Staying Stoic Under Cover Of Yaws

Dystopic party ender Yaws keeps producing the goods. Since relocating back to Australia he has produced the excellent 'Regression', and now this, Stoicism in E5, coming out through Detonic Recordings. It's as industrially skewered, manically manipulated and VHS-nasty as ever, with the devilish and gurning grin cemented in place. Somehow his music is simultaneously a relentless, battering downer and a feverish, rabid euphoria. If Cronenberg did an early film that was set in the 3 1/2 inch floppy disk "future", all scarred skylines, leather-bound bodies and slashes of red, Yaws would be your man for the soundtrack. Keep the techno madness coming - who needs their synapses intact anyhow? Pre-order Stoicism In E5 here.

Brisbane's Detonic Blessings

Detonic Recordings is lumbering out of slumber with their sixth release. The catch? You can only get it at The Bearded Lady in Brisbane on Friday August 28! What is it? Just a mixtape of some of the best wild electronic sounds to come out of the synthetic corners of the world for the last little while. Detonic is putting on the show that features mnttab, Yaws, Spirit Bunny, Wolf Shield and Corporate Vibes. It's wild. Favourites? Obviously love Yaws' contribution 'Regression', and have always loved me some mnttab and Spirit Bunny - but I also loved the garish nature of Corporate Vibes' 'Bass Strait', the sexy grind of Italian duo Schonwald's 'Slow Milk' and the post-everything romanticism of Happy Plastic Cup's closing track. It's all pretty great though (Celiac's Simple Minds cover and Prison's 'Kundle' are good too - ah, just go listen to it!)

But as you will see, the d/l is nigh on impossible to afford, so GO TO THE SHOW ON FRIDAY! Get on it! GO! GOOOO! 

Some Missed Posts From 2014 - Compilations For The Nation

It’s been quiet on the Sonic Masala front this past month – December hibernation/shenanigans. Rest assured I haven’t disappeared entirely. So I thought I better play catch up with some great compilations that have come out the past couple months.

Joe Alexander has gone from a wiry teen with a briefcase and dreams to being involved with incredible bands (Kitchens Floor, Per Purpose, Terrible Truths), running a cool festival-of-sorts in Deadshits and being the head honcho of one of Australia’s most iconic labels of the last couple of decades in Bedroom Suck. Its inauspicious beginnings in a bedroom in Ashgrove, Brisbane have moved on to the perceived musical mecca of Australia, Melbourne, and Bedroom Suck HQ show no signs of slowing down. It’s five years since Joe put out his first BSR release, and to celebrate we have this great compilation. Featuring most of the bands he has been involved with, it helps to show how the label has evolved from showcasing the dirgey scum and garrulous scuzz of Brisbane’s seething underbelly (Slug Guts, Loose Grip, Per Purpose) to the laisezz faire slacker punk that has become emblematic of Aus music of late (Boomgates, Full Ugly, Bitch Prefect, Scott & Charlene’s Wedding) and more experimental outlier fare (Primitive Motion, Peter Escott, Hissey Mayake). But the breadth of this collation of golden material has many flashes of pop wonders and sinuous aberrations – the comp kicks off with Blank Realm’s Stone Roses-esque blazed jam ‘Digging Up My Bones’ and closes with the nebulous meltdown narcosis of Angel Eyes’ ‘Bed’. There are new additions here too, yet to grace the BSR roster – the brilliant Love Of Diagrams and Totally Mild, both of which are bringing out albums with Bedroom Suck in the New Year.

Dik is a sonic pariah, always impressing most when on the further, harsher outliers of the musical spectrum - his work in Bastard Kestrel, S:bahn and mnttab spanning three decades. He is now the proud father of Detonic Recordings, which has so far released 7”s of SM faves Multiple Man and School Damage. Now he has put out Normalised, a synth-punk behemoth that traverses the globe and scrambles the senses. So besides including local exports Dead Boomers, Jonny Telafone and Wolf Shield, there are contributions from the US (Tuxedo Gleam, Diesel Dudes – who put out a 7” with Detonic earlier this year too – and Sashcloth), the UK (Men Oh Pause), Japan (Trippple Nippples) and a strong contingent from France (VvvV, We Are Enfant Terrible, Infecticide). It’s a slick release that crawls under the synthetic skin and morphs with the mind, a cybernetic mindfuck. And it’s out on 12” clear vinyl - get it here. Time to get the kids to delve into the New Flesh.

And finally we have The Reverb Conspiracy Vol. III, a compilation curated by labels Reverberation Appreciation Society (The Black Angels, Austin Psych Fest) and Fuzz Club Records, due out January next year. Fuzz Club founder Casper Dee sees these comps as a modern Nuggets series – and you can see why. Mainstays like Goat (joined by Brian Jonestown Massacre’s demented demigod Anton Newcombe), One Unique Signal and Mugstar are joined by rising space lords The Oscillation, The History of Colour TV and Lola Colt, with some leaps out of the fog and into the furnace (such as Deathcrush’s ‘You Now’). I have always lost my mind in psych rock territory, and this compilation not only highlights how hard it is to pin down what a psych band symbolises anymore, but that the diversity is actually a shining attribute, not a shambolic atrocity. The double vinyl release is coming out on white vinyl with gatefold cover, with cover art from Dead Skeletons’ Nonni Dead.

School Break Ups

(NOT a pic of the band - but you get the idea)

Australian musicians are the fidgetiest bunch. Most are in a multitude of bands, with one the focus but a myriad of half-cooked ideas floating about spilling out in weirder and wilder realms. School Damage is no different - and yet definitely IS different, in that this relatively new four-piece seem fully formed. Formed by Jake Robertson (Ausmuteants, The Hierophants, The Frowning Clouds, Drug Sweat etc) and Carolyn Hawkins (Chook Race) with Danni Damage and Jeff Raty bringing in the rhythms, School Damage is the perfect amalgamation of all these exterior pursuits - synth silliness, mewling guitars, loose-limbed garage rock bluster, B52s-esque garishness run through the rusted grinder of grit-in-the-wound punk, monotone vocals...it all adds up to a night with a beer-stained shirt and a shit-eating grin, loving life even while vomit flows down the slides at the local children's playground at three in the morning. They put out a cassette, Deep Net, on Moontown Tapes, and now have the impending 7" Break Up coming out of Detonic Recordings (Multiple Man, Diesel Dudes). All elements are present and accounted for on these three tracks, especially on the title track, which plays like a slow-swaying synth number of doo-wop-less pop before crashing into a guitar wash meltdown.


Grab your copy of Break Up here. School Damage launch this puppy on Friday August 29 at The Grace Darling alongside The Clits and Waterfall Person.

Multiple Men

I mentioned earlier today that I think Brainbeau is one of the best bands in Brisbane. Well, I think Multiple Man are right up there, the nihilist yin to Brainbeau's hypercoloured yang. The Brothers Campion brought out one of my favourite 7"s of last year with Body Double (out through the great Major Crimes label), and have a new 7" in the form of Guilt Culture. It's more dissonance, more disdain, more cerebral crucifixion and flagellation. It's a seductive, leering, dominant future punk secretion that floods the synapses and renders them (and you) obsolete. It's Multiple Man, and they're coming to get you (lovely dudes, but).

Guilt Culture is out on Detonic Recordings.