Posts By Melissa Tan

LOOK: Saskwatch – ‘Born To Break Your Heart’

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Saskwatch1

It’s mildly comforting knowing that the bands you put on pedestals have ‘normal people’ jobs like the rest of us. I struck up conversation with someone at a friend’s birthday who recalled seeing Saskwatch vocalist Nkechi turn into a howlin’ she-force on the Meredith main stage. The week after, he stopped her in a much quieter setting when he asked her for directions to the history isle at his local library. In the same way, Saskwatch’s new track is a bit of a comedown – albeit a pleasant one at that – the bloody mary / beanchairs respite after the storm. The perky Saskwatch we all know has taken a quick retreat; the horn section has been mulled back a tad; the syncopated beats have been swapped for all the makings of pop panache in ‘Born To Break Your Heart’.


Lochlan Funston & Jessica Barclay Lawton went along to set day to take some stills shots from the video. There’s a lot of fake blood and drinking in the bathtub, which is essentially an apt description of the new direction I think this record’s going to take. Saskwatch’s new album Nose Dive is set for an April release.

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EXPAT: Yon Yonson

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Mongolia Village

Yon Yonson recently visited Mongolia, Russia and China – not for gigs though, more a family holiday. Andrew from the band  has provided to us all the photogenic landscapes, Mongolian national costumes and soviet kitsch you can nuzzle up next to like fluffy white snow. Photos appear alongside tracks from Yon Yonson’s latest release, Hypomantra. If you haven’t had the decency to wrap your cheap mits around Hypomantra yet, I highly suggest you do. Listen and look below.

Mongolia Shoes

Andrew climbed a fairly perilous rock formation out in the desert and took this photo. He genuinely nearly died.

Lake Baikal Beach

Lake Baikal is the largest lake in the world in terms of volume and it completely freezes over during winter. It just looked like a really cold beach.

Lake Baikal Dog-Sled

Dog sledding isn’t a common traffic issue in Australia.

Mongolia Arrow

We stayed in a yurt in Mongolia, which is like a little hut out in the snow. This is us in the local get-up performing a ritual execution.

More photos below.

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MAP February 2014

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map

As much mixed press has been riled around Sochi 2014, it’s still clear that these kind of seemingly trivial global get-togethers do have some significance in bringing people together to fight over some small coin.The Music Alliance Pact kind of works in the same way, except we’re all much less competitive – instead working damn harmoniously to bring you the best new stuff from each part of our world. Along with us, there are over 26 blogs who take part in MAP each month. All the tunes you’ll hear below are as diverse as they get.

This month, our submission on behalf of Aus is a track by Promise Land, the new project of visual artist Johann Rashid (Home Travel, Eastlink) and producer Paul Harmon. Don’t forget to listen to Robbie’s accompanying podcast for this month’s Mapcast! This month, Mapcast features an extra tune from Russia to celebrate topical Sochi, the qualifying Jamaican bobsled team (the Cool Runnings dream!) AND of course, the Russian Police Band delivering a rather illustrious version of Get Lucky’.

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Click the play button icon to listen to individual songs, right-click on the song title to download an mp3, or grab a zip file of the full 26-track compilation through Ge.tt here.

ARGENTINA: Zonaindie
Jimena Lopez Chaplin – Hombre Estrella

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Jimena Lopez Chaplin is one of the finest emerging voices from the local scene in Buenos Aires. She has been a part of different musical projects, including the Varias Artistas collective formed by Lucas Marti. However, in order to fully appreciate her songwriting and musical talents, you should listen to her two solo albums, Ojos De Plástico (2009) and El Espíritu De La Golosina (2013). Hombre Estrella is a magnificent rendition of David Bowie’s Starman, with Spanish lyrics and arrangements by Jimena.

AUSTRALIA: Who The Bloody Hell Are They?
Promise Land – Recall

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Promise Land is the new project of visual artist Johann Rashid (also a member of Melbourne post-punks Eastlink) and producer Paul Harmon. Their first single Recall has just been released on Hole In The Sky, the imprint run by Modular band Canyons. The track aims to inject a bit of the occult into contemporary urban life, with deep noir production from Harmon featuring eerie vocal samples and an agitated no-wave tick. Meanwhile, Rashid delivers a slick, strained flow that’s almost closer to chanting than song.

CANADA: Quick Before It Melts
Look Vibrant – Sweater In The Lake

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The battlefield is set: an infantry of soldiers carrying swords made of static, a volley of cotton candy-covered cannonballs and the melodic noise of instruments imploding. This is the sound of Montreal’s Look Vibrant in their element. Surrender now and face aural annihilation.

CHILE: Super 45
Jumper Joy – Calma Que No

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Jumper Joy is the moniker for musician and composer Diego Palma who, since 2013 and after being a member of El Último Dinosaurio, decided to go solo on this playful power-pop project, splattered with references to psychedelia and shoegaze. Calma Que No is taken from his second EP released in January.

Listen to the full MAP list below.

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PREMIERE: Contrast – ‘Pipe Dreams’

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CONTRAST-band

WOULD YA LISTEN TO THIS?! I keep having deja-vu that we’ve written about these guys somewhere on this blog before, but I’m just probably under the auspice that everyone should know about Contrast already.

The Melbourne band describe themselves as ‘just a coupla blokes who like skateboarding and loud music’. Humility. Nice sentiment. The behemoth of whatever the heck is happening here really deserves your ears. Contrast play a sort of pepped-up ‘dreamgaze’, something that perhaps Slowdive coupled with a bit Primary Colours-era Horrors could have plotted in a small echoey bathroom. There are a lot of dull shoegaze bands out there, but this track is a decent show of how Contrast have cut up the genre’s lineage and nailed it right down the line. ‘Pipe Dreams’ is a reasonably huge track; everything from the explosive percussion to the euphoric pedal-driven swell diving in and out of Jack Crook’s casual delivery just DOES IT.

You can catch Contrast launching ‘Pipe Dreams’ on Friday the 7th of March at the John Curtin Hotel in Melbourne, with supports from Hollow Everdaze, Sagamore & Atolls. 

‘Pipe Dreams’ is the first single from Contrast’s upcoming EP, set for release on April 4th. Super impressive band.

 

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WTH PRESENTS: Hollow Everdaze, Seven Year Itch & Zone Out

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UPDATED-FLYER

 

We’re putting on a show in Melbourne next weekend. Whether you’ve spent the last three months of Summer watching Parks & Rec re-runs or weeping in the Gelato Messina line or just doing plain ol’ nothing, we won’t judge you, people of the internet.

It’s the last weekend of Summer. It also is the weekend when Melbourne’s CBD is open 7AM for White Night, where this lob of a city transforms into into a giant pedestrian gridlock/ the most expensive government funded acid trip ever. On your way to White Night, join us from 8PM at Alia Arthouse for some pre White Night Melbourne jams with the best from the West; Hollow Everdaze, surf chumps Seven Year Itch and WDYBM label faves Zone Out.

 

HOLLOW EVERDAZE

SEVEN YEAR ITCH

ZONE OUT

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PREMIERE: Emma Russack – ‘You Shouldn’t’

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emma-russack-

After spending the last two years touring on-off across Scandanavia and Europe (and developing a penchant for snus and Henrik Ibsen), Emma Russack is back with a new single.‘You Shouldn’t’ is the first track from her new LP You Changed Me.

2012‘s Sounds Of Our City and her earlier Peasants EP introduced us to Russack’s plenary lyrics and earthy alto. Russack, Alec Marshall (who Russack plays alongside in Hot Palms), Cameron Potts and Jake Phillips recorded the new album in rural Yowrie, south of Russack’s hometown of Narooma in just four days. More hands helped to bring record together in Cairns, including Jordan Ireland of The Middle East on backing vocals.

‘You Shouldn’t’ is either a meditative on regret or a smug note-to-self. Russack’s lyrics are frank, even obvious at times – but there’s something both strange and familiar about her delivery, almost like an old friend singing barefoot in your lounge room. That warm wah-guitar chimes in and out like photographer’s bokeh – and there’s enough two by two on drums for a slow dance with a former flame.

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You Changed Me is out via Spunk on April 4th, but if you already like what you hear, the record is available for pre-order here.

Emma Russack is playing a handful of local shows this week in diverse places…including a bowling club with Cass McCombs and WTH faves Shining Bird & The Ocean Party, and a house somewhere in Coledale. Details are below.

Feb 4th – Scarborough Wombarra Bowling Club, NSW (w/ Cass McCombs, Shining Bird & The Ocean Party)

Feb 8th – House show, Coledale, NSW (w/ Bree Tranter). Email whydontyoubelieveme@gmail.com for full details.

Feb 23rd – Old Bar, Fitzroy, VIC

 

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