In The Treehouse Zone

Tasmania's Treehouse came on my radar back in August when they supported Per Purpose on their 'Eureka' single launch. The fact that a goon sack and discordant guitar flailing complemented each other in their set meant I had connected immediately with Treehouse and their fuse-blasting fare. Now Vacant Valley are reissuing the band's debut Interzone on luscious 12" vinyl. This is loud, scuzzy, droning pop that is as ardent as it is flippant - throwaway nuggets of digestible, discernible knowledge, bashed out by dudes with too much time on their hands, for better or worse. Their live shows a set on a knife-edge, either elevated into an effervescent maelstrom of noise and light, or nosediving into a chasm of unrelenting chaos and despair. Well, I say despair - things are never that bad when there's an inflatable pillow of piss-yellow grape juice around... Luckily the trio come prepared with tracks made for either outcome. Interzone then stands as a shapeshifter of a record - setting the mood as the mood sets you. Corruption of two halves.

Pre-order the Interzone vinyl here.



And here is a clip of another Treehouse track, 'Dead Weight', recorded by Josh Watson (Sewers) at Matt Ford's Puerile Palais (I'm sure his slap-up den of dankness has a name much more suited to the house shows he throws, but this'll do for now) the afternoon before the aforementioned Per Purpose show. Good times.

Kes Is Better In Twos

I wrote recently about the new album from Melbourne multi-instrumentalist Kes, Duets, for The Music not all that long ago it should be coming out soon. Suffice to say that it is goddamn killer, an ambient melange of collaborations from varied artists such as Sonic Masala faves Lehmann B Smith and Justin Fuller (Zond) to Paddy Mann (Grand Salvo) and Laura Jean, and I discover new, amazing sounds every time I give it a spin. It's an incredible exploration of sonics with a wide array of objects, instruments and found sounds. Throw it on tonight, see where it takes you. Thank me later. 

Out through Polyester Records, you can pick up Duets here.

Shoegaze Is Not Well Lost

Last year I posted a couple of tracks from a band from Tel Aviv called Vaadat Charigim (Hebrew for Exceptions Committee). They released their debut LP The World Is Well Lost back in July, and I've had it in my possession for longer than that, but have held off due to trying to get a feature off the ground concerning underground music in Israel and Palestine during wartime. That as yet remains a work in progress. But I cannot hold off on this album, because it's just too damn good.

Originally slated for global release on Anova, Warm Ratio (vinyl) and Burger Records (cassette) back in July, The World Is Well Lost is finally earning a worldwide guernsey in November 12. Ten tracks of woozy, intimate shoegaze, assuredly precise, offering tempered squalling, tempered moods, and tempered vocals. That's not to say that the trio fail to rise above the calm - the calamitous outro to epic nine-minute wonder 'Kmo Lahzor Habaita' is killer. There is no need to understand Hebrew (though it no doubt helps) to revel in the raucous beauty of 'Haolam Avad Mizman' or the nostalgic miasma of lead single 'Ze Beseder Lefahed.' The end result is something that is both alluring and intoxicating. You get this is what Yuck wished they could cobble together, let alone deliver it with true earnestness and finesse. Fine stuff indeed.

You can buy The World Is Well Lost here.

Dirty Dancing On Crystal Shipsss

Yesterday I showed the Lee Ranaldo video for 'Fire Island (Phases)' that featured Berlin act Crystal Shipsss. That momentous occasion isn't the only thing keeping Jacob Faurholt and his cronies busy though - they have released a new LP Dirty Dancer. The album accentuates the creaky meandering nature of Faurholt's musical imaginings; a nebulous pendulum of dark and light quirk, refusing to sit still, to coalesce into something fully-formed. Due to this, and Faurholt's unique, shrill vocals, Dirty Dancer has wrongfooted a lot of critics, frustrated with the artist's knack of straying off the designated path of an album, or indeed a song. It is true that the album veers in all kinds of directions, thus connecting with the material requires dedication and attention. From choral drifts to lo-fi guitar jams, minimal scratchy beats and broken synth lines, anger that evaporates, despair that congeals, glee that drips maniacally from the fangs... Dirty Dancer is unapologetic for its schizophrenic meanderings and quick-cuts. Focus instead on Crystal Shipsss as something of a stream-of-consciousness flume ride through the mind of a beguiling artist, and you might start to get the idea. Give this Dirty Dancer ago, see if you don't get swept away.

You can pick up the album here.

Pushing Breedlings' Lungs All Over The Velodrome

As I'm not overly familiar with the bands that have burst out of the hallowed halls of Cambridge, England other than Pink Floyd, I can't let you in on the history of angularity and dissonance. That said, I met a guy in a pub there that loved my Explosions In The Sky T-shirt, and he then proceeded to school me in all kinds of awesome music. I believe I gave back as good as I got. I wish I knew his name - or indeed the pub. Swallowed in misty memories marred by substances far and wide, I'm afraid.

So I have no geographical reference when it comes to listening to this triple-A release from Cambridge trio Breedlings, other than to say that this kind of post-punk excellence is like the cast-off and eaten embryo twin of God Bows To Math - there are Minutemen references a plenty here too, and whilst it's a little more straight up the line than the NZ juggernaut, you could hear these guys doing a mean cover of 'Slow Decline'. And a band comfortable enough to release three tracks of equal merit is good enough for me. Discord is well and truly on the table here - a smorgasbord of collegiate angst, bubbling along the Punt, overflowing in bitter bile. Good times.

Wild Movements In The Arabian Dunes

About this time last year I gave a little lip service to Brooklyn wonky popheads band Beach Arabs. They finally have a full-length out, also called Wild Movement, and it's jam-packed full of frenetic, off-kilter, sunny concoctions that rock and/or roll. Liz Hogg is a happy amalgam of Screaming Females' Marisa Paternoster and Kim Deal in a dialled-down Breeders mode, whilst Nathaniel Sabat's droll, Lee Ranaldo-esque drawled deliveries offers a poignant counterpoint, two roughies that rub together to make a diamond. The focus remains the manic tempo shifts and Hogg's pitch-perfect noodling however, the math-lite precision (see closer 'Under The Whale') that underpins these lo-fi ramblings and elevates them beyond mere garage also-rans into something more appealing, a whispier Deerhoof, a American slacker take on Trash Kit or an East Coast Raincoats. Not that Beach Arabs are scaling those heady heights just yet - but with Wild Movement, they have at least made it to base camp.

You can grab Wild Movement through Mouca Records here.

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!

The Tightly Wound Pairing Of God And Math

One of my all-time favourite bands, God Bows To Math, did some recording with all-time fave man Donnie Miller in his Nowhere Audio studio (AKA his home) when the NZ trio played Brisbane earlier this year. That show left an indelible mark on those who saw it (Cam Smith of The Waiting Room has it in his top five gigs since the seminal venue opened its doors two years ago), and the fruits of the subsequent recordings are about to be heard as the band release a 7" split with another rambunctious maelstrom of a band, Shanghai's Pairs. The 7" itself comes with pop-up artwork and a zine - awesome in and of itself - but if 'Tightly Wound' is a judge of character, then GBtM are at their face-melting best once more. It takes its time, builds the tension, then flays the skin and muscle from your bones. Rattling stuff. The record comes out next Monday - pre-order this sucker now, there are only 50 available. Now, about that next trip to Australia...

Walking On These Angry Seas

Melbourne punk survivalists Angry Seas were up here in Brisbane launching their self-titled 7" last week. Which is a shame, because I missed them - if only I had listened to the release (or anything of theirs) beforehand I would have made the journey into Fat Louie's for the show (they were playing alongside Grinning Loons AKA an incognito Spinning Rooms - on the same night Nation Blue & Batpiss were also playing - what a Melbourne-centric night...) Four tracks of tearing shit up, Angry Seas plays like an Aussie blue collar VB swilling Bronx, especially the jostling juxtaposition of melodicism and raucous riffs. Yet another Mikey Young production too - the guy has the Midas touch. If you like your punk rock in a pub, screaming and spitting and leaving you with cuts, bruises and a shit-eating grin, get this 7" ASAP.

Frenchkissing Over A Dream Shake

Who is keen for a Dream Shake? The eponymous debut LP from the Virginia Beach duo came out this week on Frenchkiss Records, and it's an album that slides down easy, tastes great and give you the warm and fuzzies well after the wax stops spinning - even if it's a little sugary at times. Not unlike a Royal Copenhagen Ice Cream Toblerone thickshake. Man, I really could go one of those right about now...

The nine tracks here, made up of names of women from 80s and 90s television shows, are delivered with the slightest of hazy, sepia-tinged, fuzz cauldron echoes, a crunching sound that can start to leaven things out after a time. Still, it's undeniable that Dream Shake knows their way around a solid hook, and when you create early-Deerhunter gems like 'Samantha', you are onto a great thing. This is a fresh new take for the band (formerly called We Are Trees - the shift of name was a good call), and there is more than enough here to come back to - and hold high hopes for the future.

You can buy Dream Shake here.

Ezra Furman

Illinois' own rock'n'roll soulmate Ezra Furman has just released his new record Day Of The Dog on Bar/None Records. The album is a soothing balm of throwback rock, complete with Springsteen-style sax, and you can't help but be energised by the guy as he embodies wholesome American rock for the 21st century, amalgamating all manner of 50s and 60s cliches along the way.

You can buy Day Of The Dog here.

FRIDAY COVER UP - We're Off To See The Colourful TV Wizard...

Last week a friend of mine was telling me I really need to listen to the new TV Colours album, Purple Skies, Toxic River. I still haven't done that. But my lackadaisical meanderings brought me across this cover of album track 'Bad Dreams' by Melbourne band Wizard Oz. I know nothing about them. But this track is cool, so I imaging the original is also cool, therefore I am going to listen incessantly until I can find that album and give it a good thrashing. What more can you want from a cover? Not much, I can tell you. Good night.

Throating A Mechanical All Seeing Hand

Sticking to something different (and another band I've championed of recent times), Wellington electronic drums-turntables-and-throat noise trio The All Seeing Hand have released their new record Mechatronics through Tenzenmen and Muzai Records, and its decidedly seven levels of fucked up weirdness. Throat ranting like a hoarse, maniacal Tazz the Tasmanian Tiger, spatial space landings, elongated discombobulation, inky black masses - the songs play like the score for a Mongolian Hellraiser remake, dubbed over by acid junkies. 'Surgery' is a killer opener to ANY album (Liars are wishing they were this astrally aligned and innately evil), and it gets deceptively more intrusive from here. You have been warned.

The All Seeing Hand are halfway through their first ever Oz tour. They play Hobart tonight, Sydney tomorrow, and the Tote in Melbourne on Sunday. No Brisbane dates - no good. You will have to console yourself with buying Mechatronics, which you can do here.

Failing At Childbirth - Again

Local cracked genius Amateur Childbirth (who I've already spoken about here) has released another album in PRIPYAT (through Disembraining Machine), and its more acoustic fever dreams. Ivan Hicks still has a predilection for bodily fluids, organs, disease and self-loathing, yet his verbose rantings are as acerbic and amusing as ever. If anyone realises how good Amateur Childbirth is, they keep it to themselves - he is the invisible evangelist of body horror and overconsumption hallucinations. I really need to bow down at this warped altar more often...Destroyed folk for multiple strokes.

Krack-a-lackin' Times At Sioux Falls

Back in action with Portland trio Sioux Falls. Big Krackel is an EP that marries the best parts of Doug Martsch, Paul Westerberg and a angst-riddled Fugazi into a broiling melting pot, tempered by the thinnest of veneers, ready to erupt at the slightest provocation. The title track does so, in fact - a few times. There is a blue collar strength that courses through these six songs' veins - people struggling to get by, eager to flee, to retreat, before baring their teeth and fighting against their plight. Great stuff.

A Spinning Room Complicates Things

I can't talk about Batpiss without talking about The Spinning Rooms, now, can I? The Melbourne miscreants are headlining Sonic Masala's 2nd anniversary of putting on shows tomorrow night (alongside Big Richard Insect, Turnpike and Landing In The Presence Of The Enemy, Jaguars Advanced - that's the poster above) as well as an instore at Tyms Guitars on Saturday October 5.

Personal plugging aside, the four-piece have their sophomore album Complicating Things in the wings, and are starting their album launch with us! So, how is the album then?


It's bloody good. The band called it a strong tangent from their debut self-titled album released last year - but this to me is more than a natural progression. Sure, in many ways the queasy unsettled nature of the beast that lay at the core of The Spinning Rooms isn't as much in evidence here - yet the band has become a tightly coiled beast, meaning the moments they crawl out of their hidey-hole to bite you on the face is all the more effective. You have the hedonistic squall of 'Julia', the bluesy, unhinged dirge of 'Blues For Jas H. Duke', the riotous gnashing of 'Kids In The Car'... Pete Dickinson sees both albums as concepts - the first about a couple who move to the country and everything turns to shit, then Complicating Things is them returning to the city. But by the sounds of things, nothing has improved from their urban retreat - at all. The B-Side of the album dives into despair and chagrin once more, the lonely plinking piano a distinct highlight, before the ten minute closer 'I've Found A Place I Can Sleep (Parts 1 & 2) takes on a staggered ballad, which is either a glimmer of hope, or the howl of abject despair, a breaking, a surrender. This ambiguity is just another reason why The Spinning Rooms is one of the most electrifying, exciting bands on the continent right now, and Complicated Things only cements this notion.

INTERVIEW - Batpiss

Ah, Batpiss. The loose trio produced one of the best balltearing releases of the year in the form of Nuclear Winter back in the first half of the year. Yet this interview, conducted with bassist/vocalist Thomy Sloane, was actually conducted back in May, the same time Nathan and I interviewed another excellent Melbourne band White Walls. Why has it taken so long to air? Because I had been holding on to this for their album launch shows up here in July – that never happened. Then I was holding it for when they would launch the album at a Sonic Masala show slated for October 12. But that ain’t happenin either. Why? Because the bloody Nation Blue bloody asked em to bloody support them on a little covert tour, didn’t they? The same day I have a wedding to attend (not my own, but a close friend’s). Fuckers. No, it will be a killer show this Saturday night down at Crowbar (with the excellent Roku Music and new anomaly Greig filling out the bill). So here is the interview. (Yes, Thomy does speak like this; and yes, I laughed a lot).

SONIC MASALA – Hey Tommy, how are you man?

THOMY SLOANE – umm…fucking working on the door (at the Tote) at the moment. So if the band starts Ill ask someone to cover me if it’s too loud.

This is the flyer I saw. OFF! was a dream come true for Black Flag head Thomy...

SM – Cool, Ill get stuck in then. I can’t remember exactly where I had heard of Batpiss originally, because you haven’t been around all that long – it may have been on a flyer that I saw in Melbourne back in February – and so it feel you have leapt out of nowhere to be slaying it down there.

TS – Yeah man, fuckin ahh, it’s pretty new ay? We’re blown out by it all too, we’ve only been doing this for a year and a half. Shit’s just worked out for us, we haven’t really had to do anything, we’ve just been lazy pricks and shit’s just fallen in our laps, which is lucky for us I guess. We’re spun the fuck out over it hey!

SM – (laughs) The funny thing about your album Nuclear Winter is that its brutal but it does sound like there's some kind of manic glee in the entire process, there's no, as full as it can be it is not a serious endeavour…

TS – Totally. There’s nothing serious about us. We get labelled and put alongside these heavy as hell bands, but you listen to the record and…we’re not, you know? We’re the opposite in some ways. There are heavy elements for sure…but I don’t even think its heavy! (laughs) The album itself has real diverse shit in there; some of it’s pop I reckon…

SM – (laughs) Really?

TS – Yeah, yeah. The ‘Loose Screws’ chorus is pretty poppy, same with ‘Portal’ I reckon.

SM – That’s a pretty warped take on pop.

TS – Yeah, pretty much (laughs) Well not pop, but catchy. Catchy can be the word; I don’t wanna be in a pop band, fuck that.

SM – (laughs) Not with a name like Batpiss, that’s for sure! Where did the name come from?

TS – It came from Marty our drummer. We were drunk as shit one night, trying to come up with a band name. We came up with heaps of stupid ones, then that came up. We –

(Noise as the band starts up. The next three minutes is Thomy trying to get someone to take the door; lots of expletives; finally he works something out and things quieten down)

TS – So sorry dude! Where was I? The name? Yeah, so, do you really wanna know the long story?

SM – (laughs) That’s up to you, do you want to tell it?

TS – Ok…(sigh)…I went on this date with this chick at the Tote, and at this time of year bats hang out in the trees. It’s a clear arse night, and I’ve seen them piss on someone before in the beer garden. So that’s happened to me; it was a clear arse night, so it clearly wasn’t rain. And the girl was like “Oh, what was that?” And I was like “Ah, nothing…I'll be back in a sec.” I just live around the corner so I'm fucking running home, ripping my fucking shirt off that’s covered in fucking bat piss, ran back to the pub and ran into Marty, and I was like “Dude, I got pissed on by a bat!” He laughed and said “We’re called Batpiss, that’s it” And yep, that’s it. How good is that?

SM – (laughing)

TS – We came up with heaps of other stupid names afterwards, because it was just a joke at the start. The whole band thing – Marty and I only played songs that went for one minute. Then we got Paul in on guitar, we started writing different shit to suit him, and the name stuck.

SM – So the name literally fell from the sky?

TS – It literally did, and it covered me! (laughs)

SM – So you said you brought Paul in and started changing the dynamic of the band, were there any influences or goals that you had at the very least?

TS – Yeah, well, all three of us love different shit, like Marty our drummer is heaps into doom stuff, and I enjoy old punk rock, Black Flag and all that punk shit, and Paul our guitarist is heaps into blues – he’s one of those dudes who can just play mad shit. So I think it’s just a blend of three different people throwing whatever they want to the mix. There’s no boundaries, like we don’t say “We’ve got fucking do this or fucking sound like this!” We just sit around and fucking jam out, so things start fast and end up slow, that kind of thing. And there’s no real band influences either. If it was anything like that, it’d be local bands around Melbourne I reckon. Just got a dark Melbourne kinda sound, you know? We’re just a bunch of weird cunts, really…

SM – (laughs) Yeah, that you are! It’s funny you should say that, because one of my favourite bands at the moment is The Spinning Rooms, and there’s a certain level of affinity that you guys hold with them too…

TS – Oh majorly man, I reckon those guys are awesome! I actually live with Pete (Dickinson, vox/guitar for The Spinning Rooms). I absolutely love what they do and once again I think they’ve got that real dark underground Melbourne kinda sound, that noisy kinda thing. Whatever they do is fucking rad and I’ve definitely taken influence from them for sure. Mainly the noisy guitar and Pete’s vocals as well.

SM – It’s just something else, isn’t it? I’ve known Tom Lyngcoln since 2011 when I came back from the UK and he was starting up Harmony, who’s a goddamn legend, and…

TS – Who’s that?

SM – Tom Lyngcoln? He did your album?

TS – Oh, yeah, Tom, sorry I couldn’t hear for a second. Yeah he’s a fucking legend.

SM – Yeah, and he recorded the Spinning Rooms stuff, so it’s clearly a sound that he is gravitating towards as well, or at least is searching him out…

TS – Oh majorly man! I don’t know what it is about him hey. He’s got such an ear for good shit. I'm not saying that about us, though, the other stuff he does, including the bands hes in. He’s totally onto it.

SM – He sure is…

TS – And he’s the most humble dude to work with, man. Recording was completely stress free with him. It’s a fucking pleasure to know the guy.

SM – (laughs) He puts his neck out for anyone that he thinks is the real deal, he’s a great guy…

TS – Fucking oath. He’s someone where it’s like if you don’t get along with him, then you must be a fuckwit. (laughs) If you can’t like this guy then there’s something fucking going on with you, mental issues or some shit. He is just a fucking good dude.

SM – Stepping away from the gushing for a second…

TS – (laughs) Yeah, that was getting a bit like that…

SM – You said that Nuclear Winter was an easy recording process, you did it all at the Tote in your rehearsal room, is that right?

TS – Yeah. Well me and Marty work at the Tote, jam here, we know what the room’s like, it’s just around the corner from my house, so why not, you know? It’s where the band fucking started, so we feel at home here. Plus we don’t have to fucking pay any money, which is luck because we haven’t fucking got none, plus all our gear’s here so we don’t have to lug it anywhere. Tom has a portable studio he can take anywhere with him, so he set up a bunch of shit and we recorded it live.

SM – Nuclear Winter kind of sounds live, but it sounds so good. When I heard it was all recorded in the Tote rehearsal rooms, well, I know you can make anything sound good from anywhere I suppose, but it’s a sleeker production that still sounds brutal, like it can break down at any time…

TS – Yeah, it’s got a real roomy sound, not like it’s in a sterile environment like a studio.  There’s lots of bleed in it. It’s pretty much how we sound live, and I didn’t want to capture anything else. You know when with bands you see them a bunch of times then you hear the album and it sounds really polished? I wanted the opposite, to say “Nah, this is how we kill it” and press play. I think it’s come out sweet, I'm really happy with it.

SM – With songs like ‘Loose Screws’ that are more straightforward rock tunes, then there are songs that are slower, stretched out, dirge like songs – it’s an album that truly showcases what Batpiss has been able to achieve over the past year.

TS – Totally man, and I think that’s to do with the different stuff we all listen to as well. You can be heavy without being metal, and the riffs on the albums prove that I reckon. It’s good to be diverse, rather than be labelled as a punk band or a whatever band. We play fast paced songs, medium paced shit, it’s all good.

SM – Do you find yourselves being corralled into heavy sets or heavy lineups that don’t really suit you, or sort of diverse acts that don’t really gel together?

TS – Yeah, we get thrown onto lots of doomy sort of shows and that always flips me out because all the bands before us are heavy as fuck, and I'm thinking “Man, we’re gonna sound like the Spice Girls coming after these guys!” I don’t know, I feel we’ve always played shows with different genre bands as well. I prefer to play mixed-genre bills. A good band’s a good band, you don’t have to all sound the same to have a good time. And that’s where I think we’ve branched out to a lot of people as well. A lot of people who listen to country or folk grew up as little punks, everyone’s had their day listening to hardcore shit, and Batpiss might take them back to that. I don’t know…

SM – Well you had a pretty eclectic lineup for your launch too, didn’t you?

TS – Yeah man that was nuts. And once again I think the scene down in Melbourne is so strong dude. Every fucking band is seriously got their A game on. All the bands we picked for that were bands that we’re mates with. We couldn’t do a launch where you have one or two bands support you, we though “Fuck that! We wanna get them all!” So we made a party out of it, and it was off the tap man. Every band was on the money, and we were sitting there shitting ourselves, thinking that it had all backfired on us and we were the worst band to be finishing off such a fucking awesome lineup. I don’t know, I reckon it all worked out in the end.

SM – (laughs) Just going back to the album for a second, the artwork is pretty cool, where’d that come from?

TS – That’s our guitarist; he does all our art. He’s a freak at drawing, like you go to his house and the place is covered in pictures he’s drawn, all like skulls and that kinda shit. I reckon he’s got a distinct kind of style about him, and it’s good for us too because then our releases can be seen as Batpiss just from the drawings. His artwork is off the chain! That’s fucking nothing compared to a lot of his other stuff, it’s pretty loose.

Shit indeed. A wild guy from a wild band. Make sure you can get to the show at Crowbar this Saturday – Ill be the guy in the spew-stained suit – but if you can’t get there, you can pick up their excellent album Nuclear Winter through Every Night Is A Saturday Night Records here.

Dirt from Stevens Past

I don't know if the post-wedding blues exist, but if they do, I get 'em bad. A couple of my best mates tied the proverbial knot on the weekend and I'm pretty sure I more than exhausted my share of dopamine (and their share of champagne).

I didn't know anything was up until day two when, lying under a fan, thoroughly un-effervesed, I realised I had no desire to get up. I dragged my laptop onto the floor hoping for a distraction. Somewhat ironically, 'Hindsight' provided more than that. Further scientific study may be required to claim beyond reasonable doubt that a chord change can change the way a breeze feels, but I would be happy to add my anecdote in the affirmative.


The Stevens have a knack for capturing that fizzing anxiety, that feeling you can never quite put your finger on, let alone catch. Their sound scratches through years of quiet ceiling study, ruminating on just how limited our powers actually are. It's a reason to get up.

The debut album A History of Hygiene is out through Chapter November 1. Get it, you won't regret it.

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.

Four Score Ebb And Thrall Of An Alpine Decline

I was sent one of those anonymous Bandcamp emails yesterday, telling me that Shaun over at Tenzenmen Records was releasing yet another album. I still haven't paid lip service to some of the killers that have come through this year (sorry Birdstriking, apologies White+), yet some are frontrunner favourite albums of 2013 (hello Yes I'm Leaving; hi there Bone) so I thought I'd head over and look. It was Disappearance, the third album from Beijing-based band Alpine Decline. But as I scrolled down the side, I saw that there were a glut of albums that Tenzenmen had put out, or were about to put out - and all were from Alpine Decline. Investigation, both aural and journalistic (well as journalistic as I get), was necessary.



Seems that the band released their self-titled debut in 2010 (which comes across like Built To Spill in a near murderous sonic sense of brutality) in LA, where they had formed, then travelled to China and into the Himalayas, before coming back and recording Visualisations later in the same year. It follows a similar pattern to Alpine Decline, yet with a wider expansive of crackle and drone - it was like the trek had started opening a hitherto unknown propensity for languidly and porous drone, albeit still kept in check by an innate drive for melody and conciseness.



Yet something had been awakened, and the band could not sate this creative hunger. In 2011 the duo returned to the studio where they recorded Vizualisations (again helmed by M Geddes - who had helmed productions of Robedoor and Pocahaunted records in the past), and the resultant works, collated into third album Disappearance (the album that brought me on this mystic journey) is decidedly more insular yet kinetic; more warped and yet more focused than their predecessors. The third eye was well and truly alive within these two. A deliberate exercise in hypnosis and concerted, controlled elongation (yet with the inherent melody and groove a cell-level mainstay), the twelve tracks on offer still remained succinct, yet each appeared to contain their own alien technology, their own enveloping worlds. Such strong and clear evolution in such a short timeframe is frightening.



Then the duo disappeared, back to the outskirts of Beijing, for a year. Finally they returned with a fourth album tucked firmly under their grimy arms, and Night of the Long Knives was another transmogrification of Alpine Decline - this time more contemplative, more glazed, more ethereal. There was more of a thousand yard stare here - like returning from self-imposed exile to find the world you left behind rent asunder, nothing left behind, nothing recognisable. There are songs that still echo the very best, maudlin BtS (see 'Sleeping Gas' for example) yet with a gauzy, dystopian hue.


These four albums are still sinking in - yet I think I may have stumbled across a band that is creating albums that I will fall in love with for different reasons; that will seep into my very being; that are, in other words, quintessentially essential listening. And the more that these albums are listened to, and embraced, and revered, the stronger Alpine Decline's id grows - the albums will continue to tumble forth, fully formed and magnificent - and the world will evolve along with them.

Grab all four albums here. Seriously, for the betterment of mankind.