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rock music news welcome to the frontline: what’s goin’ on around town... with Nathan Jolly and Caitlin Welsh
five things WITH
KAHL WALLACE FROM THE MEDICS Growing Up My parents love music. They 1. weren’t professional musos, but I have memories of dad playing Bob Marley on his acoustic guitar and Mum spinning her beloved record collection and playing piano. My childhood has definitely affected me in a positive way, it has made me have an open mind, and have a good understanding of music. Inspirations Blood Sugar Sex Magik by 2. the Red Hot Chili Peppers was the first album I bought, and I loved it. I was a huge fan of At The Drive In and naturally got into The Mars Volta; I went into a mellow phase after that, listening to Sigur Ros, Sufjan Stevens and bands like Explosions In The Sky. Favourite musicians would have to be Bob Marley, Bob Dylan, Neil Young, Jimi Hendrix and Michael Jackson. Your Crew As a band we’re all different 3. in our own way but have a similar
KEEP ROLLIN(S)
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Henry Rollins is an angry man, and he is a righteous man, and he is a funny man. Those three elements combine (as elements do) to make him an entertaining man. That’s why despite these shows featuring no singing, no topless Rollins, no Black Flag tunes and no stage-diving/crowd-punching, Rollins has managed to sell out a number of shows on his Australian tour. Don’t worry, Sydney-faces, he has added an extra show at Seymour Centre’s York Theatre on April 28. Tickets on sale April 18.
BRIT AND JIMIN
You may know that Academy Award-winning comedy-musician Bret ‘Brit’ McKenzie appears in Lord Of The Rings as an elf escort of the Fellowship, where his trademark curls and stubble are replaced by flowing locks, pouty lips and cheekbones you could carve a roast with. You may not know that fans have named him Figwit (an acronym for “Frodo is grea -who is THAT??!?”, indicating spit-take-worthy
Prince
help of technology, anyone can record a song and upload it. But in my opinion, quality music is hard to find; you rarely find anything decent online. I caught a great band a few weeks ago called I, A Man that was really inspiring. With: Glass Towers Where: GoodGod Small Club When: Friday April 20
Argentina
DON’T CRY FOR ME
OK, so if you are planning to seduce someone, here are the surefire steps: a) put on Brisbane-based Argentina’s moody, mean, magnificent synthdrenched track ‘Chalk Outlines’; b) that’s it really… Don’t believe us? Then come along to the launch of this single at FBi Social this Friday (April 20), bring along the target of your desire… and then pretend you co-wrote the track. Easy, like a Saturday morning.
ROLLING IN THE SLEEP
Carrington Street, the album from Adele Pickvance and Glenn Thompson, is one of those records that was recorded in the Inner West and has that wonderful Australian-ness that somehow shies away from clichéd, jingoistic place-referencing (attn. everyone who isn’t Don Walker or Paul Kelly: don’t!), and you will enjoy it, despite being attuned over the past year to recoil upon sight of the name ‘Adele’. (Cliff’s Notes: These guys are the rhythm section for The Go-Betweens mk. 2. Glenn also ruled the ‘90s with the Gold Soundz of Custard). The pair launch this bad boy at The Vanguard on May 24.
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Music, Right Here, Right Now The music scene is really thriving – 5. loads of new artists are out there; with the
seen the movie though, so maybe I should ask her when she plays a whole bunch of her sparkly new songs at the Metro on July 18.
EDITORIAL POLICY: The views and opinions expressed in this publication are not necessarily those of the publisher, editors or staff of The BRAG.
Win a giveaway? Mail us a stamped and addressed envelope, and we’ll send your prize on over...
Samford, just outside of Brisbane. Yanto was amazing to work with. Some of the tracks were mixed by Magoo out at Applewood. Our live shows are a mixture of highs and lows; we want to take you on a journey, take you through a mixture of emotions.
LADYTALK
So I’ve never actually seen the Michelle Pfeiffer movie Ladyhawke, but I assume that it’s sort of a cross between Swan Lake, Teen Wolf, and when Tobias from Animorphs got stuck in his hawk morph permanently. Michelle alternates moping about her hawk-curse with her zany woodland friends, trying to get into some dude’s breeches, and having mad fun with her hawk powers, flying around dunking basketballs and crapping on people’s heads and spying on them and stuff. (Don’t tell me if that’s not the real plot.) Kiwi electro-pop queen (not an actual kiwi bird) Pip Brown, aka Ladyhawke, might have
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The Music You Make We recorded most of the album at 301 4. Studios and three tracks at Airlock Studios in
beauteousness). There’s a documentary on him and everything. Anyway, so Flight Of The Conchords, this other thing he does, are touring in July. Tickets go on sale Tuesday April 17. BOOM FOUX DU FAFA TOO MANY DICKS MUTHA-UCKAS ETC. (No but seriously we’re more excited than Murray was when he got the band the aquarium gig.)
REGULAR CONTRIBUTORS: Ben Cooper, Alasdair Duncan, Max Easton, Christie Eliezer, Murray Engleheart, Chris Honnery, Nathan Jolly, Sheridan Morley, Jenny Noyes, Hugh Robertson, Romi Scodellaro, Jonno Seidler, Rach Seneviratne, Roland K. Smith, Luke Telford, Rick Warner, Andrew Yorke
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taste in music. We produced our album with Yanto Browning – our manager introduced us after a gig. Recording at 301 Studios in Byron Bay was one of the best experiences of my life.
GOD-DAMN YEEZY
O(+>
You’ll have to imagine us talk-singing this entire item in a sensual falsetto, with a spaciously porny guitar undulating in the background, while we cover you in erotic oils and raaazzzzberry sauce. Because Prince is touring, mmhmmm. He hits Allphones Arena on May 11 – that’s so CLOSE, ohh, yesss – with a show that critics worldwide have been declaring the best they’ve seen since, oh, I don’t even know when, nobody’s made them FEEL like that in so long... But we hope you’re one of those delicious Sunday BRAG readers, because tickets are on sale at 9am Monday April 16 and you’ll have to have fast, nimble fingers – faster – faster... Oh. Too fast.
Gotye (or Yeezy as he is known in our circles) is currently sitting at #2 on the Billboard Hot 100 with that song (seen the clip yet? YouTube it). It’s also the highest selling single of the year so far in the UK, so when triple j Unearthed host a songwriting masterclass featuring Yeezy and Adalita, as part of Song Summit 2012, we suggest you get along, and bring your Snoopy notepad and two pens (in case one leaks). Song Summit will also feature award-winning singersongwriter Imogen Heap, and run a high school and primary school mentoring initiative called Backstage Pass, with workshops by Josh Pyke, Tim Levinson (aka Urthboy), Jake Stone (aka Bluejuice dude) and Rai Thistlethwayte. Did someone say supergroup? Song Summit runs from May 26-28, and tickets and the full lineup are available from songsummit.com.au
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rock music news
free stuff
welcome to the frontline: what’s goin’ on around town... with Nathan Jolly and Caitlin Welsh
five things
FREESTUFF@THEBRAG.COM Jack Carty
WITH TOY BOATS Growing Up Most of my key childhood memories are 1. of playing guitar in music class in high school; my parents made me take piano lessons when I was much younger and I played drums for a while, but playing guitar with my friends in high school was what I really loved and identified with. My dad had a Maton that he played blues on and mum played piano and taught a little to me. Although at the time I really disliked taking piano lessons, I couldn’t be more thankful now for being encouraged to play and create music.
entitled Diamond Teeth. I recorded it with Sam Johnson at Three Phase Studios in Melbourne throughout January and February, which was a huge change from recording in my friends’ bedrooms. Working with Sam was a really fun and awesome experience and he really helped me achieve my best on the record – as well as being an all ‘round great guy, staying up past 5am most nights to work on the songs. I’m really excited for it to be released. For my live show you can expect either an acoustic set or a full band performance depending on the setting.
Inspirations Music, Right Here, Right Now Ben Gibbard, Wes Eisold, Jesse Lacey, From what I’ve seen of the music scene, 2. 5. Mike Kinsella, Conor Oberst, Justin Vernon. it is a pretty welcoming place with a lot There’s a bunch more, but I really identify and feel connected to their music. I’m close to equally inspired by movies, especially Charlie Kaufman’s. I think there’s a big impact in seeing something, and although I can’t physically show people, I try and include a lot of imagery in my lyrics. Your Band My live band is Riley McEvoy, Jono 3. Niclair and Shaun Allen. We all met through playing in previous bands around the Gold Coast/Byron Bay area. My upcoming release was recorded and produced by Sam Johnson. The Music You Make All the musicians listed above heavily 4. influence my music. My first release 2 A.M Bones is four tracks recorded by my friend Joe Paine in his home. My second is an EP
of encouraging, like-minded, and creative people. Like anywhere and anything there can’t be good without some bad but overall it’s something that I’m very proud to be a part of. One of the hardest obstacles to overcome is just getting the ball rolling, writing the first few songs and playing the first shows. The best thing about the local scene is probably the support and encouragement the bands and individuals show each other. For good and diverse music in Sydney check out the Resist Records store in Newtown. Where: Resist Records / Basement of 294 King St, Newtown When: Saturday April 21 at 4pm More: Diamond Teeth EP out now through Resist Records
LEWISHAM LIVES
Lewisham Hotel has been known as Sydney Livehouse since it rebranded, relaunched and reignited the lives of many living in the sleepy hamlet of Lewisham (we once saw a pony there) who felt undernourished by local live options. It’s a great venue to watch bands (in my day venues were called pubs) and if you are yet to venture to the Livehouse, do so on April 27 for Gypsies & Gentlemen, Shadows At Play, 11:11 and Generation Jack. If you can’t make that (and we’ll need a doctor’s cert.) then come the following night and check out Sydney band (they’re all Sydney bands) Ramshackle, who are anything but.
JACK CARTY
We were lucky enough to catch Mr Jack Carty flogging an instantly lovable brand of folk-pop-rock that put a big smile on our face at the Sydney Uni Band Comp in, like 2007 or some stupidly long-ago time, and thought to ourselves, “That guy is GOING PLACES.” You too can go places – namely Jack’s gig at The Vanguard on April 26, where he will soothe your post-ANZAC hangover with tunes from his new album Break Your Own Heart. To win a double pass, tell us about when you saw some tiny support act who then GOT MASSIVE.
THE GUM BALL
Remember the bad ol’ days, where in order to enjoy a gum ball you would have to part with a 20 cent coin and swallow the evil knowledge that one hundred thousand germy, sticky fingers had been souping about the exit area where the sphere you were about to pop in your mouth was currently sitting? Well, The Gum Ball festival offers no such barriers, nor any of the other factors that can make festivals horrendous: it’s BYO (no long, pricey drinks lines), it’s on a huge pristine property in the Hunter Valley (no sweaty chest-pressing with strangers), and it offers a lineup featuring Custard, Jinja Safari, Ash Grunwald, Front End Loader, Wagons and many more. Best of all, we have a double pass to giveaway, which should get you all the joy you can squeeze in between April 27-28. To win, tell us one other band on the lineup.
FUSE LIT
Sydney babe Natasha Stuart is a back-up vocalist for the likes of Tina Arena, Ricki-Lee, Richard Clapton and Delta Goodrem, and is now stepping out of the shadows, throwing her cowbell and tambourine in the bin (quick Jade MacRae, pull them out, you’ll need them for the Barnesy tour) and releasing her debut record Light This Fuse, which mashes together soul, funk, and rock in the way all good backing-singerturn-pop-stars should. She launches the record on April 24 at Blue Beat in Double Bay (so much better than Single Bay, or that flashy, wanky Triple Bay) and if you preorder tickets at bluebeat.com. au, you’ll score the album for free. FREE!
Sui Zhen
The Black Seeds
SPREADING SEED
If there is one thing New Zealand is known for, it is Neil Finn. And Flight Of The Conchords. (And sheep). Speaking of Brit McKenzie (cmon keep up), reggae-soul group The Black Seeds are bunny-hopping over the Tasman like a bunch of shared-custody kids for eight shows, the most Sydney-iest of these occurring at the Metro June 16.
TIJUANA DANCE?
Tijuana Cartel sounds like a racistly-rendered gang of baddies from one of those Jackie Chan films he made just before he crossed over to Hollywood, but in actual fact they are a bunch of Gold Coast musos who teamed up with uber-producer Scott Horscroft (Sleepy Jackson, Silverchair, Birds Of Tokyo) and unleashed a weird Eastern-tinged ‘60s throwback jam named ‘Offer Yourself’. Let them kick open your doors of perception (the lock was a bit flimsy anyway) as they launch the single May 25 at Oxford Art Factory. “This building’s so square. I mean that literally, maaan.” (That’s you, that is.)
ADAMSON
“I grew up in an atmosphere where anything was possible. I always felt I was living completely at the centre of things, that the world was mine.” – Barry Adamson. By flinging this quote into the world, then forming the seminal post-punk band Magazine, working with the likes of Iggy Pop and The Gun Club, writing music for David Lynch (we
all know Lynch music is the best music), being nominated for a Mercury Prize and countless other feats, Adamson has definitively proven nurture beats nature. His latest solo record I Will Set You Free is being touted as his finest to date, which sounds like awful PR bullshit unless you attend his May 25 show at The Factory Theatre, at which point you will know this to be an undeniable fact. Don’t call for Magazine songs: he hates it, and so do we!
BOTANICAL BANQUET
Psst. Designer Caitlin Shearer, Rainbow Chan and The Wall asked us to make up some story about there being a Tazo-trading seminar at The World Bar on April 18 in order to trick you into coming to Botanical Banquet – which will feature a love-song-covers set from Rainbow Chan, food and markets stalls, artworks, textile and garment design from Shearer, a temporary tattoo booth, and all other treats. But we kinda feel that the event sells itself. Also, we would never lie to you. See you at the secret David Bowie gig at the Sando tomorrow at midnight though, yeah?
SUE-EE CHEN
Why did the hipster burn his mouth on his porridge? Because he ate it before it was cool. Now I’ve killed my cred with a dad joke, I can build it back up by bragging that I totally saw Sui Zhen slay Candy’s Apartment (back during my door-bitching phase of late last decade). It was awesome and sexy and surprising and delicious, like Heston Blumenthal’s chocolate ganache cake with pop rocks in the base. So I’ve been psyched to hear her debut, LIKE, FOREVER. It’s out on May 4 and it’s called Two Seas and she’s touring it and she’ll be at FBi Social on June 3 and I will be up the front being all like I SAW HER FIRST BITCHES. Feel free to smack me down.
“All the letters that you wrote to me seemed less and less convinced, as the beauty of our little romance began to lose its innocence,” - BROTHERS GRIM & THE BLUE MURDERS 10 :: BRAG :: 458 :: 16:04:12
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The Music Network
themusicnetwork.com
Music Industry News with Christie Eliezer
THINGS WE HEAR
* If the Rolling Stones play a blues set at Bluesfest 2013, you have this column to thank. While congratulating Bluesfest head honcho Peter Noble on getting 80,000 people, we pondered that he could top this year’s fab bill with the heavily rumoured set by the Stones next year. Turned out Noble hadn’t heard this one but said, “Since you ask, I might put in a call (to their agent).” * Radio and TV syndication company MCM Media has been appointed to launch the Vevo music video and entertainment service in Australia. * Fat As Butter revealed on its Facebook that it returns to Newcastle in September. Last year 13,000 attended amidst dramas when Flo Rida pulled out on the day. The FAB lineup is unveiled in coming weeks but Euro dance band Eiffel 65 have already blabbed they’re playing there as part of a tour. * Over 2000 people have applied so far for Channel [V]’s search for a new presenter. Entries close April 27. * Competition in breakfast TV-land can be brutal. Both Seven’s Sunrise and Nine’s Today had One Direction on last week, but Sunrise got 493,000 metropolitan viewers to Today’s 330,000. Sunrise got a bonus when the band’s Niall Horan took a bite of toast with vegemite, and spat it out. Sunrise promptly put the toast on eBay – but the auction was yanked when it became
SONG SUMMIT MENTORS
Young songwriters get the chance to be mentored through two new initiatives at next month’s Song Summit. In a team-up with triple j Unearthed, eight young songwriters from around Australia will be selected for a masterclass with Gotye and Adalita. To register as an artist, head to triplejunearthed. com and upload your tracks by Sunday May 6. Artists already registered are automatically in the running. The second mentoring program is Backstage Pass, run in conjunction with the Australian Institute of Music and focusing on primary and secondary students. The ten mentors taking part in this year’s program include Josh Pyke, Rai Thistlethwayte, Bluejuice’s Jake Stone, Tim Levinson (aka Urthboy) and Peter Northcote. It takes place at AIM in Surry Hills on Friday May 25, covering guitar, songwriting, drums, bass, percussion, audio engineering, music business, tour and festival management and hip hop. The work created at Backstage Pass will be performed during Song Summit on Sunday May 27 at the Sydney Convention & Exhibition Centre. Registration for Backstage Pass is $30 – for full details see songsummit. com.au
CHINA BRIDGE MIXTAPE
Interested in touring China but have no idea where to start? The Sino Australian/ Antipodean Music Exchange (SAME) is currently seeking submissions for their China Bridge Mixtape, to be presented to bookers
BLOG FOR VIVID LIVE difficult to work out which bids were real. Highest bid: $100,000. * In the latest in the catfight between Courtney Love and Dave Grohl, she’s accused him of hitting on her 19-year-old daughter Frances Bean Cobain. * Will Missy Elliott bring legal charges for claims she was dropped from Supafest? The rapper tweeted to fans she was “never confirmed” in the first place. * Lollapalooza US festival’s partnership with Big Day Out will possibly see The Temper Trap, The Jezabels and Tame Impala added to the bill. * Gotye’s ‘Somebody That I Used To Know’, which topped the charts in 15 countries and had 150,000 YouTube views, went to #2 in the US. It featured on Glee last week, and he’s booked on the Coachella festival. * After their Australian tour, Sneaky Sound System will base themselves in Los Angeles for the rest of the year, to write and record. Snoop Dogg, Rick Ross and Kanye West are fans of Miss Connie. Meantime, ‘Really Want To See You Again’ is out in the US next Tuesday, with remixes by Azari & III, KiNK, and Jam X-Press, and new video directed by Price James. * French band Harmonic Generator grew up listening to their parents’ collection of Aussie albums by AC/DC, INXS, Rose Tattoo, The Angels etc. No surprise that they’re recording their next album in Melbourne with producer Mark Opitz, the gent behind many of these records.
Love music, writing, and being energy efficient? Origin and Sydney Opera House are looking for two Origin Bloggers to write about the likes of Florence + The Machine and The Temper Trap, who are playing Vivid LIVE (May 25 to June 3) while also writing about how Origin is helping to make it a more sustainable festival. Submit a 100-word review of a recent gig and explain in 50 words why energy efficiency is important to you and the live music scene. Enter via facebook.com/ vividlivesydneyoperahouse
in China. Interested musicians should send one or two MP3s of your music, a one-page bio, a jpeg image of you/your band and an email contact to wearepairs@hotmail. com. They won’t book shows for you, but will get your music to the right people and answer your questions. They’re looking for mid-to-high level bands for potential festival appearances in China in the northern summer, so get your stuff in before the end of April.
POPFRENZY + COOPERATIVE
RAP ON GZA’S ALBUM
Wu-Tang Clan’s GZA is inviting fans to record a video of themselves rapping on his 1995 track ‘Liquid Swords’, upload it to Vimeo and post it on thegza.com. The winner he picks gets a guest spot on a future album.
NEWTONS NATION
Newtons Nation festival and bandit.fm Records are looking for an unsigned band, artist or DJ to perform alongside festival acts including Ajax and The Getaway Plan. Winner also gets a 12 month digital distribution deal with bandit.fm Records, and five days studio time in the Sony Music studios in Sydney. Interested musos can upload an original song to the festival website, where fans will vote for the five finalists. The winner will be chosen by Sony’s A&R team (with Onelove DJs listening to the electronic/ DJ entries). The deadline is 5pm AEST on April 19, go to newtonsnation.com.au/ bandcomp
GET ON INERTIA’S BUS
Inertia is bussing 15 indie music fans to various indie stores to celebrate Record Store Day this Saturday April 21 from 2pm. They’ll be treated to free exclusives and previews, and end at 6pm with drinks and pizza. To be one of the 15, go to facebook.com/ inertiamusic and tell them what your favourite indie music store is, and why!
ONE DIRECTION SUED
Teen scream wonders One Direction who have a #1 album in the States may have to change their name there. A US band called One Direction who have been selling their album The Light on iTunes since Feb 2011 are suing Simon Cowell’s label Syco Entertainment and Sony Music for $1 million and seeking to stop the Brits from releasing music in America. They say that when NBC’s Today Show did a story on One Direction UK, it accidentally used their single ‘2012’. They say Cowell knew there was a name problem when he tried to register the name with the US Trademark Office but disregarded it. Sydney indie label and touring agency Popfrenzy has joined label group Cooperative Music, with founder Chris Wu saying, “It represents an exciting array of new possibilities, both locally and internationally.” Set up by Wu in 2003, Popfrenzy released international acts Best Coast, The Gossip, The Drums, Neon Indian and is home to local acts kyü, Seekae (jointly with Rice Is Nice) and Songs. Cooperative Music is a multi-territory independent label group and international marketing network. Cooperative Music Australia was set up as a stand-alone entity in July last year by Tim Janes and Neil Robertson.
VALE VINCE LOVEGROVE
Vince Lovegrove’s funeral is at Mullumbimby Civic Memorial Hall at 1pm on Friday April 27. A memorial will be held in Sydney a week later, at 3pm on Friday May 4 at the High Tide Room at the Bondi Pavilion. A fund raising concert will be held at a later date. Further info email chris.bastic@live.com.au
NIMA NOMS
Nominations are open for the National Indigenous Music Awards, held Saturday August 11 at Darwin Amphitheatre. This year the nomination process has been opened up to the public as well as music execs, via nima.musicnt.com.au. NIMA is run by Northern Territory music association MusicNT, which made the Awards national last year. Categories include the year’s best artist, album, song and new talent, while NT artists are covered in school band, cover art, DVD/film-clip, traditional and the G.R. Burarrawanga Memorial. Nominations close June 29. ARIAs producer Mark Pope is apparently involved. “Artists and their management should use this as an opportunity that is knocking on their door right now”, says Darwin troubadour and previous winner Shellie Morris. “The awards are becoming as important to our industry as the ARIAs,” adds promoter Michael Chugg.
LAURELS @ RICE IS NICE
Sydney’s The Laurels joined Rice Is Nice. Their debut album, which they’re working on with producer Liam Judson (Cloud Control, Belles Will Ring) is due mid-year. Debut EP Mesozoic saw them nominated for best new talent in The Age EG Awards and Best Live Music Act finalists in FBi’s SMAC awards.
PERMANENT X SUGAR ARMY
MADONNA: GOOD NEWS AND BAD NEWS
Madonna’s MDNA had the worst second-week sales slump in US chart history. It shot in at #1 after selling 359,000, but the week after it dropped by 88% to 49,000 copies. First-week sales were artificially inflated by the promotional tactic of including albums 'sold' as part of packages for concert tickets. On a happier note, Madge’s ‘Girl Gone Wild’ is her 42nd #1 on the US dance charts. Janet Jackson has 19, Beyonce has 18 and Rihanna has 17.
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Shock Records’ new imprint, Permanent Records, has signed Perth band Sugar Army. The band’s second album, Summertime Heavy, was recorded at Sydney’s Big Jesus Burger studios with Eric J and Scott Horscroft.
SELECT ADDS FOUR MORE
Select Music have added Bob Evans and Sydney bands Step-Panther, The Preachers and Toyko Denmark Sweden to the roster. Meanwhile, in office news, Sean Cullen joined as venue consultant and booking
Lifelines Expecting: country singer Melinda Schneider and Choirboys singer Mark Gable, their first, in September. Dating: Lana Del Rey has been sporting a Guns N’ Roses T-shirt after internet rumours she’s hooked up with Axl Rose. Split: The Wanted’s Max George announced on US radio that he’s no longer getting married to actress Michelle Keegan. Injured: Ian Moss’s cat bit him leaving his middle finger swollen and infected, forcing Cold Chisel to reschedule a Melbourne show. Cat 1, Moss 0. Injured: Eddie Vedder has temporary nerve damage in his right arm, the result of a back injury sustained earlier this year. Charged: Lil’ Wayne and eight buddies for assaulting a photographer and beating his bike with a skateboard, after he took shots of them skateboarding outside a church under a ‘no skateboarding’ sign. In Court: Leonard Cohen gave evidence against his ex-manager Kelley Lynch (he fired her in 2004 accusing her of embezzling $5 million from him) saying she bombarded him with death threats, left up to 30 voicemails a day and emails that were 50 pages long. Sued: American Idol finalist Chris Daughtry by members of his previous band Absent Element, demanding royalties for four hit songs he had with his band that they say they had a hand in writing. Sued: BB King, by filmmaker Michael Zanetis, for trying to stop production of his autobiographical movie BB King And I, about how King was his mentor. Died: “Banjo” Barney McKenna, the last original member of the Irish folkies The Dubliners, 72, keeled over while having a morning cuppa with a mate. Died: Richard Teeter, 61, ex-drummer with The Dictators and Twisted Sister. Died: London-born Jim Marshall, 88, founder of Marshall Amplification in 1962 and a key innovator in the development of music equipment. assistant, while Katie Rynne and Casey O’Shaughnessy are now junior agents.
ABC 702 ‘EXHUMED’
The grand final of 702 ABC Sydney’s Exhumed band competition will be held on Thursday April 26 at Rooty Hill RSL. The ten finalists will appear on a compilation CD, with the winner getting to perform live on the station’s afternoon and TGIF programs, record at the ABC studio, and open for a well-known band. The brainchild of afternoon presenter James Valentine, this band comp is aimed at adults who’ve wanted to find success through their music but couldn’t. The grand final will be streamed on abc.net.au/sydney
RAGE JUBILEE
ABC TV’s rage celebrates its 25th anniversary with a Silver Jubilee special on Saturday at 10.20pm on ABC1. Tim Rogers will host, covering the best moments of its myriad guest programmers, their video choices, and rage memories from musos. In the run-up, Rage asked viewers to upload their own version of the rage scream. On the night, viewers who hold their own ‘Maintain the rage’ viewing parties can upload their pics and videos (facebook.com/rageabc or twitter @rageabc), and one winner will score the legendary rage red couch!
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Mutemath
Mickey Avalon
Tue 15 May
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w/ Black Cobra
Atmosphere Sat 12 May w/ Evidence
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Dead Letter Circus
Tim Ripper Owens
Fri 25 May
w/ Beni
w/ Kid Mac
Young Guns
Sister Sledge
Thu 31 May
Feat. Kathy Sledge
Sat 26 May
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Hanson
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The Dark Ages By Alasdair Duncan
or all their catchy hooks and festival-friendly choruses, there has always been something a bit dark and misanthropic about the Kaiser Chiefs. Take songs like ‘Never Miss A Beat’ or ‘I Predict A Riot’ – bouncy though the music might be, both have lyrics that tap into a deep dissatisfaction with the state of the world. Singer Ricky Wilson agrees that the band’s attitude to life has always been somewhat cynical. “We write songs about society, not songs about love,” he says, “and that’s quite unfashionable these days, but that’s the kind of subject matter that has always interested us. If you take a look at our biggest songs, they all come from quite a dark place, lyrically.” Where previous Kaiser Chiefs albums have played on the tension between the brightness of the melodies and the curmudgeonly quality of the lyrics, their most recent release, The Future Is Medieval, is dark and angry-sounding; the arrangements have finally caught up with the words. “I suppose it’s a blending of subject matter and music, more so than we’ve done before,” Wilson agrees. “In the beginning we were really excited because suddenly we were doing the thing we always wanted to do, and we were jumping around the room and bouncing off the walls, and I think that was probably reflected in our early records. Musically, we’ve gotten darker, but I think that what we’ve done [with The Future Is Medieval] is pretty special.”
If the Kaiser Chiefs were feeling glum when they recorded their new album, touring it looks set to lift their spirits. On stage is where they feel most at home, and as Wilson is keen to tell me, live performance is the most important part of the process. “I remember every show I’ve ever done,” he says. “I wish I could bottle the feeling I get from going on stage and performing. I mean, it would all amount to nothing unless we got to bring the songs to your doorstep. Writing songs in a room is one thing. I know I’ve been criticised in the past for being some kind of applause junkie – of making music for other people – but I don’t think it’s like that. I think that the ultimate reward of creating art is for people to witness it, and a really big part of that is live performance.” He retreats into self-deprecation mode at this point. “I don’t want to sound bonkers when I call it ‘art’,” he says with a nervous laugh, as if anticipating all the ways his quote could be taken out of context. “What we do isn’t at the higher end of that spectrum, but we think that when it comes to the process of writing and recording music, playing it live should be the climax. I think it’s far more important than release dates and physical copies or any of that stuff – the most important thing is the live experience.” It’s also a form of necessary release, Wilson explains; some people run for miles every morning as an outlet for their energy – he formed a band. “I’m not an applause junkie,” he reiterates, “but playing live is my outlet.”
I ask Wilson if the Chiefs consider the dynamics of the live show when writing songs, but he demurs, “As soon as you start playing a song live in front of audiences, it becomes a different beast all together. ‘Oh My God’ is an example of that – that song has gotten longer and longer in the show. I remember when we broke the four-minute barrier for the first time – it was at a gig in Paris, and we didn’t want to stop playing it, so we just kept going, carrying on and on, and it went down really well.” Anyone who’s caught one of Kaiser Chiefs’ energetic headlining sets at a festival knows just how greatly the band value the connection with their audience. “The crowd dictates whether a song is a good live song or not – always,” Wilson affirms. Things get a little prickly when I bring up a quote from a recent interview with Wilson’s bandmate Nick Hodgson, in which he lamented the state of guitar music, claiming it to be at an ‘all-time low’. He was speaking in terms of the chart performance of guitar music, and the general dearth of festival slots for young guitar bands, but when I ask Wilson how he feels about this situation, he goes on the defensive. “You know, the internet being the way it is, people trawl it and take one thing you said off-hand to a local paper somewhere and turn it into a quote,” he says. “I mean, Nick was right in some respects, but he wasn’t saying that there aren’t people out there making guitar music. There are a million garages on a million streets full of kids making great music, but it’s not in the charts. Fashions come and go, but you can’t think about that, you just have to keep doing what you love. I mean, guitar music might be at an all-time high, but it’s just not in the charts at the moment because it’s not fashionable. A lot of great art comes out of dips and troughs, and struggling against what’s popular, breaking away from it.”
“We write songs about society, not songs about love, and that’s quite unfashionable these days, but that’s the kind of subject matter that has interested us.” I ask Wilson if he therefore sees a renaissance of young guitar bands happening any time soon. “I really don’t know. I mean, it’s not up to me,” he replies. “Millions and millions of people dictate those kinds of things. We’re a guitar band, we make music and we’ll continue to do so – we’ll keep writing Kaiser Chiefs songs, and it’s as simple as that. When we brought out our first record, the kind of thing we were doing was very fashionable, and that probably helped us along, but I mean, I think you should just rely on the quality of what you’re doing and not worry about any of the bullshit that’s out there with fashion; just keep doing what you believe in and don’t worry about anything else.” With: Deep Sea Arcade, Loon Lake Where: The Hi-Fi @ Entertainment Quarter, Moore Park When: Tuesday May 15 More: Also playing at Groovin’ The Moo @ University of Canberra on May 13, Maitland Showground on May 12 (sold out) gtm.net.au
“You say you haven’t cleaned your sheets, and the sweat’s four lovers deep” - BROTHERS GRIM & THE BLUE MURDERS 14 :: BRAG :: 458 :: 16:04:12
xxx
Kaiser Chiefs took risks beyond just the darker content, choosing to release The Future Is Medieval in a highly unconventional manner; they made a total of 23 tracks available through their website, from which fans could choose any ten they wanted and customise the artwork in any way they pleased. It was a bold move, but, as Wilson says, a necessary one at this point in the
band’s career. “We were doing something we’d wanted to do our entire lives: we were in a band, releasing records and touring the world – but something wasn’t working. Our enthusiasm just wasn’t there; we needed a push, and it took releasing this record in an unconventional way to do that. If we’d done it any other way, I don’t think we’d have done it at all, to be honest.”
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Steve Reich Time And Time Again By Luke Telford
S
teve Reich (pronounced Reish) speaks quickly. His manner is brusque, almost impatient, but gracious – a common trait among people whose minds run faster than their mouths do. It also fits his reputation as a composer who likes to toy with time. Reich’s body of work is the focus of a series of events at the Sydney Opera House this month, as part of their new initiative The Composers, which celebrates the iconoclasts of contemporary music. Over two concerts, various ensembles will perform ten major works spanning Reich’s career, as well as two that helped shape it. On another night, Reich himself – who has been an artisti-in-residence at Sydney Opera House this month – will speak.
Temporal mischief is the spark at the centre of much of what Reich has written, and it traces back to something that characterised much of his early work: a device Reich refers to as phasing. He uses Drumming, a 1970 piece requiring nine percussionists, to illustrate. “What goes on in Drumming is that I’m playing the pattern, and you’re playing the pattern, and you stay put and I get just a little bit ahead of you, so I’m one beat ahead of you. In Western musical terms, we’ve created a canon, a round, just as if we were singing
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‘Row, row, row your boat’,” he says. “Only instead of starting at one particular place, we started together, and one of the other musicians slid ahead of the other.” On the surface, this sounds like a fairly dry concept. Hearing snippets of the piece being played live leaves a similar impression. But if you stay with it for longer than a minute, something uncanny begins to happen. “When it repeats, it sort of shoots out a whole lot of resulting patterns. They are sub-melodies that are created by the interlocking of the two identical drums, marimbas, glockenspiels,” he says. “Your ear wanders, as it were, through this maze, which is actually there. You’re not hallucinating; you’re wandering in a reality, choosing, or just unconsciously finding, different patterns.” For new listeners, this moment is exciting. Brian Eno compared the experience to watching Moiré patterns shift and change – identical, overlaid grids of lines suddenly yield bizarre optical shapes when moved over each other. With Reich’s phasing, this perceptive shift is continuous. It makes a piece feel like a sublime, timeless vacuum, even as it progresses. “I haven’t phased in 40 years, and there’s nothing on the horizon,” says Reich. “But the result of one musician playing against another, the same material, two beats away, can be arrived at in many different ways.”
“Your ear wanders, as it were, through this maze. You’re not hallucinating; you’re wandering in a reality, choosing different patterns.” Reich’s work may have long since moved on from phasing, but its effect persists. With Music For 18 Musicians, in 1976, he took a conscious step away from the harmonic monotones of his earlier work. Having noted the potency of the phasing technique, he advanced it by beginning to write for pairs of instruments. Rather than phasing with its partner, each instrument repeats a single note rapidly and for as long as the musician is able. As they fade out, the musician they’re paired with takes up the pulse. The effect of trying to follow nine pairs of musicians conversing like this is mesmerising. After a while, it’s impossible to focus; the details blur until you’re forced to loosen your grip on them, and the looming harmonic clusters of the chord progressions assume their full emotive weight. In wandering through this faux-hallucinatory labyrinth, you come to terms with the sadness and beauty in the piece’s cycles. Your inability to process the music is essential in seeing what makes it so sublimely, incomprehensibly beautiful.
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Since his early pieces, Reich’s work has been tarred with the ‘minimalism’ brush, which he hates. “If you listen to Piano Phase back in ‘67, you have one pattern that slightly but barely changes for 20 minutes. Four Organs has one chord for 20 minutes, different notes of the chord drop in and drop out, but that one chord persists throughout the whole piece. So the rate of harmonic change in the early pieces is really glacial, it’s very, very slow, and that is why the ‘minimal’ title stuck,” he explains. “Once you get to Music for 18 Musicians, in 1976, suddenly harmony begins to move with more variety than anything that preceded it. And it’s been moving more rapidly since.” With: Synergy Percussion, Eighth Blackbird, Halcyon, Ensemble Offspring and more What: Steve Reich – A Celebration Where: Concert Hall, Sydney Opera House When: Sunday April 29 at 6pm More: Sydney Youth Orchestra play Ligeti, Reich and Riley on Sunday April 29 at 2pm / Steve Reich In Conversation on Thursday April 26 at 6.30pm. Full details at sydneyoperahouse.com
Steve Reich – photo by Wonge Bergmann
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Reich notes that this technique of sympathetic, cycling repetition has never left his compositions, but has changed character in each of them. “The largest chunk of the first movement of Tehillim is a very elaborate four-part canon,” he says. “Of course everybody hears it as a canon because it’s an extended melody, but it’s the same thinking, it’s the same process as Drumming or Piano Phase.” In 2007, Double Sextet and 2x5 took the concept further still. In these, two equally sized groups play intensely syncopated themes. Instead of fading back and forth, they interlock to form dense harmonic matrices, with individual instruments occasionally drawing out of the fray to spar with each other. Both are broken into three sections, fast/slow/fast; when each slows, you can hear the same phase-derived effect still working its magic, sewn together with aching stretches of densely phrased violin chords or offset guitar melodies.
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BRAG :: 458 :: 16:04:12 :: 17
Husky The Dream Run By Steph Harmon
“W
ild. It’s been wild,” Husky Gawenda understates, shaking his head with a laugh. The Melbourne songwriter and his cousin (and bandmate) Gideon Preiss are sitting across from me at a table in Austin, Texas after just coming off stage at The Aussie BBQ – the now infamous Australian showcase held each year at South By Southwest, aka the indie music world’s Spring Break.
It’s Husky’s first time in Austin, and Gawenda and Preiss are looking a little worn out. “It’s pretty hectic as a band,” Gawenda says. “The shows are, you know, they’re a bit tough – it’s a bit of a hustle getting to and from them – but it’s been great. It’s an amazing experience.” Their Aussie BBQ show was the Melbourne band’s fourth of five gigs at SXSW, but it’s fair to say their most important set happened the previous night, at the much-hyped Sub Pop showcase. The band had announced their deal with the iconic Seattle label (responsible for the rise of Nirvana, Mudhoney and Soungarden, and currently home to The Shins, Beach House and Dinosaur Jr.) just a month before, causing substantial chatter amongst the global music press: they were the first Australian band to ever have the privilege.
“It was an honour to be playing with those other bands,” Gawenda says, of sharing a stage with labelmates Blitzen Trapper, Shearwater and Spoek Mathambo. “It felt like a bit of a historic occasion for us.” The record that got Husky here is their selfproduced debut LP, Forever So, which came out in Australia through Liberation in November – but it all started before then, in February, when their single ‘History’s Door’ won them triple j Unearthed. “The song got added to triple j rotation, and then the labels and the managers came knocking,” Gawenda recalls. “It was pretty strange. We’d been very much alone, doing it on our own, everything – including the production and the engineering and the management, booking our own tours, booking our own gear… It was strange to suddenly have a lot of people calling. We weren’t expecting it.” But they should have expected it. Three years in the making, Forever So is a meticulous, detailed and pensive record filled with the silky harmonic folk its lead single promised; the music brims with energy, warmth and gentle nostalgia. Often compared to Boy & Bear and labelmates Fleet Foxes, the album certainly captured the zeitgeist of the time – but Husky weren’t content to rest on that well-worn formula of four-boy folk. “I think it’s a dangerous idea to make music to suit something, to suit triple j or to suit a record label or to suit the time; to try to create a sound because it’s fashionable. Because if you don’t achieve that, then you’ve got something that doesn’t suit anything, and you don’t necessarily really believe in it…” Gawenda says, trailing off before Preiss neatly sums up his point: “And then you’re left with nothing.”
“It’s a dangerous idea to make music to suit triple j, or a record label, or because it’s fashionable. If you don’t achieve that, then you’ve got something that doesn’t suit anything.” The twist to Husky’s music, the sound that shields them from bandwagon accusations and creates a style that’s truly their own, comes courtesy of Preiss’s virtuosic jazz training; throughout Forever So, his keyboard lines are engaged in a nuanced push-and-pull with the rest of the music, building with and against the gentle guitars and rolling drums, Gawenda’s smooth voice and those wonderful melodies. Live, the sound is full and fresh, and often seems spontaneous. “There’s a bit of freedom in the parts that come from having played different styles,” Gideon agrees. Filled out by bassist Evan Tweedie and drummer Luke Collins, the band recorded the album in a homemade studio at a rickety old property that Gawenda was leasing in Northcote. They were renting and borrowing gear as they went, taking YouTube tutorials on soundproofing and selfproduction, and basically starting from scratch. Recording took them over a year. (“I mean, by the end, Husk’s beard was like – I mean it really was something,” Preiss says in awe.) “Having our own studio gave us the freedom that we needed for these songs. To make this album, we needed a space,” Preiss says. But it certainly wasn’t easy. “There were a lot of moments, or even extended periods, where things weren’t going right technically or we were having trouble with this or that,” Gawenda admits. “We’re not engineers. We’re not producers. It took some determination. But it was a really interesting, exciting, rewarding time.”
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18 :: BRAG :: 458 :: 16:04:12
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In just over a year, this young band has gone from a home-built studio to national rotation to a debut record to Sub Pop. On behalf of every new Australian act who’s trying to follow that same path, I ask what exactly it is that Husky did right. But Gawenda has trouble answering. “It couldn’t – it’s sort of…” he falters. “It’s been a bit of a dream run for us, actually. Not that it hasn’t been a lot of hard work – and there was a lot of hard work before that as well, even before our three years as a band. But in terms of what I would do differently, or what I learned, or what advice I’d give – well, even now I don’t really know how it all happened, or what we did right, or what we did to deserve this. I don’t know. All I know is that we had our mission: to write great songs, and to produce a beautiful record. And I think that’s really the only thing we did intentionally. Other than that, it all kind of fell into our lap.” Where: Oxford Art Factory When: Thurs May 3 & Sat May 5 (new show) More: Forever So out now through Liberation
11 songs that have the love of a cowboy bathed in lonesome blues and the rock ‘n’ roll swagger of a woman past midnight
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YesYou Hey You, YesYou By Alasdair Duncan YesYou, consisting of Kirkham and former schoolmate Gav Parry, found initial success when their track ‘Half Of It’ took off via triple j Unearthed, and are presently at work on their debut EP. The pair both started out as drummers, so rhythm is key to their sound. “Drummers are as important as singers in my book,” Kirkham says. “Gav and I take a lot of pride in making our drum loops and beats perfect.” Between them, the pair play drums, guitar, bass and keyboards – so effectively, they have all bases covered. “Sometimes one of our songs can start with a drum loop I think is cool, or a bunch of chords on a guitar, or a synth sound we like, which we’ll play around with, and find a vibe we like and figure out some chords,” Kirkham explains. “I mean, I sound stupid saying the word ‘vibe’, but that’s really an essential part of a song.”
J
ono Kirkham of electro-pop group YesYou started out as a drummer, but after spending several post-high-school years playing in bands around Brisbane and Melbourne, found himself increasingly drawn to synths. Turning to electronic music is an increasingly common path for young bands these days. “Synthesisers are very accessible now, and I think a lot of people
are drawn to them for that reason,” Kirkham reasons. “Plus, I think they bring a lot of the fun back into music, and you can get a lot of cool sounds out of them. The thing for me is I know that right now, I could go into the studio and choose from 100,000 different sounds if I want to do something. I see a synth as an awesome, massive production and songwriting tool.”
Two of the key inspirations for YesYou are Foster The People and Miike Snow. “They’re making the way for a new sound, but using traditional instruments, which is what we like to do,” Kirkham explains. “I really get a kick out of the way they’re able to use synthesisers and organic instruments and create an entirely new sound.” Miike Snow recently said that, as part of their new live show, they have custom-built all of their own gear, including several monstrous synths they will cart around with them, and Kirkham is quite envious. “Yeah, that’s so cool!” he says. “Gav showed me a YouTube clip, a BBC recording, of a
massive machine station that they’d created, with samplers and decks and synths all built into it, it looked amazing.” As for the future, the first step for YesYou is taking their live show on the road – including a pit stop at Sosueme’s 5th Birthday, where they will make their Sydney debut. “Gav and I swap halfway through the set,” Kirkham says of their upcoming shows. “He plays drums for the first half, then I play for the second. We also have a big sampling bay where we can trigger various things with drum sticks, so he’ll be on that for part of the show, too.” What about the setlist? “Well, we’re doing a lot of different songs with a lot of different artists around Australia at the moment, so there’s a lot of stuff we can do,” Kirkham says. “We have an eight-song set, with four of the songs from our upcoming EP, and four that will likely be released sometime in the future.” With: Alison Wonderland, Elizabeth Rose (live), Sosueme DJs, Joyride (DJ set), Brendan Maclean (live), Furnace & The Fundamentals (live), F.R.I.E.N.D/s DJs, Block Ness Monsters, Starjumps Where: Sosueme’s 5th Birthday @ Upstairs Beresford / 354 Bourke St, Surry Hills When: Tuesday April 24 (ANZAC Day eve) from 6pm
Aya Larkin Live The Dream By Benjamin Cooper
Bondi bar The Wreck as the live music and food joint Buckler’s Canteen. He didn’t come alone, bringing his young family and a debut solo album to boot. “Prior to leaving, I was working hard at my music, like something of a maniac, but my goal was always to go to America to learn and grow more,” he says. “I got over there, and got working on my skills. Now I’ve come back with a beautiful wife, two babies and a whole lot more to my game.” That game includes Waking Dream, a painstakingly realised and mature work that showcases the tenacity of Larkin’s vocals against truly gorgeous instrumentation. Created with fellow Australian expat Andy Clockwise over a period of three years, it’s a collection of songs that Larkin feels proud of. “Andy’s based in LA, and it was a case of us getting together in spurts to collaborate when we could,” Larkin explains. “He actually grew up listening to Skunkhour and loved my writing, so that kind of positive energy was very encouraging”.
A
ya Larkin, former frontman of ‘90s alt-rock outfit Skunkhour, reckons you make your own luck as a musician. “Mate,” he confides, “unless you’re talking about the glory days of the ‘80s, all that talk about the death of live music is just bullshit. It’s been like this for 20 years. It was really hard for bands in the ‘90s, when pokies started moving in to venues. The reality is, if music really matters to you then you have to work hard to carve something out”.
Larkin knows what he’s talking about. Skunkhour had a number of triple j certified hits throughout the ‘90s and built a solid group of fans and admirers through regular gigging nationally and throughout Europe. A couple of years after the band split in 2001, Larkin left Sydney for America. “I decided that it was time for a change,” he says. “I’ve always had the troubadour element to my personality, and there was infinite promise over there... It was a new landscape, where I was living in a constant state of being equal parts daunted and inspired; I think that jumping into the deep end means you can only emerge stronger.” After seven years Stateside, mainly based in Los Angeles, Larkin returned to Sydney in July last year and helped relaunch
But it wasn’t all smiles and back-slapping. “Spending that amount of time together resulted in a pretty unique relationship. We pulled down the whiteboard so many times we ended up hating each other,” Larkin admits. “But then the next day we’d be back to bromancing like crazy again! We were also helped by Suzie Katayama, an arranger who’s worked with Prince and Madonna and been Björk’s musical director for the last few years. She heard some of my stuff and gave of her time for free to get the LA Philharmonic Orchestra on board for three of the tracks. That degree of validation, in the obsessive pursuit of what I do, is incredibly important.” The album received a lot of attention through college radio in America prior to Larkin’s return to Australia, but he recognises there is a different degree of influence and operation for that particular medium locally. “The radio landscape over in the States is definitely much more diverse,” he says. “But just because you don’t easily fit into a particular paradigm isn’t a big deal. Getting out there and playing live is the only way to really do it here, so that’s where you’ll find me.” What: Waking Dream out now Where: The Vanguard / 42 King Street, Newtown When: Wednesday April 18 More: April 20 @ Old Manly Boatshed and April 29 @ Lizottes, Dee Why
Katie Noonan Going On Instinct By Alasdair Duncan
K
atie Noonan’s Elixir is in high demand. The elusive jazz trio’s album First Seed Ripening was released last year to great acclaim, and they are about to embark on their second national tour in support of it. “It’s been really special to share this music,” Noonan says of the tour. “We played two great shows at the Sydney Opera House, and we’re looking forward to coming back to Sydney. It’s also been great to bring things back to just the trio for this tour, because it really opens up the improvisation a lot more. The music we make is really gentle and quiet – our album was all about trying to create an intimate world, and we really try to recreate that live.” Elixir is a family affair for Noonan – her husband, saxophonist Zac Hurren, plays with the band, but his instrument often comes across like a second vocalist, harmonising and playing off the melodies she sings. “We really like that it comes across that way,” she says – “that sometimes it’s hard to tell the difference between instrument and vocalist”. She and Hurren have been playing together for over a decade, and Elixir gives them the opportunity to explore their relationship even further. “The idea that you don’t know which one is the voice and which one is the sax, that blending, is really what we’re trying to achieve. It’s a trio of equal voices making music together.” Structurally, the songs are unconventional – they’re dreamy, and drift from place to place, rather than following traditional verse-chorusverse patterns. I ask Noonan how she and the band went about creating the arrangements, and she tells me that mostly, it was done on instinct. “A lot of the songs are through-composed,” she says. “This album was truly co-written – it was all of us sitting in a room nutting out ideas together, all contributing equally. Often the songs start with
Zac’s chords, then we’ll jam them together as a trio and work from there… It has elements of folk and elements of jazz and elements of pop. We just try to create our own mixture of sounds that’s all those things and not any of them.” The lyrics on First Seed Ripening draw on the work of poet Thomas Shapcott, and Noonan says the idea came about years ago, when she was commissioned by the Queensland Poetry Festival to set the words of any Queenslandborn poet, living or dead, to music. “We have an amazing vernacular in Queensland with a lot of unique imagery,” she says. “I researched David Malouf and Judith Wright and Oodgeroo Noonuccal, all of them great poets who I love, but I just kept on coming back to Tom, because the intimacy and the gentleness of his prose really suited the similar textures in our music. He’s been a wonderful inspiration.” So has Shapcott heard the finished product, then? “Oh yeah, absolutely!” Noonan says with a laugh. “Tom’s a mate. He came to our Brisbane album launch actually, with his daughter. One of the songs on the album is a poem he wrote about her when she was three years old. He was born in 1935, so he’s getting on, but he still gets out there. The first concert we played with these songs, he actually got up on stage and read them. He lives in Melbourne now, and always comes to our Melbourne gigs. He heard the songs as demos and he’s heard them in their final form on the record.” What: Elixir featuring Katie Noonan Where: The Basement / 29 Reiby Place, Circular Quay When: Saturday April 21
“She whispers her name in a cab on the move. Everything’s fast but it’s never too soon” - BROTHERS GRIM & THE BLUE MURDERS 20 :: BRAG :: 458 :: 16:04:12
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arts frontline
free stuff email: freestuff@thebrag.com
arts, theatre and film news... what's goin' on around town and more...
five minutes WITH
GLEN CASSIDY FROM CAKE WINES is about the democratisation of creativity brought about by the digital age. To us, it’s an exciting summary of the ‘creative generation’ and the effects this new generation will have on future culture. It speaks to us as people and has relevance to the audience we’re a part of.
R
ooftops, alleyways and carparks are not the sorts of places you’d usually head to for a night at the movies. However, a serendipitous collaboration between Cake Wines, Metro Screen and FBi Radio is changing all that with the Cake Film Series. Each month, they’ll be choosing a new, unconventional location to screen an array of filmic gems. Cake Wines co-founder Glen Cassidy tells us more about the project, and series’ first screening, the
acclaimed 2011 documentary, PressPausePlay. What’s the Cake Film series all about? The film series is about showcasing cultural documentaries and feature films in unusual locations around the city. The films themselves will be those gems that sometimes go under the radar. The first film in the series is PressPausePlay. Why did you choose to program it? The film
Do you think that it’s better or worse to be an artist now than prior to the digital revolution and why? Better, hands down. Creative tools are so much more accessible, distribution channels are not controlled by the few and, suddenly there is no cap on creativity and the opportunities that are available to artists. There is good and bad that will come from the creative revolution. We like to think positively about the effects and hang on to the idea that the good stuff will rise to the top and that’s what we’ll celebrate. Tell us about how/why you’ve converted the FBi Radio carpark into a cinema. The Cake Film Series is about bringing people together in a
Sunbaker, 1937, Max Dupain
unique cultural setting. With our ongoing relationship with FBi and the fact that all the money raised will go back to the station, there seemed no better place. Also, the carpark has a natural slope that will make for the perfect cinema. Add wine and friends to the mix and you’ve got yourself a banging evening. What future venues are you looking at? We’ve looked at Alaska Projects in Kings Cross, many rooftops around the city and an alleyway deep in Surry Hills. Pending Council approval, we should be up for an interesting few months in terms of the next few screenings. Who should come see PressPausePlay? Anybody who’s ever used the Internet. What: Cake Film Series presents PressPausePlay. When: Thurs April 19, 6-9pm Where: FBi Radio Carpark / 44 – 54 Botany Road, Alexandria More: metroscreen.org.au
WESTSYDE @ MAROUBRA
The cool cats at Westsyde Connection will be holding a bunch of FREE 30-minute skate sessions at Maroubra Beach Skate Park on Thursday April 19 as part of the Youth Week festivities. They’ll also perform a skate demo at 2pm, so if you’re itching for some tips on how to perfect your ollie, or just how to stand up on the thing, head down from 10am-3pm on the day and they’ll sort you out. westsydeconnection.com
TIM ROGERS
You Am I frontman Tim Rogers is currently rocking the SBW Stables stage alongside Bojana Novakovic in The Story of Mary MacLane by Herself. As a bonus, he will head up three intimate post-show performances on April 20, 27 and May 3 at 9pm. Featuring new songs inspired by Rogers and Rogerstein’s travels together through time, space and their flights of fancy and outrage, be sure to stick around for this rare, up-close and personal folky croonfest. griffintheatre.com.au
ARCHITECTURE BREAK OUT
The Breaking Out And Breaking In: Distributed Film Festival explores the use and misuse of space in prison escapes and bank heists, where architecture is the obstacle
MELANCHOLIA DVDS! WIN! Whether you’re sad because you hated Lars von Trier’s latest cinematic controversy Melancholia or sad because you connected with it on a profound level, it’s hard to deny what an unforgettable piece of cinema about the end of the world it is. (Unless you haven’t seen it, or the world has actually ended... in which case you probably wouldn't have much to say on the matter). It won the European Film Award for Best Film and the Cannes Film Festival Award for Best Actress (Kirsten Dunst), and also stars Charlotte Gainsbourg, Alexander Skarsgard and Kiefer Sutherland, and the most epic opening sequence ever. Thanks to Madman Entertainment, we have FIVE COPIES to celebrate the film’s DVD release on April 18 and will give one to you if you can tell us what makes you feel melancholic. between you and what you are looking for. Independent Sydney collective Make-Space For Architecture will host a relaxed screening of The Bank Job (2008) on Sunday April 15 at 5pm. Or as relaxed as a British Oceans Eleven-for-rookies starring Jason Statham can be. It happens in collaboration with The Rocks Pop Up initiative at 47 George St The Rocks. therockspopup.tumblr.com
NA-NA-NA-NARNIA
The Powerhouse Museum is switching in Buckbeak for Reepicheep, Hagrid’s chair for The White Witch’s Throne and Fizzing Whizbees for Turkish delight. Following hot on the hooves of the end of Harry Potter: The Exhibition, The Chronicles of Narnia: The Exhibition is coming to town. Based on the blockbuster film series and C.S. Lewis’ beloved fictional books that made us both hopeful and scared of what we might find at the backs of our wardobes, it opens on May 12. We’ll get the chance to tour scenes from Narnia, come face-to-face with characters, creatures and the costumes worn by key characters including the White Witch and the Pevensie children. The exhibition will have heaps of hands-on and interactive elements, and include a recreation of C.S. Lewis’ study, where he wrote the Narnia adventures. powerhousemuseum.com
MAX DUPAIN 100
April 22 marks the centenary of legendary Sydney photographer Max Dupain’s birth and to celebrate, the State Library (Floor 1, Macquarie St Building) is exhibiting a range of his photographs from the body of 100,000 negatives of commercial work and 30,000 personal images he took over the course of his life. Famous for his picture The Sunbaker (1937), Dupain started taking photos with a Brownie Box camera when he was 13, then turned pro at 23, opening his own fashion and portraiture studio. He later moved into advertising and architectural photography and became renowned for his distinct visual style and use of dramatic light. Catch this free slice of Sydney’s cultural history. sl.nsw.gov.au/events
There’s a whole lot more to Japan than sushi, geishas and nuclear disasters. And in case you need proof (or just like fun things), the Japan Foundation has put together a free program of films as part of Japanese Cinema Week, screening daily in the Japan Foundation Multipurpose Room (Shop 23, Level 1 Chifley Plaza, 2 Chifley Square). Cinephiles, prepare to indulge in some rare treats, including an exclusive screening of Studio Ghibli’s Only Yesterday (April 17, 2pm) and Porco Rosso (April 18, 2pm). Also screening is Kenji Mizoguchi’s 1956 drama Streets of Shame (April 18, 6.30pm) about five prostitutes who work at Dreamland, in Tokyo’s Yoshiwara district. Yasujiro Ozu’s classic, Floating Weeds (April 20, 6.30pm) a romantic drama about a travelling theatre troupe, will close the program. jpf.org.au
SONIC TALES
Remember when we all used to sit around the radio with our families and listen to Under Milk Wood? Neither. But that’s ok, because we’re going to get another chance. Eastside Radio is bringing the radio play into the 21st Century and their second season of Sonic Tales 22 :: BRAG :: 458 :: 16:04:12
is upon us. Tune in to Arts (10.30 to midday) and Drive (4-6pm) on Fridays as Sonic Tales marks the world premier of three brand new, locally produced plays, featuring the work of three acclaimed AWGIE winning writers. First up is Pulpit Rock (playing April 20), a suspenseful monologue written and directed by Gina Schein. Seeking Mr. Freud (April 27) is a spooky black comedy written by Noelle Janaczweska. Then on May 4, tune in for The Night We Lost Jenny, by Vanessa Bates. eastsidefm.org
MISS BURLESQUE AUSTRALIA GRAND FINAL
In the final round of Miss Burlesque Australia, winners from each state are descending on The Enmore Theatre to vie for over $15,000 worth of cash and prizes, including a trip to Las Vegas to attend the Burlesque Hall of Fame Weekend in June 2013. Watch as these women astound you with their burlesque best, and cheer for our NSW representatives Briana Bluebell (Miss Burlesque NSW) and Bunni Lambada (Wildcard NSW). Also, for the first time ever, the night will feature a Mr Boylesque Competition! It happens April 21 at 7pm, The Enmore Theatre. missburlesquecompetition.com
PACT OUT
Looking to unleash your creative juices in a self-devised, interdisciplinary environment? Are you hankering for a brainstorm to quench the thirst of your creative garden so that it may blossom into a fully formed performance wonderland? The PACT Centre For Emerging Arts is the key into that wonderland, and they have put a call out for application registrations to join their 2012 ensemble program. Now in its tenth year, the program provides professional development for artists aged 18-30yrs and you have until Monday April 30 to register your interest in auditioning. Head to pact.net.au for details. Xxxx
JAPANESE CINEMA WEEK
PACT Ensemble 2011
ADRIAN BOHM PRESENTS
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STAR OF SATURDAY NIGHT LIVE AND THE MOVIE “HALF BAKED” WITH DAVE CHAPPELLE
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FROM CHAPPELLE’S SHOW
MORAL COMPASS TOUR 2012 “JIM BREUER IS AMONG THE BEST”
– HOWARD STERN
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A ‘Joint’ Adventure By Roslyn Helper
22 GIRLS SMOKING WEED A rtist duo Jesse Willesee and Daniel Havas are doing one of two things. Either, they are trying very hard to pull the wool over our eyes – to get us to ogle the emperor with no clothes on whilst they kick back and revel in their easy-earned five minutes of fame – or they have produced a body of work so conceptually genuine and aesthetically irresistible it’s impossible to fail them on account of them having masterfully channeled the shallow, selfperpetuating hipster zeitgeist that dominates our popular culture. The exhibition 22 Girls Smoking Weed is literally just photographs and film footage of 22 girls all smoking weed. And whilst it’s nothing that Pop Art didn’t already think of 50 years ago, the new aspect is that contemporary technologies have motivated and facilitated the project right the way through. Willesee and Havas, inspired by images they’d been seeing on Tumblr, shot all 40 photographs and the film footage on their iPhones, and completed the project in eight weeks.
The boys talk of how they first met, and Willesee expands on the Pop Art motif, “Havas used to call me ‘that guy who tries to be Andy Warhol’ and ‘That guy who cuts his hair like Andy Warhol’ [they both laugh]. I was actually trying to look like a Beatle but I had white hair [laughs]. “I’d been seeing the videos Havas was making for bands and thought they were cool, so I roped him into editing a film project. We bonded over fucking around on skateboards instead of working.” Havas adds, “Pretty soon we just began making plans to work together and collaborate on projects… We would procrastinate and go on Facebook, Tumblr and Youtube heaps while we’d hang and work on stuff, and it just sort of started from there.”
with girls smoking weed as inspired by images that have been trending on Tumblr. “I can’t think of a time in history when people sat around recording and photographing themselves smoking weed in various forms. This imagery certainly stood out for me, more than the other popular images – girls showing their tits, all the self-harm pictures, or guys flashing their six packs,” says Willesee.
The photographs are tinged with hazy purples, pinks and blues, reminiscent of the hash-happy free and easy sixties, and whilst Havas is pretty nonplussed about the general state of weed culture in Australia (“If you wanna smoke weed, smoke weed,” he shrugs), Willesee has more to say on the matter. “I became really interested in weed culture when I lived in LA. It’s a fully formed culture over there. It’s as popular as drinking. You will see girls get out their little weed pipes and just have a toke at a party or anywhere and it’s totally normal. Everywhere you go in Los Angeles smells like weed, it’s a really fun atmosphere. And yet while Australia and New Zealand have the largest concentration of weed smokers in the world, it’s still considered kind of dark and dangerous here. I think our heavy drinking culture is a lot scarier, I live in Surry Hills and the streets are covered in vomit every morning. “But it’s not so much about glamorising weed culture,” he adds. “It’s more a celebration of this time and what you can do artistically with the technology easily and cheaply available. And you have to admit, chicks with spliffs do look cool.” Havas agrees, “I’m a simple guy, and I just think it’s something aesthetically poignant. Art should look good to your eye.”
“Yeah,” Willesee continues, “[22 Girls] wasn’t meant to be a show – it was an idea for a photo shoot. I decided to take some shots of a couple girls smoking weed and when Havas heard all these girls were coming over he right away wanted to film the shoot. We thought maybe we’d just blog what we had. After that first shoot we liked what we had so much we decided to make it a whole show”.
Havas goes on to explain why girls smoking weed look better than guys. “Well the bulk of the images of people smoking weed on the net are girls. It’s obvious that guys will want to see girls smoking weed, but girls would rather see girls smoking weed as well. Girls just smoke weed better than most guys.” Willesee adds, “There’s also something more exciting about seeing girls doing things that are considered risky or transgressive. And ‘22 Dudes Pulling Bongs’ didn’t really have the same ring to it.”
The boys describe their fascination
It wasn’t too hard to get a bunch of
Daniel Havas and Jesse Willesee girls on board with the project either; Willesee and Havas used Facebook to put the word out. “I roped in about half of them and Havas knew the other half. It was calling friends, it was advertising on Facebook. The ad read something like: ‘Need stylish girls to smoke weed on camera, free beer and pizza as payment’. We had no idea if anyone would do it, or if they’d think it was some sort of rape
We has internets!
www.thebrag.com Extra bits and moving bits without the papercuts 24 :: BRAG :: 458 :: 16:04:12
party. But a fair few of the girls said, ‘Best casting call ever’. Havas doesn’t smoke much himself, but that doesn’t mean he’s any less invested in the project. “For me, it’s an exercise in aesthetics, and people should like what they see,” he says. Willesee is a more dedicated smoker, and says, “I enjoy toking on my Vaporite ‘herbal vaporizer’
around 4.20 of an afternoon. More than anything, however, I like a joint outside in the fresh air.” What: 22 Girls Smoking Weed When: Thursday April 19 from 7pm Where: Inside the abandoned Doctor Pong / 1A Burton St Surry Hills More: jessewillesee.tumblr.com
calling
Food
all freaks! s! k a e r f all
[THEATRE] Recipe For Success By Laura Brierley Newton
E
mma Jackson didn’t expect a play to change her self-professed lack of experimentation in the kitchen. “On the weekend I busted out a spanakopita (a Greek spinach pie), and it was amazing. So I think maybe the play is infiltrating my life!” Co-director and writer Steve Rodgers describes Food as “a play about food and cooking, but it’s also very much about sex, and how our relationship with both can define us, and occupy so much of our breathing time”. For actor Emma Jackson, it’s about two sisters, Nancy (Jackson) and Elma (Kate Box). After a seventeen-year absence, Nancy returns home to her sister, Elma, who has never left the highway food joint they grew up in.
Food is co-directed by writer Steve Rodgers and choreographer Kate Champion, who is also the Artistic Director of cutting edge dance theatre company, Force Majeure. “Kate deals with the physical side of the show and Steve with the text”, explains Jackson. “It’s an interesting process… very different to regular theatre. We’ve been exploring what you can say with movement and where you can take words out. It’s been really amazing, and something I’ve been interested in doing for a long time”. Trying to describe the work further, Jackson searches for the right words, “It’s hard to explain because it’s not dance and it’s not physical theatre... There’s just moments where reality is suspended. If that makes any sense.”
“It’s a beautiful story and a really intricate relationship between Elma and Nancy. Nancy has had a promiscuous past and she’s the one who’s returned after being away. It’s an exploration of the sibling relationship,” explains Jackson. The now worldlier Nancy brings home with her the idea that they can transform this highway food joint into something more. And so, the two endeavour to turn their truck stop into a restaurant. Enter Hakan (Fayssal Bazzi), a traveler and a cook.
The driving force in the play is food itself, and the action never leaves the kitchen. “There are different aspects of food that are related and they are interwoven into the piece,” says Jackson. One of those aspects is the decision to not leave the audience members hungry, and during each performance, members of the audience are chosen to enjoy soup from Love Supreme, bread from Bourke Street Bakery and wine from Cellarmasters.
“When we decide to open up this restaurant, we need to get someone in to help. We put an ad out and the only person who responds is Hakan... It is interesting how when a man enters the space it has an effect on both the female characters in very different ways.”
“It’s been an interesting process because we’re all building this project together, even though Steve wrote the piece and he wrote his idea of the physical world. We did two weeklong workshops last year, exploring it and seeing if we thought there was something there.
“It’s a different process to other plays I’ve worked on”, she continues, “because this is a new play and also has such a physical world that we’ve had to discover, devise and build together. It is really lovely, working as a whole company like that. You don’t often get that opportunity and it’s an exciting one”. In preparation for the show, Jackson says they all begin their day with a movement warm up consisting of yoga, sit-ups, push-ups, and contact movement exercises. Suggesting the entire cast is going to look pretty fit by the time they get onstage later this month, Emma laughs and says, “I’m getting paid to get cut!”. What: Food by Steve Rodgers When: April 26 - May 20 Where: Belvoir St Theatre / 25 Belvoir St, Surry Hills More: belvoir.com.au
Dimension Crossing
the misfits
are back and this time they mean s!! b siness bu series 3 as seen on abc2
[PERFORMANCE] Interesting Interventions By Roslyn Helper
I
n a world where 2D is passé, 3D is overrated and nobody can agree on what 4D actually means, directors Bec Dean and Jeff Khan have an interesting question. What happens in the spaces between? Where is dimension 2.5? What happens when you cross over from one world to another, from natural to man-made? From real to virtual? From life to death? Dean doesn’t have all these answers, but she is at Carriageworks on Easter Monday, in the throws of pulling together the final elements for the launch of Performance Space’s 2012 program, Dimension Crossing.
Yumi Umiumare photo by Garth Oriander
“My approach to programming work, and certainly for Jeff as well, is to start with the artists and what their interests are. So the themes are built around the kinds of works we’re seeing,” begins Dean. In this case, Victoria Hunt’s Copper Promises: Hinemihi Haka was the catalyst that inspired Dean and Khan to think about the different ways in which we cross dimensions, disparate cultures, histories and physical states. Hunt has been developing Hinemihi Haka since 2007, when she did her first residency with Performance Space. The dance movement work deals with Hunt’s Maori ancestral heritage as she comes to terms with its erosion over years of colonisation. Dean explains that ‘Hinemihi’ is the meeting house of Hunt’s Maori tribe, and the embodiment of an honoured female ancestor. “It is a very complex space because it’s almost like a living entity. It’s made out of trees that have been specially selected and carved into an ancestral representation, so the place is very bound up with beings.” In a sense, Hinemihi is the space where you cross from one dimension to another, “Where sometimes you’re travelling from the space of the living to the space of the dead,” says Dean. The second movement based work in the program is EnTrance by Melbourne butoh dancer, Yumi Umiumare. Dovetailing nicely with Hunt’s work, EnTrance explores the line between life and death from a different cultural perspective. Inspired by the Japanese metaphor of the ‘near shore’ of life
and the ‘far shore’ of death, the work draws audiences into the ‘crack’ – the moment of transformation where the spirit and the body are propelled into another world or existence. Dean says, “Yumi is looking at this idea of being an ‘inter-person’, someone who has a very specific cultural heritage but is living in this other context – in Australia – and the duality of that.” Umiumare combines butoh, cabaret, large-scale video projections, electronic costumes and installation elements into the piece, and this interdisciplinary process is somewhat typical of the work that interests Performance Space. “We do try to focus on practice that is more experimental,” says Dean, “Work that is trying something new, either in the form that it takes and the technologies it’s using or with the kinds of relationships that artists seek to establish with audiences and one another”. Dean cites the third performance work in Dimension Crossing as an example of this experimentality. Computer Boy, created by the Blood Policy collective “is about this mixed reality environment that a lot of people live in, where they have this one life that is completely virtual and fantastic, and then the physical world that they occupy – the real, which might be the opposite of that, where they’re actually situated in the domestic environment, in a bedroom with very little contact with other aspects of humanity.” The ‘cult of youth degeneracy’
is at the core of this work, and Blood Policy have taken their cues from the sensationalist popular media that invades our public consciousness from every angle. The performance piece uses puppetry and machinima animation amongst other multimedia elements to tell the Computer Boy story. (He is a puppet with a 12-inch LCD screen for a face.) DJ TR!P has also produced an original accompanying score made entirely with video game consoles. Dean is excited to see the works as they emerge and says, “You don’t really know what you’re going to get until the night opens. I mean, you can plan a lot but you don’t know what it’s actually going to be like to experience – and I think this season is a very experiential season of work.” So what do Dean and Khan hope audiences will encounter? “I know that bandying around this idea of transformation is a little bit hackneyed, but I’m going there anyway!” Dean laughs. “We do hope people are transformed somehow by the experience of these works. The program will have different registers for people that have different investments in the ideas.” What: Dimension Crossing Where: Performance Space @ Carriageworks / 245 Wilson St Eveleigh When: April 18 - May 26 More: performancespace.com.au
3 DISCS : TURES INCLUDE SPECIAL FEASH ON SET WITH MISFITS S BABY ORT FILM VEGA ERAZER SHORT FILM ES CLIPS 8 X BEHIND THE SCEN
STUNTS & SPECIAL EFFECTS VISUAL EFFECTS
series 1 - 3 boxset
7 DISCS
scan for series 3 trailer
new on dvd scan for series 3 trailer
/misfits3
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Arts Snap
Film & Theatre Reviews
At the heart of the arts Where you went last week...
Hits and misses on the silver screen and the bareboards around town.
■ Film
TITANIC 3D Released April 5
PICS :: AM
zoe weber: milk
It’s easy to approach Titanic 3D with a certain sense of cynicism – an already popular and profitable movie gets a new cinematic lease on life in order to wring even more hard-earned cash out of fans. However, if any movie had to receive a 3D conversion, I’m glad it was this one. James Cameron is a consummate filmmaker, one of those rare blockbuster directors who is able to display high technical proficiency while still getting convincing performances out of human beings. Sure, everyone knows his Titanic is as schmaltzy as hell – from the first glimpse of the young Rose to the last notes of ‘My Heart Will Go On’ – but when you’re James Cameron, you’re allowed a little of that. The original film succeeded for a reason – its combination of action, romance and spectacle were, and still are, pretty much unbeatable – and those qualities are still on display this time around, the updated visuals being an added bonus. Cameron himself is such a perfectionist that he would never have released Titanic in 3D if it didn’t look good. The conversion was a painstaking process, with him and his team going frame-by-frame through the original, over a period of many months. Live action 3D seldom convinces, but Cameron is currently two-for-two. Whatever else you can say about his Avatar, it looked tremendous, and Titanic looks just as good. The 3D is used to best effect in the first and third acts – the establishing shots of the ship and its interiors take on an extra grandeur, and the scenes of its destruction are even more visceral in their impact. When the camera is at water level, you actually feel like you’re there, and when it lurches around the deck and over railings, you’re taken with it.
alternate universal studios 04:04:12 :: Firstdraft Gallery :: 116-118 Chalmers St Surry Hills
PICS :: AM
04:04:12 :: The Tate @ Toxteth Hotel :: 345 Glebe Point Rd Glebe
The gooey bits in the centre of Titanic are still just as good as they were the first time. Kate Winslet and Leonardo DiCaprio have real chemistry as the young lovers, while Billy Zane’s villain is brilliantly, moustachetwirlingly evil. The sequences of the ship breaking apart are still just as breathtaking, and the tear-jerking moments (like the band playing their last song together) are still just as manipulative. Titanic 3D is the kind of movie that requires you to suspend your disbelief, set aside your cynicism and just get caught up in the story that’s unfolding onscreen, and if you’re willing to do that, then it’s a magical experience. Alasdair Duncan ■ Theatre
THE STORY OF MARY MACLANE BY HERSELF
collected thoughts
PICS :: TL
Until May 12 / SBW Stables
05:04:12 :: Kaleidoscope Gallery :: 3-7 Dank St Waterloo
Arts Exposed What's in our diary...
PARLOUR Thursday April 19, 5.30pm Levels 1 & 2, CTA Building (Martin Place Entrance) Mirror mirror on the wall, who’s the hottest art-chitecture event of all? Why, I’m pretty sure it’s Parlour, happening Thursday nights throughout April at the CTA Building downtown. This week, the highbrow creative event, presented by curatorial collective N, is hosting a mirror-themed party. The night will feature a philosophical discussion about mirrors led by Andrew Benjamin, experiential installations and architectural interventions designed by up-and coming architects, a program of mirror-inspired films, miniature model making workshops and parlour games, not to mention FBi’s DJ Frames and Johhny Lieu spinning tunes in the cocktail lounge. If there were such a thing as too good-looking, this event would fit the bill. 26 :: BRAG :: 458 :: 16:04:12
How many self-professed female geniuses can you name? How many girls do you know who consider the Devil to be their hero? It’s 1902 and at 19 years old, Mary MacLane is doing everything she can think of to lure her underworld hero out, to come and save her from the wretched boredom that is Butte, Montana – a life of “waking, eating, walking, talking to some uninteresting people, looking forward to a cold boiled potato at midnight, sleeping and doing it all over again”. This cabaret-style biography of one of the 20th Century’s most scandalous yet least remembered literary figures is punchy, energetic, and a rollicking good show. Writer and actor, Bojana Novakovic, has found juicy subject matter in Miss Mary MacLane and she embodies her hysterical, desperately wanting, contradictory personality with commanding presence. The play works chronologically through MacLane’s life, from Butte to New York to Chicago and back to New York again, as she chases literary dreams and incites scandalous uproar with her egoistic attitude, her open sexual encounters with both men and women, and her preoccupied fantasy with marrying the Devil. Tim Rogers’ original songs and music (backed by jazz veterans double bassist Mark Harris and violinist Andrew Baylor)
have a folky, backwater flavour, though the rhyming lyrics push into Broadway musical territory, and are a little cheesy at points. Regardless, the You Am I frontman is charming as MacLane’s doting stagehand. I’m not usually one for self-referential theatre, as it tends to destroy the illusion most plays try so hard to construct in the first place. But it works here: at face value, MacLane is throwing tantrums at the audience, about not wanting to perform, about the stupid set, and about how boring she is. But it could also be Novakovic speaking, and the cleverness of this double entendre leads to the play’s most gripping moment. During one of MacLane’s hysterical episodes, she brings out a bag of Novakovic’s belongings from backstage, dumps the contents on the floor and orders Rogers to read out an excerpt from Novakovic’s diary. Rogers obliges, and reads out a seemingly personal passage, where Novakovic has written about her own desire to be noticed in the world, her self-hatred and her obsession with food. It is at this point that Novakovik and MacLane share the same breath, a powerful and unexpected moment that directs our focus towards the strength with which MacLane’s pioneering voice resonates today. Roslyn Helper ■ Dance
INFINITY Until April 25 / Sydney Opera House The Australian Ballet is having a bit of a midlife crisis: attempting to wear cool clothes, act young and update its music collection. Celebrating the Ballet’s 50th Anniversary this year, Infinity is a program comprising three works by three of Australia’s leading choreographers, who have all experimented boldly with classical convention, to varying degrees of success. Graeme Murphy’s ‘Narrative of Nothing’ opened with a frantic, atonal score by Brett Dean. As the title suggests, the nihilistic piece doesn’t go anywhere in particular, and the dancers looked uncomfortable somewhere between classical ballet and contemporary dance. Stripped back and void of any emotional or narrative throughline, I sat there trying not to wonder why I was watching some fancy leotards flounce around on stage. Then Gideon Obarzanek butchered Swan Lake with his crowd-dividing, metatheatrical parody ‘There’s Definitely A Prince Involved’. A comment on ballet’s farcical conventions, the piece demonstrated how little Obarzanek’s friends could actually remember of the story when he asked them. It was laugh-out-loud funny at points, with dancers using a microphone to narrate their own surreal scenes using verbatim text from Obarzanek’s interviews. And it was poignant in other moments, transitioning between fantastical and stripped back settings. The costumes were great too (even if they were being used ironically) and James O’Hara and Sara Black tumbled about beautifully together as the lead couple. In the end, however, it was all a little too obvious. Thankfully, Bangarra’s Stephen Page saved the evening, with his astonishingly beautiful work, ‘Warumuk: In The Dark Night’ a mature approach to contemporary ballet, grounded in convention but pushing the elements of the body, structure, and dancer relationships (you could hardly tell which were Bangarra and which were Ballet dancers!) into new and exciting territory. Accompanied by David Page’s sumptuous score, call me old fashioned, but it sounded good, it looked great, and it felt theatrical and otherworldly. If the Australian Ballet is going to continue to experiment (which they definitely should!), they need to channel Page’s mature approach, not only to save alienating the bulk of their older audience, but also to inspire us young’uns to keep attending. By Roslyn Helper
See www.thebrag.com for more arts reviews
Film & Theatre Reviews Hits and misses on the silver screen and the bareboards around town.
■ Theatre
LES LIAISONS DANGEREUSES
Les Liaisons Dangereuses
Until June 9 / Sydney Theatre Wharf 1 This is the first play I’ve seen at Wharf 1 for a while, and boy have I missed it. It seems that one too many of STC’s program headliners have gone straight to the Sydney Theatre, without much thought as to how they might fill that ginormous black hole of a performance space. Oh no, wait, they bought microphones. With this in mind it is great to see that Les Liaisons Dangereuses reintroduces intimacy to the STC main stage and there’s no better play for the job. Based on the 1782 epistolary novel, this adapted playscript by Christopher Hampton, directed by Sam Strong, follows the hurtful manipulations and sexual conquests of Marquise de Merteuil (Pamela Rabe) and her ex-lover Vicomte de Valmont (Hugo Weaving) in the name of jealousy, opulence, and good old upperclass boredom. Dale Ferguson’s set design keeps things cosy, pushing all the action downstage and leaving the upstage area entirely free for grand entrances, shadow lurking, and eavesdropping; which make for some of the best moments in the play. However, it’s easy to overlook the set’s splendour, when everyone on it looks like they’ve just stepped off the cover of French Vogue. The cast is stunningly presented (even the maid looks shit hot) as they spend a great deal of time sauntering about in varying layers of silk and fur, spitting acid from ridiculously well-dressed tongues. The cast's exceptional CVs speak for themselves, and the performances are as expected, uniformly brilliant. The mastered quips and smirks from Rabe and Weaving alone are worth the ticket. Also noteworthy are the gorgeous, understated efforts of
Justine Clarke and Heather Mitchell, but no one falls short in this lineup. My only real qualm with this production is in the text itself. The dialogue is funny and deliciously nasty at times, but the subject left me wanting. Planted in a nonspecified contemporary setting I wonder if the driving motives – social reputation and feminine virtue – really hold much sway. I’m showing my generation here, but as an under 25-year-old woman I couldn’t help but grow tired of the ‘slut vs pimp’ debate that supposedly requires women of any social standing to be abstinent or if not, secretive. Mme De Rosemonde (Jane Harders) remarks: “The only thing which might surprise one, is how little the world changes”. I’m happy to say that in some small way, I beg to differ. Harriet Gordon-Anderson
Street Level Factory Space Theatre Presents
With Onur Karaozbek
A
flâneur, a jazz poet, a crazy photographer, a neo-beat with a pinch of anarchy, a monkey with a tri-band cell phone, a crimpology drop-out from Shoreditch Uni... Onur Karaozbek wears all of these hats. He is also the founder of Gallery Burlesque, a series of art and neo’burlesque nights he’s been curating since 2009. Karaozbek tells us about the Gallery’s upcoming Tim Burton inspired event, The Land Of Timania, and is fascination with Avon sales reps. What made you want to start Gallery Burlesque? I have been actively involved in the visual arts, performance and photography since my early days, and I have always been in search of a place where many could gather and share experiences. A melting pot where creative people can become a big family, is what’s behind Gallery Burlesque. How do you approach your curating? Create, share, experience. These are the three main aspects of Gallery Burlesque and I curate special events as well as regular, low-key gatherings. The regular events are for all to come and showcase creations, and events like Doppelganger Dames, The Land Of Timania and the recently announced Harry Potter Parody night take more hands on managing.
Xxxx
What draws you to burlesque as an art form? Burlesque as performance art is a joy to watch and be involved in. There is this glamorous part that most of the girls get hooked on, but for me it’s more of the edgy creative part; dark ballet routines, child pageant queens, abused puppets, dead lovers coming back to life, doppelgangers and Avon sales reps. It’s the light that is created when the story, music, acting, dance, strip and parody comes together. What’s the relation between Tim Burton and burlesque and how have you brought them together for your upcoming show at The Standard? Tim Burton, his poems, films and drawings... they are brilliant, and I feel lucky to be living at the time these have been created. The mood, themes and colours of all he has
produced are – as a whole and in sections – a work of art. You can take it all apart and each individual element will still carry the value of the whole piece. Similarly, a burlesque act comes on stage as a package and you can take it apart, separate it second by second; every move and every beat is valuable. This show mixes Tim Burton characters with Gallery Burlesque performers that have the creative genius to bring things alive. Who will be performing on the night? This night is a true ‘burtonesque’ experience; you will be greeted by the brilliant Umbrella Theatre with their take on all things Burton, crazy visuals by InsterTitle and balloon art by Benny O. And of course, our burlesque stars such as Imogen Kelly, Sheena Miss Demeanour, Miss Nic (Melbourne), Herbie Strangelove and Venue Vamp. They will bring golden moments and characters from Tim Burton productions to the Gallery Burlesque stage. What: The Land Of Timania – A Burlesque Tribute To Tim Burton Where: The Standard / Level 3, 383 Bourke St Surry Hills When: Sunday April 22 from 7pm More: galleryburlesque.com
Cat on a Hot Tin Roof By Tennessee Williams Directed by Roz Riley
13th to 28th April 2012 Star of the Sea Theatre Cnr Collingwood & Iluka MANLY
BoxOffice/ 94391906 BRAG :: 458 :: 16:04:12 :: 27
Album Reviews What's been crossing our ears this week...
ALBUM OF THE WEEK BLACK DICE
what the word ‘good’ means in pop music.
Mr. Impossible Domino/EMI
It’s near impossible to pass judgment on Black Dice. The trio now plays so completely by their own rules that there’s no real precedent with which to compare them. Mr. Impossible’s uncompromising weirdness suggests an affinity with ‘70s prog, but the exacting economy and discipline of the arrangements implies otherwise.
Though it’s baffling and sometimes infuriating, a little perseverance yields enormous rewards. Nothing impossible about that.
Given the near editorial consistency with which this record adheres to its own perverse logic, it seems foolish to write it off as ‘weird shit’. There isn’t a single scrap of guitar, synth, vocal or percussion on here that hasn’t been carefully warped, filtered, aurally sanded or rhythmically sabotaged to challenge your preconceptions of
On ‘Pinball Wizard’ thick, brazen guitar tones sketch fluorescent rifts across a calculatedly undanceable beat, with comically alien vocals providing commentary. Halfway, it dissolves into a space disco groove that appears to be perpetually melting. Ruptured bass ambles sluggishly about the low-end, while broken wah-funk blues licks and garish synth-runs ice the high frequencies. The record sounds warm and inviting, in its own gristly way. And it does offer the occasional glimmer of respite, to keep you pedalling. When the jarring key juxtapositions, savant blues guitar and manic incantations of ‘Outer Body Drifter’ recede to a fist-pumping 4/4, it feels like you’ve unlocked a major achievement in some twisted video game. The stilted strut of ‘Shithouse Drifter’ is similarly infectious. At the record’s close, the baseless,
classic rock stomp of ‘Brunswick Sludge’ makes the piece’s spinning voices and vertiginous, squelching, rapid-fire guitars feel incomparably elating, even as it disintegrates in its own sizzling mire. Luke Telford
THE CAIROS
LOWLAKES
AYA LARKIN
TOM SHOWTIME
Colours Like Features EP Island Records/ Warner
Lowlakes EP Kunsthaus Records
Waking Dream Independent
The Jam Thief Obese Records
With a new record deal under their belts, Brisbane four-piece The Cairos are embracing a more commercial sound on this EP. It’s high gloss, melodic guitar pop, yielding the odd fresh and tasty morsel – but for the most part, it still sounds a little underripe. Radio listeners will already be familiar with singles ‘Shame’ and ‘We All Buy Stars’ – both fine examples of incredibly catchy guitar pop. There’s instant listening appeal, but not much else to command attention beyond a few plays. The songwriting and production style seems like a recipe for commercial success (it’s definitely national-youth-broadcaster-friendly) but a little lyrical subtlety and restraint in the delivery wouldn’t go astray. ‘Shame’ has a foot-stomping refrain somewhere between teenage angst and carefree good times. Lyrically, it seems to have less to do with shame or anger than relationship confusion, especially with the watery mid-song breakdown featuring buried whistling and a repetitive line of impotent regret: ‘Maybe you should have saved me ‘cause there’s a lot of people, a lot of shit going on’. Similarly, the punchline of ‘We All Buy Stars’ ('trying to reach them somehow') loses more of its punch with each laboured repetition. There’s some lovely, liquidy guitar melodies though, and hints of The Cure in ‘We All Buy Stars’. Sweet, summery harmonies in up-tempo track ‘Lena’ are reminiscent of The Drums; the subtler vocal delivery works better here too, as well as in the more disco-inflected track ‘Yeah No’. By the final song, ‘Self Control’, they’re edging closer to the warmth, honesty and self-control of local music godfathers The Go-Betweens.
Laden as it is with innocently bared emotion, it’s impossible to not feel like a peeping Tom while listening to Lowlakes’ self-titled EP. Smooth, warm, and occasionally touching on the grandiose, this record is simply stunning – and while not perfect, it’s an excellent early effort from the Melburnian four-piece. Over the course of the EP, Lowlakes stride between lyrical post-rock reminiscent of Sigur Rós (opener ‘Song for Motion’, ‘Catch the Breeze’) and more focused pop ambience (‘Buffalo’). Closing track ‘Arctic House’ is almost heart-stopping, punctuated by bone-chilling waves of frontman Tom Snowdon’s voice. Lowlakes’ music has a sense of the cinematic – so much so that this four-track entry seems too brief, preventing them from truly blossoming. They seem shackled by the format – teasing the listener with promises of sweeping musical landscapes that are never quite delivered. Instead of a fully developed experience, this EP is a casual users’ guide to the ephemeral – an abridged how-to of subtlety and understatement, wrapped in beautiful orchestration. Lowlakes’ failing is to be too careful and pretty – sacrificing hard release and catharsis to create a musical ideal. In the end, the band has crafted an almost-masterpiece, a terrifically dense ocean of sound supported by the skill and power of Tom Snowdon. As an exercise in style, it’s undeniable – and as a listening experience, it’s enthralling. It’s also the kind of music rarely heard in Australia – emotionally honest, musically diverse and lyrically sound.
The Cairos reveal some serious pop chops here, even if they haven’t quite reached the stars – yet.
This is good – what comes next could be great.
Jenny Noyes
Alex Watts
'Everything is different now' proclaims Aya Larkin, as subtle strings swell over a plaintive-sounding acoustic guitar. The frontman of ‘90s funk/dub/pop group Skunkhour isn’t joking: this bold opener doesn’t rely on sinewy bass or bouncing, staccato piano lines – or on any of the other hallmarks of his former outfit. But fans of Skunkhour who might be worried that Larkin may have strayed too far from their funkpop roots will be more than placated by the rest of this solo debut. Sure, there are neither flirtations with dub nor excursions into dreaded white-boy-hip-hop territory, but the elements of Skunkhour’s sound that saw them sneak into the charts towards the latter part of their career are in full swing here: the rousing choruses, the relentless hooks and, most importantly, Larkin’s soulful voice. The Larkin of old is most evident in up-tempo moments such as ‘Too Late To Turn Away Tonight’ and ‘All Time High’, but where he truly excels – both in songcraft and vocally – is during the record's plaintive numbers. ‘Different’ and ‘No Title’ provide the album’s most beautiful moments, with shades of David Gray, or Rufus Wainwright at his most confessional. There are also moments where this album mines Powderfinger territory: ‘Everything Takes Forever’ effortlessly slides into a swelling chorus, where so many other artists attempting similar skyscraping would simply sound forced. ‘Wild In The Streets’ sounds cluttered and unsure in the verse, only to open into a triumphant 6/8 chorus. Sometimes Larkin overdoes it (the title track is diabetes-inducingly sugary), but this is a rare misfire – impressive for an album as openly romantic as this.
By now I’m used to the ‘slashie’ – those one-man solo projects where someone is a singer/, or producer/, or guitarist/. I thought I had heard every possible permutation until I came across Tom Showtime, self-described DJ/producer/saxophonist. I know what you’re thinking, but don’t worry – he doesn’t break in to ‘Careless Whisper’ mid-track. At least not on this, his debut LP. What he does instead is mix together a bunch of jazz, funk and blues – calling on Charlie Parker, Billie Holiday and more – and drags it under the umbrella of hip hop. His mixes have a deftness to them that lets the sample show off a bit while still being very much driven by a hip hop sensibility and enough energy to dance to. Occasionally the samples grate a bit – even a wonderful title can’t help ‘Natural Horn Killer’ from being diminished somewhat by the endless loop of an announcer saying, ‘His name is Charlie Parker’ – but most of them lock in to a deep groove and stay there, a down-tempo soundtrack to your late nights or early mornings. The tracks with vocalists aren’t quite as successful as the instrumentals, particularly ‘Validated’, where Melbourne’s Call & Response seem rushed and crowded when trying to fit their 16s in. Ash.One fares better, holding his own against Gift Of Gab on ‘Spaces & Places’ and shining when solo on ‘The New Classical’. But it is the music that is the focal point here, and whether you want to play ‘spot the sample’ or just groove to some smooth choons The Jam Thief rewards repeat listening.
A gorgeous, considered album from the former Skunkhour frontman; everything really is different now.
Above all else, this is good fun and eminently listenable, and you’ll find yourself drawn back to it again and again.
Victoria Lucas
Hugh Robertson
INDIE ALBUM OF THE WEEK DZ DEATHRAYS Bloodstreams I Oh You Brisbane’s much-loved party-monster duo DZ Deathrays have finally delivered their highly anticipated debut album. The first thing you notice is the production – it pisses all over what most of their contemporaries are doing. By using an array of guitar effects pedals, or perhaps even synths and some sneaky samples, DZ Deathrays create a threedimensional sound that not only fills in the gaps left by most two-pieces, but also manages to add depth and colour.
28 :: BRAG :: 458 :: 16:04:12
‘Teenage Kickstarts’ opens the album with ball-tearing riffs, the dirtiest of dirty guitar tones, and bloodcurdling screams. Lead single ‘No Sleep’ is an excellent slice of modern rock with an irresistible ‘Motherfucker!’ chorus. The call and response breakdown of ‘Cops/Capacity’ will no doubt please festival crowds come summer. ‘Dumb It Down’, one of the album’s many highlights, surprises with its dark ‘80s synth-pop vibe. Elsewhere, on songs like ‘Dollar Chills’ and ‘Dinomight’, late-‘80s hair metal (more Guns N’ Roses than Warrant) influences some of their heavy, hypnotic grooves. Singer and guitarist Shane Parsons wields an excellent rock‘n’roll voice, and
though he’s no great crooner, his abilities are well suited to the music he’s making. His offsider, drummer and co-vocalist Simon Ridley, adds plenty of his own personality to the groove-heavy songs with his considered but booty-shaking beats. Bloodstreams may not please all their fans, but DZ Deathrays have delivered the record they probably needed to make. Straight-up world-beaters in the making – this is the arrival of a major new talent. DZ Deathrays are having a party and you’re all invited. Roland Kay-Smith
KATE MILLERHEIDKE Nightflight Sony Arising from the chaos that is a jam-packed threeyear international touring schedule, Nightflight is the eye of the storm – an 11-track masterpiece showcasing Kate Miller-Heidke’s most skillful and beautiful songwriting to date. By now, we're familiar with all things Kate: the playful, witty lyricism; the operatic range that makes young girls want to take singing lessons and makes professional vocalists want to enrol in an accounting degree; the intricate weaving of instrumental parts that is never too complex. Nightflight contains all these elements, somehow re-contextualised to become slightly more mature, and just a tad darker. It’s a seamless mesh of styles that retrospectively examines life’s struggles and successes, including losing friends at festivals, homesickness, and stalking ex-boyfriends. It delivers lyrics with a sense of vulnerability that can only come from inhabiting the house of your partner’s recently-deceased grandparents, in Toowoomba, for the entirety of the writing process. The result is a collection of hilarious, tear-jerking, beautiful stories, supported by a flawless instrumental base. Opener ‘Ride This Feeling’ explodes with uplifting piano, and goes on to describe a dream sequence where ‘For some reason I decided to take off my clothes/Then I jumped off a cliff, just spread my arms and flew/All the way across Canada to see you’. In title track ‘Nightflight’, an in-flight Kate sings, ‘I’m 35 hours and three bad movies away, and if one more person coughs on me, I’m gonna punch ‘em in the face’ – and instead of laughing, the stunning piano hooks and sparse guitar lines cause you to question the impact everyday events have on your overall being. Whether you’re a long-time fan or a Miller-Heidke virgin, this is sure to plant a smile on your face. Sheridan Morley
OFFICE MIXTAPE And here are the albums that have helped BRAG HQ get through the week... HUSKY - Forever So BARA BRÖST - Elephancycle POND - Beards, Wives, Denim
THE RASPBERRIES - The Very Best Of ELITE GYMNASTICS - Ruin
“GORGEOUS ... SENSUAL” Peter Bradshaw – THE GUARDIAN
“A MAJOR FILM”
Sacha Molitorisz – SYDNEY MORNING HERALD
“SUBLIME”
Margaret Pomeranz – AT THE MOVIES
AVAILABLE APRIL 19 | WWW.CURIOUSDISTRIBUTION.COM
BRAG :: 458 :: 16:04:12 :: 29
live reviews What we've been to see...
BLITZEN TRAPPER, THE PREACHERS Oxford Art Factory Thursday April 5
Locals The Preachers opened the evening’s proceedings with conviction, trading female and male vocals back and forth through the same microphone as I walked into the room. Frontwoman Isabella is charismatic, sure, and everyone does their job effectively. The tricky thing about generating a following with this kind of shiny alt-country in Australia, however, is that you really have to crank out a lot of believable energy. Whilst this was obvious in the aforementioned exchange, it seemed to go wandering as their set wound down.
to forgo many of the more extravagant elements such as horns and woodwind. But the most compelling aspects of tonight’s show occurred when his bandmates left the stage, leaving him to his own devices. Twisting and turning as he leaned his extraordinarily gangly frame over the mic, he ripped through classic tracks with startling gusto. ‘Unfortunately Anna’, written for the lost girls from his youth, who he left behind, seemed to settle things down with its simple chords, but the bleak lyrics and fragile vocals hit the gut almost as hard as his set closer. Playing his namesake and godfather Townes Van Zandt’s ‘Rex’s Blues’, the bespectacled Earle evinced a new sense of hope and vigour, promising that he’s “bound to leave the dark behind.”
Oregon’s Blitzen Trapper released one of my favourite albums of last year. Tonight they played a swathe of tracks from said album, American Goldwing, which kept everyone tapping their toes ever so slightly. But this kind of minimal reaction was part of the problem; I have actually played these songs at full volume through a home stereo and achieved greater affect. The inherent placidity of the set was noticeable from the start, as the band undersold us albumopener 'Might Find It Cheap'. The recorded version is a raucous hustle that feels like its guitar breakdowns might shred out the door at any moment. It jarred that in a live format this track, and the 18 that followed, felt like neat products each constrained to three minutes of audience-sating fodder.
Benjamin Cooper
There were some inventive and welcome departures from the recorded versions of songs: the combination of keyboards plus a separate Moog noodling away was a masterstroke; and frontman Eric Earley’s use of harmonica, noticeably thicker than on their albums, was sublime. But Earley remains a reluctant leader, leaving much of the audience and intra-band interaction to the more charismatic Marty Marquis. Unfortunately, not even Marquis’ amazing head of hair was sufficient to dismiss the nagging sense that the band were enduring each track in the hope that they could hasten to (and through) the next one.
The mostly late-thirties-to-early-sixties crowd didn’t let allocated seating hold them back and everyone – and I mean EVERYONE – was up and bopping along from the getgo. Watussi (also out for Bluesfest) had already warmed us up with some sparkling Columbian Latin and roots vibes, but it was clear to see that everybody was there for the band Rolling Stone claims ‘changed the sound of black pop’. Lead singer Philip Bailey had a lot to do with that change, and wowed the crowd in songs like ‘After The Love Is Gone’ with his four-octave vocal range and a falsetto to make Justin Timberlake sound like a crying infant. The band pulled out all the stops, from choreographed dance moves to whack instrumentals, and percussionist Ralph Johnson demonstrating his ability to throw his tambourine in the air, catch it on the right beat – and simultaneously karate kick a crash cymbal. But party tricks and aerobic theatricals aside, the music simply stunned. The set list flowed, with party classics like ‘Serpentine Fire’ and ‘Sun Goddess’ boasting tight vocal harmonies, horn solos and cowbell riffs.
Benjamin Cooper
JUSTIN TOWNES EARLE The Factory Wednesday April 4
Flanked by an upright bass and an additional guitar player who occasionally dipped into an all-important mandolin number, Nashville resident Justin Townes Earle gave his humblest and congenial best to a packed venue tonight. Much has been made of Earle’s recent sobriety – he referred to it himself at one point, saying “there ain’t nothing cool about dying at 30” – and it’s likely that this accounts for the maturity and gloss of his latest record, Nothing’s Gonna Change The Way You Feel About Me Now. And whilst recent form indicates a more measured character, there is no fear of him losing his sense of humour. When a wag in the audience questioned his dedication of a particular song to the endless winter snow of the north side of Chicago, Earle retorted, “I’ve done a lot of blow, believe me, but this ain’t got shitnothing to do with cocaine.” While Earle has frequently mentioned the influence of soul music traditions on his latest record, in touring mode he is forced OUR PHOTOGRAPHER :: ASHLEY
MAR
EARTH, WIND & FIRE, WATUSSI Hordern Pavilion Thursday April 5
Earth, Wind & Fire are basically the musical version of the Planeteers and have spent the last 43 years saving the world with their irresistible funk, soul and peacehappy RnB grooves, which lie… Whoa whoa whoa… 43 years you say? That’s right. With only three original band members still performing, my dad is the main reason I know all the words to ‘Boogie Wonderland’, which they opened with at The Hordern Pavilion last Thursday.
They chilled out a little through the middle, with croon classics ‘Devotion’ and ‘Can’t Hide Love’ smooth enough to melt a nuclear power plant’s heart. The opening keyboard line sent the crowd wild for ‘After The Love Is Gone’, for which the stage was cleared and Bailey sat on a spotlighted stool to flex some true vocal prowess. He was soon joined for the eight-plus key changes and climax into a string of crowd favourites including ‘Got To Get You Into My Life’, ‘September’ and ‘Let’s Groove’. ‘In The Stone’, with its show tune horn punches, funkadelic percussion and Verdine White rocking out on bass cemented the fact that whilst most band members are in their sixties, time has only improved their ability to bliss out an adoring crowd. Roslyn Helper
MORE SNAPS p. 32
Justin Townes Earle
30 :: BRAG :: 458 :: 16:04:12
Remedy
More than The Cure since 1989 with Murray Engleheart
JESUS ROCKS
Here at Remedy, we’re the last folks to ever take a stand for – or offence over – a religious issue, but an ad on 2MMM that we stumbled across over the Easter break was well worthy of some serious eyebrow raising. A succession of departed rock stars were listed, including Bon Scott, Jim Morrison and Michael Hutchence, along with a snapshot of their passing. Finally, in the spirit of the holiday, Jesus was thrown in. The premise being – at least as we understood it – that all fallen stars should be remembered at this time. But that wasn’t the tacky part of it. Bon Scott – if we heard right and we think we did – “died in a carpark”. Shithouse form that, on so many levels.
WHO HUMBLED
While we’re huge fans of the rampant testosterone and wallop of Humble Pie (particularly after they dispensed of their initial folkiness), singer and guitarist Steve Marriott’s howling work with The Small Faces was really something to behold. They had the grunt and aggression of The Who with – dare we say it – better songs. (C’mon! The Who never penned anything quite the calibre of the pop masterpiece that was ‘Tin Soldier,’ although ‘Baba O’Riley’ and ‘Won’t Get Fooled Again’ are at the top of the steps of the rock pantheon.) They went from gnarly ‘60s RnB and punk on their Small Faces and From The Beginning albums to the glorious psych punk of Ogdens’ Nut Gone Flake. The reason we’re telling you all this is because their four albums, including a third-disc edition of Ogdens', are all being reissued in May as deluxe packages with stacks of bonus tracks. The perfect opportunity to make up for lost time, people!
RIP RICHIE
Richie Teeter, the former Dictators drummer has sadly passed away. He was 61.
POGUE PERFECT
Two decades into his career, punters had stopped going to see Iggy Pop in the hope that they might get to witness his last great fall. He didn’t do that stuff anymore. But the reception that Shane MacGowan received when he gingerly walked on stage last week at the Hordern Pavillion with The Pogues indicated that he hasn’t lost his teetering-on-the-abyss appeal. Even with the kind of big week under his belt that rendered his between-song banter almost totally unintelligible, the man (who is the last real punk still standing) didn’t miss a single line all night, and his timing was spot-on. No mean feat, believe us. Sure, he wandered off stage a few times and left Spider Stacey in charge – which he was all night, really; but the entire affair had a wonderful warm sense of magic to it, from the rollicking opener ‘Streams Of Whiskey’ through ‘A Pair Of Brown Eyes’ and heartswelling readings of ‘Dirty Old Town’ and ‘The Band Played Waltzing Matilda’, to the
gorgeous closer of ‘Rainy Night In Soho’ – and all to one of the most rock’n’roll crowds we’ve seen at any gig for quite a while. Glorious.
DUNAWAY WITH SCHOOL
Original Alice Cooper band bassist Dennis Dunaway has written a book that traces the outfit’s career from their highschool days right up to School’s Out in 1972. We’re not quite sure why he pulls it up there and doesn’t include the hugely popular Billion Dollar Babies album and tour, and then call time at the swan song that was Muscle Of Love… But then it ain’t our book.
FEEDTIME IN SEATTLE
More on the conquering of America by our boys, feedtime. At one of the shows they played in Seattle, Mudhoney’s Mark Arm got up for a new song called ‘Shovelhead’. The trio also did a session for the hip and fabulous WFMU station in New Jersey, where they recorded eight tracks, including two brand new ones. The newies may end up as a Sub Pop 7”, but that’s yet to be decided upon or confirmed. In any event, doing a session for WFMU is apparently quite prestigious – a bit like the US equivalent of a Peel Session for the BBC.
PILS GET MAVERICK
While John Lydon and PiL are gearing up for the release of a new album, a few weeks back PiL originals, Jah Wobble and Keith Levene, who gave the initial outfit its utterly unique sound, reconvened for the first time in three decades, in Manchester. They played much but not all of PiL’s classic Metal Box (albeit in extended dub format) as well as ‘Public Image’ and ‘Annalisa’ from First Edition as the encore. A young guest vocalist named Nathan Maverick (aka Johnny Rotter) from an outfit called The Sex Pistols Experience got up for ‘Public Image’ and did an uncanny take on John Lydon’s ultra caustic stage persona of the day – rather than the modern-day clown prince of shitty pajamas and mock anger. But it was no great surprise that Maverick was no slouch in the Rotten/Lydon stakes, as he’s part of another project called Public Imitation Ltd. Way cooler than the Australian Pink Floyd Show of ours. Nathan Maverick
ON THE TURNTABLE On the Remedy turntable can only be High On Fire’s newie, De Vermis Mysteriis, which is making all else around it pale into total insignificance. This is the recording that main man Matt Pike was dreaming of while wondering about the identity of the weird guy on the cover of Sabbath’s Paranoid, marvelling at the ferocity of Venom and later while happily lost in the 70-plus-minute riff of Sleep’s ‘Dopesmoker’. There’s no ifs, buts or maybe-next-times to this: De Vermis Mysteriis is the one, the definitive High On Fire statement – which is really saying something, cos we thought Blessed Black Wings was their ace in the hole. We was wrong. It happens.
TOUR AND INDUSTRY NEWS Not long now before the Sydney leg of Dig It Up! The Hoodoo Gurus Invitational on April 22 across four stages at the Enmore Theatre, Notes, Green Room Lounge and The Sly Fox. The bill is a killer, with the mysterious but boy, very sunny-sounding Kids In Dust, the Gurus performing their Stoneage Romeos album in its entirety and more, Seattle ‘60s punk gods The Sonics, plus Died Pretty, Redd Kross, Tek & Younger, The 5.6.7.8’s, The Fleshtones, Kim Salmon and Spencer P. Jones, Steve Wynn (The Dream Syndicate), HardOns, Royal Headache, The Lovetones,
Belles Will Ring, Straight Arrows, The Gooch Palms and Damien Lovelock. Remaining tix from ticketek.com.au and all Ticketek outlets. And don’t forget Steve Lucas is taking his final bows with X on April 20 at Stones @ Manly Fisho's with special guests Chickenstones and Young Docteurs; and then on April 21 at The Square (corner of George and Hay St, Haymarket) with the debut performance by Queen Of Swords along with Bunt, 77 Sunset Strippers and Stamp Out Disco DJs.
Send stuff to remedy@ozemail.com.au by 6pm Wednesdays. Pics to art@thebrag.com www.facebook.com/remedy4rock BRAG :: 458 :: 16:04:12 :: 31
snap sn ap
ziggy marley
PICS :: KC
04:04:12 :: Beach Road Hotel :: 71 Beach Rd Bondi Beach 9130 7247
08:04:12 :: The Metro :: 624 George St Sydney 9550 3666
PICS :: AM
justin townes earle
04:04:12 ::The Factory Theatre::105 Victoria Rd Sydney 9550 3666
blitzen trapper
PICS :: RR
royal headache
PICS :: RW
up all night out all week . . .
05:04:12 :: Oxford Art Factory :: 38-46 Oxford st, Darlinghurst 93323711
jason & the lyrebird party profile
It’s called: Jason & The Lyrebird – EP launch
It sounds like: The most nostalgic moments of your life, from birth to now! Who’s playing? Jason & The Lyrebird, Love Parade, Rascals & Runaways. Sell it to us: Two hot girls, three handsome men, dirty guitars, group vocals, a dash of synth and lots of melody... what more could you want? Oh yes that…! Grab yourself a kangaroo burger from the canteen in the front bar before you enter… life is good. The bit we’ll remember in the AM: Your legs will feel alive from dancing and swaying, your hands warm from clapping along, and life as you know it will be new and improved. You will remember the warmth you felt, and that warmth will keep you at ease right through the ensuing winter. Crowd specs: Intimate – and tix are selling fast so hit up Moshtix. Wallet damage: $12 Where: GoodGod Small Club / 55 Liverpool St Chinatown
:: RASA JUSKEVICIUTE :: ASHLEY S : TIM LEVY (HEAD HONCHO) OUR LOVELY PHOTOGRAPHER :: SAM WHITESIDE Y TNE ROUHANNA :: TIM WHI MAR :: DANIEL MUNNS :: ROSETTE
32 :: BRAG :: 458: 16:04:12
total revenge
PICS :: RJ
When: Saturday April 21 from 7.30pm
07:04:12 :: The Standard:: Level 3/383 Bourke St Surry Hills 9331 3100
STEPHEN K AMOS MARY
TOBIN
R E T UGH Y
LIAS
“Blisteringly funny Brit is at the top of his game”
A D N E AG M
PRESENTS
HERALD SUN APRIL 2012
FRI 4 - SUN 6 MAY 7:15PM ENMORE THEATRE 130 ENMORE ROAD, NEWTOWN
Ph: 02 9020 6966 www.sydneycomedyfest.com.au marytobinpresents.com.au
BRAG :: 458 :: 16:04:12 :: 33
snap up all night out all week . . .
sosueme's 5th b'day
april
party profile
It’s called: SOSUEME’s 5th Birthday
Thurs 19th
1 1stt hhe n a H+ 1roo nuicr
It sounds like: Bernie’s party from Weekend At Bernie’s but with heaps of live bands, DJs and six or seven more sets of ‘80s bikinis. Who’s playing? YesYou (live), Alison Wonderland, Elizabeth Rose (live), Sosueme DJs, DJ Joyride, Brendan Maclean (live), Furnace & The Fundamentals (live), F.R.I.E.N.D/s DJs, Blockness Monsters and Starjumps. Sell it to us: Sydney’s greatest and now longest running indie night SOSUEME is turning five. In party years, that’s 297. A gathering of the minds, a meeting of the souls and a showdown of the musically-inclined. Expect free popcorn, fairy floss, lolly bags, party hats, acrobatic dwarfs and the Beresford dressed up like you’ve never seen it before! The bit we’ll remember in the AM: Two red-heads are making you breakfast in bed… oh yeah, Furnace played last night. Crowd specs: Music-loving, non-tool-burgeresque boys and girls. Wallet damage: $10 presale or $15 door Where: Upstairs @ Beresford Hotel / 354 Bourke St, Surry Hills When: Tuesday April 24 from 6pm (ANZAC Day Eve)
A
Fri 20th
R uv ilkUuglys+ Secre t C i ty &
E B ig R ig s (Q L D ) + io B ry ce C oh e n T r
Sat 21st
y r o l G e m i T d O l C h a m b er s & Pa ul M a c a d a m alabama 3
Thurs 26th
S o n s of H av o c Ro ck cir cu s
PICS :: AM
A i tc h e s +
07:04:12 :: Manning Bar ::University of Sydney 95636000
& No t hin B u t J a m
Fri 27 th
G y p s ie s a n d Ge n t l e m e n
Sh a do w s at Pl ay + 11: 11 & Ge ne r at ion jac k
Sat 28th
R a m sh a ck l e Su p p or t s TB A
Far Away Stables, Hey Baby, Thrashed, To The Grave, Tenpenny Towers, Lakeside, Charmers, Blues Platoon, Sweet Jelly Rolls, Adam Roche, Hearts Like Wolves, Empire, One Night In Paris, Postal and many many more talented original Australian artists.
www.sydneylivehouse.com FOR ALL VENUE BOOKING ENQUIRIES. 34 :: BRAG :: 458: 16:04:12
hot damn PROUDLY BROUGHT TO YOU BY BALMAIN BREWING COMPANY
PICS :: RR,SW
COMING SOON
05:04:12 :: Spectrum :: 34 Oxford St Darlinghurst 93601375 :: RASA JUSKEVICIUTE :: ASHLEY S : TIM LEVY (HEAD HONCHO) OUR LOVELY PHOTOGRAPHER Y :: SAM WHITESIDE TNE WHI TIM :: NA HAN ROU MAR :: DANIEL MUNNS :: ROSETTE
BRAG :: 458 :: 16:04:12 :: 35
g g guide gig g
send your listings to : gigguide@thebrag.com
pick of the week
DZ Deathrays
FRIDAY APRIL 20
Oxford Art Factory, Darlinghurst
DZ Deathrays, Velociraptor $12 (+ bf)–$16 8pm MONDAY APRIL 16 ROCK & POP
Lou Barlow (USA), Unity Floors Annandale Hotel $36 (+ bf) 7.30pm The Rubens, Sures, The Upskirts GoodGod Small Club, Sydney $10 (+ bf) 8pm sold out Unherd Open Mic Downstairs, Sandringham Hotel, Newtown free 8pm
JAZZ
The Cope Street Parade 505 Club, Surry Hills $10 8.30pm Monday Jam: Danny G Felix The Lansdowne, Broadway free 9pm Open Mic Jazz The World Bar, Kings Cross free 7pm Sonic Mayhem Orchestra feat. Steve Brien Blue Beat Bar & Grill, Double Bay $10 8.30pm
ACOUSTIC & FOLK
Le Kab Duo Opera Bar, Circular Quay free 8.30pm Russell Neal, Mai-anne, Death And A Cure, Adam Hynes, Mirrors In Iceland, Sasha & George Kellys On King, Newtown free 7pm
TUESDAY APRIL 17 ROCK & POP
Adam Pringle and Friends Downstairs, Sandringham
Hotel, Newtown free 8pm OMG Scruffy Murphy’s, Haymarket free 10pm The Rubens, OXBLVD, Palms GoodGod Small Club, Sydney $10 (+ bf) 8pm sold out The Songwriter Sessions Sandringham Hotel, Newtown free 7.30pm
JAZZ
Jazzgroove: Adams Garden, Cooking Club 505 Club, Surry Hills $8 (conc)–$15 8.30pm Peter Head The Harbour View Hotel, The Rocks free 8pm
ACOUSTIC & FOLK
Gypsy Art Club with Eddie Bronson Camelot Lounge, Marrickville $20 6.30pm Tabitha Opera Bar, Circular Quay free 8.30pm
WEDNESDAY APRIL 18 ROCK & POP
Anthony Hughes Brass Monkey, Cronulla 8pm Aya Larkin, Ollie Brown The Vanguard, Newtown $18.80 7pm Bernie Hayes Downstairs, Sandringham Hotel, Newtown free 8pm Cold Chisel Hordern Pavilion, Moore Park $110 (+ bf) 7pm Dave Wilkins Coogee Bay Hotel free 9pm The Dead Marines Downstairs, Sandringham Hotel, Newtown free 8pm
Drey Rollan Band, The Twilight Rhythm Boys, DJ Brian Rock Lily, The Star, Pyrmont free 8pm DZ Deathrays, Velociraptor, Bloods Beach Road Hotel, Bondi free 8pm Leohas, Radio Cario, The Hughes Brothers Annandale Hotel $8 7.30pm Live & Local: Van Sereno, Genevieve Chadwick, G Nunan Band Lizotte’s Restaurant, Dee Why $15 8pm Michael Peter Tokio Hotel, Darling Harbour 8pm Michele Madden, Steve Lucas, Blackie, Richard Ball Sandringham Hotel, Newtown $10 7.45pm Musos Club Jam Night Bald Faced Stag Hotel, Leichhardt free 8pm Rainbow Chan The Tea Room, The World Bar, Kings Cross free 7pm The Rubens, Sures, Palms GoodGod Small Club, Sydney $10 (+ bf) 8pm sold out Scandalgate, Smotherbox, Fouulhawk, Gods of Rapture Valve Bar, Tempe 7pm Telefonica FBi Social @ Kings Cross Hotel free 1pm The Wiggles Enmore Theatre $32.50 1pm, 4.30pm all-ages Wildcatz Scruffy Murphy’s, Haymarket free 11pm
JAZZ
Jack Walton The Harbour View Hotel, The Rocks free 8pm Natalie Dietz 505 Club, Surry Hills $10 8.30pm
ACOUSTIC & FOLK
Avelina de Moray, Russell Neal Evening Star Hotel, Surry Hills free 7pm Daniel Hopkins Taren Point Hotel free 7pm Diana Rouvas Opera Bar, Circular Quay free 8.30pm Greg Sita Cookies Lounge and Bar, North Strathfield free 8pm Helmut Uhlmann, Benwardi, Ellana Hickman, Death and a Cure, Adam Hynes, Lynette Smith The Loft, UTS, Broadway, Ultimo free 6pm James Morrison (UK) The Basement, Circular Quay $27.50 (+ bf)–$82.30 (dinner & show) 8pm Mal’s Open Mic Night: Gary Brennan, Kenneth, Mal Ward, Kyle Dessent, Zelda Smyth Royal Hotel, Bondi free 8pm Russell Neal, Starr Witness Cat and Fiddle Hotel, Balmain free 6.30pm TAOS, John Chesher, Maianne Coach & Horses Hotel, Randwick free 7pm
THURSDAY APRIL 19 ROCK & POP
Big Ben Coogee Bay Hotel free 10pm The Brewster Brothers Brass Monkey, Cronulla $26.55 7pm Claire, Little Napier Gallery Bar, Oxford Art Factory, Darlinghurst free 8pm Eleventh Hour, Asthena, Ironic Sydney Livehouse, Lewisham $10 8pm Epidemic Over, Siren Lines, Teal, Anto McKeon Beach Road Hotel, Bondi Beach free 8pm Hot Damn: Resist The Thought, The Storm Picturesque, The Eradicated, Arteries Spectrum, Darlinghurst $15$20 8pm In Measures, Enola Fall Rock Lily, The Star, Pyrmont free 8pm Jo Fabro and Michael Wheatley Blue Beat, Double Bay $10 9pm Johnathan Devoy Downstairs, Sandringham Hotel, Newtown free 8pm Jon Gomm (UK), Andy Sorenson The Basement, Circular Quay $30 (+ bf)–$35 9pm Lowlakes, Round The Corner, Annie Mckinnon FBi Social $10 (+ bf) 8pm Nicky Kurta Dee Why Hotel 8pm Mal’s Open Mic Night: Mal Ward, Lisa Gourlay, Tunnel Vision, Coredea, Ironbark Rock Peakhurst Inn free 8pm Mounties Battle Of The Bands: Aurox, From Afar, Karmic Dirt, Ethan Joe, Men Of The West, G62, Distorted Sound Theory Mounties Showroom, Mount Pritchard $10-$15 7.30pm Musos Club Jam Night Carousel Hotel, Rooty Hill free 8pm OAF’s 2nd Official Hat Party: Veen, Dampvamp, Group, Skarlett Saramore, Bang! Bang! Rock 'N' Roll, Tales in Space, The Jones Rival, Hat Party DJs Oxford Art Factory, Darlinghurst free 8pm Payne Rd, Say It Forever, Seek The Silence, Cloud
Four Valve Bar, Tempe 7pm Pond, The Laurels The Standard, Darlinghurst $15 8pm Richard Cuthbert, Ben Horder, Chris Horder, Michael Gotsche Union Hotel, Newtown free 7.30pm Rob Henry Harbord Beach Hotel free 7pm Rocksteady Reggae Roots Night 505 Club, Surry Hills $10 (student)–$15 8.30pm Scott & Charlene’s Wedding, Bed Wettin’ Bad Boys, Low Life, Camperdown & Out The Red Rattler Theatre, Marrickville $10 8pm Seal (UK) Sydney Entertainment Centre $74-$199.90 8pm Sunset Riot, Neon, Chi Chi & The Go Go’s Annandale Hotel 8pm Suzy Connolly, Charlie Horse, Rushing Dolls, Matt Purcell and The Blessed Curse Sandringham Hotel, Newtown $10 7pm Tin Sparrow, Pear Shape, Boy Outside GoodGod Small Club, Sydney $15 8pm Tribute To Nikos Papazoglou & Manolis Rasoulis The Factory Theatre, Enmore $27-$30 (+ bf) 8pm all-ages A Tribute To O Brother Where Art Thou: Bellyache Ben & The Steamgrass Boys, Christa Hughes, Elana Stone, Brian Campeau, George Washingmachine The Vanguard, Newtown $23.80 8pm Uprising Scruffy Murphy’s, Haymarket free 10pm Vultures: Tom Ugly, Tomi, DJ Skar The Lansdowne, Broadway free 8pm The Wiggles Enmore Theatre $32.50 10am, 1pm all-ages
JAZZ
Arrebato feat. Eva Pinero The Sound Lounge, Seymour Centre, Chippendale $15-$25 8.30pm Daniel Weltinger’s Django Project Camelot Lounge, Marrickville $20-$25 7pm Peter Head The Harbour View Hotel, The Rocks free 8pm Sax in the City: Jeremy Rose & Friends The Spice Cellar, Sydney free 6pm
ACOUSTIC & FOLK
Andrew Denniston Narrabeen Sands free 7pm Marty From Reckless The Marlborough Hotel, Newtown free 8.30pm Russell Neal Kogarah Hotel free 7pm Simon Tedeschi, Sydney Omega Ensemble City Recital Hall, Sydney $60 7.30pm all-ages Soulganic Opera Bar, Circular Quay free 8.30pm Tiger Town, Iluka Moonshine Cider & Rum Bar, Hotel Steyne, Manly free 9pm
FRIDAY APRIL 20 ROCK &POP
Amy Meredith, New Empire The Factory Theatre, Enmore $20 (+ bf) 7.30pm all-ages Argentina
FBi Social @ Kings Cross Hotel $10 (+ bf) 8pm August Burns Red (USA), Blessthefall (USA), Northlane Metro Theatre, Sydney $47.05 7pm all-ages The Beards, The Crooked Fiddle Band, Mojo Juju Manning Bar, Sydney University, Camperdown $15 (+ bf) 8pm The Brewster Brothers Vault 146 Restaurant, Windsor $25.50 7pm Club Blink: Quiet Child, Beggars Orchestra Club 77, East Sydney 8pm Contraban, Neon Heart, Vanity Riots, Rattle Snake The Square, Haymarket $10 8pm DZ Deathrays, Velociraptor Oxford Art Factory, Darlinghurst$12 (+ bf)–$16 8pm Epidemic Over, Siren Lines, Shinobi Bald Faced Stag, Leichhardt $10 (presale)–$15 8pm Exploding Happiness Petersham Bowling Club $5 8pm Fallon Bros Stacks Bar, Darling Harbour free 5pm Fiona Leigh Jones Duo Harbord Beach Hotel free 8pm Flamin’ Beauties Mortdale Hotel free 8pm God Bows To Math, Hira Hira, The Nocturnals, Zita Grimm The Roxbury, Glebe $10 8pm The Grand Lethals, Sex In Colombia, Red Remedy, Monks Of Mellonwah Annandale Hotel 8pm Hip Not Hop Customs House Bar, Circular Quay free 7pm Hit Machine Scruffy Murphy’s Hotel, Sydney free 10.30pm Hit Seekers The Marlborough Hotel, Newtown 10.30pm Hit Selection Coogee Bay Hotel free 10pm Hoodlum Shouts Blackwire Records, Annandale all-ages Hunting Grounds Fitzroy Hotel, Windsor free 8pm John Larder Great Southern Hotel, Sydney free 9.30pm The Keep On Dancin’s, Atom Bombs, The Knits Gallery Bar, Oxford Art Factory, Darlinghurst free 8pm Lines Of Charlie, Broke Down Engines, Capitol, The Night Sandringham Hotel, Newtown $10 8pm Live Evil, Damage Inc The Valve, Tempe $15 7pm Living Chair Wentworth Leagues Club free 10pm The Louisiana Roadshow Brass Monkey, Cronulla $18.40 7pm Maiden Oz, Damage Inc Valve Bar, Tempe 8pm Mark Da Costa & The Blacklist, Kitsch78 Rock Lily, The Star, Pyrmont free 8pm Mark Lanegan Band (USA), Howl At The Moon The Hi-Fi, Moore Park $66 (+ bf) 7.30pm The Medics, Glass Towers GoodGod Small Club, Sydney $10 (+ bf) 8pm Movement: Mannequins Beach Road Hotel, Bondi free 8pm Mr Breeze Richmond Inn free 8.30pm MUM: Dead Johnny, Tail, Little Bastard, Jenny Broke The Window, The Upskirts, Louis London, Hunting Grounds, 10th
“A few hours sleep and this coffee is cold and I ain’t get younger. I’m just getting old” - BROTHERS GRIM & THE BLUE MURDERS 36 :: BRAG :: 458 : 16:04:12
g g guide gig g
send your listings to : gigguide@thebrag.com Avenue, Sammy K, Nick La Rosa, Dimes, Wet Lungs, Velociraptor DJs, DZ Deathrays DJs, Mark Dowsett The World Bar, Kings Cross $10-$15 8pm Next Best Thing Dundas Sports free 8.30pm Nickelback Show Heathcote Hotel free 9.30pm Not Just Another 90s Party: The Herbs, Mr 95, Nova Smith The Standard, Darlinghurst $12 (+ bf) Oka, The Rhythm Hunters Marrickville Town Hall $30 (+ bf) 7.30pm Original Sin INXS Show, Swingshift Cold Chisel Show, Pleasure & Pain Divinyls Show Penrith RSL free 8pm Powderfinger Show Engadine Tavern free 9.30pm Rukus, Big Rigs (QLD), Evil Ugly, The Secret City, Bryce Cohen Trio Sydney Livehouse, Lewisham $10 8pm The Switchblades, Thomas Covernant, Sir Air Vanadium, DJ Pawnography The Lansdowne, Broadway free 8pm Steve Edmonds Band The Beach Club Collaroy free 8pm Tom Ugly, Enola Fall, Jordan Sly, Kristy Lee Upstairs Beresford, Surry Hills free 6pm The Toot Toot Toots, Mother and Son, Bellyache Ben and the Steamgrass Boys The Vanguard, Newtown $15 8pm The Velvet Cave: Whipped Cream Chargers, The Living Eyes, Flash & Crash, Velvet Gallagher, Lovehandles, Ken Blements 77 Yurong Lane, Darlinghurst $10 8pm The Wiggles Enmore Theatre $32.50 10am, 1pm all-ages X, Chickenstones, Young Docteurs Stones, Manly Fisho’s $15 (+ bf) 8pm JAZZ Emma Pask 505 Club, Surry Hills $15 (student)–$20 8.30pm Phil Slater Quartet The Sound Lounge, Seymour Centre, Chippendale $10-$20 8.30pm Yuki Kumagai, John Mackie Well Connected Café / Wine Bar, Glebe free 8pm
COUNTRY
Davidson Brothers Notes Live, Enmore $19.40 7pm
ACOUSTIC & FOLK
The Little Stevies, Iluka Camelot Lounge, Marrickville $20 7.30pm Natasha-Eloise, Brittany Henderson, Sophie Hawkshaw, Pretty Young Things Mars Hills Café, Parramatta $10 8pm Rob Edwards Opera Bar, Circular Quay free 5.30pm Soulganic Oceans Bar, Coogee free 6.30pm
SATURDAY APRIL 21 ROCK & POP
031 Rockshow Scruffy Murphy’s, Haymarket free 10.30pm The 5.6.7.8’s (JPN), Kill City Creeps, The Gooch Palms The Factory Floor, The Factory Theatre, Enmore 8pm
Andy Mammers Harbord Beach Hotel free 8.30pm Boatfriends, Caitlin Park, The Understudy FBi Social @ Kings Cross Hotel $10 8pm Bondi Blitz 2012: For Our Hero, Sound Of Seasons, Nine Sons Of Dan, Highways, Some Time Soon, Forever Ends Here, The Sweet Apes, On Shoulders Of Giants, Metcalfe, Taka Favell, Apkil Falls Bondi Beach free 11am allages Cavan Te & The Fuss, Conrad Greenleaf Rock Lily, The Star, Pyrmont free 8pm The City Shakeup, Soapbox Summer, Sometime Soon St James Hotel, Sydney $10 8pm Continental Robert & The Blues Party Marrickville Bowling Club 8pm Dave Tice & Mark Evans Downstairs, Sandringham Hotel, Newtown $12-$15 8pm Daryl Braithwaite, Zoe K Lizotte’s Restaurant, Dee Why $52–$110 (dinner & show) 7pm The Deep Coogee Bay Hotel free 10pm Elevation U2 Tribute Kiama Leagues Club free 8.30pm Eleven Eleven, The Bland, Jack Anderson Band, South Devine Valve Bar, Tempe 7pm Eon Beats feat. Evelyn Dupree and Lily Dior Blue Beat, Double Bay $20 9pm Eran James, Heavy Yen Project, Bridie O’Brien Notes Live, Enmore $19.40 7pm The Feelers (UK), Gasoline Inc Beach Road Hotel, Bondi $15 (+ bf) 8pm Finn Teagardens Hotel free 8.30pm The Go Set, The Handsome Young Strangers, The Vee Bees Sandringham Hotel, Newtown $10 (+ bf) 8pm Grey Ghost, Saloons, Iron Bar Hotel, Bert and Bernie Upstairs Beresford, Surry Hills free 6pm Hoodlum Shouts Bald Faced Stag, Leichhardt 8pm Jason & The Lyrebird, Love Parade, Rascals & Runaways GoodGod Small Club $9 (+ bf) 7.30pm Jess Holland, Jaspir Hollis, Peter Christie The Roxbury Hotel, Glebe free 8pm Jubilants Gallery Bar, Oxford Art Factory, Darlinghurst free 8pm Kotahi Groove Manly Fisho’s $10 (+ bf) 8pm Lachy Doley, Claude Hay, Mindy & The Serpents The Vanguard, Newtown $14 (+ bf) 8pm Last Dinosaurs, Millions, Griswolds Oxford Art Factory, Darlinghurst $15 (+ bf) 8pm sold out Late Night Social: Rufus, Polographia, Frames FBi Social @ Kings Cross Hotel free 11.59pm Michael Bolton (USA) Sydney Opera House $69$144 8pm all-ages Mick Thomas, Shelly Short, Winter Station Annandale Hotel $20 (+ bf) 8pm Mission Jones Stacks Bar, Darling Harbour free 5pm Monsieur Camembert Camelot Lounge, Marrickville $30 7.30pm Old Time Glory, Aitches, Chambers, Paul Macadam
Sydney Livehouse, Lewisham $10 8pm Passenger, Daniel Lee Kendall, Neill Bourke The Factory Theatre, Enmore $27.50 (+ bf 8pm all-ages Pleasure & Pain Divinyls Show Bull & Bush Hotel, Baulkham Hills free 8pm Quasimodo, Mississippi Shakedown Brass Monkey, Cronulla $17.35 7pm Record Store Day: Boats Of Berlin, Richard Cuthbert, Jack Shit, Jay Katz Annandale Hotel free 12pm Reson8ers Huskisson Hotel free 8.30pm Rock My Soul Oatley Hotel free 8.30pm Rufus, Polographia Spectrum, Darlinghurst $12 (+ bf) 8pm sold out Six60 (NZ), Saskwatch Metro Theatre, Sydney $25 (+ bf) 8pm Steve Edmonds Band Wallacia Hotel free 8pm Stormcellar Baldrock Hotel, Rozelle 8pm The Truth Is, Enola Fall, Scatter Flu, Absolute Power DJs The Lansdowne free 9pm Wayne Pearce & The Big Hitters The Marlborough Hotel, Newtown free 10.30pm Ween Keen 4: T’Mershi Duween, Eddie Dingle & The Kaiser Buns, Brown Dragon, Fox Muldoon, The Corridor Of Uncertainty, The Angry Darts, Stationmasters, Dune Buggy Attack Squadron, Josh Shipton Town Hall Hotel, Newtown free 7pm West Tigers Homeground Heroes: Red Oxygen Road Kill, Daniel Hopkins Band, The Cleanskins, Arms Attraction and Lucy B and the B Sides The Bridge Hotel, Rozelle $10 7pm X, Queen of Swords, Bunt, 77 Sunset Stripper, Stamp Out Disco DJs The Square, Haymarket $15 (+ bf) 7.45pm Xtra Hot Brighton RSL Club, BrightonLe-Sands free 8pm Yacht Club DJs, Hunting Grounds, The Fabergettes The Standard, Darlinghurst $20 (+ bf) 8pm
JAZZ
Compass Ensemble The Sound Lounge, Seymour Centre, Chippendale $15-$25 8.30pm Elixir feat. Katie Noonan, Brian Campeau The Basement, Circular Quay $40 (+ bf)–$45 9pm Eon Beats Project, Evelyn Duprai, Lily Dior Blue Beat Bar & Grill, Double Bay 8pm Mannins & Muller Quartet 505 Club, Surry Hills $15 (student)–$20 8.30pm Peter Head The Harbour View Hotel, The Rocks free 5pm Yuki Kumagai, John Mackie Well Co. Café / Wine Bar, Leichhardt free 7.30pm
Diamond Ettalong Beach Hotel free 8pm Pete The Belvedere Hotel free 9pm
SUNDAY APRIL 22 ROCK & POP
Ace Brighton RSL Club, BrightonLe-Sands free 7pm Brad Johns Harbord Beach Hotel free 6pm The City Shakeup, Soapbox Summer Liverpool PCYC, Miller $10 8pm all-ages Dig It Up: Hoodoo Gurus, The Sonics (USA), Died Pretty, Redd Kross (USA), Tek & Younger, Kids In Dust, The Fleshtones (USA), HardOns, The 5.6.7.8’s (JPN), Royal Headache, Steve Wynn, Belles Will Ring, The Lovetones, Straight Arrows, Kim & Spencer, Kim Salmon, Spencer P Jones, The Gooch Palms, Damien Lovelock, Jack Shit, Silky Doyle, Nic Dalton, Andy Travers, Stuart Coupe, Jay Katz Enmore Theatre / Notes Live / The Green Room / The Sly Fox, Enmore $132.70 (+ bf)–$157.70 1pm all-ages Erin Marshall Bungalow 8, Sydney Harbour free 3pm Finn Taverner’s Hill Hotel free 3pm Galapagoose, Guerre, Cliques, Ben Fester, Life Aquatic DJs Serial Space, Darlington $15 7pm
The Ghali Groove Band, Joseph Karl Brass Monkey, Cronulla $18.40 7pm Gleny Rae Virus & Her Tamworth Playboys Marrickville Bowling Club free 4.30pm The Great Awake, Dividers Annandale Hotel $10 8pm Hit Machine The Three Wise Monkeys, Sydney free 10pm Johnny Gretsch’s Wasted Ones, The Pool Players From Hell Botany View Hotel, Newtown free 7pm Mark Hopper Artichoke Gallery Cafe, Manly free 7.30pm Michael Bolton (USA) Sydney Opera House $69$144 7pm all-ages Mick Thomas, Shelly Short, The Winter Station Coogee Diggers $23.50 6pm Monichi, Last Credit, Sprl Cnsprcy The Lansdowne, Broadway free 5.30pm Redundant Technology, Half Wit Sandringham Hotel, Newtown $10 7pm Screaming Sunday Annandale Hotel 12pm allages Sink Or Swim Fest: Forever Ends Here, Some Time Soon, Soapbox Summer, Your Weight In Gold, Rose From Ruins, Past Is Practice, The City Shakeup, With Skies Below, Divide & Conquer, Hide Your Hopes, Dansweeto, Dear Dearest Liverpool PCYC $10-$15 10am The Slowdowns Downstairs, Sandringham Hotel, Newtown free 4pm
JAZZ
Peter Head Trio & Friends The Harbour View Hotel, The Rocks free 4pm Yuki Kumagai, John Mackie, Paul Furniss, Tony Burkys, Alan Gilbert Cronulla RSL Club free 12.30pm
ACOUSTIC & FOLK
Aimee Francis Salisbury Hotel, Stanmore free 2pm Ash Lisle Oatley Hotel free 2pm Elevation U2 Acoustic Orient Hotel, The Rocks free 4.30pm Giant Steps, Cass Eager Opera Bar, Circular Quay free 2.30pm Koto Dreaming Camelot, Marrickville $20 6.30pm The Little Stevies Clarendon Guest House, Katoomba Shane MacKenzie Cohibar, Darling Harbour free 3pm Soulfood Sunday: Tahir Qawwal & Bobby Singh Camelot Lounge, Marrickville $20-$25 6pm
wed
18 Apr
(9:00PM - 12:00AM)
thu
19 Apr
(9:00PM - 12:00AM)
fri
20 Apr (5:00PM - 8:00PM)
(9:30PM - 1:30AM)
SUNDAY AFTERNOON
SATURDAY AFTERNOON (4:30PM - 7:30PM)
sat
21 Apr
sun
SATURDAY NIGHT
ACOUSTIC & FOLK Acca Dacquiries Opera Bar, Circular Quay free 2.30pm Carolyn Woodorth, Suspect Behaviour Terrey Hills Tavern free 7.30pm Daniel Hopkins, the Pug, Alex Thompson, Bity Booker, Sally Penny, Oliver Goss, Jonno Botany Bay Hotel, Banksmeadow free 7.30pm Darren Bennett, Black
The Strides, Jordan Miller Rock Lily, The Star, Pyrmont free 8pm Sunday Stampede: Limited Headspace, The Grand Union, That’s The Last Straw, Cordea, Tom Elliot Valve Bar, Tempe 2pm Sunset People: Devotional, Moon Holiday, Quaoub Hollywood Hotel, Surry Hills free 4pm Tom T Coogee Bay Hotel free 10pm
(9:00PM - 12:00AM)
22 Apr
(4:30PM - 7:30PM)
SUNDAY NIGHT
(8:30PM - 12:00AM)
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gig picks
up all night out all week...
THURSDAY APRIL 19
X, Queen of Swords, Bunt, 77 Sunset Stripper, Stamp Out Disco DJs The Square, Haymarket $15 (+ bf) 8pm
The 5.6.7.8’s
Lowlakes, Round The Corner, Annie Mckinnon FBi Social $10 (+ bf) 8pm
Elixir feat. Katie Noonan, Brian Campeau The Basement, Circular Quay $40 (+ bf)–$45 9pm
OAF’s 2nd Official Hat Party: Veen, Dampvamp, Group, Skarlett Saramore, Bang! Bang! Rock 'N' Roll, Tales In Space, The Jones Rival, Hat Party DJs Oxford Art Factory, Darlinghurst free 8pm Pond, The Laurels The Standard, Darlinghurst $15 8pm
The Rubens
MONDAY APRIL 16
FRIDAY APRIL 20 The Beards, The Crooked Fiddle Band, Mojo Juju Manning Bar, Sydney University, Camperdown $15 (+ bf) 8pm
Lou Barlow (USA), Unity Floors Annandale Hotel $36 (+ bf) 7.30pm
TUESDAY APRIL 17
Mark Lanegan Band (USA), Howl At The Moon The Hi-Fi, Moore Park $66 (+ bf) 7.30pm
The Rubens, OXBLVD, Palms GoodGod Small Club, Sydney $10 (+ bf) 8pm sold out
MUM: Dead Johnny, Tail, Little Bastard, Jenny Broke The Window, The Upskirts, Louis London, Hunting Grounds, 10th Avenue, Sammy K, Nick La Rosa, Dimes, Wet Lungs, Velociraptor DJs, DZ Deathrays DJs, Mark Dowsett The World Bar, Kings Cross $10$15 8pm
WEDNESDAY APRIL 18
Aya Lakin DZ Deathrays, Velociraptor, Bloods Beach Road Hotel, Bondi free 8pm
Cold Chisel Hordern Pavilion, Moore Park $110 (+ bf) 7pm
Rainbow Chan The Tea Room, The World Bar, Kings Cross free 7pm
SATURDAY APRIL 21 The 5.6.7.8’s (JPN), Kill City Creeps, The Gooch Palms The Factory Floor, The Factory Theatre, Enmore 8pm sold out Last Dinosaurs, Millions, Griswolds Oxford Art Factory, Darlinghurst $15 (+ bf) 8pm sold out
Dig It Up! feat. The Hoodoo Gurus, The Sonics (USA), Died Pretty, Redd Kross (USA), Tek & Younger, Kids In Dust, The Fleshtones (USA), HardOns, The 5.6.7.8’s (JPN), Royal Headache, Steve Wynn, Belles Will Ring, The Lovetones, Straight Arrows, Kim & Spencer, Kim Salmon, Spencer P. Jones, The Gooch Palms, Damien Lovelock, Jack Shit, Silky Doyle, Nic Dalton, Andy Travers, Stuart Coupe, Jay Katz Enmore Theatre / Notes Live / The Green Room / The Sly Fox, Enmore $132.70 (+ bf)–$157.70 The Hoodoo Gurus
Tom Ugly, Enola Fall, Jordan Sly, Kristy Lee Upstairs Beresford, Surry Hills free 6pm Xxxx
Aya Larkin, Ollie Brown The Vanguard, Newtown $18.80 7pm
SUNDAY APRIL 22
MONDAY 16TH APRIL ~A RATIONAL FEAR~ Comedy Panel Presented by Dan Ilic ~ Broadcast live on FBi Radio ~
7:30pm, $10
WEDNESDAY 18TH APRIL
FRIDAY 20TH APRIL
SATURDAY 21ST APRIL
~ARGENTINA~
~BOATFRIENDS~
+ Olympic Ayres +
+ The Understudy + + Caitlin Park +
+ Tokyo Denmark Sweden + + Seabourne + 8pm, $10 + bf through Oztix or $12 on the door
Lunchbreak Presented by Alberts
+++++++
~TELAFONICA~
~ROBOPOP~
1pm, Free
“ Pumping irony with a fistful of cheese!”
+ Round the Corner + + Annie McKinnon +
DJs Ping Pong Tiddly + Mush + Fran Damme + Kill the Landlord
8pm, $10
12 midnight - late, Free
THURSDAY 19TH APRIL
~LOWLAKES~
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8pm, $10
+++++++ ~LATE NIGHT SOCIAL DJs~ ~ Broadcast live on FBi Radio ~
Felix Lloyd + President Bird + + Frames + 11:30pm, Free
L2 Kings Cross Hotel www.fbisocial.com
E TS IN TH G FINALIS SONGWRITIN L A N IO 1 T 1 A 0 N 2 INTER ) TITION COMPE ONIC CATEGORY R T C E L E / (DANCE
“A PRETTY/GRITTY MIX OF SILKY VOCALS, SMUDGED SAMPLES, BLURRED SYNTHS AND CROOKED PERCUSSION” DEBUT ALBUM ABOMINABLE GALAXY OUT NOW CD/DIGITAL THROUGH ALL MAJOR OUTLETS
PRODUCED BY PASO BIONIC (TZU/CURSE OV DIALECT) FACEBOOK.COM/AUDEGOMUSIC • SOUNDCLOUD.COM/AUDEGO
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brag beats
BRAG’s guide to dance, hip hop and club culture
free stuff
dance music news club, dance and hip hop in brief... with Chris Honnery
five things WITH TYRONE FROM
RÜFÜS
FREESTUFF@THEBRAG.COM Saturday May 5, with Def Wish Cast and Ellesquire in support. They’ll be covering material from their most recent album, The Quickening, which hit shelves at the backend of last year and debuted at the coveted #1 slot on the Urban Charts, while also coming in at #11 on the National ARIA charts. The Quickening features guest performances from Hilltop Hoods, Vents, Ad-Fu, and K21, with production from Large Professor, Dazastah, Simplex and Debate, and is available through the Hoods’ Golden Era Records.
Clark
AU UNDERGROUND
Newly launched online podcast brand the AU Underground, hosted by Subsonic regular Dylan Griffin, is joining forces with Future Theories for a one-off bash at One22 on Saturday May 12. With the highly touted Melbourne pairing of Jamie Stevens (of Infusion fame) and Steve Ward from Chameleon Records playing live together for the first time in Sydney, this event ought to pique the interest of all of those with a penchant for techno, progressive and minimal sounds. Also spinning on the night will be Eoin Brosnan (the DJ as opposed to the Irish football star…), Loose Kaboose main-woman Trinity and the bon vivant Griffin himself, with presale tickets available via Resident Advisor. Anyone wanting to check out the AU Underground podcasts, which feature ‘regular guest mixes excavated from Australia’s underground electronic music landscape’, should head to facebook.com/auunderground Growing Up I grew up in a small town called Lightning 1. Ridge in North West NSW – semi desert. We didn’t really have power out there apart from a generator, so I didn’t really watch TV. But we had a crappy old upright piano and I’d bash away at that for hours on end. I couldn’t read music back then and I still struggle now, but I just loved losing time on it. Inspirations I’ve got totally different influences to the 2. other guys in the band, and I think that’s what works for us. Two of my favourite musicians are Billy Corgan and Matthew Bellamy. They have absolutely everything I love – from subtle electronica and acoustic lo-fi tracking to full blown orchestral, massive, bombastic sounds. I remember hearing ‘Adore’ for the first time when I was about 13, and just completely losing myself. I’d just disappear into this sonic soundscape and I’d be in a completely different space. Your Crew When people ask how many band 3. members we have, it’s always hard to say it’s three – because realistically there’s a hell of a lot more people involved than that. We call it the machine. And when the machine’s working, everyone’s happy. Music You Make Our new EP is called RÜFÜS (Blue). 4.The
PICNIC FT CALDWELL
Following on from last year’s epic bash, Picnic are again inviting hugely respected Sydney DJ Simon Caldwell to play all night long in a warehouse on Saturday June 16. Caldwell’s DJ pedigree is well documented; he’s co-promoted one of Australia’s longest running dance parties, Mad Racket, for the last 13 years, pushes quality deep grooves every Monday night on his Sunsets show on FBi 94.5, and had the honour of being only the second Australian to put together an RA Podcast. Presale tickets are available through the Resident Advisor website, with the warehouse venue to be revealed closer to the date. That’s about all you need to know for now, aside from the fact that there’s a ‘Birds Of Paradise’ theme and it’s BYO.
PIGEON
Brisbane live electronic band Pigeon are hitting the road again this coming April/May with their Cataclysm Tour. Having released their debut EP Parallels last August, which debuted at #6 on the Australian iTunes Electronic Album charts, Pigeon have continued to build their fanbase on the back of sets at festivals such as Splendour In The Grass, Parklife and Peats
CLARK
NME describes Clark as “a dazzling mix of Nintendo soul, warped acid and fragile neoclassical electronica” – which kinda makes us wanna jizz our pants, and definitely makes us wanna see him in the flesh, when he hits Civic Underground on Saturday April 28, with local boytoys Bon Chat, Bon Rat in tow. Initially compared to Warp labelmates Autechre and Aphex Twin, Clark has since traversed everything from techno and minimalist to snarling maximalism, and will be playing his upcoming tour off the back of his new album Iradelphic, which moves into post-rock/prog-house territory. If this is the kind of reckless abandon that turns you on, we have a double pass up for grabs – just tell us which Tricky-endorsed singer features on Iradelphic…
We basically went into Gigpiglet studios in Surry Hills with a few demos and spent a month just staying up all night, then crashing in the drum room and getting up a few hours later to keep recording. We had a bunch of analogue synths, guitars, amps, piano, drums, percussion, a harmonica, and just made use of it all, whether we were recording or serenading each other to sleep. Now we’re about to take the tracks on the road as we start our national tour and we can’t wait. We’ve got some masks and some other crazy surprises ready so it should be pretty interesting. Music, Right Here, Right Now We’ve made some really amazing friends 5. in the Aus music scene and it’s hard to see the industry ever slowing down when you see so much amazing talent around. Playing shows with bands such as the Aston Shuffle, New Navy, Mitzi and Polographia have been really inspiring for us. They’re all doing amazing things and we can’t wait to see where they go from here. With: Polographia Where: Cambridge Hotel, Newcastle / Spectrum @ Exchange Hotel, Oxford St When: Friday April 20 / Saturday April 21 More: RÜFÜS (Blue) EP out now through Gigpiglet Recordings/Inertia
Ridge. Pigeon’s sound traverses electro-pop and dubstep to DnB, and your chance to see them live comes on Saturday April 28 at Upstairs Beresford, when they play a free gig. One more time: a...free...gig!
HOT DUB TIME MACHINE
DJ Tom Loud brings his late night festival interactive dance show back to Sydney for one night at The Lair @ Metro Theatre on Saturday April 28. Entitled Hot Dub Time Machine, the night will provide a ‘guided journey through 60 years of pop culture,’ with visuals projected onto massive screens as Loud combines live video mash-ups and turntablism. Joining him is Lulu Loud and Time Lord, who appears on screen to introduce each decade, and demonstrate the ‘power up’ dance moves – from the sounds of things, there is ostensibly an ongoing element of dance participation throughout the night. The [hot dub] time machine fires up at 11.30pm, with entry $20.
FUNKOARS TOUR
Party-starting Adelaide hip hop crew The Funkoars are making the Sydney pit-stop of their national tour at the Annandale Hotel on
James Zabiela
ZABIELA AHOY
Progressive house don James Zabiela returns to Australia next month to headline a boat party on Saturday May 5 hosted by Chinese Laundry, before the party kicks on at Chinese Laundry that night. Zabiela is renowned for his Renaissance compilations, and has some seriously impressive technical skills that he shows off during his DJ sets. The Starship will depart from King Street Wharf at 2pm and dock at 7pm, with internationals Alex Niggemann and George FitzGerald set to play at Laundry following the nautical shenanigans. Presale tickets can be procured online.
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dance music news
free stuff
club, dance and hip hop in brief... with Chris Honnery
FREESTUFF@THEBRAG.COM
five things WITH
Sosueme DJs
DEAN TYLER (UK)
Growing Up I came from a two-bit council 1. estate on a seaside town in the north
my liver with the Art Department boys, Azari & III etc.
of England, and my earliest memory that would shape my music career is my guitar and how much I hated it. It was my punishment. I set the neighbours’ shed on fire when I was seven, and my dad wouldn’t let me out of my room until I learnt Jimi Hendrix’s ‘Red House’ note for note.
The Music You Make I play primarily groovy and deep house 4. with influences from disco, hip hop and soul,
Inspirations Musical pioneers such as 2. Lennon, Levan and Guru inspired me to turn to music, but it’s technology that keeps me going on a day-to-day basis. Today it’s possible to make a new track, record the video, design the cover and release it online, all from your mobile phone. Knowing that is possible is what keeps me on my toes. Your Crew Recently I’ve done a few bits with 3. the guys from Hot Creations, Richy Ahmed and my production partner Mark Jenkyns. I enjoy that sound and the fact that they are absolutely smashing it right now! In Sydney, the festival season has brought in a lot of good acts and I’ve been playing parties with Seth Troxler, Clive Henry and Jamie Jones – as well as ruining
Derrick May
but with a current and techy edge. I like to dig crates a little and look for stuff I can add to my set or my tracks where people will go ‘Oh yeah, remember that!?’. In my sets you can expect to hear stuff from the likes of Maceo Plex, Romanthony, Todd Terje and a lot of unreleased stuff from the likes of the Hot Natured camp as well as my own tracks and edits. I also like basslines that make you shit your pants. Music, Right Here, Right Now Music is thriving more than ever because 5. of the internet, and that’s great for the underground. Sydney has a healthy scene and some dedicated, educated promoters who really work hard to bring music out here. It was such a shame about Playground Weekender getting cancelled, as the line up was fantastic. As a DJ out here the dangers are mainly things like getting wrapped up in the afterparty and waking up in a skip. With: Murat Kilic, YokoO, Matt Weir, Gabby Where: The Spice Cellar / 58 Elizabeth St,
Sydney CBD When: Saturday April 21 from 10pm
‘Kemistry’, as well as Justin’s collaborations with Ardalan, PillowTalk and Leroy Peppers – aka Justin’s brother and fellow Dirtybird artist Christian Martin.
LET THEM EAT (CAKES)
World Bar’s weekly ‘multi-room party Valhalla’ (aka CAKES) is stuffing your face full of local and international goodness this Saturday with a feast of fourteen DJs over five rooms,
SOSUEME’S 5TH BDAY
Infamous indie party-monsters Sosueme are celebrating their fifth birthday at the Beresford Hotel on ANZAC Day eve aka Tuesday April 24, with an unashamedly hedonistic soiree involving fairy floss, free popcorn and free booze (if you get there between 6-8pm), plus live sets from Brisbane’s YesYou (making their Sydney debut), Elizabeth Rose, Brendan Maclean and Furnace & The Fundamentals, and deck duties taken by Alison Wonderland, Sosueme DJs, Joyride, F.R.I.E.N.D/s DJs, Block Ness Monsters and Starjumps. Oh, you want more free? Tell us the name of YesYou’s triple-j-beloved single, and we’ll maybe give you a free pass, you big trashbag. headlined by UK party-starter Birdee, of Birmingham’s Simma Records – who we assume will be bringing his trademark blend of “housey beats, obscure ‘70s samples and wobbly b-lines ghetto disco”. On the homefront, Blaze Tripp, Pablo Calamari, Adam Zae, Boonie, Hannah Gibbs, Illya and Bentley, among others, will be throwing down – all for the price of $15 (before 10pm). Disgusting. Saturday April 21, see you there bitchez.
Silicone Soul
MAY DAY
For anyone who missed it – elitist clubbers who consider themselves too underground to regularly read street press perhaps? – a reminder that Detroit luminary Derrick May will headline Chinese Laundry on Saturday April 28. May is of course responsible for one of the biggest house anthems ever in ‘Strings Of Life’, which was first released back in that acid-washed summer of 1987, but his influence extends well beyond the success of that one track. Along with high school friends Juan Atkins and Kevin Saunderson, May rounds off the ‘Belleville Three’, a trio of producers who played an integral role in shaping the bourgeoning house and techno scenes of the late ‘80s/ early ‘90s, and paving the way for producers such as Carl Craig and Stacey Pullen. May’s reputation as an auteur faded slightly due to an extended break from production during the ‘90s, though throughout this period he continued DJing worldwide and concentrated on his Transmat label, which continues to garner accolades today.
SILICONE SOUL: REDUX LIL WAYNE DEVOL-UP
According to, uh, MTV, the one and only Lil Wayne is currently midway through a new LP. The record is titled Devol – which, as more clued-in readers will immediately have noticed, is the word ‘loved’ spelled backwards. According to Wayne, “It’s my version of love songs. What I mean by my version of love songs is meaning they’re not saying, ‘I love you’… It’s all material I did when I was locked up.” How… romantic? 42 :: BRAG :: 458 :: 16:04:12
JUSTIN MARTIN: ALBUM
San Franciscan producer Justin Martin will release his debut album, Ghettos & Gardens, on Dirtybird Records in May. The long overdue album – Martin’s been around for so long that it comes as a surprise that he’s only now releasing his first LP – will cement his longstanding relationship with the Dirtybird label, who’ve been playing host to his distinctive brand of tech house since ’05. The 13-track album includes a remake of Goldie’s
Quickly atoning for their tour cancellation in March, veteran duo Silicone Soul are ‘definitely coming’ to The Spice Cellar on Saturday May 19. First appearing on Scotland’s seminal Soma label in the late ‘90s, Silicone Soul boast a back-catalogue that features cuts such as the plangent and melodic morning-after classic ‘3am’ – which was resurrected by Joris Voorn on his Balance compilation a few years back, and again by the ‘so-hot-right-now’ Maceo Plex last year with what was unfortunately a fairly prosaic and disappointing remix under his Maetrik moniker. Silicone Soul have released fairly consistently over the past few years, with 2011 seeing them celebrate their 50th Darkroom Dubs release, while they also featured prominently on the 20th anniversary Soma label mix, which was compiled by their close allies Slam. Doors open at 10pm, with free entry with guestlist before midnight.
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AY IN
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SYDNEY OPERA HOUSE DRAMA THEATRE 30 MARCH – 12 MAY SYDNEYOPERAHOUSE.COM 02 9250 7777 OPTUS UNDER 30 TICKETS FROM $33* * Seats limited. Transaction fee may apply.
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WITH JASON CHONG, IVAN DONATO, KATIE-JEAN HARDING, ROBERT JAGO, COLIN MOODY, KATE MULVANY, GARETH REEVES, PAUL REICHSTEIN, LIZZIE SCHEBESTA, HAZEM SHAMMAS & DAN SPIELMAN Bell ShakespeareCo @BellShakespeare
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The Herd
New Build
Ebbs And Flow By Joshua Hayes
Fresh And New By Alasdair Duncan
W
ith so many members – eight to be precise – behemoth hip hop collective The Herd have a level of activity that inevitably ebbs and flows between their collective releases and solo projects. In between their 2008 release Summerland and 2011’s Future Shade, for example, notable solo initiatives included Ozi Batla’s debut Wild Colonial and Urthboy’s acclaimed Spitshine. But The Herd is back and busy as ever this month, touring off the back of their forthcoming EP, Better Alive, which includes a title track featuring fellow touring acts Thundamentals and Sky’High, as well as two remixes and four unreleased tracks from the Future Shade sessions.
Y
ou may not know the name Al Doyle, but there’s a good chance you’re familiar with his work – a multiinstrumentalist, he is a founding member of Hot Chip, and spent several years as a touring member of LCD Soundsystem. In other words, if something exciting has happened recently in electronic music, there’s a good chance Doyle has been involved in some way. Doyle has just launched a side project of his own, the trio New Build, which includes Hot Chip member Felix Martin. Their debut album, Yesterday Was Lived And Lost, is a cracking listen, combining the rhythmic backbone of LCD with the stick-in-your head hooks of Hot Chip. It’s been a long time coming, but Doyle is thrilled that the New Build record is finally getting a release. “I’ve been playing with Hot Chip now for I guess probably eight years, and I’ve played with LCD for the past four years,” he says, “but I haven’t had the chance to write songs for them. Felix and I have been doing that for quite a while, but they haven’t seen the light of day, as our time has been taken up with more worthy projects, so doing a bit of songwriting and singing of my own has been great!” New Build is truly a collaborative affair, and songwriting is a painstaking process. “We’re all very critical,” Doyle laughs. “We’re perfectionists, which can make it difficult. Whole versions of songs will be written and then discarded because someone thinks the melody doesn’t work. It takes a lot of time and it’s a very intense situation. If two of us like something and the other doesn’t, we won’t use it.”
Doyle’s main band, Hot Chip, also have a new record coming out this year – touring that will undoubtedly take a lot of time from his schedule, but he promises me that New Build will go on. “We had our first rehearsal with Hot Chip yesterday,” he says, “and I’m excited about that, but I’ll be maintaining New Build as well. We’ve already written four or five songs for the next record, so it’s definitely something we want to keep going long term.”
“It’s like your favourite old pair of shoes; just slip them on and away you go. It’s like you’ve never been apart,” says Shannon Kennedy, aka Ozi Batla, of reuniting with his teammates. “It’s the same with any good friendships or good relationships; you can take time away from each other and pretty much pick up where you left off. That’s usually how it is with us.”
Their A Thousand Lives tour, which kicked off in Sydney at the end of March and rounds up in Byron Bay on April 28, takes its name from one of Future Shade’s singles, and features Kennedy belting out a passionately sung chorus. “A Thousand Lives was challenging. It was something different, vocally, for me,” he says. “It’s a little bit more personal than any of the singles that we’ve done.” Last year, as they celebrated a decade together, members of The Herd began pulling together old photos, posters and video footage, which have been a visual component of their recent shows. “There’s a lot of archival stuff that we’ve been digging out lately,” Kennedy says. “I think the ten year anniversary was cause for reflection for us. When you’re performing all the time or putting out a record, [always] doing one or the other, it just kind of blurs into one, so it’s nice to have those documents to remember… what we’ve done and where we’ve been.” The tour is a major achievement for Kennedy, after a bike accident on Christmas Eve left him hospitalised with a punctured bladder and a dislocated jaw. He says he has recovered “more or less; enough to perform, anyway. It will be a bit of an ongoing process, but definitely feeling a lot better than I did a month ago.” Kennedy was able to warm up for the A Thousand Lives tour when his other group Astronomy Class – his reggae-hip hop collaboration with producers Chasm and Sir Robbie – travelled to Phnom Penh as part of Tiger Beer’s Tiger Translate program, to perform with Cambodian ‘Khmer Karaoke’ singer Preap Sovath. “It was a really amazing experience, and we got to collaborate with Cambodia’s biggest pop star,” Kennedy says. “[It’s all] about putting on shows and getting artists from around the world to collaborate on different projects.”
Doyle tells me that he’s just put the finishing touches on New Build’s live lineup, and is keen to keep playing with them. “I feel a bit jaded I guess, having been on the road so much with Hot Chip,” he says, “so it’s great to have these new experiences. We came off stage recently and one of the guys said, ‘I’ve never been screamed at like that before!’ We definitely want to keep this going.” Whether New Build will make it to Australia is another matter. “We’d love to, but it’s really expensive,” Doyle admits. “We don’t have a label, we don’t have any financial support at all beyond the Hot Chip war chest we’ve accumulated. Me and Felix have been putting our money into this thing, and it’s nice because we don’t have to be attached to a label, but at the same time, it makes touring difficult – we’d love to take the band to Australia, but that’s taking a lot of people and a lot of gear halfway across the world. It would be great if we were to explode in popularity, or maybe we could do it off the back of a Hot Chip tour or something, but at the moment, it seems a bit unlikely.”
Kennedy’s bike accident led to a series of YouTube videos in which Thundamentals are blamed for sabotaging Kennedy’s bike. “I think it’s just highlighting how multifaceted and talented we all are. We’re really pretty fine actors as well, I think you’ll have to agree,” Kennedy deadpans. Fine actors may be a dubious claim, but there’s no doubting how multifaceted and talented The Herd is – and fans would be well advised to make the most of the group’s presence, before they ebb away again.
What: Yesterday Was Lived And Lost out now through Inertia
What: Better Alive EP out April 20 through Elefant Traks
Mitzi Looking Cool, Sounding Good By Alasdair Duncan
B
risbane’s Mitzi have been a fixture on the live circuit for some time, playing national support slots with everyone from Bag Raiders to Metronomy and The Whitest Boy Alive. The eager up-and-comers have used each and every one of these gigs as a learning experience – an opportunity to further refine their shimmering indie disco sound. “It’s always cool to see bands up close,” says keyboard player Jad Lee, “whether they’re huge international acts or local bands you’ve played with a heap of times before. You can look at their live setup, the things they do onstage, the ways they interact with the audience, and you can always learn something. We’ve been playing live for a while now, mostly learning through trial and error, so being able to take ideas from them and put them into our own show has been amazing.” Touring with like-minded souls Metronomy was a big deal for Mitzi, and was instructive in terms of learning to streamline their own show. “I think it was the moment when we realised that we needed to be a bit more functional,” Lee explains. “We realised being practical and functional was more important than having a dozen analogue keyboards onstage.” When Mitzi started out, they were prone to overloading; lugging an old Korg synth (amongst other bits of gear) around with them to shows. “We realised after a while that it looked and sounded really cool, but it was impossible to take around with us everywhere,” Lee says. “We decided it was better to use smaller synths with software rather than big, vintage ones that
44 :: BRAG :: 458 :: 16:04:12
looked cool but weren’t at all practical.” Thus far, Mitzi are best known for the sprightly single ‘All I Heard’ – you’ve undoubtedly heard it via triple j – but with an album on the way later this year, their profile will soon be even higher. Making the album, Lee tells me, has been a long process. The band initially went into the studio with producer Jono Ma with the intention of recording three songs for a new EP. When the recording was done, they sent the material away for mastering, and while they waited, they continued tinkering in the studio, writing and recording new material. In no time at all, they realised they had 20 songs – more than enough for an album. “That changed the game plan a lot,” Lee admits. “[The album release] is getting closer and closer and we’re getting really excited about finishing it and getting it out there,” Lee says. “Since we did our Whitest Boy Alive tour in January, we’ve taken time off playing live and have been spending all our time in the studio. It’s been really frustrating because we haven’t had new music out there, but we’re really excited about what we’ve been creating, and it will be well worth the wait.” What: Discopunx, Frames, James Taylor Where: The Spice Cellar / 58 Elizabeth St When: Friday April 20 from 10pm More: Also playing live at Major Raiser’s Music Outback Foundation Party @ Beach Road Hotel on Saturday May 5
Deep Impressions Underground Dance And Electronica with Chris Honnery
Modeselektor
erlin duo Modeselektor, who unfortunately cancelled their scheduled Aussie jaunt earlier this year (though with the benefit of hindsight, perhaps this wasn’t so unfortunate given they were slotted to perform at the ill-fated Playground Weekender) have announced details of their Modeselektion Vol. 02 compilation, which will be released in July. The forthcoming mix is the follow-up to 2010’s inaugural Modeselektion compilation, which featured cuts from Ikonika and Optimum, Ramadanman and Bok Bok alongside tracks from underground staples like Robag Wruhme, Shed (who is also gearing up to release a new album, entitled The Killer) and, naturally, Modeselektor themselves, in the process drawing connections between the respective vanguards of Berlin and London. It is said that Modeselektion Vol. 2 will be even grittier than its predecessor, with a presser elucidating, “The monkey on the cover says it all. Compared to the rather cute and peaceful cover of Modeselektion Vol. 01, this time it’s all a bit different. The music on Modeselektion Vol. 02 explores darker, more experimental grounds, certainly still with one eye focused on the trademark Modeselektor party-factor.” The compilation will feature exclusive tracks from the likes of the Australia-bound Clark, Martyn, Egyptrixx and Monolake, alongside tunes from bleeding edge talents such as 50 Weapons signings Dark Sky, Anstam and Addison Groove.
B
Continuing ze German duo motif, the Germanic pair of Âme are set to release a live album composed of 14 of their own tracks, entitled – drumroll please – Âme Live. It will be the duo’s first album in six years (discounting their output alongside Dixon and Henrik Schwarz as A Critical Mass). The tracklist includes exclusively produced/ re-edited versions of many of Âme’s tracks – ‘Rej’ et al – together with their remixes of Underworld, UNKLE and Roy Ayers, and a previously unreleased ‘Beatless’ remix for Kompakt’s architect-cum-techno-monolith Gui Boratto. Âme Live will be released through the Innervisions label, which Âme oversee alongside Dixon. News has come to hand that the New Yorkborn, Berlin-based artist Levon Vincent is touring Australia, with a Melbourne show confirmed for the first weekend of June. The catch? No Sydney show has been officially announced as of yet. However this column has the pig-headed temerity to predict – nay declare – that someone will emerge from
LOOKING DEEPER SATURDAY APRIL 28
Clark The Civic Underground
SATURDAY MAY 5 Nico Stojan One22
SATURDAY MAY 19 Silicone Soul The Spice Cellar
Klartraum (live) GoodGod Small Club
Âme
the pack and snare Vincent for Sydney on his first trip down under (they’d bloody better). Vincent made his name in the early noughties with a string of robust ‘proper’ house singles, mostly released on his own More Music label, before really hitting his sonic straps circa ‘08-09 as he churned out cuts such as ‘Six Figures’ and the dancefloor destroying ‘Double Jointed Sex Freak’. Vincent’s maiden Australian voyage will follow the release of his forthcoming fabric 63 compilation, a 15-track mix comprised mostly of Vincent’s own productions alongside cuts from Underground Quality boss Jus-Ed, DJ Qu, Black Jazz Consortium, Anthony Parasole and Joey Anderson. The mix will include a handful of unreleased tracks from Vincent: ‘Stereo Systems’, ‘Fear’ and ‘The End’, all of which are seemingly set for release on his own Novel Sound label. fabric 63 was apparently recorded on vinyl in Vincent’s Berlin cellar, with Vincent saying, “I wanted to use this opportunity to push my signature sound… I hope people say that I had a commercial opportunity and that I used it to do something artistic.” fabric 63 will be released on April 23. After debuting last year on Fool House, Danish producer Nick Eriksen, who produces as Taragana Pyjarama, has signed with Kompakt to release his first full-length album, Tipped Bowls. Eriksen is said to balance the hypnotism of Krautrock with the lush, wall-of-sound found in modern strains of electronica in his productions, with Kompakt describing the album (which is slotted for a June release) as a “journey that challenges genres and breaks down the annals of bass, beats, and beyond”. Tipped Bowls features collaborations with CHLLNGR and Kicki Halmos, and though I confess I haven’t yet heard it, as a general rule anything put out on the Kompakt label is worth a listen on spec – regardless of whether it’s quirky pop, offbeat disco or bonejarring techno, the Cologne institution does not compromise when it comes to the quality of the productions it supports.
Deep Impressions: electronica manifesto and occasional club brand. Contact through deep.impressions@yahoo.com BRAG :: 458 :: 16:04:12 :: 45
club guide send your listings to : clubguide@thebrag.com
club pick of the week Xxx
SATURDAY APRIL 21
The Standard, Darlinghurst
Yacht Club DJs,
Hunting Grounds, The Fabergettes $20 (+ bf) 8pm MONDAY APRIL 16 Scruffy Murphy’s, Sydney Mother of a Monday DJ Smokin’ Joe free 8pm The Sugar Mill, Kings Cross Makeout Mondays DJs free 8pm The World Bar, Kings Cross Jazz DJs free 7.30pm
TUESDAY APRIL 17 Establishment, Sydney Rumba Motel DJ Willie Sabor free 8pm Scruffy Murphy’s, Sydney I Love Goon DJ Smokin’ Joe free 8pm Trademark Hotel, Kings Cross Coyote Tuesday - We Love Brazil DJs $10 9pm The World Bar, Kings Cross Pop Panic Conrad Greenleaf free 8pm
WEDNESDAY APRIL 18 The Argyle, The Rocks Starjumps, Danny de Sousa free 6pm The Bank Hotel, Newtown Lady L, Jimmy D, Sandi Hotrod, Del, Pawnography, Kitty Glitter, Du Jour free 9pm The Bank Nightclub, Kings Cross Money Talks DJs free 10pm Epping Hotel
46 :: BRAG :: 458 :: 16:04:12
DTF DJs free Flinders Hotel, Surry Hills Hip Hop Resident DJs free 8pm Kit & Kaboodle, Kings Cross Resident DJs free 8pm Lansdowne Hotel, Chippendale Frat House Wolf & The Gang free 9pm The Marlborough Hotel – The Cellar, Newtown Student Night DJ Pauly free 8pm The World Bar, Kings Cross The Wall Brown Bear, Mitch Lowe (NZ), Nefeera, Swiss Dub, Deckhead, Pablo Calamari, Brothers Grimm, Jack Bailey $5 9pm
THURSDAY APRIL 19 The Argyle, The Rocks Kristy Lee, Alice Quiddington free 6pm Cargo Lounge, King St Wharf Dance The Way You Feel Resident DJs free 6pm The Cool Room, Australian Hotel & Brewery, Rouse Hill Traffic Light Party Ajax $10 9pm Flinders Hotel, Surry Hills Bananas Resident DJs 8pm GoodGod Front Bar, Sydney Girls Gone Mild Eliza & Hannah Reilly free 9pm Hunky Dory Social Club, Darlinghurst Beat Skool The Dark Horse 6pm Kit & Kaboodle, Kings Cross
Resident DJs free 8pm Pontoon, Darling Harbour Resident DJs free 9pm Q Bar, Darlinghurst Hot Damn Hot Damn DJs $15$20 8pm Sapphire Lounge, Kings Cross Rack City Resident DJs 9pm Scruffy Murphy’s, Sydney Books or Beer? DJs free 8pm Soho, Potts Point Ladies Night DJs free 9pm Sugar Lounge, Manly Fat Laced Funk Resident DJs 9pm The World Bar, Kings Cross Propaganda Jack Shit, MIT, Shag, Urby, Dan Bombings free-$5 8pm
FRIDAY APRIL 20 34 Degrees South, Bondi Get Down Resident DJs free 8pm The Argyle, The Rocks DJ La Vida, John ‘The Owl’ Devecchis, DJ C’est CHIC free 6pm Arq Sydney, Taylor Square Handbag Heaven Tom Kelly, Luke Leal free 9pm The Bank Hotel, Newtown Fridays DJ Delacroix free 9pm Beach Road Hotel, Bondi Movement Mannequins free 8pm Bungalow 8, Sydney Harbour Bungalow Nights A-Game, Andy Benke, Pat Ward, Murray Lake, Paris Jeffree free 6pm The Burdekin, Darlinghurst DJs free 9pm Cargo Lounge, King St
Wharf Kick On Fridays Resident DJs free 4pm Candys Apartment, Kings Cross Liquid Sky Tom Piper, Vengeance, Kyro & Bomber, Nightmare, Intheory, Nintempo, Retro Junk, Tom Willzy, Theobeats, Bass Jam, Audio Trash, DJ Hustler, Sgt Scotty, New Republic, Jake Culmone 9pm Chinese Laundry, Sydney Metrik (UK), Doctor Werewolf, Joe Barrs, Detektives, Klue, Linken, Gee Fluxz $15-$25 9pm Civic Underground, Sydney Volar Resident DJs 10pm Cohibar, Darling Harbour Gimme Five Jeddy Rowland, Mike Silver free 9pm Dee Why Hotel Flirt DJ Alana 9pm Epping Hotel Flirt DJs free Flinders Hotel, Surry Hills Cleric and Angel free 8pm Goldfish, Kings Cross The Deep End Nicc Johnson, Johnny Gleeson, Tom Kelly free-$10 6pm GoodGod Front Bar, Sydney Yo Grito! Yo Grito DJs free 9pm GoodGod Small Club, Sydney Ben UFO (UK), Kato, Bad Ezzy, Max Gosford, Preacha $15 (+ bf) 11pm Gypsy Lounge, Darlinghurst Warp Speed DJs 9pm Home Nightclub, Sydney Sublime 4 Strings, Peewee Ferris, Thomas Knight, Nick Arbor, Adam Byrne, Big J, DJ Ange, Matt Ferreira, John Young, Flite, IKO & MC Suga Shane $15 (+ bf) 10pm Ivy Changeroom. Sydney Love Gun Fridays Tina Turntables, The Apprentice, Hooligan 8pm Jacksons On George, Sydney DJ Ivan Drago free 9pm Kings Cross Hotel DJ Lok Stok, DJ Liz Bird, DJ Tony Edwards, DJ Stu Turner, Night Owl free 7pm Kit & Kaboodle, Kings Cross Falcona Fridays Dr Don Don, Devola, Isbjorn, Bernie Dingo, Maia $10 8pm Luna Lounge Nightclub, Jacksons On George, Sydney DJ Rain Julz free 9pm The Marlborough Hotel – Level 1, Newtown Resident DJs free 8pm Nevada Lounge, Darlinghurst DJ Hayden free 6pm Oatley Hotel We Love Oatley Hotel Fridays DJ Tone free 8pm Oceans Bar, Coogee DJ Yogi free 6.30pm Omega Lounge, Level 2 City Tattersalls Club, Sydney Unwind Fridays Blended Beats DJs, Greg Summerfield free 5.30pm Opera Bar, Circular Quay Random Soul free 7.30pm Paddington Inn DJ Swim Team free 8pm Pontoon, Darling Harbour Perfect Resident DJs free 9pm Retro Hotel, The Bristol Arms, Sydney The Retro’s Pirate Party DJs 9pm The Roxy, Parramatta Fridaze Resident DJs 4pm Sapphire Lounge, Kings Cross Sapphire Fridays Resident DJs 8pm Scruffy Murphy’s, Sydney Frisky Friday DJs free 6pm The Shark Hotel, Sydney Puls8 DJ Jono, Guest DJs free 9pm Soho, Potts Point Soho Fridays DJs free 9pm Space, Sydney Zaia Resident DJs 9.45pm The Spice Cellar, Sydney Mitzi, Discopunx, Frames, James Taylor 10pm
The Watershed Hotel, Darling Harbour Bring On The Weekend DJ Matt Roberts free 9pm The World Bar, Kings Cross MUM Dead Johnny, Tail, Little Bastard, Jenny Broke The Window, The Upskirts, Louis London, Hunting Grounds, 10th Avenue, Sammy K, Nick La Rosa, Dimes, Wet Lungs, Velociraptor DJs, DZ Deathrays DJs, Mark Dowsett $10-$15 8pm
SATURDAY APRIL 21 The Argyle, The Rocks Phil Hudson, DJ Huw Longman free 9pm Arq Sydney, Taylor Square Dance Dance Dance DJs 9pm The Arthouse Hotel, Sydney Armageddon DJs 9pm The Bank Hotel, Newtown Saturdays Sista P free 9.30pm Bungalow 8, Sydney Harbour Bungalow Nights Dave 54, Super C, Andy Benke, NAD, Warren Jackson free-$10 6pm The Burdekin, Darlinghurst DJs free 9pm Cargo Lounge, King St Wharf Kick On Saturdays Resident DJs free 6pm Candys Apartment, Kings Cross Big Guns Mewtwo, Nightmare, Pretty Young Things, Stalker, Chick Flick, Ethan Boyd, Slip & Slyde, Aero O 9pm Chinese Laundry, Sydney Midland (UK), Peking Duk, The Slips, John Glover, Northie, Ben Korbel, Robbie Lowe, King Lee, Ella Loca, Mo’Funk $15-$25 9pm City Hotel, Sydney Kin.Ki Saturdays DJs 9pm Cohibar, Darling Harbour Yellow Sox Brynstar, Matt Roberts free 8pm Dee Why Hotel Kiss & Fly Saturdays DJs 9pm E11even Nightclub, Paddington Turka Resident DJs $20 9pm Epping Hotel Back Traxx DJ Kandi, DJ Hypnotixx Flinders Hotel, Surry Hills Horne Dogg free 8pm Gladstone Hotel, Chippendale Sonunda T n A, Kayros, Jordan Zed, Beaunatural, Wodjer Want, Kilty Pleasures, Oblingmonster $10 9pm Goldfish, Kings Cross Switch Robbie Lowe, Ben Korbel, Grry Todd, Johnny Gleeson, Tom Brereton, Ben Ashton 8pm GoodGod Front Bar, Sydney All Eras DJs free 9pm GoodGod Small Club, Sydney Jingle Jangle 3rd Birthday Smokey La Beef, Smart Casual $5 11pm Hugo’s Lounge, Kings Cross Saturdays DJ Dolso 8pm Hunky Dory Social Club, Darlinghurst Ghetto Boogie DJs 6pm The Ivy, Sydney Pure Ivy Cut Copy (DJ Set), Ember, Cadell, Emoh Instead, Sushi, Oh Glam, Animal Jeans $20 8.30pm Jacksons On George, Sydney DJ Simon Laing free 9pm Kings Cross Hotel DJ Tim Boffa, DJ James Taylor, Shaun Keble, DJ Junipa, DJ Will Style, DJ Matt Hoare free 7pm Kit & Kaboodle, Kings Cross Kitty Kitty Bang Bang Resident DJs 8pm Luna Lounge Nightclub, Jacksons On George, Sydney DJ Michael Stewart free 9pm The Marlborough Hotel – Level 1, Newtown
Resident DJs free 8pm Nevada Lounge, Darlinghurst DJ Hayden free 6pm Oceans Bar, Coogee DJ Diego Lenis free 7pm One22, Sydney Kevin Griffiths (UK), Belted & Sloppy, Marc Jarvin, Adam Carter & Robbie Myers $15$25 9pm Opera Bar, Circular Quay La Fiesta free 4.30pm Pontoon, Darling Harbour Resident DJs free 9pm Q Bar, Darlinghurst Girlthing – Jelly Wrestling 2012 Girlthing DJs, Kyro & Bomber, Sveta $15 9pm Retro Hotel, The Bristol Arms, Sydney The Retro’s Pirate Party DJs 9pm Sapphire Lounge, Kings Cross The Suite Resident DJs 8pm The Shark Hotel, Sydney Puls8 DJ Jono, Guest DJs free 9pm Spectrum, Darlinghurst Rufus, Polographia $12 (+ bf) 8pm sold out Spectrum, Darlinghurst Kittens Kittens DJs $5-$10 11.30pm The Spice Cellar, Sydney Dean Tyler (UK), YokoO, Gabby $20 10pm The Standard, Darlinghurst Yacht Club DJs, Hunting Grounds, The Fabergettes $20 (+ bf) 8pm Star Bar, Sydney Situation DJs 10pm The Sugar Mill, Kings Cross Rockin Retro Disco DJs free 6pm Tunnel Nightclub, Kings Cross ONE Saturdays Resident DJs $10-$20 10pm The Watershed Hotel, Darling Harbour Watershed Presents… Skybar $15 9.30pm The World Bar, Kings Cross Cakes Birdee (UK), Blaze Tripp, Pablo Calamari, Adam Zae, Boonie, Hannah Gibbs, Illya, Ben Morris, Johnny Rad, Foundation, Saywhut, Bentley, Nate Perry $15-$20 8pm
SUNDAY APRIL 22 The Argyle, The Rocks Random Soul DJs free 6pm Arq Sydney, Taylor Square Dirty Disco DJs 9pm The Beresford Hotel, Surry Hills Beresford Sundays DJs free 5pm Cargo Lounge, King St Wharf Cargo del Mar Future Classic DJs, Set Mo free 3pm Coogee Bay Hotel – Arden Lounge Cointreauversal DJs free 3pm Goldfish, Kings Cross Martini Club DJ Tom Kelly free 6pm Hugo’s Lounge, Kings Cross Sneaky Sundays Residents DJs 8pm Kit & Kaboodle, Kings Cross Easy Sundays Resident DJs free 8pm Oatley Hotel Sunday Sets DJ Tone free 7pm Sapphire Lounge, Kings Cross Sapphire Sundays Resident DJs 8pm The Spice Cellar, Sydney Spice Matt Weir, Murat Kilic $20 4am The Watershed Hotel, Darling Harbour Afternoon DJs DJ Matt Roberts free 2pm The World Bar, Kings Cross Dust James Taylor, Alley Oop, Ben Korbel, Pow Pow free 9pm
club picks
snap
up all night out all week...
up all night out all week . . .
boss bass
PICS :: AM
Mitzi
05:04:12 :: Chinese Laundry :: 111 Sussex St Sydney 82959958
WEDNESDAY APRIL 18
Ajax
The World Bar, Kings Cross The Wall Brown Bear, Mitch Lowe (NZ), Nefeera, Swiss Dub, Deckhead, Pablo Calamari, Brothers Grim, Jack Bailey $5 9pm
THURSDAY APRIL 19 The Cool Room, Australian Hotel & Brewery, Rouse Hill Traffic Light Party Ajax $10 9pm
krs-one
FRIDAY APRIL 20 Chinese Laundry, Sydney Metrik (UK), Doctor Werewolf, Joe Barrs, Detektives, Klue, Linken, Gee Fluxz $15$25 10pm
PICS :: AM
The World Bar, Kings Cross Propaganda Jack Shit, MIT, Shag, Urby, Dan Bombings free-$5 8pm
05:04:12 :: The Enmore :: 118 -132 Enmore Rd Newtown 9550 3666
Metrik
The Spice Cellar, Sydney Mitzi, Discopunx, Frames, James Taylor 10pm
SATURDAY APRIL 21
05:04:12 :: GoodGod Small Club :: 53-55 Liverpool St Sydney 92673787
Goldfish, Kings Cross Switch Robbie Lowe, Ben Korbel, Garry Todd, Johnny Gleeson, Tom Brereton, Ben Ashton 8pm GoodGod Small Club, Sydney Jingle Jangle 3rd Birthday Smokey La Beef, Smart Casual $5 11pm One22, Sydney Kevin Griffiths (UK), Belted & Sloppy, Marc Jarvin, Adam Carter & Robbie Myers $15-$25 9pm Spectrum, Darlinghurst Rufus, Polographia $12 (+ bf) 8pm sold out The Spice Cellar, Sydney Dean Tyler (UK), YokoO, Gabby $20 10pm The World Bar, Kings Cross Cakes Birdee (UK), Blaze Tripp, Pablo Calamari, Adam Zae, Boonie, Hannah Gibbs, Illya, Ben Morris, Johnny Rad, Foundation, Saywhut, Bentley, Nate Perry $15-$20 8pm
m.a.n.d.y
PICS :: RR
Ben Korbel
wolf & cub
PICS :: AM
GoodGod Small Club, Sydney Ben UFO (UK), Kato, Bad Ezzy, Max Gosford, Preacha $15 (+ bf) 11pm
07:04:12 :: Chinese Laundry :: 111 Sussex St Sydney 82959958 :: RASA JUSKEVICIUTE :: ASHLEY S : TIM LEVY (HEAD HONCHO) OUR LOVELY PHOTOGRAPHER :: SAM WHITESIDE Y TNE WHI TIM ROUHANNA :: MAR :: DANIEL MUNNS :: ROSETTE
BRAG :: 458 :: 16:04:12 :: 47
snap up all night out all week . . .
propaganda
PICS :: DM
party profile
killPOP rooftop It’s called: KillPOP Rooftop It sounds like: Dubstep and filthy electro Who’s playing? Kuriosity Killz, 3-Bit DJs and Daniel Kael. Secret acts on the way! Three songs you’ll hear on the night: Knife Party – ‘Fire Hive’; Feed Me – ‘Trapdoor’; Rusko – ‘Everyday (Netsky Remix )'. And one you definitely won’t: Avicii – ‘Level s’. Sell it to us: KillPOP Rooftop is Sydney’s bigge st dubstep rooftop party, held in the heart of the CBD and showcasing the dirtiest dubstep and electro! This event is not for sensitive souls – we're bringi ng all things dirty out from the underground and dropping them loud upon Sydney’s fine skyline. The bit we’ll remember in the AM: With the under-priced drinks, not a great deal. Maybe the badass bass to go along with the amazing views from the roof. Crowd specs: Bass-face lovers and dance floor shakers. Wallet damage: $10 Where: Hotel Sweeneys / 236 Clarence Street (cnr Druitt St) When: Sat April 21/2pm-2am – and every secon d Saturday thereafter!
kittens
PICS :: SW
moodymann
PICS ::AM
05:04:12 :: World Bar :: 24 Bayswater Rd Kings Cross 93577700
31:03:12 :: Spectrum :: 34-44 Oxford st Darlinghurst Sydney 9331 3100
easter island
PICS :: AM
05:04:12 :: The Spice Cellar :: 58 Elizabeth St Sydney
bag raiders
PICS :: TW
08:04:12 :: World Bar :: 24 Bayswater Rd Kings Cross 93577700
:: RASA JUSKEVICIUTE :: ASHLEY S : TIM LEVY (HEAD HONCHO) OUR LOVELY PHOTOGRAPHER :: SAM WHITESIDE Y TNE ROUHANNA :: TIM WHI MAR :: DANIEL MUNNS :: ROSETTE
48 :: BRAG :: 458 :: 16:04:12
strike
PICS :: AM
05:04:12 :: The Australian Brewery :: 350 Annangrove Rd Rouse Hill 9679 4555
07:04:12 :: Strike Bowling :: King St Wharf Darling Harbour
FREE BOWLING WITH EVERY DRINK SOLD!
ALL DAY SUNDAYS AT STRIKE KING ST WHARF THE PROMANADE, KING ST WHARF, DARLING HARBOUR
$6 MINIMUM SPEND. CONDITIONS APPLY. PLEASE SEE WEBSITE FOR DETAILS.
FIND US ON
BRAG :: 458 :: 16:04:12 :: 49
snap
gorge
PICS :: RJ
picnic feat kink
PICS :: AM
up all night out all week . . .
07:04:12 :: The Spice Cellar :: 58 Elizabeth St Sydney
hold tight!
PICS :: RR
08:04:12 :: The Spice Cellar :: 58 Elizabeth St Sydney
roman flügel
PICS :: AM
07:04:12 :: Oxford Art Factory :: 38-46 Oxford St Darlinghurst 9332 3711
08:04:12 :: The Abercrombie Hotel :: 100 Broadway Ultimo 9211 3486
08:04:12 :: The Greenwood Hotel :: 36 Blue St North Sydney 9964 9477 :: RASA JUSKEVICIUTE :: ASHLEY S : TIM LEVY (HEAD HONCHO) OUR LOVELY PHOTOGRAPHER :: SAM WHITESIDE Y TNE ROUHANNA :: TIM WHI MAR :: DANIEL MUNNS :: ROSETTE
50 :: BRAG :: 458 :: 16:04:12
party profile
circoloco
PICS :: AM
traffic light party It’s called: Traffic Light Party It sounds like: All the latest house and electr o party anthems upstairs, and purely RnB and hip hop downstairs. Who’s spinning: AJAX. Three songs you’ll hear on the night: Tom Piper feat. Chrome and Styler – ‘Ooh Now’ (What So Not remix); Twinsy – ‘Take Me Home’; Joe Goddard – ‘Gabriel’ (Compound One remix). And one you definitely won’t: John Farnh am – ‘Burn For You’. Sell it to us: We’re taking the guesswork out of trying to meet new people: green = single, orange = complicated, red = taken. The bit we’ll remember in the AM: Having an awesome time, meeting heaps of cool people and partying to some of the best tunes out. Details will be vague though, due to too many $5 drinks . Crowd specs: 1,300 young party animals, who don’t give a sh*t about work in the morning... Wallet damage: $5 drinks, $10 cover charg e Where: Cool Room @ Australian Brewery / 350 Annangrove Rd, Rouse Hill When: Thursday April 19 from 8pm
SATURDAY
APRIL 28TH
+
The BRIGHT
YOUNG THINGS
+
Ginger & Drum 34 OXFORD ST SYD
ENTry $10 Tickets available at www.qbar.iwannaticket.com.au