Old Mate's Under Pressure

It's so great to have a new Old Mate track. It Is What It Is was such a surprising gem from last year, its schizophrenic laconicism and downer aesthetics somehow combining to create something wholly inexplicably wondrous. They are slipping this first taste of new album Maraby (to be brought out through Format Records) right under the radar - as they are wont to do - and the maudlin gospel western 'Atomspheric Pressure' plays like the vocals (featuring Joel Carey) has been mastered at the wrong speed - or if Jack Ladder took a handful of Diazepam and covered Charlie Pride. That sax though - Australia has been killing it with effective solos in their tracks over the last few months. Its abnormally addictive - my girlfriend heard me playing in the kitchen and asked why I was playing "shit in slow motion" but after a few plays said "what the hell is with this song? This shit is getting stuck in my head." I think that says it all - no more reviews necessary.

Wallowing In Vintage Violence

After that interview with Liam Kenny last week, I thought I would continue with another Adelaide funk out that features a Liam Kenny that isn't Liam Kenny. The drone in the punk synth wail of Vintage Violence (not to be confused with the Italian punkoids of same name) evokes John Cale (seeing as they cribbed their name from one of his albums, that is a fair if obvious make) and more insidious gothic synth lurkers like 'Desert' and 'Nerve damage'. This Liam Kenny (of excellent unhinged boozehounds Wireheads) is joined here by fellow Old Mate old mate (and a Peak Twin) Ben Quici. The seven-track album moves along at a oozing pace, the industrial crawl emblematic of the bleak Gothic claustrophobia Europe continually pumps out of the pores of its desecrated earth. Especially when you hear 'Back To You', which is as desolate and dead-eyed as they come. It's brooding, barren, brilliant. Out through Format Records as a digital download or 100-run cassette, both from here.

High and Mightily Furious

I spoke about High And Mighty, Melbourne's resident genius weirdo Orlando Furious' new tape (out through Cinnamon Records), briefly when vibing out on his 'Fresh' video. But I really think High and Mighty needs more recognition.

I'll start with 'Dogs' the last song on side A. Why? Because I can't figure out if Orlando is doing some weird British Caribbean quasi accent. Because when he says 'Who gave me constables?' it sounds like he is saying cunts. Because when he says 'Who gave me dogs from the east?' he immediately ratifies the statement by saying 'Obviously I'm not being serious but, like, who told me about the dogs from the east?' Will the brain be expected to fail? The songs winds down with warped voices echoing over Orlando, the oxygen being weaned, stolen, suppressed, expunged. The static beats maintaining a narcotic pulse until it becomes erratic, then stops. It's kinda dumb, but also kinda genius. And that is High and Mighty, and indeed Orlando Furious, to a tee. The aberrant yet charismatic vocal rants are at once absurdist, nonsensical and rapturous. His is an addictive presence. The slightly sinister beats/rhythms (which are great all the way through High and Mighty, by the way) of 'Assets' propels the forever-on-the-verge-of-a-breakdown vocal stressings of Orlando to a plateau where he overlooks us all - as he is no coward, no drifter - he is 'the master'. Hot tamales, anyone?

Even when 'Peace' is nothing but a coalescing disturbance, a tape-loop explosion, it falls into a VHS vortex of Korine-like despair and gurning grotesqueries. And hearing 'Fresh' as the closing statement rather than on its own, it underscores my initial correlation with Liars - but I feel like this is more truly 'experimental', pushing aural, lyrical and physical barriers rather than setting the quirk flag in weird yet nonetheless familiar territory (and I love Liars). This stuff will always be an acquired taste for many - but Orlando, give me your 'Porkrawl' any day of the fucked-up week.

Dissolve yourself in High and Mighty here. Orlando Furious' next hit is supporting Old Mate launch their excellent LP It Is What It Is this Saturday at The Tote in Melbourne (also with Cool Sounds) - get there early if you know what's good for you.

Old Mates Is What They Is, Ey?

One band that seemed to both be confined by and outstrip the ill-fated "dolewave" genre pigeonhole was South Australia's Old Mate. It may have been in the name; it may have been in the droll drawl that lead Pat Telfer (Bitch Prefect) delivered his sometimes-weary, sometimes-jacked-up lyrics. But just as many of the bands that were tarred with that brush over the last two to three years have moved on by incorporating stranger tics and tricks to their bag, Old Mate's new album It Is What It Is (out through SDZ Records) explodes, its core aesthetic spreading in every direction like the impact of a paintball on a white wall. Don't let the kangaroos boxing on the cover dissuade you from acknowledging that we are entering a whole new world.


'Medicine Man' is a gargantuan jazz blues number - seriously. Sure, it's used and abused and flung in the corner to dry, but the 12 bars, the solos, the howling space, the husky vocals are all present and accounted for. It's a strange opener - it's a strange choice, considering the band's back catalogue - but then nothing should surprise you with these guys (remember the other half of Bitch Prefect is the chameleonic Liam Kenny...). From then on we are taken to one surrealist vignette to the next, in a battered limousine al Carax's bizarrely brilliant Holy Motors film from 2012, with Telfer the ever-present ringmaster of the macabre. 'Requesting Permission' is back on terra firma, a downer jangle with dour vocals a la Brisbane act Dag, with a melancholy that reminds me of the solo work of Neil Young in his early years - really - or that first recipient of the Grant McLennan Fellowship back in 2007, Charles Curse. But this isn't the needle and the damage done. We step up with 'Something', a vocal that sounds like Macka from The Onyas having a go at an acoustic number. It isn't overtly funny though - the tempo, the backing vocals, the 'hey hey hey hey hey heeeey, hey' lending a desperation to proceedings. 'February' is a lament in a netherworld saloon - the Gothic drawl reminiscent of another dormant Aussie act, Nikko - holding that plodding, maudlin beat for its entirety, and drags you down with it.

Then we hit a sonorous contemplation with 'Stressin'', a lysergic percolation of languid rhythms (for some reason Im tracking back to some of those subterranean grooves the Stone Roses often doled out) in what is generally an instrumental track, except for some growled, rolling-around-the-mouth vocals (and yet another video featuring that post-Soviet kid in the nightclub, which really looks like a sequal to the film Orphan); the sax burbles into the fervour underscoring 'Know What He Wants', a fine addition here; 'Him' re-enters the Young orbit, albeit in a warped fashion, offering layered nuance that promises more than it gives, with lyrics that imply never learning from mistakes; and closer 'Truth Boy' evokes another crooked minstrel of the Australian musical landscape, Nathan Roche, although there are no Sydney references in sight, just some Aussie sardonic sneers...

It Is What It Is is a bizarre and inexplicalby attractive record. The title tells it all, thus making this review, or any really, redundant. Old Mate, Telfer, the music - it is what it is. Deal with it - get it here.

METRO SCHOOL REUNION FOREVER!

(Post written by Fred Savage Beasts)

Adelaide - home of the severely underrated genius. Right where Australia balances between the currents from the Antarctic and the wide, brown desert. Wide streets, trams, Jamie Siddons, Crows and now this… The Metro School Reunion. This is the reason you’ve been looking for to take your beat up VK Holden on its final legendary drive.

Get a load of the bands on the list, dammit! TV Colours alone would make this worthwhile. Like the Crows say, “FAAARK…” All these bands should be in the test team.

TV COLOURS★CONSTANT MONGREL★HIT THE JACKPOT★NATIVE CATS★LAKES★SCHOOL OF RADIANT LIVING ★BITCH PREFECT★PEAK TWINS★OLD MATE★RULE OF THIRDS★WIREHEADS 

On at the city's stalwart Hotel Metropolitan on October 5. Wind down the windows, rubber band your teas towels round your frozen water bottles and get yourself there. Any way you can.

Big Richard Idjits

This Friday marks two years of putting on eclectic shows of some of the best bands this country has to offer (with a couple of Kiwi brethren thrown in for good measure). We've put together a stellar lineup - The Spinning Rooms, Turnpike, Landing In The Presence Of The Enemy Jaguars Advanced (what a fucking mouthful) - and these guys, Adelaide shitkickers Big Richard Insect. They released a self-titled 7" a couple months ago through the excellent Major Crimes label (responsible for equally strong releases from SM faves Multiple Man and Old Mate), and it's four wiry tracks of seething hiss and spit, albeit in a drunken, borderline innocent way. 'Cop Out' is the only song-song here (and the only track to break a sweat over two minutes), a swaggering king hit to the back of the head, all grime and hazed sunshine. It's a great track. The other three are steaming pustules of slavering, slobbering punk mayhem, kicking walls in with garish, oblivious abandon. Good, concise, arsenic capsule shit.


As I said the trio will be palming off this puppy this Friday at The Waiting Room (who also turns 2 this weekend), a tenner on the door, BYO, beginning of the long weekend, let's get loose.

Wagga Wagga's Dreamboats Of Velcro

Here is a little lo-fi act out of Melbourne that I am absolutely loving at the moment. Velcro are a three-piece that released Dreamboat, a 6 track EP, earlier in the year on London-based label Njord Kassetts. Similar to current bands like Cat Cat and Dick Diver, with a slacker ennui inherent in the likes of Old Mate, Scott & Charlene's Wedding or Kitchens Floor, yet there is also an affinity for McLennan/Forster and the Flying Nun clan, thus allowing Velcro to steep their short whimsical numbers in a plaintive melody and surreptitious hooks so that the crooked pop tunes remain embedded in your mind for days afterwards. They have been putting out a plethora of cassette releases over the past eight or so months, demos on the internet at an alarming rate, and one of these releases is entitled Wagga Wagga and is out on Why Don't You Believe Me - which just makes me want to grab them and make them etch out a singular vinyl with all the tracks on it just for me - hell, even a CD-r would suffice! Especially as the digital version of Dreamboat is pretty pristine. But don't think you will get to see them in Aus any time soon, as the driving force behind the band, Curtis Wakeling, has moved to Brooklyn to try his wares solo whilst also playing in ace band Love Connection. If you're in NY, hunt this guy down, he is special.


You can get Dreamboat on cassette here.



And here is a track off Wagga Wagga, which you can purchase here...

Velcro - G&T