Bleeding Knees Club – ‘Have Fun’ (m4a)

Bleeding Knees Club are a couple of bros from Brisbane that have been cutting their teeth playing house parties, warehouses and the odd club night. Comprised of Alex Wall (Vox/Drums) and Jordan Malane (Guitar/Vox), Bleeding Knees Club bust out punkish, surf rock tunes inspired by the likes of Wavves and The Black Lips. The songs sound loose and, content wise, they’re pretty much about getting loose. Fitting. Anyway, the above song is called ‘Have Fun’ and it’s one of only two demos they’ve recorded so far – not a bad start. [Insert my usual plea for band to keep things raw/loose on actual studio version]. Anyway, have fun – it’s an apt name.

www.myspace.com/thebleedingkneesclub

Northeast Party House – ‘Dusk’ (mp3)

Seems like the only way to get your band gazumped by college kids is to get your brood on the party circuit. Northeast Party House’s name has been tramp stamped onto every ounce of facebook party spam I’ve received in the last month. These type of invites won’t fuck off no matter how much you stab ‘no’ into your keyboard, so I thought I’d give them a chance.

Don’t let the steady progression of guitar (it’s all a bit too Two Weeks for my liking) or that sleepy stream of vocals fool you. That mellow, dreamy verse floats around as if it’s just been plucked out of Damon Albarn’s cerebral cortex. But just when I’m about to be transported into oblivion by that awesome hook that reeks of spandex and glitterati, those shrill synth fart noises start up and undermine all the goodness that was promised.

Yes, at times this track sits in your stomach a bit like a badly mixed jagerbomb and can’t make up it’s mind whether it wants to party or pass out. There’s probably a bunch of streetparty kids who will beat me into the ground with their strobe lights and smoke machines for dissing the fun.

In the meantime, Northeast Party House will be overtaking vacant houses and gig venues providing Saturday playtime to little girls donning nanna-chic and floppy haired boys who take pride in doing their shirts up to the top button. In the meantime, I’ll need a few beers and a blast from the smoke machine before I can adjust to all that fuzz and novelty print.

www.myspace.com/northeastpartyhouse

Mosman Alder – ‘Raisin Heart’ (mp3)

Mosman Alder, hey? I first noticed this band’s name on the poster for the epic Richard In Your Mind/SPOD gig tonight at the Fans club night at Alhambra (for the Brisbane folks) and thought nothing much of them other than “how did these randoms land the support slot for a relatively high profile gig (at least in the indie/blogging sense).” But then this guy said I should check them, and so I actually went to all the effort to hit up their Myspace page.

And you know what? Turns out they’re pretty good. It shoots for the same kind of grandeur as Arcade Fire and early Doves and actually reaches that level pretty well without falling back on the whole ‘let’s get lots of people to sing loud at once to sound epic’ kinda way. Yeah, they bring some of that in toward the end, but when it works it still works (and when it doesn’t work… well, see that latest Little Red single. WTF is that shit?). Largely, though, the vocals are restricted to a smooth baritone and the song relies on the actual instruments to create crescendos.

Above is ‘Raisin Heart,’ the clear stand out amongst their tracks so far. I won’t go pronouncing these guys as an impending ‘big thing,’ but I can confirm that they have at least one pretty great song with a serving of ‘potential’ on the side. Hopefully they can turn it on tonight and win some more people over.

www.myspace.com/mosmanalder

Sticky Fingers – ‘Juicy Ones’ (mp3)

Sticky Fingers – ‘Murderous Nerves’ (mp3)

There are always those bloody festival punters I get stuck next to in the pit who put their dreadlocks so close to my face that I can taste henna ointment and lentil chutney. I’ve sat through too many awful consecutive renditions of ‘No Woman, No Cry’ by neigbourly compatriots camping next to my tent at Falls Festival to ever appreciate anything associated with reggae again.

I’m no expert in reggae, so if it sounds somewhat coherent, in tune and adopts some kind of swaying cohesion, it’s sweet music to my ears. When these guys described themselves as garage/pop/reggae I wasn’t quite sure to pull out my serious scorn or take the piss. While Sticky Fingers sounds more like the name of a roving kids craft centre or the title of a b grade porno, I’m getting into this.

Juicy Ones delivers translucent layers of jewel toned riffs over a vibrant pop melody.  Dylan’s crisp tone has chutzpah, but an added effortless restraint to it that guides SF’s sound through this with absolute ease. Loose tuning on the ends of most phrases add a nice tempered dimension to the track too.

Murderous Nerves serves up the band’s reggae leanings. And as ugly as you’d imagine the spawned offspring of british hued indie pop and reggae to be, the end product ain’t all bad. Smokey, musky atmospherics here that could easily slot straight onto one of those dub mixtapes most bars seem to whack on between sets.

At the 1:43 mark I’m picturing Kyle Falconer from The View staggering around stage blowing smoke rings and donning raggamuffin beads and hemp-dyed pants. Oh! What a turn on. There’s something about reggae dub beats that brings out the best of stoned ‘come-hither’ faces in most people. Whatever it is, it’s working it’s charm.

The band have managed to develop a fresh, clear-cut sound without flaunting too much studio polish. They’ve glazed that ‘r’ word with a nice twist, and I’ve just given in.

www.myspace.com/stickyfingers_

* Sticky Fingers will be playing with a hoist of other schweeet bands (Howl, Puta Madre Brothers, Traps, Guineafowl, Parades & more) at Oxford Art Factory’s 3rd Birthday on the 20th of Aug.

Ride The Tiger – ‘Danny’ (mp3)

Ride The Tiger is a band from Tasmania, made up of veterans from the state’s punk/rock/hardcore scene. ‘Danny’ is the second track from their debut EP Ambush, and combines sing-a-long choruses with a nice groove and a sneaky harmonised guitar solo. It’s often a struggle for songs in this genre not to sound samey, but the guitar playing is what grabbed my attention and sets this song apart from similar tunes.

www.myspace.com/ridethetigerrock

I first heard this song on the excellent D.I. Wireless podcast, a must-listen for anybody into punk rock.

Flight Facilities & Aeroplane (with Giselle, Au Revoir Simone and Friendly Fires) – ‘I Crave Paris’ (mp3)

OK I know this is confusing but bear with me. One of the year’s best electronic tracks, Flight Facilities & Giselle’s ‘Crave You‘ has received the mashed treatment by Belgium’s hot electronic duo Aeroplane, whom I just found out has now become just a solo project by Vito de Luca. The beat that Aeroplane used was originally their remix of Friendly Fires’ hit Paris. They took the vocals of that remix, sung by Au Revoir Simone, off that beat, and put Giselle’s vocals. So technically, this should be credited as Aeroplane featuring Giselle, but I’ll leave it as it is so everyone’s happy.