(photo: Kristy Milliken)

Last weekend marked the 21st anniversary of Meredith Music Festival and the start of another summer festival run. Headliner Total Lunar Eclipse did a no-show due to a cloud cover, but the cosmos aligned in other ways; Barbarion threw some flames, Grinderman bid us adieu and Big Freedia… brought the ass (everywhere). Meredith organisers have been good to the people for over two decades and the weekend delivered.

Good on yr Aunty M.

DAY 1.

With Mike Larkin’s grim prediction of torrential rain forecasted for the weekend, Aussie Disposals survived a mass pillage on Thursday as punters prepared for a rerun of Meredith Mudbath ’08. Contrary to the shitty forecast, Friday was all sun. Apart from having our windscreen smeared with some 40+ orange butterflies we hit somewhere past Geelong, it was a cruisy traipse down the Princes Hwy until we poked the line. A large mass of punters seem to have bypassed the ‘no dickhead policy’. Fools who overtook the long line of fair queuers, got bad karma and runs from the Hare Krishna tent on the weekend. Eco tyrants who also scampered past the queue on fixie bikes also provided comedic entertainment, after said fixies encountered punctured wheels on gravelly terrain.

Meredith minions parading around with yellow tees were strategically placed around our welcome path as ushers, but all were useless at giving directions. One of my mates wrangled a free ticket for three hours of handing out ‘snakes and redbull’. Order seems unnecessary when you have vibemen.

On the topic of vibemen, the main stage was packed to see King Gizzard and The Wizard Lizard open the proceedings. Perched on the edge of the stage, the rowdy 7 piece wasted no time on introductions. The driving beat of ‘Lunch Meat’, anthemic ‘Willoughby’s Beach’ and the rest of those whooops, theremin and fezzy swamp stuff caused a minor dust storm in the front left of stage. A cover of the (more…)

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‘Ice Cream Suxx’

(mp3)

Bleeding Knees Club’s Alex Wall has a Sunday jam and it turns into this. 12 minute EP, lots of dumb fuzz + school taunts made low-fi (see ‘Gay Batman’).

Grab the EP for free at WW’s bandcamp.

waxwitches.bandcamp.com

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‘Step & Stagger’

(mp3)
The Murlocs are a 5 piece out of Melb (not to be confused with WoW mascots of the same name). Lead guy Ambrose Kenny-Smith also does harmonica duties for King Gizzard. Loose, jangly riffs, bluesy drawls…probs a Geelong band. Always dig a slacker soundtrack, good stuff.

The guys are are supporting Harry Howard & the NDE this Friday, swing by here for details.

Murlocs Soundcloud

FB

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Bearhug – ‘Angeline’

(mp3)

Procrastinate, and the better part of the blogosphere nabs the good tunes first. Either way, this gem from Sydney’s Bearhug is too much of a good track not to warrant a shout out here. Sounds like the guys are slowly parting from the low-fi aesthetic of their first demo Matt posted in 2009. But like all Bearhug tunes, there’s enough modest melodies and light headed guitar deeds here to keep everyone happy. Their last EP ‘To Anything’ shed glowy memories of earlier Broken Social Scene stuff, so quite stoked to see what they’ve done with the full record which will be out early 2012 through Spunk Records. Caaaaan’t wait.

www.facebook.com/bearhugtheband

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After Expatriate dropped In The Midst of This in 2007, they pissed off to Europe as most local bands do (Jack Ladder aka. Tim Rogers played bass on that record but left to do his solo thing). Most return with damaged gear, a few nice photos to share on social media and a collection of leftover Euro coins, but these guys stayed and have amassed a pretty big following. The band signed to PIAS International in Europe, toured with Placebo, played some huge festivals including Arras (France), Hard Rock Calling (London), iDays (Italy), Sziget (Hungary), Nova Rock (Austria), Werchter (Belgium) and Rockwave (Greece) as well as German mega festivals Rock am Ring and Rock im Park.

Spend too long in Europe stadiums and you eventually end up sounding like Interpol. Which kinda sums up new single ‘Miracle Mile’. Brooding muppet was always a good thing in my books anyway, but glad to see these guys returning for some shows.

We’ve got double passes to giveaway to Expatriate shows in Melbourne on the 15th Dec @ the East Brunswick Club and on 17th of Dec @ Kings Cross Hotel in Sydney. Send your name + contact details to rsvp@whothehell.net by the 14th of December to go in the running.

www.expatriateband.com

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How come everyone from the sunshine state makes the rest of us look like a bunch of miserable fools? Either way, I love these dudes. They’re supporting The Death Set in Sydney in December, playing Big Day Out 2012 and have just notched up rad support slots for two big internationals early next year (which haven’t been announced yet). Gonna be a hectic summer @ Dune Rats camp.

dunerats.bandcamp.com

Dune Rats FB

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‘The Line’

(mp3)

‘Live Like It’s a Free Giveaway’

(mp3)

Tim Fitz is 21 year old producer/instrumentalist/singer out of Sydney. He put out his first EP Infinite Space in March, but his latest release Beforetime is definitely a rich picking. Some might hear genre spanning and others will hear indecisiveness, but there’s a great feel to this collection of tracks. ‘The Line’ is a good example of Fitz’ kaleido-instrumentals. Just as the flouncy percussion gets into the proper swing of things, we get bombarded by drive-high fuzz around the 1 min mark. It’s a little startling at first, but it suddenly breaks with a weird kind of comedic ease back into another crazy improv section.

Throwing about 6 different song ideas into three minutes, gives any tune the potential to get manic. And this does. However there’s something about the way it all comes together here that makes careful production sound like a casual afternoon jam sesh. From a production point of view, this guy has a lot of great ideas. Perhaps an 8 track EP just isn’t enough to fit all of them in. The chatty verse and loungey keyboards in ‘Hold Back a Second’ comes across as another general formula for those closing tracks on local ‘hip hop’ releases, while ‘Blanket of Love’ earns back redemption sounding like a dreamy Mesita remix. Then there’s title track, ‘Beforetime’ – oddly at contrast to the rest of the songs on the EP, but I guess a little introspective piano solo is good for making all of us a little less edgy.

Fitz sound is original, but the way he’s put his sounds together are still familiar enough to catch onto. One of the more enjoyable releases I’ve heard this year. More please.

You can hear the full EP at his bandcamp here.

Tim Fitz is playing with Telefonica and Atom Hawk (Daniel Cunningham of Parades) at The Gate on the 9th of December. It may well be the final send off for the portable music event that begun in the same humble backyard. I’m geographically frustrated that I’m in Melbs when this is happening, but there is every reason (outlined above) for you to get along if you’re in Sydney.

www.timfitz.bandcamp.com

www.thegatepresents.com

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