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LISTEN: Nimble Animal – ‘Back n Forth’

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Brisbane guy Dom Stephens has a lot on the go. Eccentric indie band Oh Ye Denver Birds is on the back burner since he moved to Melbourne to study sound design, but he’s also got solo beats outfit Outerwaves (which is responsible for gorgeous tunes like this one) and a more introspective project called Nimble Animal.

About a week ago Stephens released the Bleak Moments EP as Nimble Animal. It’s basically drone, with distressed analogue sounds looping alongside percussive taps and clicks, layers of lush synths and Stephens’ voice, which is mostly buried in echo. There’s a lot of tape hiss and weirdly circumvented instruments, but overall the EP has a warm, gently soporific feel.

Bleak Moments is a patient and engrossing record as it leads up to the cathartic closing piece, ‘Back n Forth’. With its repetitive, uplifting motifs and homemade vibe, it reminds me of the best tracks from Youth Lagoon’s breakout debut, The Year of Hibernation. Though it comes right at the end, ‘Back n Forth’ sounds like the EP’s pop heart, its circular melody spiralling upwards to take you home.

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PREMIERE: The Murlocs – ‘Space Cadet’

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The Murlocs - Space Cadet

 

The Murlocs are impressive for a number of reasons. The main being that they’re one of only a few lo-fi/ garage bands that don’t bore me to death. I don’t know if it has something to do with growing up in near Geelong and having limited things to complain about, or the good influence of having The Dingoes frontman as your frontman’s old man. If ramshackle ‘jangly’ garage tunes constitutes something OTHER than writing whingey songs about day jobs, I think these guys are great advocates. ‘Space Cadet’ is the newest single from the five piece, taken from their forthcoming record. It’s another simmering slingshot of rhythm and blues with Ambrose Kenny-Smith’s respiratory snarl at the helm. Plus, this track is about space zombies…ROCK ‘N’ ROLLA.

Ambrose says that ‘Space Cadet’ was “one of the only songs saved from the original recordings we did with Stu (McKenzie) at Cook’s mum’s house in Colac. We had it sent to Mikey Young to mix. Sadly not long after, the rest were gone with his laptop that was stolen so we’ve since been re-recording the rest…”
There’s a clip that’ll be rolling out from Zonk Vision in the next few weeks too. The video was filmed by Jaso Galea on the egde of Lake Corangamite near Colac. We’ve been told that the finished deal looks like ‘Black Sabbath with computers in the 70s’. Looking forward to that.
Murlocs tour announcement happening soon, we’ll keep you posted.

 

 

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WATCH: The Golden Awesome – ‘Autumn’

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So a shoegazer falls in the forest. They probably won’t make too much of a sound, especially in this EDM climate anyway. I like m b v, JMC, Ride and everything The Laurels have ever committed to. But you know, on a good day – sometimes I think I’d feel more stimulated watching Mazzy Star’s corpse eat a bowl of porridge. Although, when G R E A T, atmospheric bands somehow trod my path, I digress.

I came across The Golden Awesome recently. The Wellington band released their debut album back in 2011, but the video to the title track ‘Autumn’ was only released in March this year (my justification for being late to this). The band pluck their prime cuts off early NZ bands of the 90s – there’s echoes of Bailter Space and some of the other early acts spawned by the Flying Nun label in their early days. The result is a slower accolade of the ‘Dunedin sound’, that’s still equitably lush and glorious without seeping your attention. Stef Animal on vocals is Hope Sandoval with a power chord. There’s a whole lot of harmonizing and not a whole lot of lyrical staunch but as with any bout of expansive, hazy shoegaze – ‘feeling’ is probably the only feeling happening here.

There’s an immersive weight that backs ‘Autumn’, and the band have channeled all of that into the accompanying video.The video features an array of helicopter shots panning over an expansive North Island, combined with some pretty intense animation of trees scaling the colour spectrum. I’m not sure whether I’m meant to feel intoxicated or entirely motivated, but I like it.

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The Golden Awesome are playing a show at Public Bar (Vic) this Thursday, 10th of October. They’ll also stopping by The Gasometer this Friday for a headline show with Contrast and Glaciers.

 

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LISTEN: Boomgates – ‘Widow Maker’

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Australia, you may have noticed, is really flipping big. There’s a lot of distance between our urban capitals, and we’re a heck of a long way from most of the so-called ‘Western world’. We sometimes feel a bit isolated, on our own all the way down here, and we get a bit defensive of our cultural exports – not to mention fiercely supportive of their creators.

These factors tend to make our music scene kind of incestuous. Enthusiastic music journos toss the word ‘supergroup’ around with gay abandon, but when every drummer plays in about five different bands the term doesn’t always mean that much. Boomgates, however, have one of the most drool-worthy line-ups upon this vast continent, featuring Eddy Current Suppression Ring frontman, Brendan Huntley, Dick Diver‘s Steph Hughes and Rick Milovanovic from the Twerps.

These guys have actually crossed the ditch for their latest release (in a sense – no one actually had to leave their hometown, let’s not get crazy), a split single with Kiwi group the Bats from that country’s own great export and singular pride, the Flying Nun roster. Boomgates’ contribution to the 7″, ‘Widow Maker’, is a jangly existential ode to the mundane. It opens with a great riff, open strings singing, then clicks into a bright, guitar-led groove with a steady forward momentum. Huntley memorialises a few moment-to-moment pleasures (‘I wear my diamond necklace just to show it off / I tie my shoes just to tie the knot’) – the take-home message being don’t take this stuff for granted, because at any old time that eponymous widow maker could snap off and wipe you out. Like most Boomgates tracks, ‘Widow Maker’ turns on the counterpoint between Huntley’s roughshod, half-sung, half-spoken delivery and Hughes’ soothing harmonies, as well as the loose interplay of the two guitars.

 

The Bat’s contribution to the split, ‘December Ice’, is an outtake from their sessions at Seacliff Asylum, a 19th century psychiatric institution located at a village on the country’s South Island. The singles were released digitally yesterday, with vinyl coming on 1 November. You can preorder the 7″ from Bedroom Sucks or Mistletone. Both bands will be playing a huge show for Melbourne Music Week’s opening night, on 15 November, alongside Montero and San Francisco’s Sonny and the Sunsets. Get your tickets here!

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WATCH: Courtney Barnett – ‘Avant Gardener’

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Fark, sorry all we’ve offered you this week is some shameless product placement. To make up for it, here is the awesomely goofy new video by Charlie Ford from Melbourne’s Courtney Barnett for the lovely ‘Avant Gardener’. Can’t help but think this should’ve been cricket instead of tennis but I reckon it was shaped for a US market. Featuring some really nice filming of Barnett straight down the barrel singing what is one of my favourite tunes this year. Barnett has combined two EP’s for a new release The Double EP: A Sea of Split Peas, released on House Anxiety / Marathon Artists / Milk! Records which you can pick up from her label here.

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Tour Dates:

WED – Oct 16, 2013 CMJ – Dates to be announced New York

TUE – Oct 22, 2013 Notting Hill Arts Club London

WED – Oct 23, 2013 Servants Jazz Quarters London

THU – Oct 24, 2013 Old Blue Last London

SAT – Oct 26, 2013 La Fléche d’Or Paris

FRI – Nov 08, 2013 “How To Carve A Carrot Into A Rose” EP Launch Shadow Electric at Abbotsford Convent,

VIC FRI – Dec 06, 2013 California Design Up Late Queensland Art Gallery, Brisbane QLD

SAT – Dec 14, 2013 Meredith Music Festival Melbourne, VIC SOLD OUT

Supporting Billy Bragg:

SUN – Mar 09, 2014 – Perth Concert Hall, Perth WA

WED – Mar 12, 2014 – Federation Hall, Hobart TAS

THU – Mar 13, 2014 – The Palais Theatre, St Kilda VIC

SUN – Mar 16, 2014 – The Sydney Opera House, NSW

WED – Mar 19, 2014 – Canberra Theatre, ACT

THU – Mar 20, 2014 – The Tivoli, Brisbane QLD

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INTRODUCING: The Creases

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Housemates Joe Agius and Jarrod Mahon had only been writing songs as The Creases for a couple of months when they got an email from iconic indie label Rough Trade asking to release their debut single.

A couple of commentators have attributed this early success – basically every slacker’s wet dream – to Triple J presenter/manager extraordinaire Maggie Collins, but personally I’d pin it on the tunes. We hear a lot of lo-fi, low stakes garage pop in Australia, and all too often it’s more style than substance. But the effortless sound of The Creases’ debut single ‘I Won’t Wait’ belies a flair for simple songwriting. The rising chorus with its backing ‘oohs’ and ‘aahs’ is a charming exercise in tension and release, not to mention harmony.

 

‘I Won’t Wait’, along with b-side ‘Fun to Lose’, will be out digitally and on 7″ vinyl from 11 November, and preorders are now open via the Rough Trade webstore. The Creases have rounded out their line up with bassist Aimon Clark and drummer Bridie McQueenie and, with a few shows now under their belt, they’ll be supporting the Jungle Giants on their national tour, which starts this Thursday in Hobart.

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INTRODUCING: Logitech UE BOOM

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*Advertisement from Logitech*

I bought a set of Logitech computer speakers about 8 years ago. Various desktop systems, house migrations and house parties all soundtracked through a trusty 2 speaker/bass box setup. Worked for me.

Speaker days are gone though. We’re ‘mobile’, whatever that means. The obvious problem is staying portable – without sound quality the equivalent of having your head jammed in a tin can.

Enter the UE BOOM Tall Boy. I’m calling it a Tall Boy cause it looks like a large German beer can. Except fluorescent.

If you don’t believe me, here’s thirty seconds of hot people roadtesting the damn thing.

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The sound is sprayed in 360-degrees via. a tube shape and it’s surprisingly even in every direction. Perfect for ‘spin the bottle’ right? You can lose the ear buds, which we all know are just for blocking out the crazy people on the train. This one is perfect for festival season. The UE BOOM is made for hanging up in your tent (tuff-as-nuts design), getting sloshed with 360°degree Flume pumping into the night (15 hr battery life) or wearing it around your neck (lanyard hook included) – if you’re that type of guy.

And yes, you can hold your speaker and your beer in the same hand – it’s water and dirt resistant too. But if you can’t be bothered holding it, you could grab two of them and pair them together via the UE BOOM App. Why would you bother I hear you thinking, well either double the sound or left & right stereo separation… BOOM!

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These babies retail for $199.95 here, which is like half the price of a Splendour ticket! So check em out and you could nab one for the summer festival season – so you can wake up alone, plastered in a paddock at Meredith 2013, booming Nile Rodgers from an ergonomic speaker around your neck.

Check out more reviews here and GET TO IT.

 

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