Tagged By brisbane

INTRODUCING: Gang of Youths

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Gang of Youths

 

Gang of Youths aren’t confused, just curious. People who write about music love it when a band releases two tracks that sound completely disparate from each other. We thrive on that shit. It lets us make stupid comparisons, gives us an excuse to abuse the right to use adjectives like ‘juxtaposing’ and ‘brooding’, and makes the lesser of the two feel reasonably insecure.

‘A Sudden Light’ and ‘Riverland’ sound like they’ve been penned by two different artists. For anyone who wanted an example of what Wim Butler at your birthday or Julian Casablancas singing at your funeral would sound like; here’s your smorgasboard. As soon as that major-minor piano refrain treads in at the start of ‘Riverland’, you get the feeling this is gonna be something special. Actually, anyone who can sit down at a piano and sing in-tune is pretty special (and sadly, too rare these days). It’s definitely a mood setter; a track for closing time, quiet train rides home. I can picture this track sitting nicely in the background of some Sophia Coppola film, the one where the characters are probably dressed in ornate clothing and doing something suitably ironic.

On that note – for the small lapse of stillness that ‘Riverland’ brings, ‘A Sudden Light’ is the punchline here. It’s a loose, belter of an anthem with modulating chorus, overbearing references to children and drugs and enough swarming around harmonic ‘WHOAAAHS” to put the whole Brisbane league of bands out of business. This is a killer track –  and even for GOY’s indecisiveness, you should probably claim this tune early. You know where good pop songs go to die? Derpy Australian dramas, like Offspring more often than not. So while their music programmers go hunting for matching cobalt outfits (see above) and the strange form of ‘censorship’ the band have employed on all their press shots (see above), definitely recommend you cart along to their next show. Nothing wrong with committing to a good hook, right?

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INTRODUCING: Ghost Notes

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=ghost-notes

Australian instrumental rock bands are generally a very underrated and under-heard species. With a little bit of creativity and imagination In this genre, bands get the chance to purely focus on the wondrous avenues music alone can take them to. Bands such as Mr. Maps (Brisbane) and Apricot Rail (Perth) are doin’ it right. So are Ghost Notes.

Ghost Notes are a six-piece instrumental band from Brisbane who’ve been kicking around since 2009. They’ve released a brand new single ‘Go Where It Takes You’, which follows on from their incredibly rich By Cover Of Night LP. The track sticks to the band’s signature jazzy, post-rock element, with that stark lead trumpet taking us all for a wander. And while we’re all in Gatsby mode, this could make a fitting soundtrack to that intense moment where Leo decides to snort diamantes.

The glorious thing about this 6 minute epic is the mystery and romanticism captured in the lead melody. The track sits on top of an unsettled and messy percussive bed of sounds. Listening to Ghost Notes is like watching the highlights reel of a good film in your mind; it’s unpredictable and exciting. More people should definitely be paying attention to this band, and this entire genre in Australia.

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LISTEN: Tiger Beams – ‘Beat It’

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 Tiger Beams

‘Beat It’ is the first thing we’ve heard from Brisbane duo Tiger Beams since their incredible (and criminally underexposed) debut album In Your Dreams, which came out in 2011. Plenty of other projects have kept singer/drummer Jesse Hawkins and guitarist Jeremy Neale busy, but it’s still massively exciting to see them back and in fighting form. ‘Beat It’ comes strutting out of your speakers, dark and tough (even while referencing Willow Smith), with Jesse Hawkins’s spikey, erratic beats starting out front and centre and staying there throughout the whole track.

The song builds up a great sense of rising suspense, Hawkins’ vocals are cool and snarky in the verse, the choruses exploding with that howling thing that these guys do so well. With ‘Beat It’, Tiger beams have found a sweet spot of music that’s both sparse and dangerous, and supremely danceable and catchy. Here’s hoping another album isn’t too far away…

The video is also very cool, and very creepy – watch it here.

Also, do yourself a favour if you haven’t already and snag a copy of In Your Dreams.

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LISTEN: Johnny and The Fembots

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johnny and the fembots

(photo by Thomas Oliver)

Johnny And The Fembots are an annoyingly talented group of youths from Brisbane, featuring members of Go Violets and Jeremy Neal’s live band. I knew I was gonna like them when they released their first single (a Christmas song) – the delightful  ‘(I Wish It Could Be) Christmas Forever’. Their second single ‘Hey, Don’t!’ Has the same breathy, effortless harmonies and naive 60’s pop aesthetics. Coming in at just over a minute, it’s a short and shiny gem of a song. The video to this track also features some swooning over 50c soap in a laundromat. It’s charming…check it out.

Keep up with Johnny and The Fembots while they do great things here.

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LISTEN: James X. Boyd – ‘James X. Boyd & The Boydoids’

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Brisbane can be shitty in a lot of ways: it’s hot all the time, there are a lot of racists, and it’s pretty ugly to look at. But every now and then a record like this comes out of our big country town, and goddamn it makes you proud.

A little while ago we brought you ‘Elissa Says’, the first single from James X. Boyd & The Boydoids self-titled debut album. Now you can wrap your ears around the whole thing in digital form, with a cassette due out before too long.

This is (with a couple of exceptions). an album of love songs. Love songs in which the word ‘c*nt-wits’ is used, but love songs all the same. It starts off gently with ‘Blue Apia’, a tropical paradise set to delicate, wistful strumming that recalls old Hawaiian records and apparently “the only place in the world you can still buy cans of new coke”.

‘New Town Tango’ and ‘Brunswick Street Junkies’ paint pictures of suburbs in very different lights, but Boyd seems to be fighting himself in both songs. The former starts out with that very pretty jangly guitar that is used to great effect all through this record, but builds to a more aggressive point near the end, Boyd seemingly unable to answer his own question when he asks “and do I need you back?”. In the latter he perfectly expresses the mix of sympathy and repulsion that junkies conjure, with a few instantly relatable lines.

The middle of the record reveals the emotional centre; three sweet, restrained ballads, the highlight of which is ‘Baby Green’, where Boyd plays a sage advisor. “Quit your job and we can see what the world’s like/ and I know there’s things stopping you/ and they, won’t let up/ but it’s not quite as hard as it may seem”.

There are a lot of beautiful things about this album. Boyd’s restraint and lightness of touch is striking, along with the band’s ability to communicate lyrics that are both immediately endearing and honest. My favourite track is ‘For What You’re Worth’, which reveals a more cynical side of the band. During the chorus the music cuts out, leaving Boyd to throw a question into the ether, before the meandering guitar comes back in, leaving him again unanswered. The dark and dusty ‘Diamond On Your Own’ and soft, lilting single ‘Elissa Says’ close out the record. But if you’re anything like me, you’ll be putting it straight back on before the last note even ends.

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Support these guys by purchasing the full album here.

 

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WATCH: Major Leagues

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Major Leagues Teen Mum

In high school, a friend and I used to play a game where we’d sit in the local Westfield foodcourt watching people eat. While the crux of fat suburbia would devour their goods, we’d make corresponding bestial ‘eating noises’ for each person based on reasonable moral grounds such as appearance, weight and assumed saturated fat content of their food-court meal fare. It was a terrible game. But one I kinda have strong urges to repeat after watching this new one from Brissie’s Major Leagues.

Thirty five people in a room, eating in slow motion. Reads like the plot outline for a work of custom erotica. Thankfully, Major Leagues have made the whole thing heaps of fun! The cast here look like the types who spend more time taking photos of their food rather than scoffing anything, but there are some outstanding table manners and scenes of some dudes bonding over breast meat.

Easily one of my fave clips so far this year.

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LISTEN: Tiny Migrants – ‘Uncontrolable’

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Tiny-Migrants_Uncontrolable

 

‘Uncontrolable’ (too wild even for conventional spelling) is the latest track from Brisbane’s Tiny Migrants.

We’ve been on the trail these guys have left ever since they played our Brissie Halloween party in 2010.

This track doesn’t waste one second of its 2:12 running time, starting out with a blazing beat from Tiger Beams’ Jesse Hawkins, picking up some tambourine and a dusty bass line before Julien James’s spazzy guitar and vocal yelps complete a volatile experiment in damn exciting R ‘n’ R.

This track is the sound of going a little too far and taking a little too much. Jacinta Walker’s backing vocals are almost taunts, daring the listener to follow the band into the hole they’re gleefully throwing themselves into.

‘Uncontrolable’ follows on from Tiny Migrants’ killer single from early 2012, the slightly poppier ‘Fishpond Goldmine’ and their standout contribution to this year’s Nuggets covers compilation, ‘A Public Execution‘. With more releases due out in 2013, keep your eyes open and your ears pricked for Tiny Migrants, ‘cause they’re coming for you.

Pick this awesome track up for a buck on Bandcamp.

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