DZ Deathrays – ‘Brutal Tapes’

Known also as ‘those dudes who make killer filmclips’, Shane Parsons and Simon Ridley/DZ/DZ Deathrays’ Brutal Tapes marks the second EP for the thrash punk (thrush?) dance DUO.

I bold/caps duo as they make more noise than that plane Snoop Dogg piloted in one of his acting career ‘highpoints’ if it cut laps on [insert relevant street] on a Friday. In a good way.

Compiled of studio recorded, house party (complete with rowdy bro crowd vocals) recorded and remixed tracks, Brutal Tapes is a polished, harder, sexier offering of dirty-glorious guitar riffs and belting drums from the Brisvegans.

It is about 5/7ths killer, though, with the two remixes taking some punch out, but to be fair it’s a tough ask to make it any more danceable. To be unfair they should’ve left it at five tracks.

The filler isn’t unlistenable, but the remixes seem limp compared to the rest of Brutal Tapes, really just showing that these two don’t require anything else added to their formula.

They even slip in bongos, and it fits. It fits so damn well you won’t look at bongos the same way. Amazing.

And live? Fuck. They’re even better in all their ear smashing glory.

Dananananaykroyd picked them up for another bout of Splendour sideshows when they get back to our shores after tearing the UK a new one, so if you haven’t already hit that then make it happen.

I’mma go ahead and put Gebbie St. up for the sexiest song of 2010/11. This (NSFW) fan made clip captures all of that.

Calling All Cars

Calling All Cars - ‘Animal’

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Calling All Cars is a collision of myriad different styles – lo-fi garage rock (just listen those overdriven single-coil electric guitars), punk rock (there is a definite palpable energy here), pop-punk (inflected within the chorus) and straight-out Aussie pub rock (ummm… I’m stuck for another bracketed sentence).

Real Aussie rock seems imbued into the collective unconscious of Australians; there’s something about a rough’n'ready band sweating it out on a pub stage that automatically endears us towards them. There’s an exploding Aussie rock scene at the moment, although sadly there’s a tendency towards mediocre output on record (Gyroscope, I’m looking at you). Calling All Cars is perhaps slightly generic in their delivery, but their point of difference is a gruff heart that bleeds out onto their music. It’s not blowing me away, but it’s not shunning me either. And it’s certainly an evolution in the right direction. I reckon the chorus would rock live.

I’m intrigued.

http://whothehell.net/QN

Ohana: ‘When Things Come Alive’

Ohana - ‘When Things Come Alive’

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Australia’s most combustible band, Ohana, return with a brand new track off their forthcoming record. Once again sounding like a band on the edge of completely losing the plot, the Wollongong four piece play their noise-pop with aplomb, echoing alienation with music that pushes and pulls you with visceral energy and infectious rhythms. I can’t wait to hear their new album, and ‘When Things Comes Alive’ is a fantastic teaser track. It’s a wandering progressive number that bookends a My Disco-esque shoegaze mid-section with a frenetic beginning and end, tearing their guitars apart. I think I can hear the blood on the strings.

http://whothehell.net/W4

Snowman: ‘Daniel was a Timebomb’

Snowman - ‘Daniel was a Timebomb’

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While the proprietors of Who the Hell argue over the merits of Snowman’s brutal new beast The Horse, The Rat and the Swan, I’m unequivocally on the “Pro” side for this album. It’s fucking menacing, like a Birthday Party record, completely visceral and incendiary; it feels like the four piece won’t just bring down Perth, but the whole of Australia with the force behind these songs. The music darts from raucuous punk rock like that found on ‘Our Mother (She Remembers)’ – what an opener! – to the weighty darkness of ‘The Blood of the Swan’ and ‘She Is Turning into You’, two songs that’d fit almost too well in the soundtrack to Wolf Creek or a similarly evil Aussie outback film.

‘Daniel was a Timebomb’ is the closest thing Snowman have to a pop song on this album – that is, if you like your pop songs to explode your eardrums.

http://whothehell.net/io