Julia Wheel

I’ve written about Sydney trio JuliaWhy? before, and have even reviewed their album Wheel a few months ago (you can read that over on The Music website here), but thought I would give it a little lip service today seeing as the band are really getting some strong footholds this year, what with their Canadian Music Week shows and supporting hyped degenerates Fat White Family.

Anyway, Wheel is pretty solid. Maybe it’s the main riff throughout opener ‘Turntable’, but I am reminded of Joy Division, although the sound is more akin to fellow Sydneysiders Mere Women (with a few extra streaks of sunlight and a few extra tears of gutter punk). The gritty riffs that kick off ‘Bride To Be’ are certainly at the forefront of Aussie rock circles thanks to Courtney Barnett’s garage conflagrations, yet this is more aggro in the rolling drums and shouted vocals, which slides into the pastel abrasion of ‘Painkiller’. To flail from post-punk machinations to garage chugging to raucous punk implosions over three songs and five minutes may seem schizophrenic on paper, but the sonic throughlines are held firmly together by Julia's energetic vocal delivery and a tight engine room. ‘La La Love’ fucks with the formula some, highlighting a proclivity for doo-woop garage that explodes into more serrated fare without a second glance, whilst ‘Just One Night’ is the closest the band comes to a straight-up mainstream hit, a power-pop trip that keeps it strong and simple, stupid. ‘Flowers’ is the kind of song Frente would have thrown out if they were more hedonistic; ‘Im Not Gay But Your Boyfriend Is’ grunges things up and brings the tone down even further. Yet for me the propulsive closer ‘What You Want’ is the clincher, a Sleater-Kinney echo down the line, showing serious chops amidst the gurning. A lot of fun indeed.

Get Wheel now through Exxe Records.

Australian Pride, Sonic Masala Style (Pt1)

SO MANY AUSSIE BANDS DOING GOOD THINGS. So let's check some of the most recent ones out!

Let's start with my currently most played song from one of the best bands in Australia. 'Flesh War' is the first taste from the upcoming Total Control record Typical System, coming out on the excellent Iron Lung label. It's shaved away some of the industrial dirge that lurked in the corners and fully embraced the 80s Gothic New Wave. This doesn't even feel Australian - if it weren't for Mikey Young's guitar lines, I would thing we were in Berlin on a snow blasted Sunday, time indeterminate, all pofaced and windswept, black coats and wasted gazes. In short, it's amazing. Cannot wait to hear how this all comes together - colour this my most anticipated release of 2014. Always a dangerous comment to make - but it can't be unmade now...

Three bands are playing tonight in Brisbane that have new music out. Depraved goth rock trio Gazar Strips are launching their second EP Sparkling on yours truly's Sonic Masala Records. I can't go into too much detail as that would be self-aggrandising, but obviously I like it, especially closer 'Bee Mantis'. Pre-order the EP here.

Then there is Naked Maja, who have been steadily building elliptical steam since the release of their Disillusion EP last year. They have a new single at the ready, 'Out Of Mind', and it's a slice of tempered, considered mood, a salubrious offering that nevertheless feels suspended in formaldehyde, the sun piercing the liquid in amber shards, a sleepwalking daydream in between worlds. It's this kind of sun drunk miasmic emotion that this band does so well, a meticulous deconstruction/reconstruction of pop conventions. Great stuff - their The Vagrant EP promises to be another bar raiser.

Finally there is one-man darkness machine The Steady As She Goes, whose Dangerous & Dead LP is a brooding, calculating winner. All brooding theatrics in a minimalist pit, this act is one of the more understated must-see acts in Australia at the moment. It's the fact that the magnetic pull comes from one man, sucking the air out of the room at the first few notes of the guitar, that makes his performances so hypnotic. All three bands, alongside the excellent Barge With An Antenna On It (who are recording new music the following day at Incremental Studios) and Hypnotic Bedrooms, all at the Underdog for a tenner. See you there.

Now for another current favourite album from a band I can't get enough of right now. Melbourne four-piece Nun have released their debut self-titled record through Aarght! (Australia) and AVANT! (Europe), therefore letting it slip that they love exclamation marks. And darkness - plenty of darkness. For Nun is one delectably dark spiral of despair. Opening track 'Immersion II' is by far my favourite due to its chaotic atonal nature, but the way it bleeds straight into 'Evoke The Sleep' is brilliant. Apocryphal synth madness - can't beat that. 

Keeping things dark is label No Patience, who has just brought forth two great releases from doomed soothsayer Lakes and gutter scum Flesh World. Lakes' Carved Remains/Face In The Ash 7" follows hotly on the heels of last year's Blood Of The Grove LP, and these two tracks are another cut above, filled with sworling gothic tension and pent up anguish. There is a vibrating intensity that hums at the heart of these tracks, even as Sean Bailey's delivery seems at once teeth-gnashing and slack-jawed - on the precipice between exultation and damnation. No such tightrope walking for Flesh World though - their Planned Obsolescence EP is a breakneck kick into the abyss. This kind of thrash wasn't made to be heard on anything other than shitty cassettes thrown onto a bonfire, but now that they are on vinyl expect this devilish energy and power to ooze out and consume the world. 

Let's travel to Newcastle now and catch up with Bare Grillz. This band brought out Friends at the beginning of the year, and it's an excellent record that I unfortunately slept on until only a few weeks ago. There is a rawness to the recording where you can hear the mistakes, elements of the studio wouldn't normally take in, and this is the Araldite glue that stick all of this atonal angular aggression in place. It has that hollowed dissonance that some of the NZ bands that dole out this type of warped noise tend to have woven into their DNA, and that is an imminently good thing. A real grower - hopefully the boys return for a show up north sometime soon.

I'm running out of time because I have to go eat a handful of flu tablets so I can make it through the Gazar Strips show tonight alive - although Ill probably try to drown the germs in liquor anyway - so I thought I would end this first instalment of Aussie awesomeness with everybody's favourite, Courtney Barnett. She played The Tonight Show With Jimmy Fallon, she has the video clip out that is at the bottom of this post, and she has this interactive zine about her tour/trip that you can colour. I could write for hours more about this, but Ill leave it for now. Keep between the lines! Come back tomorrow for the next instalment, featuring the likes of Wizard Oz, The Seaport and the Airport, Austin Buckett, Full Ugly, No Action, Freak Wave and lots more!

Getting Finked At The Royal Witherspoon

I don't know anything much about Melbourne wistful kids The Finks (except they aren't likely to be burly bikers with eccies and shotties - although it could still be the skinny hipster above). I was looking around the Milk! Records (Courtney Barnett, Jen Cloher) store the other day and stumbled across this EP, At The Royal Witherspoon, and it's been the salve to the wounds of a stress-heavy week. Why? The six songs on this cassette reverberates through my bones, the kind of jangly slow paced indie joys that Aussies pumped out with heady regularity some fifteen years ago. These humourous, verbose songs strike a chord, taking me back to those early 2000s where space, guitar and personal lyrics involved witticisms and personal letdowns as opposed to dilapidated house parties and missed Centrelink forms. Let it inform your weekend - these Finks may be sorry excuses, but as the battler entrenched in the barstool next to you down at your local, you couldn't wish for a nicer inebriated wingman. Especially when Sam Cooper tells his incredible narrative 'Alternate Histories'. Choc tops, serial killer projectionists, Benson & Hedges, smoking with matches - man, I love this EP. This is going to be a great weekend...

There's 8 copies of the cassette still available, so if I were you I'd get in now.

Brendan's Favourite Songs of 2013

Whilst my other two top 10s will be a bit more definitive, here are TWENTY songs that stuck in my head a lot this year - whether they are the BEST twenty is of contention, even with me. Ah well, let's have at it then...

20. Mogwai - Remurdered

As if a list of songs from me wouldn't feature Mogwai. This song has taken a lot of people by surprise - but this is Mogwai now. And I can deal with it. Very much. This track is just as dark as their transcendent white pulse nightmares of Young Team, just from a different sonic universe.

19. FIDLAR - Cocaine

This isn't the best song from these guys, but they were excellent fun at the dire Splendour In The Grass this year, and Ron Swanson pisses on people. Fin.

18. Crying - Bodega Run

Chiptune guitar pop whimsy? That mosquito buzz at the beginning is painful...but give it a few seconds, and for the live instrumentation to crash on in, and everything makes sense. I'm stuck in a 90s 8bit skateboarding RPG!

17. Violent Soho - Covered In Chrome

I am so proud of these boys and their new album Hungry Ghost. I would have this at the top of every list if I was ten years younger - effervescent, virile grunge rock played at maximum velocity. The fact I still think it's a great album even when I rarely visit these realms anymore is a testament to its success. I've seen them play live four times this year alone and I felt the years melt away every time. And they are the best dudes on the planet. Keep killing it guys!

16. Porches. - Headsgiving

Porches.'s album Slow Dance In The Cosmos makes me wish that the Wolf Parades of the world hadn't gone so quietly into the dark dark night. This isn't slacker territory; just classic cracked intellect guitar rock. I love it.

15. Pale Earth - Coral Skulls


This foray for Benjamin Thompson to step way from the introspections of The Rational Academy continues to sprout myriad legs, and this track of the decidedly left-field Coral Corral release is the culmination of his propensity to push himself to the outer limits of his abilities, and then some. A track that may not be brilliant, but to me is a true testament to a work in progress; a stepping stone into the stratosphere.

14. Batpiss - Loose Screws

Not my favourite track from the trio's debut album Nuclear Winter, but it's a live staple, and this insane clip that accompanies it elevates it to cult status. If you don't feel a rush of blood to the head when listening to Batpiss, you are probably dead. Or at least about to be.

13. Dead - Scratching My Arts

A split with No Anchor is never an easy ask to stand out on, such is their brutal brilliance, but the underdogs of the Australian noise rock scene easily usurp their brethren here. Why isn't everyone championing these guys? With the amount of dark and twisted rock coming out of the bowels of our country, surely it's about time that people sat up and took notice?

12. Girls Names - The New Life

The longest track on the Irish band's new album, and for me the best by far. I really enjoyed the album, but it didn't stick with me as much as this song did.

11. Plant Parenthood - Transit Town

A small band from Knoxville who delivered what was the most listened to song on my playlists this year. Bizarre but true. See if you can ignored the sleepy, deceptive hooks. I can't. Shit, I'm listening to it on repeat again...

10. TEEN - Ambient



A cut from the Brooklyn band's In Limbo recordings. That was a great album of 2012, yet it baffles me how this didn't make the cut, even as a longwinded outro. All cyclical psych, all killer.

9. Per Purpose - Eureka


Probably not the best song Per Purpose put out this year - 'Warburton' was amazing, as is most off their new (and missed out of my year review yesterday) LP Circle The Stains - but every incarnation of the band is present and accounted for in this nine-minute dirge. Caustic brilliance.

8. Double Dagger - Heretic Hymn



The excellent Baltimore punks called it a day last year, then surprised us with a posthumous album, 333, in time for Record Store Day. This is a fitting farewell if I've ever heard one - Nolen's vocals say it all.

7. Pissed Jeans - You're Different In Person

The irascible howlers slayed it once more with new album Honeys, and this is the track that buried its sordid hooks furthest into my soul this year. It's typically dirty, raucous, serrated and blackly funny. You just can't fuck with this.

6. Ides - Prisms

Alanna McArdle might be more recognisable as part of Joanna Gruesome, who brought out a great LP this year. But it's her solo endeavour Ides that moved me most this year, and 'Prisms' really slays me. Every time. I cannot listen to this without getting whispers of the maudlin shakes and the longing that love and the loss of it can bury within you. Hauntingly beautiful.

5. Totem - See Saw Girl

I'm sure most of you won't agree with this one, but this track was played ad nauseum for weeks on Planet Masala. It's like a voodoo mantra, maniacal in its bubblegum hooks disguised as dark motorik. I'm not sure if Totem will ever match the heady heights of this one song, and I'm not sure if I care. This is enough.

4. Lake Mary & Nathan Wheeler - Agrimony (Porch Music)


A lot of great experimental and drone music crossed my desk this year, and there are so many tracks that I return to in my dark den of iniquity that its unfair to focus on one. Yet 'Agrimony (Porch Music)' is one that took me completely by surprise, and I find new pieces of beauty in it with each listen. A great improvisational track, and one I never want to end.

3. Gooch Palms - We Get By

I could have this here for the video alone. I interviewed Leroy from the band earlier in the year for a national magazine and it was a lot of fun. The fact that their LP NOVOs isn't a complete shambles but a combustible ball of playful energy and soulful intent is a further surprise. This track, though - quintessential party music. Well, a party in a grimed-out Queenslander with holes in the shirts and bottomless cans of beer. So, my kind of party then.

2. Pontiak - Innocence



This is a fresh one, but the Carney brothers are in my opinion one of the greatest psych rock bands going round. Why? Because the emphasis is on rock. Every album they have put together is strong, and 'Innocence' intimates that the next one will be a killer as well. All together now...'WAAAAAAAAASTED!'

1. Courtney Barnett - Avant Gardener

This is the only song that is solidly in place as numero uno. I have loved this song ever since I first heard it. A woozy guitar track that feels country and slacker at the same time; Barnett's hilarious lyrics about a panic attack are prescient, acerbic and, whilst delivered in a flippant way, are defiant in the way they shape who Barnett is. No pretentions here, just a meteoric talent on the rise.

Tomorrow - my top 7"/10"/EPs...

Eleven from Thirteen

It's pretty hot in Brisbane today. I have no memory of who my secret Santa is anymore. But there's some things I'll never be able to forget about this year (in no particular order and with some of them actually released last year):

Violent Soho - 'In the Aisle'

Violent Soho have killed it this year. There is something behind this that I still can't quite put my finger on. That's a good thing. Plus, I can find no better contender for a nude bike riding anthem.



Parquet Courts - 'Stoned and Starving'

This is the first Parquet Courts track I ever heard. I went straight home and ordered the album on the strength of it. The best feedback of the year. The best solo of the year.



White Walls - 'Transmission'

The White Walls album spent the most time out of any on my player this year. There is a dirge that runs through these gems. The tone at 0:40 here is un-fucking-believably good.



Mogwai - 'Re-murdered'

From most played last year to an early contender for next year already. Brendan told me he listened to this 16 times in a row. I didn't believe him. Then I listened to it. Then I believed him. The I listened to it  fifteen more times. The bass tone at 3:17 could surely be used in place of a defibrillator.



Pop. 1280 - 'Nailhouse'

This Pop. 1280 record is also full of all things good for the soul - especially 'Nailhouse'. I was listening to this on headphones in my lounge room so that my housemates could hear the telly. Too bad for them when the "in a nailhouse" part came along. If I could do this on Karaoke, I would go to Karaoke every night.



Yes I'm Leaving - 'Creepy Man'

The Yes I'm Leaving we put on at the Waiting Room this year was really up there for me. And this song live is a revelation. If you haven't got Mission Bulb, don't worry. Tenzenmen have got your copy (and the Yes I'm Leaving back catalogue) waiting for you.



Cloud Nothings - 'Wasted Days'

Though technically released in 2012 - same with the Whitewalls album, actually... - I only got 'round to listening to this this year. I love bands who aren't afraid to hold a groove for as long as needs to be held.  I don't know anyone who doesn't appreciate the 'Wasted days' sentiment either.



Dollar Bar - 'Everyone's Everyone'

Oh, man, talk about feeling good about music in Brisbane this year. These guys are bloody legends who write bloody great pop songs. The album launch at the Beetle Bar was a damn love-in. And rightly so! When do Dollarbar get there plaque on Brunswick street?



Courtney Barnett - 'Avant Gardener'

Another singer who writes bloody good, bloody clever, pop songs. Never have I smiled so much after hearing a song. I fucking hate gardening and now have a legitimate excuse in the medium of song. Hedging on genius.



Batpiss - 'Loose Screws'

Genius again here. Evil Genius. A Bat Pisses on a dude. This band is formed. If there is a necessary connection between animal urine and insanely rad music, here's hoping for further such incidents.



The Spinning Rooms - 'Julia'

The Spinning Rooms at the Waiting Room (and then at Tym's the next day) was the best gig of the year for me. Hands down. Frenetic, pacing, torpid they are really something to behold.


If I've forgotten anything (which I have), I blame the weather. And budget cuts to my brain.

Caught At Sea With Courtney

Man, this is becoming a habit. Here I am writing about Courtney Barnett - again. But it seems that she is everywhere right now - and rightly so. She is back after shuffling through CMJ, taking it all in her laconic stride. And the more acolytes that champion the cause, the better.

We've spoken about Barnett's EPs before, but it's worth mentioning that Milk! Records, alongside House Anxiety and Marathon Artists, have released the two together as a singular LP - The Double EP: A Sea Of Split Peas. Seeing as these songs started with an experiment to see how songs could hang on just one progression, it's amazing to find so many gems to hang onto. Most of this has to do with Barnett's incredible songwriting and blindsiding lyricism (not that the words are hard to pick up, but you can read most of them here on her website), but she also cuts a mean axe, and now has a good bunch backing her (aptly titled The Courtney Barnetts). Every song on here has moments of stark genius, which is hard to fathom and feels embarrassing to say, lathering on such platitudes without coming off like an infatuated Luddite with a laptop and a prayer. So Ill leave it at this - just buy the bloody thing and go to her shows, you will not be disappointed.

Barnett has been up to Brisbane a couple times in the past year - I managed to catch her play at last year's Big Sound, whilst her show at Southside Tea Room has caused a few people to label it gig of the year. Hopefully we will see these songs in their glory soon.

VIDEO VACUUM - Courtney Barnett, Peak Twins, Forest, Girls Names

It's a breakneck kinda day, one thing piling up on the next. So these excellent music vids should help alleviate the tension, baby...



Sonic Masala's current fave song of the year has just been equipped with its own rad visual, with Courtney Barnett and co clowning around on the clay tennis courts for 'Avant Gardener'. Everything Barnett does at the moment turns to gold - even if there was backlash for her cover of a Yeezus track. Cmon! She appropriated Coon cheese into the lyrics! That's sleight of hand comic genius of the Aussie laconic sort! Anyway, we have the whites, the wooden racquets, the good natured rivalry, the durries at drinks breaks. Golden. Barnett is playing in London, the Notting Hill Arts Club to be exact, tonight. If you're around, check her out - she's on at 8.30pm and will be the best act of the night by far.


Peak Twins - So Long from BSR on Vimeo.

Adelaide's Peak Twins have developed the perfect Blue Velvet-esque slow-dance karaoke tune in a decrepit photo studio film clip committed to celluloid. They are warming up for the eponymous album release through Bedroom Suck, and it promises to exceed expectations as the band subvert genres to their own cursed whims with uniquely salacious results. Great stuff.



Two Aussie bands juxtaposed with two UK acts. Cambridge kids Forest are infusing their jangle slackerdom with ample amounts of scuzzy, blase abandon. Their 'Coaster' vid has the requisite shimmering, slightly out of focus images, the clowning around in a field, and...blase abandon. Just abandon the blase and embrace the fuzz, because Forest dish out in generous helpings. Their freshly-minted EP Caramel Arms should be a good'un. If you value Brit bands because you have NME grafted to your inner thigh, disregard others and give these guys a try - they are genuinely fun.


Finally we have Belfast buddies Girls Names, who have released the almost-nine minute title track of their album The New Life as a single. Good on them, eschewing convention. Truth is, this is my favourite song on the album, perfectly encapsulating the band's emancipation from twee noise pop to a moodier expanse - a similar chrysalis moment that the Horrors encountered a few years ago. This B&W clip is epileptic performance art at its most cloying yet entrancing. Seriously though, the combo of sight and sound is a hypnotic masterstroke.

Courtney's Carving Up

I have a total crush on Courtney Barnett. She's a great guitarist, she doesn't hide her plaintive Aussie accent, her verbose lyricism is both affecting and amusing - and she knows how to write a good song. When I listen to 'Avant Gardener' I forget that there aren't many people out there that have innate melody in every pore of their being. Writing a song about having a panic attack whilst gardening shouldn't be a good song - yet 'Avant Gardener' is frontrunner for my favourite song of the year. Barnett is a revelation.

Big Sound stuff

And so it begins...The 2012 Brisbane Big Sound conference and live showcase promises to be the biggest yet, and already is touted as the Southern Hemisphere's fledgling answer to SXSW. Big shoes to emulate, but there is credence in such claims. With the likes of Steve Earle and the like taking part in Q&As, panel discussions and masterclasses, it has the potential to be an industry icon - as far as that goes, I suppose. I for one can see why some people consider these kinds of things a bit of a wank, but it gets people interested in all facets of music, which can't be a bad thing.

But the most exciting thing about Big Sound is...the sound! Big Sound Live showcases 120 bands within a two block radius all playing over the next two nights. There are some amazing bands that are playing, some of which I have spoken about at length in previous posts (Violent Soho, Transistors, Kirin J Callinan, Velociraptor), but there is a huge list of great acts doing the rounds. Below is a "hitlist" of artists to try and check out. Have a listen, then if you are on the ground check out where/when they are playing here. Ill be around and about reviewing, taking snaps, and other things I won't dare to mention here. See you on the beach!

Straight Arrows



Super Wild Horses



Step-Panther



King Gizzard & the Lizard Wizard



Courtney Barnett



Bearhug



Drunk Mums



Go Violets



Geoffrey O'Connor



Jeremy Neale



Shady Lane



The DC3



The Gooch Palms