Get your pop on while Ricki-Lee gets her boobs out.

Sorry, no MC Hammer here.

http://www.myspace.com/rickileeofficial

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The Chaperones – ‘Jacqueline’ (mp3)

It’s an apt time to post about two-piece garage rockers The Chaperones because we’re smack bang in the middle of their month-long residency in the darkened interior of The Excelsior Hotel in Sydney’s Surry Hills where they’re playing every Wednesday night.

The Chaperones are the girl-boy combination of the rather cute drummer Marissa Gillies (I’m not sure if she’s in any way related to Silverchair’s stickman Ben Gillies) and frontman Matt Vince (the girls will have to decide whether he’s cute or not… sorry Matt!) and, like a number of bands in this post White Stripes world, they’ve deemed a bass player unnecessary. To me, not having a bass player is a cardinal sin because there’s a whole frequency range missing and unless you build a custom guitar/bass like Local H’s Scott Lucas or have someone playing droning low-octave keys a la The Red Sun Band, you’re never going to actually hide the fact you’re missing a bass player.

This duo plays with plenty of panache and energy and have some really lo-fi, groovy tunes. Overdriven guitars and solid drum patterns give The Chaperones that indie/garage aesthetic and their debut EP has been garnering some healthy reviews. Still, a bass player would be nice…

http://www.thechaperones.com.au
http://www.myspace.com/chaperones

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Lady Strangelove – ‘Rotate (Part 2)’ (mp3)

It’s been a while since I’ve heard a band actually do old-skool psychedelica. There’s been a booming undercurrent of psychedelica-inspired bands in my home town of Sydney, but who knew they actually did it properly in Adelaide? Lady Strangelove are a funky rainbow cocktail of Wolf & Cub style rhymths, Hendrix inspired lead guitars which screech throughout and delay-heavy vocals which bring to mind Led Zep’s Robert Plant and former Pink Floyd vocalist Syd Barrett.

They call their music “psychedelica dance-rock” or “prog-dance”. It’s all very 60s technicolour/acid inspired with a touch of Mars Volta and The Music thrown in. I’d love to see these guys play live if they didn’t live so far away. Here’s hoping they come by the Annandale Hotel sometime soon.

http://www.myspace.com/ladystrangelove

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Pomomofo – ‘Island’

It’s been a while since we heard the disco grunge of Sydney’s Pomomofo. The now familiar sounds of dirty bass, hi-hats on the upbeat and 80s synths has become a stalwart on the airways of local radio stations around Australia and has seen the kids lining up down the streets to see acts like Midnight Juggernauts, Muscles, Dukes of Windsor, Plug-In City and more.

Which may just be the problem for Pomomofo. When they hit the scenea couple of years back, they were exciting and fresh but now the sound has been carbon copied so much that this three-piece has lost that initial buzz about them. What does set Pomomofo apart though is their energetic and thoroughly enjoyable live show, which may help save them from drowning in a sea of Aussie electro acts. Their set opening for Cornelius last year, including their cover of ‘Mr. Wendell’ WITH Speech from Arrested Development equaled pure musical orgasmic joy.

Check out what we wrote about them over a year ago.

http://www.myspace.com/pomomofo

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Brian Campeau – ‘Reinventing Myself’ (mp3)

Wow, we are so late on Brian Campeau it’s not funny.

This is a man who deserves immediate attention. I fell in love with the Sydney troubadour straight away after hearing ‘Reinventing Myself’, a song that marries Eastern samples, beautiful finger-plucked acoustic guitar and some rather abstract electronic elements. These disparate parts I’ve never really heard crammed into one song, which I think is the beauty of Brian’s music – he’s trying something a little different, and succeeding so brilliantly at it.

The Sandwich Club have written an excellent summation of Brian, his sound and his live performance, saying it better than I could have. Check it out, along with a selection of MP3s. 

http://www.briancampeau.com/
http://www.myspace.com/briancampeau

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The Bumblebeez – ‘Rio’

So the debut Bumblebeez album is finally out. Rumoured to cost over $200,000 over a few years and several mixers to make, is it really worth the wait? Was anyone waiting for it anyway? The previous Triple J Unearthed winners disappeared from attention so long ago I’m not sure many remembered. But I have to say the tracks that I’ve heard so far sounds amazing. It sounds, and I’ve said this before, nothing like any other Australian artists. Except maybe the Avalanches but they’re taking even longer for a followup record. I’m keen to get this album, but I won’t see them live because from what I heard from pretty much everyone they are not much entertainment on the stage. The one and only time I saw them was when they were supporting Radiohead in 2004 in Melbourne, and I walked out of their show then.

www.myspace.com/thebumblebeez

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Brand new single from Sydneysiders The Paper Scissors. Enjoy!

http://www.thepaperscissors.com
http://www.myspace.com/thepaperscissors

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