Video Vacuum - Dollar Bar, Beach Arabs, Wireheads, Sneers, Peter Escott

I am scurrying around London trying to find a job. Not having much luck to be honest. Still, I'm trying to be patient. Plus it gives me time to sit down and listen to some great music. But then I get stir crazy and need my visuals stimulated too. So here are five vids that are doing the bizniz.

First up are these perennial clownish nice guys, Dollar Bar. They were "big" in some sense back in the '00s, then gave up on the idea of chasing the Triple J buck, before reuniting for a mate's 40th, realised they still dug playing all of these GBV guitar pop games, jammed a bunch, played a bit, and put out new record Paddington Worker's Club. They are playing the excellent looking Blurst of Times festival in October alongside the likes of Blank Realm, Dick Diver, UV Race, Hard Ons, TV Colours, Day Ravies and our very own Roku Music. Word is that Dollar Bar themselves might be joining the SM stable in 2015... Watching this video of '(You're Blind) Baby' (directed by Matt Banham) of guitarist/singer Chris Yates having "the time of his life" and see if this is a good move... What party animals, I feel the hangover kicking in just watching this...

Beach Arabs - "Drifters" from Mouca on Vimeo.

Getting a bit more jumped up (and following in the trend of doing 60s/70s montages as film clips - which I am really digging incidentally) is Liz Hogg's outfit Beach Arabs. Helps that this is a great menagerie of seaside party times. Wild Movement was a good lil album, and Hogg is currently playing around Spain and other parts of continental Europe - well worth checking out if you can.

Wireheads - Five Grand from Format Records on Vimeo.

Damn I love Adelaide idiots Wireheads. Their album The Late Great Wireheads is killer - somewhere between Bed Wettin Bad Boys and more downtuned, downtrodden, dirty fare (Per Purpose comes to mind). This ode to Adelaide showcases the whiny, strained, unhinged vocal delivery of Dom Trimboli and crunched, screwed violin of Tom Spall - and how easy it is to get drunk at a mate's place on Coopers Red and make a killer video. I think I have listened to this song eleven times today - and it's not even close to the best song on the album. Bloody great stuff.

I missed out on writing about Berlin-based nihilists Sneers' last record For Our Soul - Uplifting Lights To Shine As Fires (out through Brigadisco - trust me, you really need this) so here is a video of 'Self-Atoning Apostasy' to get you fanging for it. Watching a couple eating surrounded by red velvet; flashes of goth darkness, domestic violence, blood-caked skin, caressing foliage, self-mutilation, shotguns, prostate sex, all soundtracked by dissonance and fear. I really love these guys. It's all sordid and evil no wave wailings - right up my alley.

And as a final bonus, here is Native Cat Peter Escott doing his own thing. He has just released solo album The Long O through Bedroom Suck (I reviewed the album briefly at The Music over here) - it's a fascinating portraiture of an artist both confident and insecure, flamboyant and subdued. Great lyrics, beguiling compositions. And I really like this film clip too - especially Escott's dance moves. There is something emotionally bare about them, yet hidden due to the secluded nature of the surroundings, that resonates with me. Plus it makes me homesick for Australia. It truly does.

NOW GET BACK TO WORK!

Wild Movements In The Arabian Dunes

About this time last year I gave a little lip service to Brooklyn wonky popheads band Beach Arabs. They finally have a full-length out, also called Wild Movement, and it's jam-packed full of frenetic, off-kilter, sunny concoctions that rock and/or roll. Liz Hogg is a happy amalgam of Screaming Females' Marisa Paternoster and Kim Deal in a dialled-down Breeders mode, whilst Nathaniel Sabat's droll, Lee Ranaldo-esque drawled deliveries offers a poignant counterpoint, two roughies that rub together to make a diamond. The focus remains the manic tempo shifts and Hogg's pitch-perfect noodling however, the math-lite precision (see closer 'Under The Whale') that underpins these lo-fi ramblings and elevates them beyond mere garage also-rans into something more appealing, a whispier Deerhoof, a American slacker take on Trash Kit or an East Coast Raincoats. Not that Beach Arabs are scaling those heady heights just yet - but with Wild Movement, they have at least made it to base camp.

You can grab Wild Movement through Mouca Records here.

Wild Movements On The Arabian Beach

 

A quick catch up post about a little Brooklyn band called Beach Arabs. They are prepping their Wild Movement release and it’s the kind of discordant post-punk that doesn’t take itself very seriously – so the punch and jaggedness is tempered by a grin and a hug. Imagine if Kim Deal fronted Screaming Females, or a sped up, sun blessed Life Without Buildings (although there is no ‘New Town’ here).

 

Wild Movement has been sitting on the shelf for a few months now – we here in Australia would love it to come out, just so it can soundtrack our summer. Especially for those gearing up for a carefree, care less, loose and easy summer that is all about casual impromptu parties, hook ups and skinny dips.