Posts By Melissa Tan

Spender – 'Magic Man'

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Spender – ‘Magic Man’ (mp3)

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On good occasions, you stumble across distinct voices that belong to neurotic dancing machines and all those great. Tom Spender is Spender. Thoughtful arrangements on this track and a happy tide of lightness that makes me want to barrel roll in my undies like the Dominican kid in the photo above (taken by Spender). And my, is that chorus is grand.

I hear Luke Steele feeling a little saccharine, I hear ELO, I hear digestible greatness. Listen up.

(ps. while you’re here, best checking out this fun acoustic session Spender recorded in Ubud, Bali – http://vimeo.com/35630410)

www.spender.com.au

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Hunting Grounds 'In Hindsight' Showcase @ Luwow

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I constantly see the word ‘mature’ pop up in reviews of this album. What does that even mean? Seems to allude to reviewers feeling the need to pinpoint the rite of passage when a band starts using minor chords and decides to mull over philosophy and heartbreak instead of school and teenage loins. It’s probably a general cop-out for boring. However, last night’s showcase at Luwow proved otherwise. Hunting Grounds still have all their energy in tow, even if the keyboard jams and throaty yells have been polished down for now. They might have been making EPs for forever and even the album title suggests so, but this is still their first album. I’ve watched Power of The Zookeepers, Howl, Hunting Grounds make music for a long while, and while Ballarat may have been good breeding grounds for swampy basslines back in the day, if ‘mature’ is what these guys need to export themselves to other places, then good going.

In Hindsight is out now through Red Cat Sounds/ MGM.

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Tame Impala – 'Apocalypse Dreams'

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Tame Impala – ‘Apocalypse Dreams’

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Tame Impala have been missing from these parts lately, and in case you haven’t already seen the teaser video for their second album, the guys have been busy playing in other bands, jumping off tall monuments and recording stuff for the follow up to Innerspeaker. The first track from their much frothed over second album Lonerism, is ‘Apocapyse Dreams’. Not particularly apocalyptic in the disastrous sense, but follows up with enough suspenseful piano chords, time changes and Parker’s usual sonic warble to fuel any revitalist dream.

New Tame Impala – still sounding like old Tame Impala, still sounding re-re-re-listening to their Cream records for inspiration and still WAH-peddling through the Dionysian conch shell of the universe.

Lonerism is out October 2012.

Download the new track here.

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The Walking Who – 'Candy Flu'

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‘Candy Flu’ (mp3)

The Walking Who are three guys out of Wollongong. ‘Candy Flu’ is nice bit of cruisy psychadelia with a definite Brian Jonestown Massacre flavour, and I’m loving the scribbly projector aesthetic of this clip. The guys have an excellent album out of the same name which projects much of the same comatose prog-psychadelia, muffled out twangs and other space oddities in between.

The album is available for free download at their bandcamp page right here.

thewalkingwho.bandcamp.com

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Hey Geronimo – 'Carbon Affair'

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Hey Geronimo – ‘Carbon Affair’ (mp3)

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Hey Geronimo are a five piece from Brisbane made up of the offcuts from bands like Blame Ringo, Montpelier and The Boat People.

I haven’t heard a sad song come out of Brisbane in the last two years. If that’s any indication, I probably should be moving north, since ‘Carbon Affair’ is the pretty much the epitome of the sunshine state’s collective optimism in one song. Sounds like James Mercer fronting Hungry Kids of Hungry or something. All these punchy pop songs find their resting place in insurance ads somewhere down the line but in the meantime, I’m all for musical groups of the ‘TAKE ME TO A HAPPY PLACE!’ sort.

facebook.com/HeyGeronimo

heygeronimo.bandcamp.com

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Harts – 'All Too Real'

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Harts – ‘All Too Real’ (mp3)

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Darren Harts is Harts, a one man show out of Melbourne. Lars Stalfors from the Mars Volta somehow got his hands on some demos and offered to mix his EP. This sound ain’t no gamechanger, but gamechanging is irrelevant when you can get down and BOOGIE. This kid WILL kick some serious goals overseas, just you wait. And when he does – I would love to see him bring out a full piece brass band Friendly Fires style. ‘All Too Real’ has that whole Streetparty era vibe right down – adequate synth hooks, bites of face melting guitar (post. 2:46) and a good dose of indie peacocking to keep all the kids happy.

Hart’s EP Offtime will be released soon. Keep in the loop here and here.

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Water Music – 'Wayward'

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Water Music – ‘Wayward’ (mp3)

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Matthew Barker first dropped us a line about his other project, The Gypsy Curse, with NY born wife Beth. They’ve put out a great melodic country/folk record which they recorded over four days in a little log cabin in Sweden which you can hear over here. I did do some link surfing to his other project Water Music, and I was immediately taken by this track when I heard it.

If you’re Conor Oberst/Bright Eyes inclined, or sway towards a bit of alt-country and drawn out tales about life on the road, you’ll enjoy this. This is mega lo-fi, but all that distortion seems to stand stoic against Barker’s fragile vocals. A warning though, this is epic sad-time music. Not feeling suitably emo or probably just hormonal today, but the record feels like the post-breakup companion you need to console with greasy food, several wines and a few bouts of weeping your life story to. Enough about that though, there are a lot of good things to say about Mountains. Spend a little time with this release. Beautiful, honest music worth it’s weight.

Hear Mountains in full at Water Music’s soundcloud.

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