Totally Mild Time

I stumbled across Totally Mild pretty much by accident in February 2013. The year before I'd asked Melbourne troubadour du jour Lehmann B Smith to come up to Brisbane to play a show for a Lofly gig. I missed it due to an emergency operation, but we kept in touch, and I finally caught him in the flesh when I was in Melbourne to see the MBV & Drones ATP (also playing that night at Bar Open - The Menstrual Cycle AKA Snowy Halliwell Nasdaq et al). He was playing in a friend's band which was - yep - Totally Mild. I really dug it.




It's great to see Elizabeth Mitchell's brainchild not only metamorphose into a larger band concern, or because my memory that night has always been hazy (I raced into Bar Open after two days of drinking at the Altona sweatbox, and had just finished up with Einstürzende Neubaten). It is that Mitchell's melodic music is excellent and deserves to be tickling at everyone's spine. Down Time is TM's debut LP (out through Bedroom Suck and Fire), and it is chock full of pop altruisms and melancholic mantras, knitted together with an elegance and a subtle mischievousness that is impossible to ignore. 


 
A stunning achievement, Down Time can be grabbed here.

Totally Mild Down Time

One of the albums I'm anticipating in 2015 is Down Time, the debut longplayer from subdued pop chanteuses (and boys) Totally Mild, who are the latest converts to the Bedroom Suck religion. I saw them play at Bar Open back in 2013, directly after obliterating my headspace all day at ATP - I think TM were supporting Liam 'Snow Nasdaq from The Ocean Party' Halliwell's solo thing The Menstrual Cycle - I don't truly remember, I was pretty shattered. The band is the brainchild of Elizabeth Mitchell but also enlists the aid of Lehmann B Smith (if you haven't heard his stuff before, goddamn rectify that asap), Ashley Bundang (Zone Out, Hot Palms) and Zach Schneider (Full Ugly). The first taste off the album is 'Christa', and it's a languid corker. The band are about to embark on a national tour with best buds The Ocean Party (I feel like a mouthpiece for those guys!), and you can catch 'em at the following places:

Thurs, Jan 29 – The Phoenix, Canberra, ACT [w/The Ocean Party, Black Springs + Eadie and the Doodles]

Fri, Jan 30 – The Lansdowne, Sydney, NSW [w/The Ocean Party, Black Springs + King Single]

Sun, Feb 1 – Black Bear Lodge , Brisbane, QLD [w/The Ocean Party, Workshop + Curlew]

Sun, Feb 8 – Ceres, Melbourne, VIC [10am, w/The Ocean Party, two sets each]

Sat, Feb 14 – Brisbane Hotel, Hobart, TAS [6pm, w/Bitch Prefect, Peter Escott, Old Mate, Superstar, Pines, Small Black Lambs + All the Weathers]

Tues, Feb 24 – Howler, Melbourne, VIC [w/The Ocean Party + Real Estate]

That Brisbane show with Workshop and SM faves Curlew looks fantastic... Get along you donkeys!

Quaffing The Healing Crystals Down For Those Cool Sounds

Barely six months have passed since Melbourne dudes Cool Sounds brought us Melbourne Fashion, and yet here is another album to light up and take in. Healing Crystals is eight songs of blissful, sanguine pop, an easy glide down the backstreets of your town. Snowy (The Ocean Party et al) has become more of a fixture on this album, his saxophone lending a warm hum that at once refreshes and lightens the load. There are additional vocals lilting in the background too from the likes of Amanda Roff (Harmony), Ashley Bundang (Zone Out, Hot Palms, Totally Mild) and Zac Denton (The Ocean Party, Ciggie Witch) to add to the wash of sultry sounds. In fact this reminds me a lot of last year's Ciggie Witch record, Rock and Roll Juice. There is an ease and familiarity with all of this, that doesn't feel as put on (or put upon) as other players in this crowded tavern. Especially when they get into storyteller mode, like closer 'Pizzas', which plays out like a vignette of a bit player from Edward Scissorhands, if the film was shot in Coburg. Which to me should be the focus of more jangle rock albums - concept it the fuck up.

Seriously though, Healing Crystals is a lovely record. The fact that French label Beko Disques (who put out the Excusers EP I mentioned recently, as well as Day Ravies and Nathan Roche releases) are putting this out is doubly exciting - grab it here. The boys have had a residency this month down at the Tote - and are finishing up this Sunday with Palm Springs and Tam Vantage in support - get along.

Drinking The Juice of Young Ciggie Witches

The latest in a long line of acts to come out of Osborne Street in Brunswick, Melbourne (although it’s been a week so more may have spawned) is Ciggie Witch, and their debut album Rock & Roll Juice hits all the hallmarks of this highly creative hub. It opens with a predictable summer jangle about languid Melbourne living, 'Long Weekend', before we get the more baritone vocals of Mitch Clemens on 'Broken Nose' – and it makes sense. It's this particular counterpoint of voice, tone and worldview that works on disparities like wondering why you'd bother getting out of bed if you will only surf the 'Net in, er,  'The Internet' or waiting for your brother to come to the servo to pay for your petrol because you have no money in 'Point Cook'.

Resplendent in shimmering beauty (thanks to some wonderful instrumentation from Ocean Party/Zone Out/Alek & the Ramps alumni) and a measured production from Dusty Anastassiou (Brisbane brother in arms from Dag), Rock & Roll Juice is the perfect aural equivalent of diary entries for these guys and gals – the kind of lackadaisical, ponderous, easy-livin’ existences that do indeed exist, seem point- and fruitless, yet are rich in existential whimsy, introverted melancholy, yet an overall love of living life in the moment, as it comes, without worrying too much about where the 2 minute noodles or toilet paper will come from one week to the next because there is a footy to kick, a beer to drink, a Sega emulator to play, a guitar to strum and a smile to crack.

Rock & Roll Juice is available on limited vinyl here.

Twelve Months Of Snowy Nasdaq Starts - Let's Get Physical

Apparently 2014 is the Year of the Nasdaq - Snowy Nasdaq AKA Liam Halliwell (The Ocean Party/Zone Out/Mining Boom/Pencil/etcetfuckingera) is releasing a single a month over at Why Don't You Believe Me? Records. January's kick-off is 'Physical Parts', a pop confection littered with disco simplicities, sampled quirks and sonic sleights of hand, culminating in a cute pop jam that nonetheless takes you down dark, hallucinogenic side alleys in the process. This promises to be a very interesting journey indeed...

Pencil Pushers

Yet another Melbourne act branching out of the Osborne Street crew that's spawned the likes of The Ocean Party, Velcro, Hot Palms, Zone Out and Andre, Pencil is the wonky pop brainchild of TOC bassist Liam Halliwell (AKA Snowy Nasdaq, who amongst moonlighting with Mining Boom and doing his own things like Menstrual Cycle, as well as recording and mixing stuff, is a busy boy indeed). Halliwell is joined in Pencil by Ashley Bundang (Hot Palms, Zone Out), Jordan Thompson (The Ocean Party), Andre Vanderwert (Andre, Hot Palms), and Zahra Khamissa (Hot Palms, Zone Out) - a petri dish of the Osborne Again/Why Don't You Believe Me? rota. It's more blissfully laid back than The Ocean Party (if you can believe that possible), and deserved of their own spot on the shelf of an already overloaded Melbourne soundscape.

Pencil have a few little releases to their name, most recently their Good Excuse EP. It's sold out, but you can pick up the digitals (and a limited number of their earlier self-titled and Sydney Weekender EPs) at their Bandcamp.  What will these guys come up with next...

Something Less To Zone Out About

Another great little release is Something Less, the debut EP from Melbourne's Zone Out, and it's the perfect way to see out the night. The quartet features members of the bands Hot Palms, Pencil, Totally Mild, Scotdracula and is the bedroom daydreams of one Ashley Bundang, and each release gets decidedly more wistful and sepia-toned - a cloud of nostalgia, heavy burdens, metaphysical fatigue and the light touch of hope. It saunters along absentmindedly, a dancehall slowdance for those about to drop out, but the tracks here never feel listless. There is a majesty here that hints at a lot more substance just around the corner. That shimmering guitar on 'Greeves Street' also imbues a wasted elegance - being opulent and sundrunk on a VHS rerun.

Something Less is out now in cassette (through Osborne Again) and CD (Why Don't You Believe Me?) forms.

Zoned Out In This Place

Oops - I somehow posted this as the email I received from Lachlan at Osborne Again Music - MY BAD. So here is the actual post...

Enough people have mentioned to me in the past month the "fact" that too many people play in too many bands in this day and age that their efforts are wasted IE they should focus on making one thing the best it possibly can, rather than hedging bets with a plethora of acts that are variants on the same theme. I see their point - there are bands that are filled with half-formed ideas, merely because friends wanted to play together and it's so easy to record stuff rather than work and work on it until you have the money to go into a studio and make it right. Osborne Again Music is the kind of label that will fall into this category for some, seeing as every band on the "label" have a member or members from the same Osborne Street house in Melbourne. Beef Jerk, Velcro, Feline Fine, Shark Alarm...they all have that jangly, slacker, wasted suburban debasement vibe. 

Then there is Zone Out. Featuring members of Hot Palms (who are playing our September 6 gig extravaganza alongside the aforementioned Velcro crew' and hence the co-release of the EP through Hot Palms' Why Don't You Believe Me? record label), Pencil, Totally Mild (who I got to see the last time I was in Melbourne, they were pretty rad) and Scotdrakula, Zone Out has more of a considered, cosmopolitan touch (IE this doesn't feel burped out after a half carton and box of pizza has been consumed on a Tuesday morning). Their upcoming EP Something Less is one of spatial awareness - the band know their limits but are willing to surpass them, travel out into the glacial wilderness, their noise exacerbated by their willingness to drift and dream. 

Something Less is out on Friday. I'm quietly confident that this one will be a slowburner that will light your fire.