The birthplace of Where’s One was a dilapidated Californian bungalow in Melbourne’s Western suburbs. Recording began just hours before the tragic death of The Citradels‘ former drummer and friend Connor Tolson, which set the tone for what was to come. Drawn out over nine months, layers and fragments were meticulously arranged. Most songs were conceived individually, though their form significantly adapted over time with shared input. In spite of this, the album retains an introspective and highly personal quality.
The Citradels’ trademark early sound is referenced with opener ‘Barnyard’ yet descends into something much darker and more repetitious. Sweet relief comes with ‘Piscine’, which straddles the strung-out yet playful arrangements of an increasingly paranoid Brian Wilson. The earnest ‘Pets on Fire’ has the emotive subtleties of Galaxie 500 in mind. ‘Already Gone’ bubbles away with angst and indecision while the otherworldly and uncomfortably dark love song ‘Pelican’ closes side A. ‘Sugarplum’ conjures the playful 60s, mixing in slices of attention deficit musical changes. ‘Sunflower Man’ plays with time and repetition to coax the listener down the rabbit hole. ‘Goosestep’ begins life as a slow burning Lennon-esque piano ballad with acid folk and feedback gradually creeping in. ‘Riding with Him’ is an optimistic ode to a friend now gone which bleeds into ‘Dumb Angel’, closing side B with a reverb drenched farewell.
Since they burst onto Australia’s indie rock scene in 2015 with their debut album, The Positions, Gang of Youths have been one of Australia’s best kept secrets. Their warped, proggy take on indie rock has gotten them fans around the world, and they’ve seemed like they’re on the cusp of breaking through in a big way.
Which is why we’re hyped to bring you this premiere of their brand new video for “What Can I Do If The Fire Goes Out.” Made by Thomas Rawle, a self-taught animator, the song’s rushing riff is backed by images of fleeing animated fauna, warplanes, diving whales, and pirate ships. Here’s what Rawle said about the narrative arc of the video:
“With this clip, the band sent me some paintings by Norton Wisdom as a point of reference as well as television show Evangelion. There was also the desire to not have something super narrative driven, the song reminded me of the dread of running out of life in your life if that makes sense? So with that notion I kinda imagined a boy on the moon who has to fly down to save earth from a strange fire, he’s chased by giant flying sail boats which eventually end up being his vessel for rescue. It’s loose in terms of narrative so hopefully everyone can take something different from it.”
05.25.2017 Sound Control – Manchester, UK , 05.27.2017 Sound City – Liverpool, UK , 05.28.2017 The Sunflower Lounge – Birmingham, UK, 05.30.2017 Green Door Store – Brighton, UK, 05.31.2017 BarFly – London, UK
The Brisbane trio of Tom Lindeman, Rian King and Stu McKenzie have curated a sound, that although harbours strong indie-pop influences, is much more layered than your standard, run of the mill indie-pop. Thrown into the mix are surf influences and classic rock n roll undertones that intertwine slow, laid-back vibes with more upbeat and bouncy sounds. Indie-pop can sometimes come off sounding a bit flat and lifeless, but the interpretation Good Boy have clued onto offers up a textured and unique sound, which in the long run will keep them a step ahead of the rest.”
Cable Ties is a name that’s been echoing around the dimply-lit pubs and clubs of Melbourne for a little while now, a raucous three-person shout that’s pricked the ears of all who’ve heard it in the band’s short lifespan.
It’s exciting to see that, despite having only kicked things off in 2015, they’ve just found a home with local legends Poison City Records as they gear up to release their debut LP. It’s the perfect place for them too, seeing them nestled alongside bands like Luca Brasi, Clowns, Screamfeeder, The Nation Blue, PCR’s formidable stable of noisy, noisy bands.
Having said that, Cable Ties are more than just a heap of noise ,they’re one of the new crop of bands pushing for recognition for female and non-gender-conforming acts . Having helped in carving out an enclave of acceptance in the Melbourne scene, they’re ideal candidates to expand that further . Their debut album will be out in May via, Poison City Records, but right now you can give their brand new track a spin below.
Shades of Souixie/Joy Division/Magazine/All that was good in the 80’s…with a fresh twist. And I think I can hear some Au Pairs in there somewhere to,
Taken from forthcoming debut album on Poison City Records.
Though he achieved his greatest notoriety as the founder of Australia’s punk progenitors Radio Birdman, Deniz Tek is a Detroit kid—no surprise, as guttural guitar ferocity like his has the Rust Belt written all over it. RadioBirdman were shot through with Detroit influences, specifically via the Stooges—their name came from a misheard Iggy lyric, and their rehearsal space/clubhouse was dubbed the Funhouse.
In later post-Birdman years, Tek would play in bands with ex-Stooges, like New Race with Stooges guitarist Ron Asheton, and the short-lived (exactly two gigs) and underdocumented Dodge Main, whose live lineup featured the MC5’s Wayne Kramer, Stooges’ Scott Asheton, Sonic’s Rendezvous Band’s Scott Morgan, and The UP!’s Gary Rasmussen, with Jimmy Zero of the Dead Boys.
Tek is releasing a four-song E.P. with later Stooges guitarist James Williamson, titled “Acoustic K.O”. a play on the title of Iggy and the Stooges’ live album “Metallic K.O . It features four Williamson compositions “Penetration” and “I Need Somebody” both from Raw Power, and “Night Theme” and “No Sense of Crime” from the 1977 Pop/Williamson album “Kill City” . The acoustic transformations are startling and quite effective. Williamson: says
The songs of Acoustic K.O. are pearls from my youth, which are almost equally familiar to Deniz Tek from his. In fact the same could be said for the others on this record, to varying degrees. The process of recording them acoustically enhanced their luster with new clarity from re-interpretation. We love how it turned out.
He ain’t wrong—“I Need Somebody” seems a natural for an acoustic treatment, and the new version with Tek maintains the original’s menacing stomp. A more substantial transformation occurs on “Penetration,” but the E.P.’s real stunners are “No Sense of Crime,” on which Tek duets with Annie Hardy of Giant Drag, and “NightTheme”; the original on Kill City it’s a noisy-ish guitar theme-and-reprise suite that straddles the LP’s two sides, but here it’s a lush instrumental featuring a full orchestra.
Australian Post Rock band Sleepmakeswaves release their long awaited third studio full length album Made of Breath Only
Following on from 2014’s acclaimed LP Love Of Cartography, Made Of Breath Only is a wonderfully ambitious, sonically lush collection of world-class post-rock only hinted at through its lauded first single, Tundra.
The album which runs for just shy of an hour contains a wealth of engaging, imaginative soundscapes that defy lengthy runtimes (midpoint track The Edge Of Everything spans more than 10-and-a-half minutes) to remain captivating through peaks, troughs, dynamic shifts and all manner of other aural tricks over which the band has developed a formidable command through the years.
Sleepmakeswaves are a notoriously hard-working outfit, and have been on the road consistently this year; their 2017 got seriously under way with a support slot for US juggernauts Underoath in February and most recently saw them knock over an extensive tour of China earlier this month.
This is a band that has truly clawed their way from the underground to some seriously lofty heights over the course of their career, and you can make yourself a part of the adventure (if you haven’t already) at any one of their upcoming shows.
Cameron Avery is best known as bassist of Australian psych-rockers Tame Impala, as well as frontman of fellow Australian band The Growl. Over the last few years he’s been building up his very own solo career, doing some opening performances under his own name, including support for The Last Shadow Puppets tour last year .
On March 10th, Avery released his debut solo album “Ripe Dreams, Pipe Dreams” via Anti Records . He celebrated the release of the album one day early with a performance at Baby’s All Right in Brooklyn. The show actually almost didn’t happen, as Avery got held up at the airport until nearly 6pm due to an issue with U.S. customs (something that will sadly probably become a problem for many artists in the next four years). Thankfully, he made it work, and the show went on.
The lineup of his band had changed quite a bit since the last time I saw him, as his band The Growl had joined him to bring his songs to life. Avery expanded the setlist by included a few of The Growl’s songs (“Douse The Lamps” and “John the Revelator”) along with the soulful songs off his record. It was a nice mix that added a little bit of power to the show, and let his band enter their comfort zone for just a moment.
The show was nearly sold out, and based on the crossover appeal from Tame Impala and The Last Shadow Puppets, and the fact that he’s writing some really good songs, it’s only a matter of time until he breaks out on his own. There’s also the undeniable fact that the women at this show were loving him, making it clear that his fan base will be growing in no time at all.
Olivia Hally and Pepita Emmerichs are the “Oh” and the “Pep!” in this Melbourne band. They write mostly upbeat music filled with questions about desire and life’s priorities and considerations. Their pop sensibilities offer more twists and turns than the usual “verse/chorus” formula, but there are still big, catchy hooks. It’s just that those hooks seem to happen after you’ve taken a journey through a story, so the hook sinks much deeper and offers a kind of emotional relief.
Hally and Emmerichs have been making music since secondary school; they’re now both 24. The band’s use of fiddle, mandolin and harmonies are refreshingly original.
Stadium Cake is Oh Pep!’s debut album, recorded in Nova Scotia. Each of the duo’s previous three EPs is a progression into ever more complex songwriting and intricate playing. They’re funny at times, and they can be thoughtful and thought-provoking, sometimes in the same song. Stadium Cake expands on Hally and Emmerichs‘ talents, to the point where it surprised me how detailed and intricate they are as both players and listeners. I’ve come to find new favorites, though “Doctor Doctor” and “The Race” were the standouts. Put this on repeat, and by the time you stop, phrases like, “I know what I want and it’s not what I need” may be part of your own personal soundtrack.
Crazy Feels is taken from Oh Pep!’s debut album “Stadium Cake”
Rolling Blackouts Coastal Fever Melbourne quintet Rolling Blackouts Coastal Fever shows that there’s a distinct difference between American surf rock and the Aussie breed. There’s an utter lack of slackerdom in their polished riffs and vocals from this band, which also sounds like it took influence from Morrissey and Rachel Aggs of Brit-punk outfit Shopping. This determination, emphasized on the the eponymous single from their upcoming “The French Press” EP hints that they may be the next big thing to come out of Melbourne’s rich scene
The Church Band’s ‘Priest=Aura’ released 20 years ago today. Been listening to this one a lot lately. Where do you think it ranks in the band’s discography? Pretty near the top for me…Priest=Aura (styled as priest=aura) is the eighth album by the Australian psychedelic rock band The Church , released in March 1992
After touring their previous album,Gold Afternoon Fix (1990), with new drummerJay Dee Daugherty (Patti Smith Group), The Church returned to Sydney’s Studios 301 to commence work on new material. With lowered commercial expectations and less pressure from Arista Records, the atmosphere was more relaxed than the fraught L.A. sessions for their previous two albums. Bringing in British producer Gavin MacKillop to supervise the sessions, the band began to improvise the framework for the next set of songs. The use of opium and, for Kilbey, heroin, saw the material take on a more expansive and surreal quality, while Daugherty’s occasionally jazz-like approach on drums brought a fresh change.
Titled Priest=Aura, from Kilbey’s misreading of a Spanish fan’s English vocabulary notes (‘priest’ = ‘cura’), the album contained fourteen tracks, several over six minutes long. At nearly 65 minutes, it was their longest release so far. With song concepts derived from cryptic, one-word working titles (an idea originally proposed by Willson-Piper), the lyrics leaned towards the abstract and esoteric. Emphasising free association and undirected coincidence between music and motif, Kilbey declined to define their meanings. Sonically, the interplay between Koppes and Willson-Piper dominated throughout, especially on tracks such as “Ripple,” “Kings,” and the epic, aptly titled “Chaos”, whose lyrics were a reflection of Kilbey’s unsettled lifestyle at the time.
Upon its release on March 10th, 1992 (it was issued in the United States slightly before Australia), Priest=Aura had less chart success than any of its predecessors, It was given a mixed reception. Rolling Stone‘s Ira Robbins called the album “rich in texture” but with an “arid atmosphere”. The band went on a sold-out tour of Australia (the “Jokes-Magic-Souvenirs” tour), as Kilbeyprepared for the birth of his twin daughters, but after the final gig founding guitarist Peter Koppes announced his departure. Increasing personality conflicts, especially with Willson-Piper, who had been moonlighting with UK band All About Eve, combined with frustration over The Church’s declining chart success had made the situation intolerable. Koppes would eventually return to guest with the band on their 1996 album Magician Among the Spirits and rejoined permanently in 1997.
Despite its muted reception at the time of release, Priest=Aura is considered by both the band and fan base to be an artistic high point. In 2011 the album, along with Untitled #23and Starfish, was played in its entirety on the band’s 30th Anniversary “Future, Past, Perfect” tour. In his 2014 autobiography, Something Quite Peculiar, Kilbey calls it their “undisputed masterpiece”.
The original 1992 Australian release was bundled with the 1991 rarities album A Quick Smoke at Spot’s: Archives 1986-1990.
A 2-CD remastered edition was released in Australia in 2005. The second disc included the tracks “Ripple (single edit)”, “Nightmare”, “Fog”, “Feel (extended mix)”, “Drought” and “Unsubstantiated”.
In 2011,Second Motion Records re-released the album as part of their 30th Anniversary Remaster series, with the bonus tracks “Nightmare” and “Fog”, in a cardboard sleeve with a booklet containing lyrics, photos and sleeve notes by Marty Willson-Piper.
The Fat Angel Sings 