The Essential Festival, Sydney

I spent my Anzac day at Sydney's Essential festival, which takes place across three indoor stages in the city centre:With ticket prices perhaps seeming a tiny bit steep, pre-sales clearly didn’t take off amazingly well, judging by the fact that the three venues did feel quite empty in the early part of the day, but those who were there were treated to a lovely set from Cuthbert and the Nightwalkers in The Gaelic Theatre. Conversely, Centipede started proceedings on The Madison Stage with female-fronted poppy electronica/noise that lacked charisma and charm and at times was clunky and ugly.

Following Centipede was Erin Marshall (above). Now, I don’t want to sound like a broken record, but the singer/songwriter continues to impress with every performance. Today, a beguiled audience was won over by her acoustic ditties, which went from being powerful and gutsy when accompanied by her brother on drums to being pretty and delicate when she performed alone. The highlight was the beautiful Once Upon a Time, during which you could hear a pin drop amongst the crowd. Just remember, when Marshall inevitably becomes absolutely massive in the not-too-distant future, you heard it here first.

Watching Bird Automatic was a nice enough way to fill half-an-hour, not least because they have a frontman who, in a dark room and from distance, looks a bit like David Walliams. Meanwhile, in the upstairs Gaelic Club, The Seabellies were also perky and pleasing.With a sound that included elements of rock, electro and dance, Bluejuice (above) flew the flag for Aussie hip-hop better than most. Admittedly this isn’t too hard, but there can’t have been a person in the increasingly busy Gaelic Theatre who didn’t get a kick out of their energetic performance. Vocalists Jake and Stav clearly absolutely love being on a stage and their infectious high-energy filtered though to a crowd that had so far found little on the bill to dance to. Stirring stuff, and fucking loud too. The day belonged to Bluejuice, no question.

Sydney boy/girl duo WOW won the title of being the weirdest band of the day. With a frontman who looks like a futuristic incarnation of The Young Knives’ House Of Lords and hacking out crazy garage-electro-disco-punk-lunacy to the bemused handful in attendance, it’s hard to tell if they were the best thing in the world or the worst. One thing’s for sure though, Nathan Barley would love them.

While American band Ratatat impressed with their beautifully-crafted and layered instrumental indietronica, local lads The Kahn Brothers offered sweet acoustic harmonies to a much smaller crowd on the Madison stage. Sure, it was incredibly twee and fairly bland, but pretty enough in places.Up in The Gaelic Club, an ear-busting turn from Cassette Kids was as far from twee as it is possible to be. In vocalist Katrina (above*), they have a captivating frontwoman in the mould of Be Your Own Pet’s Jemima Pearl or Yeah Yeah Yeahs' Karen O. She stamps, stomps and screams her way around the stage, hollaring through a mop of blonde hair like she is having the most fun tantrum ever. Sometimes their songs do kinda blend into one, but the band does have some really interesting guitar effects up its sleeve and what the set lacked in variety it made up for with sheer fucking raw energy. Theirs was one of the highlights of the day, even if the turnout to watch them was undeservedly low. On this display though, 2008 might just be their year.

With Regurgitator and The Holidays wrapping things up, another Essential Festival could justifiably call itself a success. A low-key success, but a success nonetheless.

(*I actually took this photo of Katrina two days later at Oxford Arts, after all the ones I took of her at Essential were of poor quality. Incidentally, they put on another awesome show)

The Raveonettes at Oxford Art Factory

Last week I reviewed The Raveonettes in Sydney for Drum Media:THE RAVEONETTES
THE BLACK RYDER
Oxford Art Factory, Darlinghurst
17/04/08

Australian band The Black Ryder was an obvious choice of support act, with six musicians filling the room with a dense noise that at times pointed in the direction of Black Rebel Motorcycle Club. It’s also safe to assume that they have listened to more than the occasional Velvet Underground song in their time.

On the dot of 11pm, The Raveonettes - all cheekbones and ice-cool poise - took to the stage and unleashed their intriguing combination of guitar fuzz and surf rock to a sold-out venue. Dressed all in black, Sune looked handsome in a button-up shirt and skinny jeans, while Sharin was the picture of elegance in a beautiful dress as she pressed pedals in high heels. In contrast to the support act, the stage set-up was minimal. Sharin, once the bassist, played guitar, as did Sune, as their sound was embellished by nothing more than a standing drummer with a simple kit and a few samples at his disposal.

Such a dynamic was perfect to showcase the stripped back nature of tracks from their new record, Lust Lust Lust, of which Dead Sound and Aly, Walk With Me were especially drenched in atmosphere. But despite the current album being their strongest to date, the Danes’ older songs were generally more pleasing. The likes of That Great Love Sound from Chain Gang of Love and Attack Of The Ghost Riders from their first long-player have clearly benefited from years of being played live.However, the set did unquestionably suffer slightly from a lack of variety. While there were no lulls to speak of, there were no genuine standout moments either. Even taking into account the stirring You Want The Candy and Let’s Rave On, the cadence and tone rarely changed throughout the hour-long performance. While it may have damaged the ambience that had been so carefully crafted, it would have been pleasing if they had punctuated the set with some more shimmering doo wop and maybe a couple more tracks from their riotous debut album, Whip It On. Also, the beautiful Uncertain Times was a disappointing absence.

Still, these are minor grumbles. After all, they were here to promote their new record rather than to extensively revisit their back-catalogue, and the dizzyingly intense atmosphere was captivating enough to paper over any cracks in the set-list.

Loudlight

I attended the opening of Loudlight, Cybele Malinowski's solo photography exhibition:Cybele’s solo exhibition loudlight displays massive translucent life-size prints on custom light boxes in a blacked-out MTV Gallery creating an out-of-this-world experience. Some of the artists featured include Josh Pyke, Dapple Cities Fly, Ben Lee, Young and Restless, PNAU, Muscles, Midnight Juggernauts and Catcall.

The exhibition runs until April 30th, and is at the MTV Gallery, 4-6 Yurong St, East Sydney.

Raveonettes interview

I recently interviewed The Raveonettes for Melbourne's Inpress and Sydney's Drum Media. Here is the extended version that appeared in Victoria:SHARIN FOO FROM THE RAVEONETTES TELLS ROB TOWNSEND THAT THE BAND’S DARKEST WORK TO DATE IS ALSO PRETTY ROMANTIC

“Wait, I just have to find my passport.” Bassist/vocalist Sharin Foo is in the midst of a journey to Toronto when she spares a few moments to take a phone call from Inpress in anticipation of The Raveonettes’ upcoming Australian tour. Despite being distracted by the rigmarole of crossing the American-Canadian border, the statuesque Dane talks with careful consideration and engaging enthusiasm, most notably about their recently released, fourth long-player.

“I think this is our darkest album,” she says of Lust Lust Lust; their most critically acclaimed work to date. “[Debut release] Whip It On was very celebratory; it was the ultimate party album. It was like a road trip and made you want to drive really fast, party and get really trashed. Then Chain Gang of Love was very dense and texturised. Pretty in Black was organic, much bigger sounding, more produced and it didn’t have any noise or distortion, which was pretty unusual.”

Following the slight direction change of Pretty In Black, their latest recording sees The Raveonettes step back towards the nature of their earlier work but without the self-imposed shackles of only recording songs of less than three minutes in b-flat minor/major. Keen on retaining complete creative control over their output, Foo and bandmate Sune Rose Wagner chose to produce Lust Lust Lust themselves, and crafted an album they are intensely proud of. “In many ways that’s how we’ve always worked, especially to begin with as a foundation for an album, but this time around we kept it really lo-fi. It is the album with the most space in the music because it is so minimal in its production. So it is very atmospheric and very intimate.” As well as allowing them the freedom to make the record that they really wanted, shying away from the studio experience also turned out to be generally agreeable for the duo. “We both recorded at home alone and were shooting sounds back and forth. It was just very enjoyable to have that peace and no pressure of a big studio, which is something we don’t really utilise anyway.”While it is an undeniably dark record, there is also an underlying innocence and charm to their subject-matter. “I think that’s very true,” Foo concurs. “We really are both super romantic. This album is more personal than any other album really. We had been touring a lot and we just felt a little bit lost and were trying to find balance, so I think it is a reflection upon that. It’s a romantic album. It’s about longing and nostalgia.” Indeed, The Raveonettes’ distinctive fuzzy, distorted sound has never really gone hand-in-hand with the kind of morose, pessimistic meanderings one might expect from such a genre. Rather, their style and imagery is drenched in idealistic reminiscence of 50s and 60s Americana, which makes for an alluring juxtaposition. “It’s the nostalgia of it. It’s that old fashioned fascination that we have,” Foo tells me when I ask her what she finds so appealing about that particular era of America’s history, considering The Raveonettes are Danish. “I think, coming from a small country like Denmark, we have a fascination with something strange and different; this outsider’s perspective of Americana with a very naïve approach and an almost voyeuristic sense to it.”

Such is the influence of this era on both their sound and style that the band’s name is a reference to the Buddy Holly version of Rave On! and the 60s girl group The Ronettes. This leads me to ask Foo whether, if she ever chanced upon a time-machine, she would set the dial back 50 years. Would it appeal to actually live in those days and have a slick-haired, cigarette-smoking, motorbike-riding boyfriend called Johnny? “No. I would hate it,” she laughs. “It’s very romanticised. It’s an escape from reality.”

Regardless of how romanticised it is, the stylish, supercool and devilishly attractive Raveonettes are clearly very conscious of the importance of their whole aesthetic. “Yes, definitely,” Foo says when I ask her if they like to have a similar amount of creative control over things such as artwork as they do over the recording of their music. “It’s always been important for us that it all makes sense. The visuals and the imagery are part of the creative outlet and it emphasises what the music is like.”
Despite haling from Denmark, the duo’s love of America is such that they now both live there, with Sharin based in Los Angeles and Sune abiding in New York. “It was very inspiring to get out of Denmark,” Foo tells me when I ask whether she felt the need to move away from her homeland in order for the band to succeed. “Not because there is anything wrong with Denmark but because it is always inspiring to be in a different context to what you are used to; to get a little perspective. Sometimes I wonder how I ended up in L.A. but that’s where my life took me and that’s where my relationship is and… I don’t know; that’s just where I ended up.” She pauses briefly, before adding: “And the U.S. is ultimately where rock ‘n’ roll comes from.”

Because The Raveonettes’ beguiling, fuzzy surf rock leans towards bygone days, and amidst talk of rock n roll’s origins, I wonder whether any contemporary artists are currently featuring on the stereo of their tour bus. “I love Primal Scream,” Foo enthuses when I ask her for a few of her present-day favourites. “They’ve been around for a long time and they are very innovative. I like Liars, and I like a band called Autolux from Los Angeles.”

Before we get the chance to speak at any length about The Raveonettes bringing their atmospheric, electrifying live experience to Melbourne, Foo has to bid me an apologetic farewell in order to go through border customs. “We’re not through yet. They’re pretty tough you know,” she sighs. Just before she signs off, she briefly talks of her excitement about heading to Australia for the second time and leaves me with her memories of the band’s previous tour of these shores. “It was exciting because it was the first time we were there and it’s always fun to play in front of a new audience that has been waiting for you to come. The weather was good, the wine was good the food was good.”

Does It Offend You, Yeah? - You Have No Idea What You’re Getting Yourself Into

DOES IT OFFEND YOU, YEAH?
You Have No Idea What You’re Getting Yourself Into
The scenesters with the worst name ever have been causing quite a buzz in their native England recently, meaning their debut album arrives to an equal amount of excitement and apprehension. Will this be yet another band that fails to live up to the hype that the British music press dispenses so cheaply?

After the instrumental electronica of opener Battle Royale starts things off pleasingly enough, the brilliantly hectic With a Heavy Heart (I Regret to Inform You) kicks in, sounding like Death From Above wrestling with Klaxons. Elsewhere, Attack of the 60 Foot Lesbian Octopus is two-minutes of pure surf-punk insanity. Yet stirring moments like these are counterbalanced by weaker efforts like Weird Science, which sounds like something Daft Punk threw away, and the vacuous Let’s Make Out. Meanwhile, the banging We Are Rock Stars is awesome but for the annoying vocoder vocals, which crop up all too often throughout the album.

Ultimately the band seems to be torn between dance and indie. Largely, the album offers chunky dance tracks reminiscent of Justice, yet tunes like Dawn of the Dead and Epic Last Song weirdly land closer to The Rakes or Bloc Party, making them incongruous with what surrounds them.

Although such dichotomy makes You Have No Idea… something of a hotchpotch, there are interesting and exciting moments here and the sheer energy on display suggests that, when the band inevitably tours these shores in the near future, seeing them live will be an absolute fucking riot.

Adam Green - Sixes and Sevens

ADAM GREEN
Sixes & Sevens

With his profile raised by the part Moldy Peaches’ music played in Juno, the fifth solo album from New York’s Adam Green is gaining more attention than his preceding outings, so it is particularly pleasing that Sixes & Sevens is a fine collection of songs.

Following the disappointment of his previous long-player, the aggressive Jacket Full of Danger, Green rediscovers his charm as he dips in and out of a host of differing styles. His tongue-in-cheek, obscure lyrics are delivered with that familiar baritone cabaret croon, most pleasingly on the swing of Morning After Midnight and the Leonard Cohen-esque Getting Led, which comes complete with female backing choir. Elsewhere he takes a stroll through soul and jazz, while Exp 1 revisits the stripped back anti-folk style of his debut. Similarly, a duet with girlfriend Loribeth Capella on Drowning Head First is reminiscent of the Moldy Peaches at their most tender.

The beautifully produced, 20-song album is all over in 48 minutes, meaning there isn’t much meat to the bones here, but then we have come to expect that from Green, whose tracks are always so succinct that it seems unnecessary for them to last more than three minutes.

Sixes & Sevens really doesn’t play like an album but rather a random journey through the musical genres of the 50s and 60s. However, while its overtly eclectic nature makes for a noticeably incoherent body of work, a few of the individual songs represent some of his finest output to date, making this a marvelous return to form.

Erin Marshall at The Empire Hotel

Sydney singer/songwriter Erin Marshall recently took up residency at The Empire Hotel. I went along to a couple of her shows:It’s been over a year since I first saw Erin Marshall perform. Back then, she was rough diamond with a voice to die for and a natural stage presence. Since that night at Ruby Rabbit, she has played plenty more solo shows (most notably, support slots for Angus and Julia Stone, for whom she also sung backing vocals on their album) and written a plethora of bold new songs which demonstrate her continuing growth as a songwriter and guitarist.

These songs were on display during impressive 45-minute sets at The Empire Hotel in a three-night stint spread over three weeks. Playing as part of a three-piece band (which included her brother on drums), Marshall was as jovially affable as ever as she ran through her eclectic new material. The current ace in her pack is new track Once Upon a Time, which plays out like the prettiest lullaby and is surely her best composition to date. Juxtapose the sheer delicacy of that with the deliciously riotous romp, Hard Case To Crack - which lands nicely between Feist and Nancy Sinatra - and you get a nice idea of the diversity of her work. At times it is foot-stomping fun, elsewhere it is ruminative and downbeat. Regardless, it is always intelligent and carefully crafted.In a scene where skinny-jeaned bands gaze with disinterest through their fringes while they purvey generic indie guff, Erin Marshall feels like a breath of fresh air on the Sydney circuit with her sweet acoustic melodies. One suspects that the venues will grow in size as Marshall continues to wow audiences with her honest, emotive storytelling and her jaw-dropping vocal. Surely it is only a matter of time before this songwriter hits the big time.

Global Young Leaders fundraising show

I attended the Global Young Leaders fundraising show at Sydney’s Annandale Hotel last Sunday:Bridezilla frontwoman Holiday Sidewinder is heading to America for the Global Young Leaders conference in June, so to raise funds she put on a show with a little help from her friends and family. First up were brother and sister duo Hunter Dienna, whose minimalist sound required just one guitar and the occasional accordion, yet was still dizzyingly atmospheric and gothic. Thomas' low-down growl juxtaposed nicely with Xanthe’s softer vocal, landing them not a million miles from the collaboration between Mark Lanigan and Isabel Campbell.

The ever-captivating Loene Carmen (below) was next up, and she was backed by a supergroup comprised of some familiar faces as she rattled though songs from her latest long-player, Rock n Roll Tears. “So you fucked it up,” she snarled in that amazing vocal at the start of Don’t Let Her Slip Away, which was indicative of the equally vitriolic and seductive nature of her barnstorming set.Even by the high standards they have set for themselves, Bridezilla, frankly, were magnificent. Oozing confidence and sass, they were watched by the largest crowd of the day. Holiday’s presence as frontwoman grows increasingly strong with each gig, while her fellow band members also looked like they were born to be on stage. In front of drummer Josh – who looked especially suave in his suit - Pia and Millie were assured and cool, while Daisy, always the firebomb to Holiday’s left, prowled atop the bar.

The Scare polished things of with a riotous display which had the fans at the front going nuts, as vocalist Kiss Reid - animated, mesmerising and a bit terrifying – expelled a throat-busting vocal. Having been joined for one song by the evening’s hostess, they brought proceedings to a close with Bats! Bats! Bats! which saw Kiss roam around the room and stagedive. No-one could accuse him of not giving it his all.

Holiday dashed onto stage at the end to thank everyone for coming. The fact that she did so amid chants of her name and requests for more songs suggests that the day was a success. Ten bucks well spent.

Supergrass - Diamond Hoo Ha

I reviewed the new Supergrass album last week, for Drum Media in Sydney:SUPERGRASS
Diamond Hoo Ha

When Supergrass released Road to Rouen back in 2005, a decade after they had burst onto the Britpop scene with the stunning I Should Coco, it seemed they had left their jaunty indie-pop roots behind them. However, if the brooding, psychedelic folk-pop of that recording showed a band growing old gracefully and moving on, then Diamond Hoo Ha sees them return to what they know best.

Named after the temporary touring project of frontman Gaz Coombes and drummer Danny Goffey while bassist Mick Quinn recuperated after sleepwalking through a first floor window, the album sees a smile returning to the reunited band’s face through a familiar brand of perky melodies with glam rock sensibilities.

Ok, so maybe this is merely the sound of a bunch of elder statesmen trying to recapture the vibrancy of their youth, but they certainly haven’t lost their knack of writing tunes so outrageously catchy that you’ll be humming them in your sleep. Big and brash in its production, the album opens with Coombes screaming “Bite me” in the chorus of the title track like a man who has rediscovered his mojo, while Rebel in You is the kind of joyously singalong tune that the band is renowned for. Elsewhere, Coombes’ vocal strangely wanders into Bob Dylan territory in Ghost of a Friend.

Supergrass simply don’t release bad records, and though Diamond Hoo Ha isn’t the best of their six so far, it’s a genuine grower with enough effervescence to suggest that, 13 years after their debut, there’s life in the old dogs yet.

Laura Marling interview

I recently interviewed English folk singer Laura Marling for Drum Media. Here it is:ENGLISH SINGER/SONGWRITER LAURA MARLING TELLS ROB TOWNSEND THAT SHE REALLY HAS NO INTEREST IN BECOMING THE NEXT BIG THING

“People are kind of patronising but that’s because they don’t know what to expect. It’s a minor annoyance but, you know, I am young and people expect young people to be idiots.”

Laura Marling is not an idiot. In fact, the wisdom, passion and integrity with which the articulate 18-year-old English singer/songwriter talks about music proves that she is as far from being an idiot as it is possible to be. “It’s almost patronising when people say: ‘You’re pretty mature’ because it’s like, well, what did you expect? I put my heart and soul into it. It’s not mature; it’s just what it is.”

The “it” that Marling refers to is Alas, I Cannot Swim, her beautiful debut long-player of lovingly-crafted folk songs. Growing increasingly despondent at being part of an mp3 generation that uses “music for wallpaper,” she wanted to make an album that actually sounded like an album rather than a bunch of random songs to put on your iPod Shuffle. “I grew up to really appreciate sound and the making of a good record and it just seems a shame that people have lost that passion.”

Marling has been making waves in the UK since Jamie T saw the then 16-year-old’s second ever gig and asked her to tour with him. “It was bloody exciting because I was touring in my school holidays,” she laughs. She has since supported Devendra Banhart and, with her other project Noah and The Whale [whose frontman Charlie Fink produced Alas, I Cannot Swim], Jeffrey Lewis. She also appeared on the standout track of the second Rakes album. “They found me on myspace, messaged me and an hour later I was in the studio.”While she is notably level-headed, the transition from being Laura Marling the girl from Reading to Laura Marling the person who appears on TV shows and has to do phone interviews with people on the other side of the world is still one that she finds most peculiar. “It’s incredibly weird. I don’t think it will ever stop feeling incredibly weird,” she admits. “You can’t help but feel that you’re losing some integrity but at the end of the day I want my music to be heard and I want to have a career.”

Indeed, Marling keeps it real to the degree that she no longer feels the need to wear make-up because, refreshingly in an age where style often rules substance, she says it doesn’t matter how she looks; she simply wants to create great art rather than achieve any level of fame. “I think success is what you make of it. If you don’t want to be a star then you’re not going to be a star. My idea of success is completely different to what people expect you to want.” Her ethos is unsurprising as, when we discuss her musical influences, she reels off a list of anti-folk musicians who don’t conform to the expectations of the modern-day music industry and care not for how many units they shift. “Bonnie Price Billy has always been a big part of my life. Jeffrey Lewis and Kimya Dawson are great. Diane Cluck means more to me than any of them though. What I love about her is the brutally honest lyrics, that amazing voice and the way of coming about a melody. I think anti-folk is quite an honest, endearing genre.”

Bearing in mind her disinterest in becoming The Next Big Thing, one wonders if Marling is ready for the possibility that she is going to sell a lot of records, considering the glowing reviews that her debut has received. “It’s not what I’m about and it’s not what I’ve ever intended to do,” she frowns. “In many ways it would be awesome because you’d probably make a lot of money and we all need money, but there is part of me that thinks anyone who sells a lot of records has been pushed. I would never want that and I would never want people to think that.” After a moment’s reflection, she adds: “I shouldn’t give a shit what people think but I just would never want that.”

When I suggest that selling records doesn’t necessarily have to go hand-in-hand with selling out, and that it is sometimes possible for an artist to be commercially successful while still retaining their integrity, citing Kimya Dawson’s recent success, Marling agrees. “I wouldn’t mind if it came about organically. Kimya Dawson hasn’t been pushed; she’s just in a great soundtrack. I think people are quite snobby about success. Even me saying that I don’t want that kind of success is quite a snobby thing to say. It’s such a vicious circle that it’d make my head explode if I kept thinking about it.”

KT Tunstall at the Enmore Theatre

Following my interview with KT Tunstall, I went to Sydney's Enmore to check out a live show:KT TUNSTALL
NEWTON FAULKNER
The Enmore Theatre, Enmore
19/03/08
For a support act, Englishman Newton Faulkner had a surprisingly firm grip on the audience’s attention. Fresh from a UK headline tour [where he was supported by Sydney’s own Angus and Julia Stone], the dreadlocked solo artist entertained a large crowd with his witty between-song banter and some accomplished acoustic guitar work. Though his own songs offered nothing especially groundbreaking or memorable, his cover of Massive Attack’s Teardrop was exquisite, while a cheeky version of 2 Unlimited’s No Limit and an impression of Kings Of Leon were fun. His set ended with a one-man acoustic version of Bohemian Rhapsody, which was equally impressive and ridiculous.

“How totally fantastic to be here,” KT Tunstall beamed before rattling through tracks from her two studio albums in a performance that brimmed with energy, as her foot-stomping, hip-swaying guitar action was supported by a six-piece band which included two female backing vocalists. Opening track Little Favours was indicative of the upbeat indie-pop that would follow and the pace was also occasionally slowed nicely by the likes of White Bird and Paper Aeroplane, which were gentle, acoustic and pretty. While the band’s sound was great, the highlight of the evening came when the Scot stood alone onstage and crafted her breakthrough single, Black Horse And The Cherry Tree, using a loop pedal. Starting by drumming a beat on her guitar, she then layered guitar parts, percussion and vocals to staggering effect, before being joined again by her band for country-pop tune, Hopeless.

Just like Newton Faulkner before her, Tunstall chatted jovially between songs. She taught the audience to body-pop and, inspired by a visit to the Botanical Gardens, dispensed facts about bats [“when bats take off, they always go left,” apparently], before ending the set with Saving My Face and singalong favourite, Suddenly I See.

She may have already achieved massive success in the UK and America, yet she was still visibly taken aback by the warm reaction her first Sydney audience offered as she returned for an encore. “We’re gonna come back,” she promised before, fittingly on a night punctuated by bizarre cover versions, belting out a rocky version of Walk Like An Egyptian.

Perhaps there is nothing especially unusual about witnessing an evening of quality music, yet tonight was undoubtedly made all the more enjoyable by the sheer unpretentiousness of its performers. Refreshingly good fun.