com.au
Kate Tempest
The Book Of Traps And Lessons
Hatchie
Polish Club
The Saboteurs
Ivy League
Island / Universal
Third Man / [PIAS]
Iguana
Keepsake
Help Us Stranger
HHHH
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Although The Book Of Traps And Lessons is bleaker than an abandoned warehouse at twilight, it’s lit by lyrically vivid scenes, compelling the listener to stop and absorb every detail. Tempest’s South London accent is brought to the fore by a backdrop of little more than ethereal drones, faint arpeggio (Lessons) and ghostly piano on I Trap You. A beat doesn’t materialise until Firesmoke. Drawbacks? It’s chorus-less, and could use a thematic centrepoint, as the album tends to wander around gloomy scenes without any direction until People’s Faces.
Hatchie is retro in the sense that her influences — Cocteau Twins, The Sundays and Kylie, for her music is pop at heart — are obvious, but the spirit of her music is focused on the right here, right now. Bright, glossy and optimistic, her sound wraps up even her feelings of uncertainty and vulnerability in an aura of beauty. Her confidence in omitting early singles is justified by the many sharply written songs here. Keepsake is a shining example of how pop music can be dynamic, singular and surprising, and like the title suggests, something worth holding onto.
While the concept of the power trio is all well and good, there really is just something killer about a hard-rockin’ duo isn’t there? Sydney’s Polish Club, a gruesome twosome of guitar and drums, have returned for their second album, Iguana. And it’s a bloody good time for the most part. Reminiscent of The Colour And The Shape-era Foo Fighters and Death From Above 1979, Iguana will be an easy sell for anyone who likes a good fuzztone or a blown-out larynx. When even the most average of songs inevitably offers an unexpected monster-riff or sick tempo change, it’s hard to call ‘em sellouts.
Christopher H James
Christopher H James
Donald Finlayson
Two Door Cinema Club
Bench Press
Gena Rose Bruce
Art Of Fighting
Dot Dash / Remote Control
Remote Control
HHH
HHHH
The narrative surrounding Gena Rose Bruce’s debut album has the singer holed up at Warrnambool, in south-west Victoria, writing songs following the demise of a toxic relationship. It’s perhaps inevitable there’d be a touch of emo to the results. But the album is also, implicitly, a testament to collaboration and creativity as paths back from the mire. Musician Jade Imagine helps elevate several tracks above the level of dirge; note the spangly guitars and pops of bass that answer The Way You Make Love’s dark, obsessive lust.
Twelve years since their last album was released, Art Of Fighting have come out of hibernation and delivered a superb record that oozes charm and quality from end to end. Luna Low is chock-full of all that was great about the ‘90s — Recovery, Au Go Go Records and flannel shirts. Sure, the three Brown(e)’s and one Frew are older and greyer, but they show on Luna Low they are still master songwriters and performers. If there is such a thing as a coming-of-age album for 40-somethings that happily ignores the what-ifs, then this has to be it.
Tim Kroenert
Adam Wilding
Fiction / Caroline
HHHH
HHH
False Alarm
Prolifica Inc. / [PIAS]
HHH½
False Alarm, a glitzy slab of retro-futurist pop from Two Door Cinema Club, is a relatively rare animal. As a pop record, it’s MO is colour and sound. Yet it’s pushing back against maximalism, while still milking as much as it can out of the studio to make it sound full, vibrant and as on-brand as early ‘00s Kitsune Records alum can be without resorting to volume. This one’s all about validation, with characters pleading to either be recognised, liked, or for their partner to quit being self-absorbed. It can get a little broad, but it’s all wrapped up in such a catchy package it’s easy to move past the didacticism and get to the good stuff.
Not The Past, Can’t Be The Future
Can’t Make You Love Me
Poison City Records
HHHH No gain, all pain, Bench Press’ second fulllength album retains all the frantic aggression of their self-titled debut but strips things down so those grainy nuances seep through, bordering on sludgy. The balance here is beautiful, you’ll miss nothing and really enjoy the subliminal dissection Bench Press offers. This is an enigma of a release that, clean cut as it seems, still manages to penetrate the eardrums and leave a suitably filthy residue. Anna Rose
Matt MacMaster
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Spectacular as it was to witness The Saboteurs perform new material live on their recent (and first-ever) Australian tour, it takes the studio recording of their brand new album, Help Us Stranger, to really appreciate the melodic nuances, timeless influences, and eccentric genius of vocalist and guitarist Jack White. The Saboteurs are more than White, of course, and his band of very merry men have been visited by the ghosts of blues-rock and ‘60s pop greats in this release; there’s something new to discover with each listen. Anna Rose
Luna Low
The Music
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Banff Mountain Film Festival World Tour A selection of short films from Canada’s nine-day international film festival of mountain adventurers, including RJ Ripper, pictured, tours to Melbourne as part of the Banff Mountain Film Festival World Tour this month. RJ Ripper follows mountain biker Rajesh ‘RJ’ Magar as he mountain bikes around Kathmandu, the capital of Nepal, including on the rugged trails of the Himalayas. Other flicks airing at the festival include This Mountain Life, about 60-year-old Tania Halik and her 30-year-old daughter, Martina, on a six-month ski traverse through the Coast Mountains of British Columbia; Reel Rock: Break On Through, following 19-year-old rock climber Margo Hayes as she tries to become the first woman to ascend both La Rambla in Spain and Biographie in France; and Skier Vs Drone, which sees Olympic bronze medallist Victor MuffatJeandet race drone pilot Jordan Temkin in a slalom ski course race at Snowbird in Utah.
Banff Mountain Film Festival World Tour runs from 3 Jun at Village Cinemas Crown & Astor Theatre.
The best of The Arts in June
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Intimate Antipathies Luke Carman drops essay collection Intimate Antipathies this month through Giramondo Publishing, in which he squares up against arts administrators, meets Gerald Murnane at a golf club in regional Victoria, and muses on being a writer in his hometown of Western Sydney. Out 1 Jun
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Les Ballets De Monte-Carlo: LAC Monaco’s national ballet, Les Ballets De Monte-Carlo, bring their full troupe of dancers to Melbourne this month with director Jean-Christophe Maillot’s unique and modern interpretation of Swan Lake, LAC, which blends neo-classical ballet with modern dance to revive the oft-performed classic. Pic by Alice Blangero.
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From 27 Jun at Arts Centre Melbourne
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Drive Rebecca Meston’s new play Drive is based on the life of former NASA astronaut Lisa Nowak, and sees the jilted and disguised Nowak trek 14 hours across the United States wearing an adult diaper to confront her ex-lover’s new, much younger, girlfriend. Pic by Sarah Walker.
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From 6 Jun at Theatre Works
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The Spiegeltent Geelong The line-up for The Spiegeltent features some of Australia’s most loved comics like Judith Lucy, Joel Creasey and Tom Gleeson, musicians like Ella Hooper and Renee Geyer, Indigenous dance group Djuki Mala, pictured, and awe-inspiring circus feats at Limbo. Until 23 Jun
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Wunderage Melbourne hosts the world premiere of Circus Oz and Company 2’s latest collaboration Wunderage this month, featuring precariously perched bicycles ridden on wires, acrobats on Chinese poles and more, all set to a nailbiting score of drums, banjo, slide guitar, piano and vocals. Pic by Rob Blackburn.
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From 20 Jun at Meat Market
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Ethnic City The Improv Conspiracy Theatre hosts comics like Golden Gibbo-nominated cabaret performer Margot Tanjutco, pictured, and other up-and-coming comedians from diverse backgrounds like stand-ups Aurelia St Clair and Sami Shah, and sketch comic Vidya Rajan every Friday. Fridays until 14 Jun at The Improv Conspiracy Theatre
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Film & TV Deadwood: The Movie
HHHH½ Airs 3 Jun on Fox Showcase
Reviewed by Guy Davis
I
regard the HBO western Deadwood as one of the great television series of the 21st century, if not in the history of the medium. I was thrilled to hear that its creator, David Milch, was given the opportunity to follow up its three seasons with a 100-minute telemovie that would reunite much of the cast and crew and reassemble the residents of the titular 19th century township one more time since the series ended in 2006. I started viewing the movie, simply titled Deadwood, through critical eyes but the sensation of once again seeing such vivid, distinctive faces, albeit showing a little wear and tear after a decade or so, and hearing Milch’s rich Shakespeare-in-the-saddle dialogue was akin to walking through a house I’d once lived in and loved but hadn’t revisited in years So I allowed myself to revel in it before returning for a second, more analytical viewing. Believe me, it was just as rewarding and fulfilling, although I suspect devotees of the show will be more taken with it than those unfamiliar. (Having said that, if
you haven’t watched Deadwood, please watch Deadwood.) Life hasn’t changed a great deal in Deadwood as the story begins, although illness and age are taking their toll on some, while others have welcomed or are about to welcome new life into the world. But the reappearance of ruthless tycoon George Hearst (Gerald McRaney), looking to further expand his empire, stirs up trouble on more than one front, and the uneasy alliance of lawman Seth Bullock (Timothy Olyphant) and criminal Al Swearengen (Ian McShane) is once again called upon to keep the peace, often through violent means. It’s clear Milch and his collaborators view Deadwood as a microcosm of America, its good intentions sometimes subverted or thwarted by a hair-trigger temper or a cold pragmatism, but Deadwood also serves as a warm, bittersweet and romantic musing on life’s possibilities and fragilities. With plenty of juicy profanity and the occasional pistolwhipping, of course.
Under The Silver Lake
HHH½ In selected cinemas 20 Jun
Reviewed by Anthony Carew
A
s a goofy stoner-paranoia riff on noir movie tropes set in a toxic Los Angeles, populated by colourful characters, and delivered with genuine directorial command, there’s two obvious precedents for David Robert Mitchell’s Under The Silver Lake: the Coen Bros’ The Big Lebowski and Paul Thomas Anderson’s Inherent Vice. Like those films — made as follow-ups to Fargo and The Master respectively — it’s a kooky, oddball, unexpected left-turn following a beloved masterwork. And, like those films, it’s best thought of as shaggy, unkempt, wild, ridiculous; a movie that may be maligned upon release, but will surely find its intended audience — goofy, paranoid stoners — over time. This is both grand praise and gentle critique. Under The Silver Lake is genuinely ambitious, a big swing by a director out to merge a surfeit of wild ideas and a confluence of oft-contradictory tones into a semicoherent, hallucinatory whole. This stands in opposition to Mitchell’s prior pictures – teen
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movie, The Myth Of The American Sleepover, and instantly iconic horror flick, It Follows – which were astonishing works of sustained, singular mood, each set among teenagers in the Michigan suburbs where he grew up. Under The Silver Lake is way bigger, brasher, and messier; its narrative sprawl echoing its setting, which feels like a cine-realm resembling David Lynch’s forever-nocturnal, terrorstruck LA. Andrew Garfield stars as an aimless, 20-something stoner prone to voyeuristically peeping on his apartmentcomplex neighbour, Riley Keough. When this femme fatale suddenly disappears, ‘moving out’ in the middle of the night, he suspects foul play, or secret conspiracy. Thus, our existential detective is lured into an underworld of surreal nightclubs, parties, tunnels, and mazes, a journey coded by a host of cryptic clues hidden in cereal boxes, gamer magazines, and pop songs. What ultimately results is an artwork that doesn’t quite hit its mark, a noble failure that still feels like a strange success.
Director Declan Greene and performer Zahra Newman talk to Hannah Story about reimagining Wake In Fright for contemporary Australia.
How good is Australia?
K
enneth Cook’s debut 1961 novel Wake In Fright has long provided a fascinating insight into the Australian psyche, and how we perceive Australianness, and in particular, Australian masculinity. The story of schoolteacher John Grant, who on his way home to Sydney for Christmas finds himself trapped and penniless in the fictional mining town of Bundanyabba in remote western NSW, was adapted into a film in 1971 by Canadian director Ted Kotcheff, starring Gary Bond, Chips Rafferty and Donald Pleasance. Made into a TV miniseries in 2017, Wake In Fright is now being reinterpreted as a one-woman play at Malthouse Theatre by theatre-maker Declan Greene, in collaboration with actor Zahra Newman, and with sound design from Melbourne-based electronic duo friendships. Both Greene and Newman believe the work asks questions about what being an Australian means, and how Australia understands itself, drawing connections to the way we treat the ‘Other’, whether refugees or First Nations peoples. “It feels like there’s a lot of contemporary questions that can sort of be linked to it about how Australia sees itself, a sense of who belongs here and who doesn’t belong here and how you define what a true Australia is and what a true Australian is,” Greene begins. “As soon as you start recognising
Bundanyabba as a microcosm of Australia itself, the central question of the text is, ‘What are the terms by which John Grant is granted sanctuary there?’ And, ‘What does he have to give up in order to be accepted into this civic body?’” Newman notes that little about our conception of what being an Australian is has changed since the release of the novel in the early ‘60s, or the film ten years later. “I feel we can read those texts and they can ring true and resonate really strongly today,” Newman muses. “The face of Australia has changed since those times, and yet our relationship as Australians to what it means to be an Australian hasn’t really shifted. Maybe it has in political discourse, people talk about it a lot, but it doesn’t feel that way — the cultural memory hasn’t shifted. “I hope that the show illuminates that and gets people ruminating on the ways in which we may be taking part in and upholding a version of Australia that’s not necessarily true to the way it actually is right now. “ She points to the way the novel and their adaptation explores not only our understanding of our national identity, but Australia’s “relationship to a land that has been colonised, and a land that refuses to conform to a colonial desire”. “I really hope [our production] engenders a conversation around the difficulty and challenges that Australia has in its history and in its own identity,” Newman says. “As a person who’s immigrated to Australia, I’ve always found it really fascinating, Australia’s relationship to its own identity, its relationship to its Indigenous history and culture, and this sort of shouting from the rooftops: ‘We’re a multicultural country, we’re multicultural!’ Methinks he doth protest too much sometimes.”
“The face of Australia has changed since those times, and yet our relationship as Australians to what it means to be an Australian hasn’t really shifted.” — Zahra Newman
While a success at Cannes, the film Wake In Fright fared poorly at the domestic box office — a fact attributed in part to Australian audiences finding it distasteful to see themselves presented in such a disturbing way. “I love that story about when it had one of its first screenings in Australia at the end of it somebody stood up and yelled out, ‘That’s not us,’” Greene continues. “I think for me that throws up a question about how Australia sees itself and the contradiction that exists in our culture about particular values that are held to be Australian, like generosity and hospitality, that everybody in Bundanyabba seems very certain that they practise. And then the reality of that, because we have actually proven that we are not a terribly hospitable or generous nation, certainly when it comes to aiding vulnerable people. “You see that reflected in Wake In Fright as well: nobody ever gives John Grant a job or any kind of ongoing support, all he’s really given is beer which is more a gesture of assimilation and going, ‘This is what men do here,’ and, ‘This is what people do here in this town,’ and, ‘This makes us comfortable,’ more than actually helping him in any way.” In the novel, Grant is a schoolteacher from Sydney working in Bundanyabba — his urban perspective is the “lens of the outsider”: “We’ve reimagined what that outsider means today,” Newman says. “I guess that’s reflected in my casting, casting a woman of colour to be the vessel through which we explored Australian masculinity and blokeyness, and Australian identity.” Newman and Greene brought their own understandings and experiences of Australian identity and masculinity to the text, Greene as a queer person, and Newman as a woman of colour who emigrated from Jamaica to Australia at 15 years old: “There seems to be certainly from Declan, an openness to really use those personal experiences as a launching pad for some interesting content,” says Newman. “There are particular resonances that Zahra feels,” Greene says, “because she’s somebody that came to Australia at the age of [15], and did go through a process where she had to ask herself a lot of questions about the terms by which she decides to slot into Australia and how she does that and what parts of her she leaves behind and what parts of her that she changes in order to make that comfortable. A lot of those things felt very, very relevant, or have ended up informing the take on the text.” Inspired to finally adapt Wake In Fright for theatre, an idea that had long been in the back of his head, after listening to friendships’ album, Nullarbor 1988-1989, Greene describes the album’s spoken word tracks as sounding “like they emerge from that Bundanyabba kind of consciousness”: “There’s this mixture of larrikinism and something much more terrifying crawling underneath the surface,” he says. Friendships’ sound design for the production becomes, according to Greene, “another character in the space”: “The [composition is] actually the character of the ‘Yabba. “What Nic [Brown, from friendships, has] really gone into this with, and I think is doing a really exciting amazing job of, is using the sound to create change in the actor. The sound, sometimes it coddles, sometimes it pushes back, sometimes it attacks, but it’s all really, really active. It’s not just atmospheric sound or anything like that.”
Wake In Fright plays from 21 Jun at Beckett Theatre, Malthouse Theatre.
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Reclink Community Cup Australia’s favourite marriage of music and footy is celebrating its silver anniversary on 23 Jun at Victoria Park. That’s right, the Reclink Community Cup is turning 25! This year’s national theme is From Little Things Big Things Grow, borrowed from Paul Kelly and Kev Carmody’s iconic tune, which is fitting since Kelly will be performing with Dan Sultan on the day. This year the bill also features Melbourne’s fave post-punks RVG, grunge rock legends Magic Dirt, Yolngu hip hop star and Young Australian of the Year Baker Boy and self-described “funk synthesist” Harvey Sutherland.
Pictured from left to right: MzRizk (PBS 106.7FM and Megahertz Co-Captain), Mark Blanch (Rudely Interrupted), Chris Gill (3RRR-FM), Rachel Rose, Lucy Dwyer (Lucy & The Diamonds). Front and centre: Barry Bulldog. Pic: Carbie Warbie
Here comes the sun
The winter solstice approacheth! On 22 Jun the Earth tilts ever so slightly back towards the sun to give us back precious minutes of daylight. It’s a primeval excuse to party, but the longest night of the year also means the shortest day to prepare. Best be ready.
Bump in the night Lauren Baxter takes a look at how to get the most out of the longest night of the year. Illustration by Felicity Case-Mejia.
T
he longest night of the year can only mean one thing: Night King begone, it’s time to throw an outrageous party. But why not get on brand and make it a solstice soiree? After all, it falls on a Saturday this year. Your guests will love that s-s-sibilance. Don’t know where to start? We’re here to help. Embrace your inner druid, throw off the shackles of your mortal being and fall deep down our midwinter rabbit hole. We promise YULE have a great time. Drinks, finger food and themed puns provided.
Food for thought
While Yule celebrations in the Northern Hemisphere might be strongly linked to traditional Christmas feasting, we’re in no way advocates for a Christmas in July-style meal here. Get your abhorrent jumper out of my face, Susan. But you know, in the spirit of warming the cockles and getting into the merriment (not because we are alcoholics or anything), we recommend copious amounts of mulled wine (recipe yonder &gt;) and a hot, spicy ale called wassail. On the food front, cooking up a thick slab of meat-on-the-bone seems appropriate. Or maybe a suckling pig. Get primal, baby.
The naked truth There’s a bunch of midwinter traditions from around the world, but nothing that quite screams solstice party like getting your kit off. Every year, the otherworldly delight that is Tasmania’s Dark Mofo honours the winter solstice with a bare-naked romp in Hobart’s River Derwent. It’s normally a brisk one degree Celsius but that’s all part of the fun. Something, something, health benefits, something. In the spirit of honouring tradition, we hereby declare it’s not an official solstice party without some good ol’ fashioned skinny dipping. Sorry, we don’t make the rules. Not near a body of water? No worries! Invest in a paddling pool; fun for the whole family.
Come on baby light my fire
Kramp my style
Cut the cackle
Rise and shine
A seance baby. WICCA WICCA WHAT. It’s an attempt to contact the dead. We’re not really sold on the whole idea to be honest (SHUN THE NON-BELIEVER), but it seems like a fun time. Turn it into a drinking game, play a prank on your most gullible mate, watch the hilarity unfold. Iranian, Celtic, and Germanic traditions say the solstice is when all kinds of evil spirits come out to play — and not the alcoholic kind. But hey! It’s a party. As long as they are down, the more the merrier we say.
Whatever you end up doing this winter solstice, there’s no better way to end the night than by watching the sunrise. The point of all this death symbolism isn’t to freak you out... It’s to embody rebirth, or so we’re told, and nothing really says rebirth like the dawn of a new day. Whether you’re stumbling out of a club, going on an early morning hike and putting us all to shame, or surrounded by mates at the solstice party of the century, feel the wholesome solar energy surge through you. Oh wait, nope, that was vomit. The hangover is setting in.
One quick google of winter solstice party ideas and you’ll be smacked in the face with wholesome pinterest boards about making candles and lanterns and shit. And while that might be suitable mood lighting for the unfolding shenanigans, it’s go big or go home here. Burnt offerings have a long and crispy past but we don’t have time for a history lesson now so just light a bonfire and trust us. Besides, after all the skinny-dipping escapades doesn’t cosying up by those roaring flames sound just delightful? Crowdsource some marshmallows, construct a wicker man (instructions yonder &gt;), listen to the words of our lord and saviour, Jim Morrison.
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In our extensive research to help you plan the best party, like, ever, we came across the “half-goat, half-demon” creature that is Krampus. Central European folklore suggests this weird dude comes out at Christmas time to eat bad children. And while we’re all for that scenario, the origins of Krampus actually come from an ancient pagan ritual where town folk dressed up as the mythical creature and paraded through the streets to disperse winter’s ghosts. With that in mind, we reckon we’ve got a two birds scenario here. Get your guests to dress up like Krampus to both dispel those ghastly ghouls and scare small children. It’s win-win!
We didn’t start the fire
Mull it over
Maybe all men are created equal, but their wicker simulacrums can make no such claim. Most definitely not a cultist Sam Wall answers your burning questions about flaming statues.
Jess Dale’s mulled wine must-do’s.
T
hought to have once been receptacles for human sacrifices to mighty Taranis (praise him), wicker men these days are mostly associated with doing drugs in the desert and Nick Cage screaming about bees. That doesn’t mean, however, that they can’t still play a versatile part of your neo-pagan rituals. Most recent batch of backyard tommies not as plump as previous years’? Wicker man. Bone-
sick of winter and hoping the Celtic pantheon will put the spurs in spring? Wicker man. Solstice fire feast just needs a dazzling centrepiece? You guessed it — wicker man. But building a giant, flaming keg on legs is surprisingly difficult, and there are fewer YouTube tutorials on the subject than you’d think. Learn from my mistakes to turn your fizzling effigy into a blazing manneq-win.
W
hat better bevvy could there be to warm yourself with during the solstice than mulled
wine? Whether you believe that this tasty tipple was originally sank by posties who travelled through the freezing Scandinavian countryside or by the Romans, who used it to prep their bodies for the winter, what matters most is that centuries on, the recipes and good times remain. You can find a heap of recipes online but here are our hots tips for your hot wine.
Balsa Bob
Materials: balsa wood assorted craft pack, Tarzan’s Grip epoxy adhesive Balsa seems like a home run really. It’s strong but lightweight, kind of fuzzy even. If that sounds to you like a combination of adjectives that should add up to a perfectly serviceable temporary structure which will also fire the fuck up then, friend, you’re as dumb as I am. To be fair, Balsa Bob’s failure to ignite and thus ensure the gods’ favour on my crops might actually be because I made him a bit thicc. There was a lot of Bob to love and my wee little bonfire just wasn’t up to the task. Verdict: 4/10
Sloooow it down It’s time to bust out the crock pot and get
Chris Pine
Materials: popsicle sticks, Tarzan’s Grip epoxy adhesive This bloke was called Chris Pine because I had no idea popsicle sticks are most commonly made of Baltic birch. Birch tends to come apart in strips when it breaks, instead of fragmenting and firing splinters into your tongue. It also lights up a treat. Having learned from Bob, Chris was a tall, skinny thing with a wide stance you could really pack some kindling into. Having skipped leg day though, his gangly pins gave out pretty quick. If you’re going to build one of these things on the scale of ‘divine tribute’ you want it to last the full hour.
cooking. While traditionally you would prepare your mulled wine on the stovetop, we figure that if you’ve got the technology make the most of it and get your recipe stewing in the slow cooker. And there’s the bonus that it’ll keep warm while you go burn some effigies.
Verdict: 6/10
Tas Mania
Materials: 4mm Tasmanian oak dowel, cotton twine Tas definitely looked the part, like the Blair Witch and the creeper from the first True Detective had a crafternoon together. I 100% thought he was going to turn into a stack of twigs the second that string copped a lick of flame though. The trick is to use way too much of it. Get it seriously snarled in there. The twine becomes kindling instead of a liability if there’s enough of it. The oak was nice and solid so he stayed upright long enough to light up and he even gave off a pretty inoffensive scent. Just the ticket. Verdict: 9/10
The price is right Here’s some excellent news: you definitely don’t need to raid the cellar for a bottle of wine. If you’ve got a random bottle of
Termignitor Materials: pipe cleaners While not technically ‘wood’, pipe cleaners are cheap, readily available, and flammable as all get out. They come in all the colours for added personal flair and the wire skeleton creates a satisfying Terminator effect as the fuzz goes up. Thing is, they’re flimsy. Even if you got enough together to weave yourself a proper wicker man, you’d have to rope the thing to a tree or burn it lying down. The smoke was cancer black too. On second thought, don’t build your offerings out of pipe cleaners. Nonsense idea.
red leftover from your last get together, this is the perfect chance to bust it out because the spices will cover a multitude of untasty tannins.
Verdict: 3/10
Pre-made
Materials: ? This thing went UP. Those little overall things were more polyester than anything else, which gave the flames a cheeky boost up to that straw hair/cushion head situation and that was that. Tribute made, gods appeased, back home in time for supper. Minus two points because I’ll be damned if store bought’s getting top prize after the amount ‘epoxy adhesive’ I got on me. And less two more because burning the thing’s weirdly expressive face made me super uncomfortable.
Don’t skimp on the decorations Make things even easier for yourself and get your mates to do the decorating. Cut up a heap of fruit — think apples, oranges, lemons — and chuck it on a plate with spices like cinnamon sticks and star anise and everyone
Verdict: 6/10
can create their own custom cups.
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For the latest live reviews go to theMusic.com.au
“[Aurora’s] mesmerising, magical and immersive set makes it one of the highlights of the festival.”
G Flip
– Michael Prebeg
Groovin The Moo @ Prince Of Wales Showground. Photos by Lucinda Goodwin
G Flip riled up the crowd with joyous energy and infectious drum solos, Aurora doled out whimsy
and magnetic Norwegian pop, and A$AP Twelvyy
brought the Bronx to Bendigo for another knockout Aurora
Groovin The Moo. Plus, Gangsta’s Paradise. Iconic.
Hatchie @ Northcote Social Club. A$AP Twelvyy
Photo by Joshua Braybrook
Obsessed dropped just hours
before Hatchie’s Northcote Social
Club show, making the lucky buggers present the first to hear her
latest ‘90s-tinted dream-pop gem
live. She’s flat out touring overseas
until October but here’s hoping she does a victory lap when she gets back so we can see her again.
Billie Eilish @ Margaret Court Arena. Photo by Andrew Briscoe
“That old cliché of the ‘next big thing’ is tossed around with abandon, but Hatchie is the real deal.” – Joe Dolan
“Between songs there is no clapping, only shrieking.”
Billie Eilish is the kind of pop monster that inspires obsessed teens to swarm stadiums in squealing
– Joel Lohman
hordes - Exhibit A: Margaret Court Arena. The 17-year-old is a com-
manding performer, and, in April, became the first ‘00s kid to get a US #1 album.
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Reviews
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The Music
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june
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Howzat! Local music by Jeff Jenkins
Angel wings: more than three decades of ‘Real Life’
Milestones and memories Milestones and memories
Glenn Shorrock turns 75 (30 Jun). One year ago
Sam Perry wins The Voice. His win-
N
David Sterry
ot many Australian songs crack the US Top 40. Real Life’s Send Me An Angel did it twice. Thirty years ago this month, the song became a hit for the second time in America. Singer David Sterry shares his Send Me An Angel memories: “I was sitting in the back of Richard [Zatorski, keyboards]’s old Ford Falcon on the way to a gig at Phillip Island. It was a hot summer night in February 1983 and there was a strange glow in the night sky. It was a Wednesday. “Real Life had formed three years earlier. We’d built a large following by working our arses off in the pubs and it was time to make our first record. We had lots of songs but needed an undeniable single. The way we worked was Richard would give me cassettes of music he’d written and I’d add words and melodies.
“Sitting in the back of the car, with my Walkman plugged in, I was listening to his latest piece and from the classic opening keyboard riff, I knew he’d really nailed his part and it was up to me to get my bit right. For me, as soon as I’ve got a title, I’m three-quarters finished, and the words, ‘Send me an angel,’ popped into my head. “As we got closer to the gig, there’s a part of the road where you can see across the bay. When we got there, we found out what the strange light in the sky was — Lorne was on fire.” It was Ash Wednesday. The bushfires killed 47 people in Victoria and 28 in South Australia. David finished the song at home the following day. “It was so good, I thought I must have ripped it off.” He played the rough demo to Richard and Real Life’s sound man Ross Fraser (who later found fame as John Farnham’s producer) in the Grainstore’s tiny band room, before their next gig. “Richard was really pissed off about the lyrics, ‘Why do you always have to be so negative?’ But Ross loved it and thought we should demo it.” The demo, at Richmond Recorders, saw Ross add the chorus handclaps, which became a big hook. “I’d never seen our manager Glenn Wheatley look so happy as when he
ner’s single, Trust Myself, debuts at
played that demo.” Real Life returned to the studio to record the final version, with producer Ross Cockle adding Lisa Edwards’ angelic vocal. Send Me An Angel hit number six in Australia, and was a hit all around the world, except the UK. It peaked at #29 in the US, #2 in Switzerland, #9 in Austria and spent four weeks at number one in Germany. It was also the only Australian song to top the NZ charts in 1983. And it turned up on the Teen Wolf Too soundtrack. Fun fact: Molly Meldrum was late for his first Madonna interview because he was presenting Real Life with the Countdown awards for Best Debut Album and New Talent in 1984 in New York, where the band was touring with Eurythmics. The ‘89 remix was even bigger in the US, reaching #26. Real Life also did a third version in 2009. “What really amazes me,” David says, “is the amount of times it’s been covered. There are dance, metal, punk, goth, jazz and rockabilly versions. We’ve even made it on to a Gregorian chants album.” Real Life followed Send Me An Angel with the equally poptastic Catch Me I’m Falling, another US Top 40 hit. They helped broaden Australian tastes, introducing a smorgasbord of vegies to our meat and potatoes ‘80s rock diet, with their synthesisers, exotic hairstyles and adventurous outfits. Pop was a bit of a dirty word during pub-rock’s glory days, though some fine local pop was produced. But some great pop bands have been seemingly overlooked or forgotten. Men At Work, Models, Mental As Anything and Icehouse are in the ARIA Hall Of Fame, but the hall has so far snubbed Real Life and contemporaries such as Pseudo Echo, Kids In The Kitchen, I’m Talking, Eurogliders, The Reels and Wa Wa Nee. Despite international success, David Sterry remains a modest pop star; shy and self-effacing. But of Send Me An Angel, he notes, “I guess it’s a pop classic. I never get tired of singing it. It makes people happy all over the world and gave me a life I never thought I’d have.” The good news is there’s still life in Real Life — they’re releasing a new album, Sirens, next month.
number 78.
5 Seconds Of Summer’s Youngblood
debuts at number one in the US — their third number one album in a
row. They are the first Australian act to have three chart-topping albums in the US. Five years ago
Doc Neeson dies of a brain tumour, aged 67.
Jim Keays dies of pneumonia, due to
complications resulting from multiple myeloma, aged 67. Ten years ago
Hilltop Hoods’ State Of The Art debuts at number one.
Eskimo Joe score their second
number one album, with Inshalla debuting on top.
Daniel Merriweather’s debut album, Love & War, enters the UK charts at
number two. His single Red remains at number five in the UK.
The Veronicas’ Untouched goes to
number one in Ireland. 30 years ago
Real Life’s Send Me An Angel
becomes a hit for a second time in the US.
Hot album
Top five Aussie songs that have been hits twice 1. Real Life — Send Me An Angel (1983 and 1989) “Around 1988, Quincy Jones did a remix of Blue Monday, and at lunch with our record company and management, I wondered out loud what a new Angel mix would sound like,” David Sterry explains. “They got Nigel Wright from Shakatak to do a remix and it took off.” 2. John Paul Young — Love Is In The Air (1978 and 1992) Strictly Ballroom saw JPY’s biggest hit soar for a second time, again peaking at #3. 3. Men At Work — Down Under (1981 and 1983) Alan Bond used Down Under as his America’s Cup theme, and when we won, it was back on the charts. 4. Moving Pictures — What About Me (1982 and 1989) Like Send Me An Angel, a hit twice in the US, reaching #29 and #46. 5. Daddy Cool — Eagle Rock (1971 and 1982) Ross Wilson’s classic spent 10 weeks on top in 1971 and returned to the Top 20 when re-released in 1982.
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Jimmy Barnes —
My Criminal Record After books, tours, documentaries, soundtracks and spoken word shows, did the world need another Barnesy album? But he’s delivered a ripper, which ranks alongside his finest solo work. Showcasing a great band, including his son Jackie on drums and Davey Lane on guitar, this is Barnesy doing what he does best — sing rock songs. Some of his early solo work, including the classic Working Class Man, didn’t always ring true. But here you believe every word. As he sings in the title track, “It’s the truth.”
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thepostofficehotel.com.au
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Bobby Alu
This month’s highlights
Going swell
Everything is Aluminated
Madeline Leman & The Desert Swells are launching their full-length debut Nobody’s Fool this 6 Jun at The Tote. Cat Canteri (full band) and Moon Cup are supporting, with an opening set from Girls Rock camper Violet Kelly.
Bobby Alu’s taking his tropical ukulele jams, smooth voice and energetic percussion on a run of intimate Australian headline shows with his recent single Finally. Catch him in Melbourne at The Wesley Anne this 14 Jun.
Big CHANGES
Madeline Leman & The Desert Swells
Music summit CHANGES is back to spark another round of vital industry conversations at its new home in Abbotsford Convent this 3 & 4 Jul. That also means showcases from just about every local label, agency and music organisation in town, with everyone from HEXDEBT to SaD filling Fitzroy’s venues.
Is this love?
Trip hop The Original Wailers
HEXDEBT. Pic: Louis Roach
Triple One
Reggae royalty, The Original Wailers are bringing all the Bob Marley classics to Oz, including a stint at The Prince. Going down 8 Jun, the band carry on Marley’s message of love and unity to ensure his music will live forever.
Sydney-based hip hop group Triple One are headed to Howler with their recent single, and “sad boy banger”, Butter. Brisbane-based grime MC and producer Nerve will be there to support this 9 Jun.
Suffer gladly Returning from a massive UK/Europe tour through April and May, Make Them Suffer are taking the show ‘round Australia next with special guests After The Burial, Saviour and Gravemind. Catch them at Max Watt’s on 9 Jun.
The Music
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See My Vest, Can I Borrow A Feeling, The Monorail Song - the golden age of The Simpsons had some solidgold tunes, and local guitar wizard Boadz is playing the lot for The Simpsons singalong extravaganza at The B East. All your fave covers with no cover charge this 15 Jun.
The Simpsons
Make Them Suffer. PIc: Max Fairclough
Be sharp
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bar & live music venue
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on in june W E D N E S D AY 5 T H J U N E
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3 AUGUST
the best and the worst of the month’s zeitgeist
The lashes Front
Back
Confused and horny?
Taiwan makes history
John Wick rules
Shoeys are cooked
So stuffed up
Fuck the Sun
With the rise of the music-
Taiwan became the first
Film distributor Lionsgate
We need to stop demand-
Winter is no longer coming
The way The Herald Sun
loving Albo to Labor leader
country in Asia to legalise
announced last month that
ing touring international
– RIP Game Of Thrones – it is
reported the murder of
(hell yeah), people have
same-sex marriage last
there will be a John Wick:
artists drink booze from
HERE. The change of season
Melbourne woman Court-
been trying to congratulate
month. The Taiwan High
Chapter 4, much to the
their shoes, not only
means that it’s finally chilly,
ney Herron as a ‘Party Twist’
him on Twitter. Except they
Court had moved that a ban
relief of Wick/Keanu Reeves
because it is vile, but
day and night, and everyone
was revolting; Herron is the
keep congratulating the
on same-sex marriage had
stans everywhere. John
because we don’t need the
around us is contagious.
20th woman in Australia
wrong man – @AlboMP is
“no rational basis” two years
Wick: Chapter 3, in cinemas
world knowing about our
Look at the person next to
to die violently this year.
who you’re looking for.
ago, prompting the land-
now, is already the highest-
secret shame. Can’t we just
you – they’re full of germs,
The violence needs to stop,
@Albo is an Italian porn
mark vote in parliament,
grossing film in the sexy
agree to keep shoeys at the
because it’s flu season, baby.
and language around this
artist. Easy mistake.
66-27, on 17 May.
assassin franchise.
grassroots punk gigs where
God help us.
reporting needs to change..
they belong?
The final thought
Words by Maxim Boon
America and Australia are two political peas in a pod
D
id anyone else feel a strong sense of deja vu on the night of 18 May, as the results rolled in for the Federal Election? It had been billed as the unlosable vote; a Labor shoe-in that would see the nation flip the bird to a chaotic Liberal administration riven by in-fighting, leadership spills, unpopular policies and pandering to a conservative minority. The outcome of
The Music
•
the day was so thoroughly assured, or so it was thought, that Sportsbet dished out more than $5 million to those who had placed a wager on a Labor landslide, hours before the ballots had been counted. Exit polls had also promised Bill Shorten would be our next PM, but as the evening progressed, that red wave turned out to be a blood bath. Senator Penny Wong, one of the resident pollies on the ABC’s election coverage, was a barometer of disappointment, as her bright-eyed confidence slowly ebbed away, becoming a grimace of disbelief. As the nation’s most trusted political analyst, Antony Green, called the victory for Scott Morrison, an unthinkable result came to pass. But perhaps Wong, Shorten, and the rest of the Labor faithful would have been a little less blindsided if they had cast their minds back just a few years to the American presidential upset when Donald Trump snatched the title of Leader Of The Free World. The parallels between the two elections are uncanny. Firstly, Australia’s two top pollies are dead ringers for their American counterparts. Shorten, like Clinton, an experienced political pro who had strong policy agendas but an almost total lack of charisma and likeability. Morrison, like Trump, a populist firebrand with an almost myopic devotion to big business and a thinly veiled contempt for issues like climate change and equality.
54
•
The End
Just as it was in America, the Liberal’s campaign was marked by snafus and slip-ups – although none quite so drastic as “Pussy Grab-gate”. Dodging questions about same-sex marriage and climate change, while attempting to squirm out of inconvenient allegiances with right winghardliners, Morrison’s almost indefensible positions seemed destined for political ruin. This assumption was reflected in the polls, which declared the nation had a clear preference for progressive laws that tackled social, financial and ecological disadvantage. Those polls ultimately proved to be unreliable, just as they had when similar polling predicted a Clinton victory in 2016. As the dust has settled on the shock Liberal victory, the influence of Clive Palmer’s wall-to-wall United Australia Party advertising – $50 million worth, which failed to secure Palmer a single seat – seems to be the source of Labor’s undoing. In fact, the tsunami of anti-Labor propaganda that Palmer unleashed is not so dissimilar from the Russian-spurred #FakeNews flood that so damaged the Democrats in the American election. So, this begs the question, will the result of the Australian Federal election provoke the same scale of social division, legislative atrophy and anti-progressive isolation that we’ve witnessed in America since Trump’s inauguration? We’re all about to find out.
Something to kill time before #BIGSOUND19
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