Aural Australia #2 - Apocalyptic Gifting

Christmas garbage filling the outer aisles of the supermarket, all while Trump rattles the doorway to Hell and we are dragged behind him in a hand basket. I am hoping that Tim Allen does another Santa Clause film, but it's set in the future with Furiousa helping him deliver presents to chroming baldies and models dressed in hessian and prosthetic pregnancies. At least there is hope in that future...Oh, and then there is music. There is always music...

New Brisbane label Coolin' By Sound (run by two of the raddest people ever, Belly and Shell) have two releases coming out this month, with some even bigger announcements on the way. First cab off the rank though is SM favourites Thigh Master, who release their debut LP Early Times today. It's been a long time coming - Thigh Master have been scarring the land with their scuffed, scuzzed and skewed guitar pop for almost five years now. It's an old offering in some ways - originally recorded in 2013, then redone when grand Dag Dusty Anastassiou layered more guitar over the top. The songs include contributions from multiple members across their revolving ensemble (the four piece have seen six incarnations, with Matt Ford and Pat Byron the mainstays throughout) and perfectly encapsulates the loose frivolity and looser hooks lathering their live sets. The band have made lackadaisical lambasted and loose-limbed jams seem both effortless yet frantic - 'Company', 'Treehouse A.P.' and closer 'Flat City' being golden examples. But there are times when they lose the slacker cap and try more melancholic, laconic speeds - the Brisbane downer drawl of 'Brunno Brawl', the Superchunk via Dunedin cheesed melt of 'Canned Opening', the languid malaise of 'Baroona'. The solo 'Hassa Been' is a cracked bay croon, caught on the back deck in the inner suburbs, 44 seconds of lightweight browbeating. Pretty indicative of all facets of what makes Thigh Master an indelible part of the Brisbane musical landscape. Get Early Times here.

Craig Dermody's Scott and Charlene's Wedding releases Mid Thirties Single Scene on Bedroom Suck and Fire Records, and it's a shaping up to be his best effort yet. His band has solidified to include members of Terrible Truths and Beaches and uber producer Jack Farley, and there is a muscularity to the musicianship this time around that, rather than showing a rock lash out or change in direction, it shows a confidence in the laconic, lugubrious, whimsical nature of ambling through the world tasting simple pleasures and grinding down the hours that comes with maturity. I am talking about music of course - Craig will always be a knockabout journeyman in life, taking knocks and giving back a languid grin - and what more can you ask for? 'Maureen' and 'Don't Bother Me' are already classics in the making, which bodes well for their upcoming album and Euro tour - Ill be catching the guys at Brunedell Social Club in Leeds on October 22, but there will be ample opportunities to catch them across the continent.





Now to another supergroup of sorts. Melbourne's God Squad features members of Cobwebbs, Black Vacation, The Kremlings and Sewer Side, and take on a woozy lounge groove take on post-punk doom and gloom. It was very much a time-and-place collaboration, but on the strength of these off-cuts the dudes should make this a bit more of a concern. There is gold in them thar hills, gentlemen...

I intend to do a much more in-depth look at this artist later on in the year, but I am so glad to hear that Greg Charles is releasing new music again. Having flitted around the edges of Brisbane music scene for over a decade in the likes of Blonde Cobra, Charles Curse, 6Magick9 and the Ex-Catholics, Charles has been an enigmatic yet fleeting presence, each appearance full of cracked genius, pastoral awe carved out of personal anguish, tragedy, punishment and redemption. Those who have heard his as-yet-unreleased 2007 album The Wrecking Moon have rued the fact that Charles' spiked and ambling, wasted yet eloquent rock hasn't been embraced by more. He has taken himself out of the limelight and has been fairly prolific; and in December he will be releasing his first release under his own name, Rough Music, recorded with Ben Thompson (The Rational Academy, Pale Earth) and Cam Smith (Ghost Notes, Tape/Off) on band duties. Highly literate about bruising ennui and catharsis, filled both with gutting hubris and garish gallows humour, Charles' songs will make you laugh, cry, and be happy to be alive. I will write more as the album comes to the fore, but in the meantime, here is a taste of what's to come...

One of my all time favourite artists in Australia right now is one of its weirdest outliers - Orlando Furious. The Melbourne provocateur has now moved into the hinterland of Queensland's Sunshine Coast, but his warped sense of humour riding a gnarled seductive lysergic techno ooze is firmly, synthetically intact. 'Sedyouse' is the perfect example of the cracked genius that OF is capable of. Every line is barbed with sardonic wit fused with silliness, but the beats are real - these songs are designed to bewitch. Performance art which revels in acerbic hilarity and ridiculousness - it's Liars for the Bi-Lo generation. I fucking love it.

It's fitting then to segue into Yaws' newie, 'Yuek', seeing as Orlando Furious both stars and directed the video. The techno noisenik is now back in London, but his sojourn back in Australia has only helped to fuse his warped dystopias with a wider zeal... Doubt is an amazing 12" (the first release from Purely Physical, you can get it here), and this video does everything to amplify the dazzling weirdness. The Squatter board game? Cyclone screen doors? Yaws google searches, thus promotion within promotion? Orlando trance dances? A ball pein hammer? A candle in a bar fridge? The ritual to be Yaws is complete.

Let's finish on brand new band Life Strike, who features members of Deaf Wish, Dollar Bar and The Rational Academy. The first sounds to come out of this collaboration merges The Kinks, The Chills and The Cannanes, with a smidgen of Robert Forster there as well - warm hooks that feel evergreen, yet with a 90s Gaslight Radio-meets-Sekiden geeky-pop-with-an-edge opaqueness that throws shadows over the pastel tones. This is likely to become murkier - the boys promise apocalyptic visions mixed with noise rock and punk as well. But for now, ride these two bliss bomb waves like Snake Plissken and Peter Fonda.

Friday Cover Up - Benny, Susanne, Scott, Charlene & Doe

Let's double down on today's covers! First up, London scrappers Doe have released this faithful, gooey rendition of 'Susanne', the Weezer track from the Mallrats soundtrack. It's raucous and fun, with more grunt than Cuomo's boys tend to muster. When is the next Doe release? Soon, so I've heard... But until then. You can get it on this 7" Art Is Hard release that is part of the Hand Cut Singles Club..

Then we have SM faves Scott & Charlene's Wedding giving us a rambling, reverbing, shambling 'Benny & the Jets'. We already have one timeless rendition of Elton's hit, a slurred lounge reverie from the Beastie Boys, but Craig Dermody and his gang of gangly losers make this sound like it is their own. The timorous falsetto at breaking point preludes a sonic implosion which is just brilliant - the kind of cover you do when shitfaced and careless/carefree. Love it!

Fawning From A Safer Spot

I only heard of York trio Fawn Spots when I heard their side of the split release they did with Scott & Charlene's Wedding last year - and I really liked what I saw. I'm also a massive fan of comedian Stewart Lee, so when I heard him compare them to Husker Du and Guided By Voices, I was in. From Safer Place is their debut record (out through Critical Heights earlier in the year). It’s a funny one. Not funny haha; not even funny peculiar. It’s just that I have had this album since February, and have listened to it a fair bit on and off since that time. It isn’t as melodic as I was anticipating – there is more angular attack and vitriolic caterwauling here that at times comes to be overbearing (even if the album only scraps over the thirty minute mark). It’s that mixture of …Trail of Dead freneticism and Thrice post-hardcore earnestness that walks a fine line for me. In fact it is the latter that From Safe Place most reminds me of – its highs and its lows. But it’s in the melody of the title track, the high-octane energy of ‘I’m Not A Man – I Never Will Be’ that grinds down then marchs forward, all in just over sixty seconds; the atmospheric ‘In Front Of The Chestnut’. The spit-flecked angst here is something I would have gravitated towards ten years ago; and yet here I am, drawn once more to their cathartic flame. I am yet to see these guys live – I think I would become one of the converted masses then.

Cater(er)ing For Shorts In Berlin Circa '71

New York-based-Aussie Mikael Caterer AKA Shorts is back with another single. ‘Berlin 1971’ isn’t exactly new new – it’s a track that has been around the traps in demo form for a few months (I even posted up when I first mentioned the band), but the it’s been glossed up to within an inch of its life, its heart beating faster than a hummingbird’s, professing love in a score to a faded Super 8 of a fledgling relationship. The sunniness of the track doesn’t fit the titular German city – yet – but it’s easy to imagine yourself in this world, forever sepia toned in the park where the sun is always at half mast, never beating down, drinking cool drink and eating antipasto nibbles... Jarvis Taveniere from Woods recorded this at his new Rear House studio in Brooklyn, so it’s in more than able hands.

‘Berlin 1971’ will be on a 7” EP of the same name (put out through Bad Paintings and Aloe Music) soon - preorder it here (awesome cover art btw). Can't wait to hear the other tracks if this is anything to go by - especially seeing as his backing band consists of Jonah Maurer (Real Estate, Free Time, Titus Andronicus) on bass, Dylan Shumaker (Woodsman, Alex Bleeker and the Freaks) on drums, and fellow Aussie Adrian Tregonning on guitar and keys. Clearly he's learnt a lot from his Scott & Charlene's Wedding brother in arms, Craig Dermody - albeit with a much stronger Dunedin twist of sunshine.

Eat Scott's Shorts

Man, sorry about the lame headline guys...it's too hot to think. Not too hot to listen to slacked out guitar pop though. Im Australian - it's a given nowadays...

Ah, yes, Shorts. The NYC band have a "distinctly" Australian sound, and there's a pretty good reason for that. Michael Caterer used to live in Melbourne, played in Full Ugly, and is in the New York edition of Craig Dermody's Scott & Charlene's Wedding. The two tracks on offer below are more full-bodied though - 'Berlin 1971' is more like 60s pastoral psych pop transplanted in Central Park with tattoos and the faux blues; 'Silver Circles' is just downright sexy, in an autumnal dappled sunlight kinda way. And look at that scrawl of the bare-breasted lady with cocks on her arms. Its a world of juxtaposition, that's for sure. they have releases in the wind - stay tuned, this'll be worth waiting for...

VIDEO VACUUM - Scott & Charlene's Wedding, Lee Ranaldo, Angie, Cuntz

Sometimes it's hard to take life seriously. If you get thrown enough curveballs and low blows, you either shrug and laugh and find the stuff that makes your world go round, or you curl up into the foetal position whilst chewing a dogshit-stained shoe. Today could have gone either way. But a handful of Aussie degenerates and one sonic youth on his crystal ship(sss) got me across the line, just in time to neck a bottle of red, watch the new episode of The Walking Dead, and be thankful I get another day to get things right. Maybe these tracks will help you too, hmm?

Craig Dermody of Scott & Charlene's Wedding has a proclivity for suburban malaise and chagrin, yet on this latest video for 'Jackie Boy', he's taking no prisoners. A typically laconic take on the Rocky male fantasy, the clip sees Dermody jogging around NYC, looking decidedly weedy but with a puffed out chest and a decidedly grimy gray tracksuit (hopefully from Lowes),punching wet carcasses and looking to make a difference in this mixed-up world that we live in. And when Dermody mumbles-shouts 'When you've got nothing left you've still got rock'n'roll', goddamn if it isn't a mantra after my own heart. TKO, dude.

Lee Ranaldo - "Fire Island (Phases)" from Mouca on Vimeo.

The latest solo album from Sonic Youth alum Lee Ranaldo certainly divided the pundits what with its somewhat traditional mode of songwriting (well, at least for this progenitor of no wave nihilism and explorer of atonal terrains). Between the Times and the Tides is more about looking for more nostalgic and referential ways of telling stories, as opposed to crafting something outside the proverbial box, and in the main I'm a big fan. This six-minute clip for 'Fire Island (Phases)' is an ode to the Berlin winter, an experience that brings goosebumps to my soul, and he also garners help from skronky folk weirdniks Crystal Shipsss, which is pretty ace too. Ive been lucky enough to interview him AND speak to him in person - still one of my all-time highlights - so the bias has only risen, but I really appreciate the guy for forever being honest and subversive (even if that means travelling straight on when everyone else wants him to zig and zag).

ANGIE - PARALLELS from Angela Garrick on Vimeo.

If you want to circle back on the olde days of Sonic Youth, this might be your best bet. Angie is the new project for Angela Bermuda, the outlandish performer who props up the likes of Circle Pit and Straight Arrows. On 'Parallels' she gets the dirty, warbled, hypercolour VHS no-fi down pat, whilst the track itself is both Aussie pub rawk guitar noodling, buzzbin fuzz, and disaffected lyrics. It's a killer track, one I didn't see coming, and spiked my will to live even further. Nice one, Angie.

"Never Felt Better" - Cuntz from Tahlia Isabel Palmer on Vimeo.

And lastly, Melbourne's Cuntz deliver the knockout blow, ensuring that I've never felt better with, well, 'Never Felt Better.' Still giving out dark, despairing punk spirals, all the time. Despite the whole thing is a constant drunken shit-stir, you can't help but get swept up in the nihilistic charm of its atonal wares. This is actually a depressing song, isn't it? Fuck it. Scream to your heart's content, drink a shit tonne of beers, and hold the baby.

NOW GET BACK TO WORK!

Sliding Down The Honey Flowers

Once again stupid life has gotten in the way of a good time - doubly so, seeing as I haven't been able to write about good shit for about three days (believe me, that is a looooooong time). Back in June I was offered tickets to go to London trio Honeyslide's 10" launch (put on by Critical Heights) at Stoke Newington's The Waiting Room. This sounded serendipitous seeing as the vast majority of Sonic Masala shows have been held at Brisbane's own Waiting Room. Yet I declined, and although I didn't waste my evening - I went and saw William Basinski and Fennesz play in a Hackney church - I felt I was letting the SM side down a little. It was a little more painful when I found out that the supports included personal fave Scott & Charlene's Wedding, pencilled in as a "special Guest". Seeing as I missed their own album launch the following week because I was flying back to Oz, it smarted. Nevertheless, I can't complain - at least I have Drippin/Deep Architecture to listen to. The 10" offers a seven minute sloping squall in the form of 'Drippin'' which bleeds into an untitled miasma of swirling ephemera. It reminds me of Gaslight Radio, one of the most underrated Aussie bands of the late 1990s/early 2000s, albeit without the tongue-in-cheek lyricism. The back side offers more bite-sized versions of the same - 'Deep Architecture' holds sway, whilst 'Sugar Routine' saunters along jauntily, a bouncy, languid ride into the sunset. You can grab the EP here.

The reason I came back to Honeyslide was because of the minimalist yet showy fuzz of another London trio, Flowers. Their Until You're Dead 7" (out on Fortuna Pop - you can grab it here) has been the one link I have had to the world of sanity in the past few days, which bled into the things I found most enjoyable about the Honeyslide release. Admittedly Flowers are a little more saccharine and overtly shoegaze (which makes sense seeing the label they are aligned with), but there is an effervescent yet gritty sheen to their sonorous noise pop that sees them drift markedly further from the twee vortex than others that court this terrain. The titular track is the perfect example of this - a crunching guitar, high, breathy vocals, and a steely mesh of noise underneath that propels everything forward at a bracing pace. 'Clover' follows a similar mode, then 'Stuck' offers a stripped, stark, bare counterpoint. It is all done with flair and aplomb - and with the presser boasting that many Flowers tracks are written within an hour, fully formed, we should hear a hell of a lot more soon.

Gettin' Me Some Free Time

Our current predilection with jangly slacker rock that is slowed to an amble, tin in one hand and Centrelink rejection letter in the other, has been striking a chord globally - the success of the likes of Twerps, Dick Diver and Scott & Charlene's Wedding in particular are testament to this. These bands are going on European and US jaunts, plus getting picked up and taken home by Pitchfork and the likes - dirty stop-outs. But it makes sense that by throwing your love around willy-nilly, you will eventually mete out praise to something that deserves it, so kudos to them.

Before this post disappears into waffle mumblecore, I'm stating all this because the trend doesn't look to be abating, and ex-pats are now taking it to the international man as well. Free Time is a Melbourne four-pieces featuring Dion Nania (of Panel Of Judges fame, who also has played with S&CW and Twerps in the past), and their relocation to the Big Apple hasn't blunted their influences at all. Their debut LP (out through Underwater Peoples) has been doing the rounds for the past couple of months, I feel it warrants another mention. Why? Because it's a cracker - not content to move at its own pace, the album goes slower than even it seems wont to do, then speeding  up and slowing down like awkward lovers. I love it. You can understand why the Kurt Vile comparisons have been made too - although Free Time remains decidedly Antipodean. The song 'Nothin But Nice' rolls along like a merry narcoleptic on a beach-bound road trip, with an able and willing accomplice steering from the passenger seat when things become too much. Deliberately ramshackle yet always in control - it's a difficult thing to harness and maintain, yet Free Time have all the time in the world to get it right and make it their own.

Free Time can be gleaned here - well worth it.

Crashing into Scott and Charlene's Wedding

Looking for something can be the worst way to find it. It's not that looking is bad in and of itself, it's just that we have a tendency to, before looking, define what it is we want to find - pretty much 'eff-ing' (or at least 'F-ing off') the ineffable from the get go. 'What exactly are your goals here?' they will ask. The stuff of 'Performance Reports', 'Key Indicators' and the like; a successful life defined by a clearly outlined set of criteria. But can we really organise our cosmic junk shop in such a way? 

Not really.

Just like fellow Antipodean ex-pat Peter Porter pointed out in 'A Consumer's Report', when it comes to life, there is no 'best buy'. There's no X-marked map or guide book on this lonely planet, there's just the sun, the stars and everyone [in] between. So if you're dizzy with ambition, forget about flying to the heart of the sun for a moment (you're not heat resistant anyway) and enjoy the orbit.  Sometimes you just gotta let the ineffable 'eff' you. And when you're smoking a cigarette afterwards you might even find yourself smiling.  

And even if you hear the door close in the morning before you get up, rest easy, you can still put on Any Port in a Storm to remind yourself we're all in the same boat. Scott and Charlene's Wedding may not save you, but hey, it's likely nothing ever will, so go where it takes you - you never know what you'll find. 

You can order it from Fire Records in the UK or Bedroom Suck if you're downunder. And if you're in the Europe, there's sure to be a show in a port (or yoghurt shop) near you soon:

Scott & Charlene's Wedding EUROPEAN TOUR 2013
27 June: Sound Knowledge (in-store), Marlborough, UK 
29 June: Glastonbury, UK Festival 12pm 
30 June: The Garage, London, UK
1 July: The Haunt, Brighton, UK
2 July: Lick (in-store), Brighton, UK
2 July: Green Door Store, Brighton, London, UK
3 July: Rise (in-store), Bristol, UK
4 July: Undertone Bar, Cardiff, UK
5 July: Registry, Southsea, UK 
6 July: The Victoria, Dalston, London, UK
8 July: Fragel, Benicassim, Spain
9 July: Terraluna Terraza, Zaragoza, Spain
11 July: Cidade de Cultura, Santiago, Spain
12 July: Houston Summer Party, La 2 de Apolo, Barcelona, Spain
13 July: East End Live Festival, London
14 July: Hangover Lounge, Lexington (Acoustic), London, UK
15 July: Espace B, Paris, France
17 July: Buskers Festival, Lugano, Switzerland
18 July: Buskers Festival, Lugano, Switzerland
19 July: Festival Natala, Colmar, France
20 July: Swamp, Freiburg, Germany
22 July: Schoken, Stuttgart, Germany
25 July: Knust, Hamburg, Germany
27 July: Karrera Klub, Berlin, Germany
1 August: Broadcast, Glasgow, UK
3 August: The Tunnels, Aberdeen, UK
7 August: Shipping Forecast, Liverpool, UK
8 August: Tie Dye Tapes, Sheffield, UK
9 August: Head of Steam, Newcastle, UK
10 August: Sound It Out Records (in store), Stockton on Tees, UK
10 August: Rook & Gaskill, York, UK
11 August: Urban Outfitters (instore), York, UK
13 August: Wharf Chambers, Leeds, UK 
14 August: Arts Centre, Colchester, UK
15 August: The Music Exchange (instore), Nottingham, UK
15 August: The Hairy Dog, Derby, UK 
16 August: Yard Party Festival, London, UK 
16 August: Flashback (instore), London, UK

SCRATCHIN' ROUND - Left and Right, Diving Bells, Fawn Spots

Direction is something that, when brought up, is often claimed to be something I lack. I don't really mind too much. I might be walking around by myself with no idea where I'm heading, but I managed to find these, so it's working out okay so far.

There is something victorious about Left and Right's 93 EP. A kind of world weariness, worn thin but not through; a real coming to terms with things (as long as those terms still mean they can still wail away on their distortion pedals if they see fit). There are some classic '90s sounds here: the production has the crowded sparseness (trust me on this one) of an early Archers of Loaf recording and I especially dig the the way you have to listen for the vocals in 'Coliseum'. They're not buried, just covered by a bit of dust - you have to work for the good stuff, you know. I'm very fucking glad I dug through the inbox for these guys.



You don't often see the words 'Ireland via Korea' arranged in that order. But Diving Bells have made the connection. From the drone of ruddy Irish waters through the repeated patterns of the hand and foot, here that connection makes sense. It pushes and pushes and pushes, piled behind itself in the shell of an abandoned bank headquarters. Ride it to where it takes you.

I found Fawn Spots on someone's couch. I can't help but feel I'm not alone in having done so. When you don't know where your headed, a welcoming couch is nirvana. Like when you probably went a little too far and did things you'd rather not remember (because you don't really feel like breaking down). Wash your face. You might not wanna see yourself but you still need to get up and keep going - even if it is by yourself.



This track's out through Critical Heights on a split 7" with fellow couch veterans Scott and Charlene's Wedding.

Popularising Plastic Flowers

Man, I'm looking forward to my holiday. Cramming England and Holland into two weeks, give or take a couple days. Hope to see some bands too (Honeyslide and Scott & Charlene's Wedding to be precise). But more keen for a European summer. One of my favourite summers was spent in Europe in 2009. I kicked it off in Greece for two weeks, spent a week in Manchester (what a weird week that was), then to Bosnia and Germany. Sublime...but I cant help but wonder how much of an improvement Plastic Flowers would have made the experience (especially the ferry from the Greek islands to Athens at night, which I spent drinking the worst vodka ever (read - ethanol) with a stranger who was paying, and strangely enamoured with my clothes...hmmm...). These characters are the dreamiest of popsters, floating in a minimalist ether, dust motes floating and lighting up as it hits opaque sunlight.

Plastic Flowers - Populists

'Populists' is off Plastic Flowers' Aftermath EP (out through Manic Pop Records), which you can hear in full below, and buy the red vinyl 7" here. Its a name your price download too, well worth the investment.

Fakin' A Neighbourly Wedding Creates A Storm

I'm pissed off at Craig Dermody. The dude decides to launch his new album Any Port In A Storm in London on Saturday July 6, the night before I will be flying back to Australia. Sure, I could still make it - my fiancee wouldn't be overly happy - but its more the fact that the laconic music Dermody crafts as Scott & Charlene's Wedding makes me want to drink. Usually in a sunny afternoon kinda way too, which doesn't bode well for an 8am flight the next day. I could always postpone it I guess...

Any Port In A Storm (out soon through Fire Records - preorder here) is actually quite an exciting prospect, as these tunes are relatively new - Para Vista Social Club and the Two Weeks EP consist of pretty old tracks, most of which were written before or just after Dermody reached New York. He has been there for a good while now, and his sense of self within the Big Apple, intermingling with further bouts of alienation, pangs of love, the gnashing of teeth over b'ball, and everything other bit of everyday ennui that Dermody dredges up, will come to the fore. Check out the new track 'Fakin' NYC', about scraping by as a doorman at a trendy bar in New York City.

Scott & Charlene's Wedding - Fakin' NYC

If you are in the UK over the next couple months, you can get your fair share of Scott & Charlene's Wedding, seeing as they are playing everywhere, to the big (Glastonbury, some support slots for Mission of Burma) to small (Flashback Records, as well as a yoghurt shop in Brighton - as you do).

 29 June: Glastonbury, UK

30 June: The Garage, London, UK (supporting Mission of Burma)
1 July: The Haunt, Brighton, UK (supporting Mission of Burma)
2 July: Green Door Store, Brighton, London, UK
4 July: Undertone Bar, Cardiff, UK
5 July: Registry, Southsea, UK
6 July: The Victoria, Dalston, London, UK  (Album Launch)
13 July: East End Live Festival, London
7 August: Shipping Forecast, Liverpool, UK
8 August: Tye Die Tapes, Sheffield, UK (with Fawn Spots)
9 August: Heart Attack & Vine, Newcastle, UK (with Fawn Spots)
10 August: Rook & Gaskill, York, UK (with Fawn Spots)
12 August: Adelphi, Hull, UK (with Fawn Spots)
13 August: Wharf Chambers, Leeds, UK
14 August: Arts Center, Colchester, UK
15 August: Hungry Dog, Derby, UK (with Fawn Spots)   
16 August: Yes Way Festival, London, UK 
    
Scott & Charlene's Wedding will also be doing a series of free promotional performances at the following places:

27 June: Sound Knowledge, Marlborough, UK
2 July: Lick Yogurt, Brighton, UK
13 July: Independent Label Market, London UK
10 August: Sound It Out Records, Stockton on Tees, UK
11 August: Urban Outfitters, York, UK
16 August: Flashback Records, London, UK

It's A Common Life In Surf City

We here at Sonic Masala quite enjoyed New Zealand band Surf City's last album, Kudos. They have another on the way called We Knew It Was Not Going To Be Like This (genesis for title - a snippet of conversation overheard in a crowded South Korean bar - brilliant). The excellent and Antipodal guardian Fire Records (Blank Realm, Scott & Charlene's Wedding, Lower Plenty) are pushing it, which can only be a very good thing. The first track released off it is 'It's A Common Life'. Now, it's pretty grim today here in Brisbane. I work next to an army barracks, and today they have had army choppers going back and forth over my head, probably innocuous, yet still foreboding. Yet the warm fuzz of 'It's A Common Life' helps to shut the shit out, a swirling guitar pop gem that glimmers defiantly amidst the murk and the muck.

Leader Davin Stoddard has been around the traps since Kudos - holed up in a basement in NYC, teaching English in South Korea, lots of isolated moments both without and within. It really sounds like it's paid off in spades - I'm really looking forward to this one... We Knew It Was Not Going To Be Like This is due out in August.

Plenty of Hard Rubbish on the Lower End of Things

Good morning sleepyheads! So I thought Id give you something Ive been mulling over for the past few weeks. Melbourne quartet Lower Plenty seemed to get some really street cred last year with the release of Hard Rubbish in April last year (through Special Award Records and Easter Bilby). Hell, Mess+Noise gave it their Album of the Year. Named after a Melbourne suburb (really), the band specialise in woozy, mournful lo-fi pop, and their pedigree (Dick Diver, UV Race, Total Control, Deaf Wish, insert other million band names here) ensured that their name was shouted across most boozy dives in the Victorian capital.


Now Hard Rubbish is preparing for an European assault after the US got a taste thanks to Goner Records (and have a split single 7” coming out through Matador). Fire Records, who over the past couple years have been loving the hell out of great Aussie music (Blank Realm, Scott & Charlene’s Wedding, Opposum, HTRK, Greg Boring, insert other thousand band names here), are adding Lower Plenty to the bill, and it seems a no brainer.

But…

I’ve found it difficult to fully embrace Hard Rubbish. Not that I don’t want to. I’ve tried, and still am. The fact that Lower Plenty works as an outlet for the various band members to ease back on the grimy throttle of their other outfits is worthy in and of itself; whilst tracks like ‘White Walls’ emanate with the kind of drawling inert and off-kilter Australiana guitar pop that I usually lap up. But there is a want to shower after listening to these guys, or at the very least take some happy pills. The term “downer country” has been coined, possibly to play on the downer pop that the likes of Craig Dermody and Matt Kennedy revel in – but isn’t most country downer? Certainly the best C&W exists when the narrative comes from the gutter. And Lower Plenty definitely dwell there, and at times it feels TOO relatable, too world-weary.

   

But there are moments on Hard Rubbish that burrow like a sonic termite into your cerebral vortex, gnawing away at you until you have no recourse but to tumble under the weight (or the lack thereof) of your resistance. ‘Nullabor’ is the kind of Badlands-style romance that anyone can believe in, let alone Australians with an itch for the quixotic unknown; ‘Close Enough’ is heartrending in its wistful acknowledgement that a relationship slipped through the fingers (“I was close enough away to see the fading of the dark”). 

Once this happens, you really take on board the lyrics – the mumbled, half-asleep, foggy from slumber and alcohol phone conversations, sinking lower into the moth-eaten couch, sweating in a tongue-and-groove house, lamenting a place and state of mind that you can’t (or won’t) leave. With the vocals interspersed between Sarah Heyward, Al Montfort and Jensen Tjhung, there is enough variations on the tired intonation to offer fresh counterpoints – but only when you let the songs inside. At the end of the day, Hard Rubbish will tear you up, wring you dry, and leave you on the edge of the bed crying. But if ever there was a beatific wonder in being resigned to emotional failure and heartbreak, then Lower Plenty have nailed it. 

 Sorry everyone, I just got some dust in my eyes…

   

Hard Rubbish is available for pre-order here. You can still get some through Goner here. Expect to hear more about Lower Plenty in 2013. 

Lower Plenty – Strange Beast 

Lower Plenty – Close Enough

Blase Histrionics & Cacophonous Vibes - Two Weeks Of Scott & Charlene's Wedding

 

Last year was absolutely stellar for Aussie rock albums, whether they were narcissistic (Slug Guts, Spinning Rooms), or narcoleptic (Bitch Prefect, Pageants). Possibly at the top of the heap was Craig Dermody AKA Scott & Charlene's Wedding. Starting with the struggling ne'er-do-well in 'Gammy Leg', the ambling spirit of Para Vista Social Club which also graced the excellent split record with fellow Australian slackers Peak Twins. It's Dermody's scratchy, blase observations of the minutiae of Australian life that elevates his music, which continues onwards even after he has moved to New York. The bare-bones honesty is endearing and relatable, as can be seen on the title track to his about-to-be-released mini-album (through Critical Heights), Two Weeks. There are only a couple of new tracks on here, but with a new album in the wings we won't have long to hear how the misplaced Dermody views life in the Big Apple. Odds on, its same shit, different day. Hopefully that leg of his has healed...

Scott & Charlene's Wedding - Two Weeks

A Dripping Sex Pile

 

Wow. Talk about an Internet-baiting headline...

There are moments when you discover bands that are good from the first note, and after living wit the music for a few days, or even hours, it becomes ingrained in your sonic psyche for forever more. Then there are bands that are insidious, their pull imperceptible, worming its way into your central core until your dreamscapes and nightmares are scored by their apocryphal affectations.

But occasionally there comes a song or album that blows you away so unexpectedly that everything changes. We all have at least one of these transcendental moments in our lives, where a song, a voice, a riff, a roll, a drone, a scream, smashes its imprint on your soul, and you spend the rest of your life reliving that moment. It would certainly be rash to put a small band from Boston into my list, but Pile's 3rd record Dripping blindsided me so completely that I had gravel rash underneath my chin AND my tongue. It’s probably futile to describe this album, but I’ll briefly try.

From the raw energy of opener ‘Baby Boy’, this record never lets up, incorporating the indie rock of the 90s (when it truly was independent) with a crunchier, heavier edge and hair-on-your-chest yowls from frontman Rick Maguire that evokes a simpler, grungier Modest Mouse who are most definitely still on the self-flagellation and sauce downward spiral.

Dripping comes from recording the album in Philadelphia in the middle of summer, and the heat, sweat, anguish and ephemeral base emotions comes bleeding out of these tracks. Even when things slow down (‘Prom Song’, ‘Bubblegum’) there is a feverish itch that pervades, albeit one that has you grinning maniacally. And when they kick it into an addictive rhythmic gear as they do with ‘Bump A Grape’, ‘The Jones’ and the acidic ‘Grunt Like A Pig’, it takes all your might to stop from tearing your own face off with glee. This may sound all perfunctory and stupid, but that is the power of these songs over me. I struggle to comprehend the power that these guitar lines, insistent bass and rumbling drums have over me. And that wail…

When you wake from a dream where your band was playing these songs, and they killed – thus its your subconsciousness telling you that your band will never make songs as good as these in real life – then you know you have something pretty great on your hands.

There have been quite a few bands that have stirred me in this fashion this year – Spook Houses, Tiny Spiders, Dikes of Holland, Grass Cannons, Plateaus, Iowa, Looks Like Miaou, Invisible Things, PAWS, Scott & Charlene’s Wedding, Post Teens, Sleepies, and I'm leaving a few out – and it’s these moments, just as much as when a feverishly anticipated release like GY!BE, Ty Segall or Swans slays mightily, that keeps the faith burning bright.

A glowing review? Sure. Dripping isn’t perfect by any means – but that makes it even better, because the next album could be bullshit good, and that’s worth living for.

 

Pile’s Dripping can be gleaned via Exploding In Sound Records here.

Neighbours Are Your Best Friends At The Para Vista Social Club

 

Australia is rife with skronky grungy slacker rock, yet almost every single band that peddles the stuff have their own slant on it. Eddy Current Suppression Ring offer a feverish post-punk stiltedness to their garage cauldron, overseen by a manic and unpredictable wordsmith with countless neuroses. Twerps saunter down suburban streets in the afternoon, sitting on the verandah drinking beers whilst listening to the stereo. You have the silly (Tiny Migrants, Cannon, Gooch Palms), the psychedelically crazy (King Gizzard & the Lizard Wizard, Drunk Mums), the cocky retro kids (Velociraptor, Go Violets)…then you have Scott & Charlene’s Wedding.

The product of Craig Dermody, Para Vista Social Club (which actually came out in Australia last year) is raised up not just by the wonky yet addictive instrumentation and melodies, but his takes on working class malaise, heartache, and world-weary commentary on the ills of the slightly disenfranchised are fascinating ('Gammy Leg', although not found here, is one of the best songs of the past couple years PERIOD). Imagine The Go Betweens making their earlier albums in the 21st century in a scum-stained corner of the urban sprawl, playing good cop to Matt Kennedy-led Kitchens Floor’s bad cop, and you have Scott & Charlene’s Wedding down…or, if you were like me, you had me at “Scott & Charlene’s Wedding”.

 

Unfortunately Dermody has flown the coop to search out New York’s realist corners (a la Curtis Wakeling from another unheralded Aussie gem, Velcro). But thanks to Critical Heights Records, Para Vista Social Club is getting a UK release (grab it here!). When Dermody first put out the album, he created each vinyl sleeve from scratch, using covers from other albums and defacing them in some way (check them all out here). Those are all sold out now - I'm not sure if you Europhiles will get similar treatment, but trust me, you are in for a treat. You can grab the LP here – this is a goddamn great record, yet another testament to the goods that are coming out of this vast wasteland...

 

Scott & Charlene’s Wedding – Footscray Station
Scott & Charlene’s Wedding – Rejected
Scott & Charlene’s Wedding – Back In Town

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