five things WITH
HUDSON WHITLOCK AND HENRY JENKINS FROM THE CACTUS CHANNEL
Growing Up Soul Jazz Records! 1. The now legendary Londonbased label put out New Orleans Funk Vol. 1 around ’99, we heard it when we were in early high school and it set the course. That and just playing heaps with each other – lunchtimes, after school, weekends, that made us play like we do now; we all know each other’s playing very well. In the early days we learnt from The Meters, Booker T. and The M.G.’s, Lyn Collins, Marva Whitney, Marvin Gaye, Eddie Bo, et cetera. Our perspective on music exploded a little when we start digging into the soul of the ’60s and ’70s and how it was being incorporated into the present.
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Inspirations Obviously the best part of a band is all the individual inspirations and how they collide to make something unique, but a few albums that we
“LIMITATIONS ARE EXTREMELY GOOD FOR CREATIVITY.”
A
t first glance, Toby Martin may appear to be just your run-of-themill academic: a scruffy, wild-haired intellectual with flecks of grey beginning to spread from his temples. He teaches music at the University of Huddersfield in the United Kingdom. But more likely, you know him as the frontman of the band Youth Group. Their cover of the Alphaville song ‘Forever Young’ featured on the soundtrack to popular TV show The O.C. in the mid2000s – and simultaneously, became the theme song to a generation. Now, Martin is due to release a new solo record, Songs From Northam Avenue. It’s an unusual but soulful folk album inspired by time spent in Bankstown in Sydney’s southwest. “Limitations are extremely good for creativity,” Martin says. “We were limited. We didn’t have a big budget for Songs From Northam Avenue and we decided to spend the money on a studio for three days. So we had to do it in that time. I think if we were making an album for radio it would be different, but since we didn’t have to worry about that, we did what we wanted to.” Martin wrote the songs as part of a collaboration with Urban Theatre Projects in 2013. The idea was for an artist to set up their equipment in the front yard of a Bankstown local’s house and devise a project. Martin’s project was music, and he developed an unusual but friendly relationship with the property owners. “I’m still friends with them. It’s impossible not to get to know them, but I think you’ve got to be careful not to intrude too much in that situation. You get to know people like a neighbour would. You have lots of conversations with them, but there is that line you don’t really cross. I was at two houses
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vibe are Menahan Street Band’s Make The Road By Walking, Badbadnotgood’s IV, Les Baxter’s Ritual Of The Savage and Madvillian’s Madvillainy. We also draw a lot of cosmic inspiration from comedians Tim Heidecker and Eric Wareheim. These days we’re more into Tom Hanks. Your Band Caccy Chan, seven 3. strong at the moment. Just
trying to make good tunes that are a bit funky, got a bit of soul and zane-brain enough for the nerds. The band has had a slow but important evolution over the past few years and we feel like we’re about to put out our most exciting stuff yet! The Music You Make 4. Just released a single
with Sam Cromack (Ball Park Music), and we’ll be dropping a six-track EP with him in April. Super keen for that one! We just want to
get as creative as we can and keep putting out wild shit in the hope that Busta Rhymes will tweet at us. Music, Right Here, Right Now 5. Bands that are inspiring us
at the moment are Whitney, The Frightnrs, BBNG and people like Anderson .Paak. The Melbourne scene right now is going gangbusters. There are always great things to hear, and it feels like everyone is working towards some really wild releases. Sydney is bumping too. Sampa The Great and Wallace keep things fresh. We always get lost in Sydney, shake our fists at Casino Mike, meet up with friends and they chaperone us around until we move onto Canberra or some shit. Sydney has some amazing bistros. Where: The Captain Cook Hotel When: Friday February 24
five things WITH
and a lot of their anecdotes and the things we talked about made it into the music.”
PETER BLACK
Martin has close ties to Bankstown himself. His grandfather originally emigrated to Australia in the 1940s, and he sees Bankstown as a vibrant multicultural hub where it’s impossible not to encounter people from vastly different cultures and places. “If you read the tabloids you might not get that opinion, but it’s such a nice, neighbourly place. I’ve always really liked writing about place, landscape and geography. I love the specificity of writing about real places and I think it makes songs sound real. I also like the contrast between very ordinary details, like the name of the street or the shop you go to, with some more internal emotional drama going on. That’s kind of what I was going for.” With the inspiration for Martin’s album being the people and places around Bankstown, a problem arose. Martin’s subjects were around him every day – they would inevitably recognise themselves in his songs, and so would their friends. “There’s a song called ‘Dreams In German’ which is based a little bit on one of my hosts,” Martin explains. “I did a little gig in a shop in Bankstown and he came along. When I played the song, his daughter was like, ‘Hey Dad, this song’s about you,’ and he was like, ‘Oh, is it? I didn’t even realise.’ “I think it’s funny. You worry about people hearing the music and not being happy about aspects of their lives being represented in song, but sometimes they go along with the whole song and don’t even think about it.” What: Songs From Northam Avenue out Friday February 17 through Ivy League
Growing Up The thing I remember 1. the most about growing
up is the ‘magic-ness’ of the radio. My parents had a Volkswagen Beetle and you didn’t have to wear seat belts so I’d stand in between them staring at the radio with all this stuff coming out of it. It was wild hearing ‘Here Comes The Sun’ by The Beatles; just incredible! Later on, I joined the Police Boys’ Club band playing the cornet. It was years before AC/DC and the Sex Pistols would change everything for me. Inspirations The three main reasons I wanted to play
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guitar and the SG in particular were Brian James of The Damned, Angus from AC/DC and Ed Kuepper from The Saints… wild, wild players! Your Band The Hard-Ons; we 3. met at school and started
playing our mix of punk, pop and early metal. Nunchukka Superfly; our more proggy and arty bent. And the solo stuff I do to explore pop in a stripped-back fashion. The Music You Make I’ve lost count of how 4. many albums I put out, and last year I released a new song every day of the year
(366 songs in total) via my Bandcamp page. Check it out at peterblacksolo.bandcamp. com. Music, Right Here, Right Now 5. Same as always, and
thankfully there will always be good music around. It’s just a pity these days you never get paid, so its very hard to pay for the upkeep, especially in Australia where right now we are a little artless. But music is wonderful and will always be wonderful. Where: Midnight Special When: Wednesday February 22
BRAG :: 700 :: 15:02:17 :: 15