Monthly Archives For March 2014

MAP March 2014

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Our submission for the MAP March edition comes from Yon Yonson with their track ‘Culver City’. If you haven’t heard the full record, do yourself a favour and listen to the album stream, stat. Alternatively, if you like what you hear and would prefer to listen to the record set to photos of musicians in traditional Mongolian costumes trying to have it at each other, check it out Yon Yonson’s photo set from their Siberian travels on our blog.

On the subject of voyaging, if you know of any Australian bands residing in the general UK/EU region, we’d love to hear from you. Mail us – editors@whothehell.net. 

FInally, if 28kbps isn’t doing you any favours and you ain’t got time to listen to the full MAP compilation this month, our very own Robbie Ingrisano hosts the MAPCAST podcast – a quick bite of the best from this month’s MAP list. Stream/free download the podcast at our Soundcloud.

 

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 27-track compilation through Ge.tt here.

ARGENTINA: Zonaindie
Plein – Madera & Fuego

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Plein started almost seven years ago as an excuse for a group of friends to gather and play their favorite songs. After several years of playing live and participating in different compilation albums, this indie-rock band from Buenos Aires released their first record in 2012, with songs recorded using a method of pre-established rules inspired by Lars von Trier’s film The Five Obstructions. Madera & Fuego is taken from their 2014 EP Número Uno.

AUSTRALIA: Who The Bloody Hell Are They?
Yon Yonson – Culver City

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Childhood friends Andrew Kuo and Nathan Saad are Yon Yonson, an experimental pop duo from Sydney. Their sound is ambitious and unpredictable – listen no further than their latest release Hypomantra to understand. As the band designed the record to be played as a continuous set, each track on the record is incredibly malleable, both in sound and score. Culver City, with its origami beat samples, is a glimpse of Yon Yonson’s standout oddities which show that this talented duo’s output is just as diverse as their intention.

CANADA: Quick Before It Melts
The This Many Boyfriends Club – Only Trying

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“We are a mercurial bunch,” says Casimir Frederic Coquette Kaplan, guitarist and vocalist for The This Many Boyfriends Club, since by the time you hear Only Trying, vocalist Veronica Danger Winslow-Danger will have sung her last lo-fi “dandy punk” show with the band. A new single will also be up for the offering, signalling yet another shift for this ever-evolving Montreal band. I’ll follow this club wherever they want to lead me. You will too.

CHILE: Super 45
Cóndor Jet – Igual Que Ayer

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Antonio Favero, Nicole L’Huillier and Tomás Vidal are Cóndor Jet, a trio that has refreshed the indie-rock scene in this country. They play psychedelic dream-pop, so they were a perfect fit to open for Tame Impala last October in Chile. Igual Que Ayer is taken from their debut album Anillos.

COLOMBIA: El Parlante Amarillo
Goli – Tú y Yo

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Goli is the project of Sara Rodas, born in Medellín, who is remembered for being the singer of synth-pop group Mr. Bleat. Now Sara shows us her other side, in which we perceive something more intimate and romantic. Tú y Yo is taken from her debut album released this month. Don’t miss the limited edition handwoven version.

DENMARK: All Scandinavian
Shiny Darkly – Dead Stars

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This edition of MAP marks my fifth anniversary as Denmark’s representative in this great music blog alliance. It’s a special occasion so I’m happy to be able to mark it with a track from some of my all time favorites, Shiny Darkly, who will release their long-awaited (and excellent, I might add) full-length debut, Little Earth, in Denmark on March 31 and internationally on May 5. A MAP exclusive download, Dead Stars is the nine-plus minutes of awesome post-punk album closer.

DOMINICAN REPUBLIC: La Casetera
Sin Fin, Realidad & Lugo Santiago – La Expropiación Legal

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Several hip-hop artists united to record a tribute album for Juan Antonio Alix (available as a free download on the link above), one of the most influential poets of the Dominican Republic and a master of “décimas”, ten-line poems that usually satirize social, political and religious themes. One of the poems, La Expropiación Legal (written in 1876), attacks communism directly, accusing the government of seizing private properties for their own benefit. Rappers Sin Fin, Realidad and Lugo Santiago add their rhyming skills to turn this song into one of the most memorable moments in the album.

 

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WATCH: T54 – ‘AC Parade’

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T54_1

 

I like to imagine that the conversation around this video clip, from Christchurch three-piece T54, went something like this: “Hey man, we’ve gotta do a video for this clip, whaddaya reckon?” “How ’bout we just go down to those sweet mountains past mum’s house and stand around and throw rocks and shit?”

And it totally worked, thanks to the casual beauty of New Zealand and the casual excellence of this song. There’s something sweetly strange about the video; the camera lingers for awkward close-ups on band members who are obviously finding it very hard to keep a straight face, and any attempts to look brooding are fruitless.

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The song itself is that very popular mix of distorted rhythm guitar, pretty lead melody and high vocal, but these guys pull it off by keeping the track short and packing it with plenty of hooks and different parts so it never gets boring or repetitive. It also feels like the kind of track that would go off way more live, if its droning, dreamy fuzz tendencies were let off the leash.

And what do you know! They’re coming to Australia for three shows, with dates below:

Thursday March 20 –  The Old Bar, Melbourne (w/ Claws and Organs, Glaciers and Popolice)
Friday March 21 – Yah Yah’s, Melbourne (w/ The New Pollution and The Sunday Reeds)
Saturday March 22 – Grace Darling, Sydney (w/ Contrast and Miniatures)

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INTRODUCING: Food Court

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Food Court band

I met the guys from Food Court at a Halloween shindig in Redfern last year where they were playing support for Bad//Dreems.

Anyway, I was struck by how nice the guys were, as well as their drummer’s Prince costume, crucifix earring and everything. And when they hit the stage, by which I mean the living room, they blew me away so hard I thought there was a gale force wind tucked into their amp or something.

Thankfully, Food Court can capture their live nature pretty easily on tape. In fact, there’s almost no noticeable difference, besides the considerable lack of guitarist sweat. Food Court’s debut EP Smile At Your Shoes (now available for free from their Bandcamp page), is a rag-tag slice of ordinary guys doing extraordinary things.

New single and the final track from the EP, ‘She’s Away’ is a strong reminder of what makes these guys so great. Why dig for your old Screamfeeder and Jebediah records, when there’s amazing Aussie rock like this popping up?

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INTRODUCING: Babaganouj

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Babaganouj

Yet another band to have risen from the ashes of the dearly departed Yves Klein Blue, Babaganouj was formed by guitarist Charles Sale in 2011 – just months after YKB split due to ‘creative differences’. Named after a ridiculous 12-second song by Sydney legends Smudge (not to mention a delicious eggplant dip) Babaganouj has something of a Brisbane all-stars line up. Originally featuring Jack Gleeson of Inland Sea on drums and Harriette Pilbeam from Go Violets on bass, they’ve recently added a second Violet, Ruby, who’s also part of lollypop behemoth Johnny and the Fembots.

Babaganouj draw on bands that represent the rougher side of twee pop: the Lemonheads, the Pastels, the Vaselines. In fact, they’d just about pass as a Lemonheads tribute band, with their boy-girl harmonies, 90s hairdos and derpy sense of humour (the line ‘I fell for you and I hurt my knee’ could rival any of Evan Dando’s silly puns) – if it weren’t for Sale’s genuine knack for writing power pop hooks.

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INTRODUCING: Heart Beach

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Heart Beach

There’s something uncompromising about Heart Beach. Their music is spare but rough, its few elements swiping at you from a blank background in the way a Malevich claws at your vision. The songs all feature Jonathon McCarthy and Claire Jansen’s intertwining vocals – his a caterwaul, hers a disarming coo; a guitar sound like shredded sheet metal; and the restrained, ever-patient drumming of Daniel Butcher.

So far the Hobart three-piece have four releases to their name. The first, 2013’s Holiday/Weather, has a hint of surf rock, but as though it were soaked through by the chilly Antarctic waters that creep up to meet the Tasman. The stark, droning vocals of ‘House’ sit atop an icy layer of feedback that gives the song an illusion of industrial echo. ‘Record’ is short and sharp, a punk tune that’s the closest Heart Beach have come to sounding optimistic. And, from January this year, the insistent, driving ‘Hours’ has to be the band’s most emotive track to date.

Heart Beach have just returned from a stint in New Zealand playing Camp a Low Hum. For now they’re taking a little time to recuperate, but we’re sure to hear more from them soon.

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WTH PRESENTS: Morning Harvey – East Coast tour

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Morning Harvey

 

Brisbanites Morning Harvey are setting out on a tour of M̶a̶d̶c̶h̶e̶s̶t̶e̶r̶ the East Coast to mark the release of their new single ‘Girl Euphoria (Come Back to Me)’.

I used to think that unnecessary uses of parentheses’ were just superfluous things you used when you weren’t really sure if the first line of your chorus was better than the second – or just stupid gimmicks Iceladic people applied for their own entertainment. Beyond the brackets, ‘Girl Eurphoria (Come Back to Me)’ is sharp slice of psych-pop. Much like The Laurels, Morning Harvey aren’t slinging anything ‘new’, but their dreamy re-appropriations are comforting for anyone who finds solace in big melodies, pedal panning and the rest that comes with deft hands and a great sound guy.

The new track follows on from the band’s 2012 debut EP Well For Wishes, which we reckon is worth revisiting if you like what you hear. 

We’re presenting Morning Harvey’s upcoming tour with Spark & Opus and have 2 double passes to give away to the band’s Melbourne and Sydney shows. Email us at editors@whothehell.net.

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Who The Hell + Spark & Opus present:

MORNING HARVEY – East Coast tour

Saturday April 5th – Black Bear Lodge, Brisbane w/ Salvadarlings

Thursday April 10th – Brighton Up Bar, Sydney w/ The Jones Rival & Dead Radio

Friday April 18th – Alia Arthouse, Melbourne w/ The Citradels & The New Pollution

 

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LISTEN: Milkshake – Milkshake EP II

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Milkshake

We get a lot of band write-ins that end with many, many kind regards and other polite fluff. Among my favourite are the submissions which leave nothing but a trail of obscure hyperlink crumbs and not much else for us blog-types to deliver accurate, real-time information to the people. Milkshake got our attention late last year after sending us a funny abusive rant. An email apology a week later blaming life on drunk existentialist haiku was also noted.Fergus Miller from Bored Nothing plays guitar in Milkshake. He showed up to our last warehouse party reasonably wasted and spent most of the night scrambling hands and knees on the floor trying to locate his glasses. Fergus fangs around on guitar in here, Matt Connelly of Retro Culture makes nice noise, Geoffrey Thorsen also does the same and some other people do other things in this band which I can’t decipher beyond the flavour alias in the ‘about’ section of their Facebook page. 

To provide some visual context to Milkshake’s second EP, Milkshake II sounds like backflipping through space. Wet snow sock. Murky optimism. Midi sound crackles between dude-chants and rousing chord work make for some soothing listening. Could be the biopic soundtrack to a stoned Jonathan Boulet eating packet noodles in the dark.

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