Tagged By New Music

LISTEN: Black Cab – ‘Uniforms’

, , No Comment

black cab

We’ve been waiting far too long for another local band like Cut Copy to unite the dancefloors and house parties and festivals of Australia. Nite Fields probably could have done it if they had any ambition to be popular in this country (and, you know, why would they?). Blank Realm have the vibe but are maybe a little too rough and tumble for that weird subset of partiers who still listen to the radio. California Girls are going too hard to care. Add your favourite of the hundreds of others who almost cracked the formula for electro-success to this list.

But Black Cab have got it: the polish, the choruses ready-made for sing-alongs under blinding lights, the universal, vaguely romantic lyrics (‘boys can boys can/and the girls can have it all’) and vocals in the monotone English new-wave style that sound vitally important even when the words are banal.

‘Uniforms’ does everything a good dance song should – swells and pulses, builds up and repeats until you think you could really dance forever. Flashback: me and everyone else at Golden Plains. ‘I love this. I LOVE THIS. This is a GREAT SONG’. It sounds like a strobe, arpeggiated and bright. And in case you needed more proof of the broad and impeccable taste of Mikey Young, here he is on guest keys. Must have been a lot of fun.

Black Cab launch ‘Uniforms’ in May at Melbourne’s Howler and at the Newtown Social Club in Sydney. Those of us outside the big smoke will have to wait (we’re used to it). The band’s hinted at a vinyl release later in the year, so hopefully it won’t be too long.

Facebook / Web / Soundcloud / Buy

Read Post →

WATCH: BENT – ‘Skelton Man’

, , No Comment

bent
The premise of this video from Brisbane three-piece BENT is pretty simple: wake up, mess around with breakfast stuff, writhe around on the kitchen benches, look deranged in an attractive way. A couple of ideas and a whole lot of fuck-it confidence that they’ll work out. The song itself, from their Bent EP, released in early January on Moontown Records, is like walking around in circles and bumping into things – metal things mostly. It’s also very well recorded: all the pieces stand out and apart and grab your attention equally.

The vocals are bratty and dramatic. I wanna say maybe too dramatic, but that’s just cause I listen to too much auscore shit and now whenever I hear vocals that are at all dynamic from someone who can actually sing it freaks me out. Singer Heidi Cutlack kinda freaks me out on this track anyway, especially when she yelps that childish kinda-funny, kinda-sinister line ‘Where is your milky???’ over and over.

Cutlack made this video. She also does the art and makes the merch – and I reckon that even if BENT hit it big (or as big a band that sounds as weird as this could), she still will. This is a real DIY band, and that means more than just playing a few house shows from time to time. They’re totally involved in every part of their look and sound (they definitely know exactly the kind of no wave-ish stuff they’re aping better than me, so I’m not gonna embarrass myself by guessing) and they make you want to get involved as well.

Watch this cool weird video and then listen to the record. They’ve been playing on heaps of sick lineups in and out of Brisbane lately – I’ve never seen them but I did hear they’re the reason bands aren’t allowed at Heya Bar in the Valley any more – so catch them live if you can.

Facebook / Bandcamp

Read Post →

PREMIERE: Bad Vision – ‘Goons’ video

, , No Comment

bad vision goons

A few weeks back, Melbourne’s Bad Visions released the first single from their upcoming album, Turn Out Your Sockets. At first, it felt like a far cry from their early days of eyeball-gouging album art and music to match. The thrash had been replaced with something that could almost be described as country – closer to bluegrass than torrential garage dissonance. But the fear quickly dissipated. Bad Vision have broadened; changed, but stayed the same where it matters. They’ve still got what it takes to lay a garage rock smack down.

‘Goons’ now features a video to accompany its story of teenage mall terrorists: a tracking shot that features all the foosball, record fondling and band practice on the patio that a young punk could dream of. This is the real life of Bad Vision, and their ode to goons – the type of person with a passion for everyone’s favourite sack of cheap wine. The kind of folk who shove good advice to the curb, just so they can say they did things their own way. A person who can spend an entire day on a street corner, people watching and snickering at what they don’t want to be. ‘Goons’ is a love letter, delivered with jangly guitar lines and a raucous chorus. The kind you can lean into in your leather jacket, knowing only half the words but with the courage to yell them like you wrote the thing.

Facebook / Bandcamp

Read Post →

LISTEN: Alex Lahey – ‘You Don’t Think You Like People Like Me’

, , No Comment

alex lahey

DO! YOURSELVES! A! FAVOUR! Yes, the caps is necessary, and yes, each exclamation mark is justified. Alex Lahey is a gift to Australian music in the same way that a serving of gourmet Italian pizza is a gift to someone who’s been eating Dominos their entire life. Although she’s only released two solo tracks, they’re endlessly listenable – guiding your hand to the repeat button like Darth Vader is Force-choking your index fingers.

Her first single, ‘Air Mail’, was a simple guitar pop number lamenting a long-distance relationship; it was irreverent, light and catchy, like Feist mixed with some Courtney Barnett. Now, for her second single, ‘You Don’t Think You Like People Like Me’, Lahey has stepped up the guitar crunch enough to snap the neck of a Bon Iver fan.

But, even with the pedal board lit up like Kings Cross pre-lock out laws, Lahey still maintains her signature wit and earnestness. The song begins with, “All I want to do is drink clean-skin wine and watch Mulholland Drive with you”, a line that’s sure to be grinningly repeated by the legions of Lahey nerds who are bound to pop up over the next few months. Then the chorus come on, catchy but still driving, with Lahey’s familiar openness and that smidgen of real pain which separates her from the pack.

‘You Don’t Think You Like People Like Me’ is a hell of a lot louder than Air Mail’, but both songs are like enormous arrows pointing to a future in which Alex Lahey has established herself as one of our country’s best young songwriters. DO! YOURSELVES! A! FAVOUR!

Alex Lahey will be playing some shows soon:

23 March – Old Bar, Melbourne w/ DIET. and Max Quinn’s Onomatopenis

26 March – The Hills Are Alive Festival, Gippsland

1 April – World Bar, Sydney

2 April – Shady Cottage Festival, Trentham

Facebook / Soundcloud / Unearthed

Read Post →

LISTEN: Clever – ‘Your Eyesore’s Sweet’

, , No Comment

clever kewdi udi

When you’re kinda into punk music you get to hear a lot of bands that sort of play at being aggressive – in a posey rock’n’roll way – but it’s rare to hear something that legitimately shakes you up. Brisbane’s Clever have got me shook right up. Once I saw them play at a bowls club in the middle of the day next to bain maries full of make-your-own taco ingredients and it put me on edge for hours before I even touched one drug.

You can hear that charged-up brutality on the band’s first ‘single’, ‘Your Eyesore’s Sweet’, from their debut record Kewdi Udi, out 11 March on Homeless Records. It’s in the jumpy drums and bass, and Mitch Perkins’ relentlessly menacing vocals – I’ve listened to this song 10+ times (it only goes for 2 minutes) and can’t hold on to a word he’s saying. Fred Gooch from the Wrong Man holding this whole aural tyre-fire together with that sawing, immovable guitar.

If you’re a certain kind of person, hearing that Clever is made up of members and ex-members of Sewers, the Wrong Man (as mentioned), Psy Ants and Per Purpose is gonna be enough. For everyone else, this is powerfully – purely – sick stuff.

Facebook / Bandcamp

Read Post →

PREMIERE: Naked – ‘Critical Half-Arsed’ video

, , 1 Comment

naked1

Tasmanian experimental punk malcontents, Naked, are on the cusp of having a very big month. The three-piece made some waves in late 2015 with ‘Sprinters of the World Unite’, a ramshackle but intriguing piece of outsider noise. Around the same time it was announced that Naked would be releasing a full-length record through Brisbane label, Tenth Court, who released some stellar LP’s last year from the likes of Wireheads and Mope City. Pink Quartz is the name of the record, which is set to drop into our hot little hands on Friday, 5 February. To make sure we don’t forget, Naked is offering up a new single and video, ‘Critical Half-Arsed’.

‘Critical Half-Arsed’ is one minute and twenty seconds of buzzing and strained noise punk. Taken at face value, you might think the title accurately describes the offering, but in eighty seconds the band manages to fit a large amount of urgency and tension into the mix. Toothy guitar slashes and quick pummelling of the drums keep you on edge, as lead singer Kieran Sullivan offers a halted recollection of a deadly accident.

The clip sees the members of Naked rinsing off in showers and bathtubs fully clothed. It’s as if they are trying to wash themselves of some distasteful experience – a cleansing of something unshakable, something that can’t be unseen. Quick cuts build on the tense nature of the song, and it makes for a suitably unnerving accompaniment.

You can preorder Pink Quartz on digital or limited edition vinyl via Tenth Court now. Once the album drops, catch Naked on their extensive east coast tour:

Fri 5th – The Grand Poobah, Hobart w/ Native Cats, Orlando Furious (Melb) and Henry Savery

Sat 13th (arvo) – 4ZZZ Carpark, Brisbane w/ Thigh Master, Clever, The Mosaics and Hexmere

Sat 13th (eve) – Trainspotters, Brisbane w/ Cannon, Pillow Pro (Melb) and Rebel Yell

Sun 14th – Seespace, Lismore w/ Dracopede, Skinpin and Poetaster

Tues 16th – The Croatian Club, Newcastle w/ Nailhouse and Polyfox

Wed 17th – Rad Bar, Wollongong w/ Julia Why? (Syd), Orphans (Syd) and White Blanks

Thurs 18th – Marly Bar, Sydney w/ Julia Why? and Lenin Lennon (Facebook)

Fri 19th – The Union, Sydney w/ Mope City (LP launch), Point Being and Pillow Pro (Melb) (Facebook)

Sat 20th – The Phoenix, Canberra w/ Wives and California Girls (Facebook)

Sun 21st – Grace Darling, Melbourne w/ Faye Soft, Orlando Furious and Sweet Whirl

Mon 22nd – Northcote Social Club w/ Taipan Tiger Girls, The Bunyip Moon and Secret Valley

Facebook / Bandcamp

Read Post →

LISTEN: Free Time – ‘Who Owns the Moon’

, , No Comment

free time

Free Time is a one-quarter NYC, three-quarters Melbourne outfit headed by Dion Nania, who you might recognise as the former front man of Panel of Judges. Nania has been loitering around in the big apple for a few years, but since he touched back down in Melbourne, Free Time have been playing a few precious gigs here and there, most recently closing out Bedroom Suck Records’ Melbourne Music Week Bike Ride. They’re gearing up for an album release later this year, following on from their self-titled debut and a 7″ released through Underwater Peoples in 2014.

Their latest single, ‘Who Owns the Moon’, has musical touchstones in a bunch of local talent – and looking at the line-up here, that’s no surprise at all: Free Time is about the closest thing Melbourne’s got to a supergroup. Martin Frawley from Twerps on bass? Totally Mild’s Zach Schneider on lead?! Terrible Truths’ Joe Alexander on drums!?! Oh my stars.

Free Time is harnessing some of 2015’s golden boys of sick tunes, and on ‘Who Owns the Moon’, it’s nice to see they’re not just along for the ride – each brings their distinctive style to the picture, while thankfully not overpowering Nania’s vibes. Schneider’s wobbly, high-necked plucking is out in full force, plus Frawley and Nania work in tandem for a cooing, nasal vocal delivery (which sounds bad, but isn’t).

Free Time’s second album, In Search of Free Time, will be out in mid-2016.

Facebook / Bandcamp

Read Post →