Nina May – ‘Monsters In The Dark’ (mp3)

OK, so I have a bit of a confession to make.  I’m quite impartial to bands with female singers – hey I was in one myself – and yes, that does mean that I’m sometimes caught enjoying the odd tune by The Veronicas (they write catchy pop tunes, you gotta give them props for that).  But The Veronicas segue quite nicely into Nina May, because just like the Origliasso twins, Nina May are from Brisbane and they play pop music with distorted guitars as well.  Is it emo?  That’s one for you to argue amongst yourselves about..

But Nina May seem to align themselves more with the metal and alternative side of music, and it comes out in their riffs and song structures.  They remind me a lot of an unsigned band out of the States called Estrela, although I’m sure Nina May have never heard of them.  Nina May are just about to complete their debut EP and ‘Monsters In The Dark’ is the first taste of what’s to come.  It’s an extremely catchy tune, and if their popularity on MySpace is anything to go by, it seems as though a lot of people are digging this track.  I like vocalist Erinn Swan’s voice, although her lyrics leave a lot to be desired – you’ll find no deep and meaningful messages in here.  Aside from said track, the rest of the stuff on MySpace is poorly recorded demos and the songs don’t live up to the standard of ‘Monsters In The Dark’.  But it’s a solid start from a band who I think will appeal to a large audience looking for pop music with a bit of an edge to it.

http://www.myspace.com/ninamaymusic

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Plug-In City – ‘Broke On A Wheel’ (mp3)

Plug-In City have all the characterists to become the new darlings of the sometimes fickle indie music scene.  They’ve got “cool” written all over them – be it in their promo photos, their influences and especially in their music.  It’s minimal, with enough keys and bleach-clean guitar to keep those eighties lovers happy.  Yeah, it’s one of those bands.

It’s getting to the stage where we can see over the hill of the indie scene.  Bands are all starting to sound the same and in my opinion, the beginning of the end is near for the minimalist electro/indie scene.  But amongst the tonne of mediocrity and clones, some gems do appear.  I don’t think this Melbourne group is doing anything extraordinary – in fact, I don’t really like most of what I’ve heard of these guys .  So why am I blogging about them? Well, I quite like their track ‘Broke On A Wheel’.  The limited-range vocals leave a fair bit to be desired, but they’re better on this track than the others.  But the music is catchy, and I can easily picture the indie guys and gals packed like sardines in Sydney’s fave indie spots like Candy’s Apartment and all the 34 Oxford St clubs going off to this track. 

Hey, it’s fun and we might as well enjoy it now before the scene implodes upon itself and all we’re left with is nü-rave.  And you don’t want that, do you?

http://www.plug-incity.com
http://www.myspace.com/plugincity

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It’s been a while since we posted about SA’s Wolf & Cub and in that time they’ve managed to record one of 2006’s best Aussie albums in Vessels.  While I don’t think ‘This Mess’ is the first single lifted from Vessels, it’s definitely the first song to have a film clip accompany it.  Yep, that’s it from me.  Just watch the clip…

Previous post: Wolf & Cub 

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Filler blogs are fun! We’re all too busy to contribute a real blog post – that’ll all start happening again in a day or two – so to tide you over here’s a filmclip from Melbourne’s .hinge.  The track is called ‘Ring of the Gypsy Bitch’ and it’s an oldie – it comes from an EP entitled Gypsy which came out in 2001.  Flashbacks…

Previous post: .hinge

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Sydney metallers Many Machines On Nine were nominated for 4 awards at this year’s MusicOz Awards, which is one of, if not, the biggest awards for unsigned acts in Australia.  It was held at the prestigious Enmore Theatre in Sydney, and this is MM9 performing at the awards ceremony.

Previous post: Many Machines On Nine

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Young & Restless @ Homebake 2006 – photo by Matt Booy

Dom Alessio: Despite living in Sydney for 23 years and being an avid supporter of Australian music, 2006 marked the first year that I actually attended Homebake. Thanks to Who The Hell cohort Jerry, I got my hands on a VIP pass to the event, and on Friday I managed to get a public ticket for my girlfriend Megan.

We arrived at 11.15am – big mistake, because with the gates having only opened at 11am, it meant that the queue to get in stretched around half of The Domain (a map of The Domain can be found here). With the first act (Mountains In The Sky) coming on at 11.20am, there was no way 20 000 people could have got through the gates in 20 minutes. 11am is really an idiotic time to open the gates (whoever decided on that should be sacked), so it was around an hour before we got through the gates, meaning I missed Young & Restless who I was extremely keen to see. (With a VIP pass I could have walked straight in, but I waited with my girlfiend – aren’t I nice?) Then the rain came… so while waiting in line, we got a tad wet! If the gates had been opened even half an hour earlier, a lot of the hassle could have been saved.

Jerry Soer: I agree with Dom on the gate opening time. At the Young & Restless show there were just as many people watching the show from the front as the people queuing in line by the side. Would have been nice to have these people in front of the stage.

DA: When we finally got through the gates at around 12.20am we made a bee-line for the Hopetoun Stage to catch The Basics. A relatively small crowd was on hand to watch the Melbourne group who have become favourites here at this blog. Despite missing my fave tracks ‘Rattle My Chain’ and ‘Just Hold On’, The Basics were still extremely entertaining with their 60s-pop influenced tunes and their mixture of originals and covers. Combined with light, off-the-cuff on-stage banter, it was an excellent way to start the day.

JS: I too missed the those two songs after coming from the other side of the domain from the Dome stage. But I bumped into Sophie at the back of the tent and we went off to see Macromantics belt out a few songs, ending her set yet again with the very catchy ‘Scorch’. Always an amusing sight to see at Homebake are the fence jumpers being chased around by security guard. This one was particularly playful when he ran around the crowd Big Top tent and had security guards chase him around and it all ended with a crash tackle. Soph and I headed back to the Dome stage where we caught a few songs by Melbourne’s up and coming rockers British India who had quite a few fans here in Sydney.

DA: With a couple of hours to kill before the next act we wanted to see was on, Megan and I ventured round the grounds, checking out all the stalls and grabbing some very nice Thai food for lunch. By the time 2.20pm rolled around, we made our way to the Main Stage to see Little Birdy put on a rather uninspiring set. They were hindered by the guitarist’s technical problems, which meant that we didn’t hear any guitar for about half of the set (and the guitarist looked pissed off). But aside from exuberant frontwoman Katy Steele (who’s both cute and possesses an amazing voice), the rest of the band didn’t put on much of a show, and they couldn’t match Katy’s energy or musical ability. Their songs are catchy but lack interest and while mildly entertaining, they didn’t blow me away.

While the crowd stampeeded towards the stage when NZ rapper Scribe came on, Megan and I ducked off to kill some time. It wasn’t long before the heavens opened up and we ran for cover, finding solace in the Cinema Tent, where we bore witness to some rather unusual short films. The rain cleared just in time for us to watch The Butterfly Effect, who put on one of the best sets of the day in my opinion. Despite the fact that their latest record Imago has the band focusing more on the melodic elements of their music, they definitely played a set befitting of a large-scale outdoor event, selecting the heavier tracks from their back catalogue, much to the delight of the large audience. The Brisbane four-piece didn’t put a foot wrong – they were full of energy and worked the stage briliiantly, and vocalist Clint Boge commanded attention, rarely hitting a wrong note.

We then rushed to the Big Top to witness the most disappointing event of the day, and the most brilliant set of the day, courtesy of Gotye. With Homebake 2006 being Gotye’s first Sydney show, there was a massive crowd on hand to witness the set. But, as I found out later, a wrong stage setup meant that the band had to rearrange everything, including microphones and foldbacks, therefore causing them to run 15 minutes late; time which was rather unfairly deducted from their overall set time (after all, there was only a DJ set following the band). But once Wally de Backer (the man behind Gotye) took the stage, he launched into a brilliant six-song set. On stage with VJ Jacob Simkin (who directed the filmclip for the Gotye track ‘Out Here In The Cold’), we were treated to a stunning audio-visual set. The music is nothing short of amazing, and the crowd loved every minute of it. His performance of ‘Hearts A Mess’, complete with a string section, was spine-tingling, with the huge audience singing along with the chorus and it was evident Wally was loving it as well. He was later joined by members of his other group The Basics, as well as backing vocalists, to perform a stunning rendition of ‘Learnalilgivinanlovin’. It was so disappointing to have this set run so short, but even then it was by far the most amazing set of the day.

JS: Soph and I arrived late at the Gotye stage and were backstage when we saw all the commotion of rearranging the set from the sidelines. No one was particularly too happy there, and the biggest disappointment from it all was not having the string quartet miked. ‘Hearts A Mess’ missed out the most from this, last week hearing the song played as how it should have been was just amazing. Still, great performance from Gotye.

We then went off to the Hopetoun stage to see a set by punksters Die!Die!Die! who unfortunately lost power to the stage a mere half a song into the set. It was a good 20 minutes before they came back on. Talk was the generators ran out of fuel. They came back and I saw them played a few songs of their new EP.

DA: By now the heavens had really opened and it was pouring down. I ducked inside the VIP area and managed to grab Megan a VIP pass as well, which was a godsend because it meant we both had somewhere to hide from the rain – however by this time we were completely drenched. We hung around here for a few hours, having a couple of drinks and chatting to Kris, Dave and Wally from Gotye/The Basics and VJ Jacob Simkin. It was during this time that I found out that the stage crew hadn’t followed the stage plan Wally had drawn out for them, meaning that the stage was incorrectly set up, which in turn meant Wally had to rearrange a lot of the equipment, causing the Gotye set to run late.

JS: I was back at the Dome stage to see Augie March whom I’ve never had the chance to experience live. I really didn’t know most of the songs and just held on to the set to hear my and crowd favourite ‘One Crowded Hour’. A truly beautiful song.

DA: When the rain cleared, Megan and I ventured out to grab some dinner and watch the end of Adelaide hip-hop act Hilltop Hoods and catch an excellent set from Eskimo Joe. Gracing the Main Stage, Eskimo Joe put on an extremely entertaining set, playing songs from their last two released Black Fingernails, Red Wine and A Song Is A City. While the set seemed to wane in the middle, they did recover well and finished with two of their biggest songs, the infectious ‘Sarah’ and ‘From The Sea’. I had been told that Eskimo Joe struggle on larger stages, but it seems that the band is finally growing into their role as one of Ausrtalia’s biggest musical acts.

Silverchair @ Homebake 2006 – photo by Matt Booy

But the set that everyone wanted to see was Silverchair. It’s been a couple of years since Silverchair has played a large-scale event, as Daniel Johns had been performing with his other band The Dissociatives. Joined on stage by Dissociatives cohort Paul Mac, as well as a brass section, Silverchair demonstrated why they were the headlining act of Homebake, owning the stage with their unique brand of rock. Opening with the brilliant ‘Emotion Sickness’, the band played songs mainly from their last two records Diorama and Neon Ballroom, but also treated the audience to a number of songs from their upcoming album Young Modern. Having started their career as teenagers playing music akin to the early-90s grunge movement, Young Modern demonstrates Daniel Johns’ penchant for quirky and intelligent pop tunes. The new songs seem to have been influenced from Daniel’s stint with The Dissociatives, and personal fave out of the newies was ‘Straight Lines’. The crowd definitely gave the band a mixed reaction the Young Modern tunes, and I think most of the crowd wanted to hear Silverchair’s heavier tunes. The band also rehashed their cover of Midnight Oil’s ‘Don’t Wanna Be The One’ which they performed at this year’s ARIA Awards.

Now for a cheesy summary paragraph: It was definitely an excellent day. Most of the bands I saw played really well, and for me the best two acts of the day were The Butterfly Effect and Gotye. The rain did sour the day somewhat because it restricted movement around the site, but it’s a small price to pay to witness some amazing Aussie music.

http://www.homebake.com.au
http://www.myspace.com/homebake

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Fire! Santa Rosa, Fire! – ‘Captain Thunder Hearts Mistress Ice’ (mp3)

Big thanks to Stuey from The Sandwich Club for turning me onto these guys.  Yep, Fire! Santa Rosa, Fire! first captured my attention purely because of their awesome band name.  It also reminded me somewhat of The Arcade Fire, a band who I’m a particular fan of, and upon listening found that it wasn’t just their music that bore a resemblance to the Canadians.  According to their less-than-informative MySpace page, there’s six of them, but there could be four permanent members.

They hail from Adelaide, South Australia and play indie-rock like their life depended on it.  A tonne of energy accompanies their rocking, infectious tunes.  Solidifying their lineup in 2005, the band released an EP this year entitled You Seize The City, I’ll Seize The Sky which comes with some fantastic artwork.  There’s also a couple of tracks of an upcoming EP on the band’s MySpace page, and the one that’s featured on this blog, ‘Captain Thunder Hearts Mistress Ice’, is one of those aforementioned songs.

I’m not sure why these guys have evaded me for so long, but rest assured I’ll be at their next show when they come to Sydney town.

http://www.myspace.com/firesantarosafire

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