July Issue | 2019
Brisbane | Free
S p l e n d o u r i n t h e g r a ss Meg Mac, A Swayze & Thelma Plum are set to stun Allday: cosmic inspiration meets just getting it done
Come fortify yourself with some serious comfort food
DJ Algorithm: the best of YouTube’s weird music recommendation AI
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MUSIC FESTIVAL PRESENTED BY
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Credits Publisher Handshake Media Pty Ltd Group Managing Editor Andrew Mast National Editor – Magazines Mark Neilsen Senior Editor Sam Wall
Invasion of the pod people.
Editors Daniel Cribb, Neil Griffiths
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his month it’s time to take a look at something new that’s happening with The Music. Handshake Media, the company that publishes this masthead, has launched a podcast network, which you can find housed at theMusic.com.au website. While the site has long been home to a variety of podcasts spread across the platform, they have now been relocated to the Podcast home page. They’re now much more easily navigated through and also all living together under the Handshake Media channels on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Our flagship series The Music Podcast has been rebranded as The Green Room With Neil Griffiths (hosted by our very own Head Of Online News & Content) and returned last month with two blockbuster episodes featuring Jimmy Barnes and Dean Lewis. We are also happy to announce that our former digital editor and triple j announcer Uppy Chatterjee has transformed her popular Two Truths And A Lie column into a regular podcast as well. Chatterjee has a way of disarming her guests and getting them to divulge their deepest secrets. If you want to hear Megan Washington spill on the rumour she had to remove from Wikipedia page or Allday confessing to wayward sins of his youth, Two Truths And A Lie is the show for you. Handshake has also picked up Matter Of Faction, hosted by Pricey & Browny, who discuss all things heavy music. And it’s not just the latest release and tour news but all those other music lover topics such as filming at gigs or the worthiness of musical collaborations (fun fact: they don’t always see eye to eye). And our WA-based digital editor Dan Cribb has teamed up with Troy Nababan to launch the That Sucks! series. Together they explore the bad side of things people love. Each episode introduces a guest who is encouraged to gripe about a topic that they normally love. Yep, there’s a lot of quality what-grinds-my-gears whining. Coming back soon will be the critically acclaimed The Lashes (well, it got a rave review in the Herald Sun). If you missed the first two, highly unhinged seasons, they are still available for streaming. There are also plans for more of our Producers series as well continuing to podcast from various musical events around the country. We plan to be back ‘casting from both Splendour In The Grass and BIGSOUND this year. With more series in pre-production, expect to hear us veer into some new directions, with immediate plans including series based around sport and booze (as separate topics, we won’t be encouraging you to mix the two). Hopefully these will be making their way to the channel before the end of 2019.
Assistant Editor/Social Media Co-Ordinator Jessica Dale Editorial Assistant Lauren Baxter Arts Editor Hannah Story Gig Guide Henry Gibson gigs@themusic.com.au Senior Contributors Steve Bell, Maxim Boon, Bryget Chrisfield, Cyclone, Jeff Jenkins Contributors Nic Addenbrooke, Emily Blackburn, Melissa Borg, Anthony Carew, Uppy Chatterjee, Roshan Clerke, Shaun Colnan, Brendan Crabb, Guy Davis, Joe Dolan, Joseph Earp, Chris Familton, Guido Farnell, Donald Finlayson, Liz Giuffre, Carley Hall, Tobias Handke, Tom Hawking, Mark Hebblewhite, Samuel Leighton Dore, Keira Leonard, Joel Lohman, Alannah Maher, Taylor Marshall, Anne Marie Peard, Michael Prebeg, Mick Radojkovic, Stephen A Russell, Rod Whitfield Senior Photographers Cole Bennetts, Kane Hibberd Photographers Rohan Anderson, Andrew Briscoe, Stephen Booth, Pete Dovgan, Simone Fisher, Lucinda Goodwin, Josh Groom, Clare Hawley, Bianca Holderness, Jay Hynes, Dave Kan, Hayden Nixon, Angela Padovan, Markus Ravik, Bobby Rein, Barry Shipplock, Terry Soo Advertising Leigh Treweek, Antony Attridge, Brad Edwards, Jacob Bourke sales@themusic.com.au Art Dept Felicity Case-Mejia print@themusic.com.au Admin & Accounts accounts@themusic.com.au Distro distro@themusic.com.au Subscriptions store.themusic.com.au Contact Us Mailing address PO Box 87 Surry Hills NSW 2010 Melbourne Ph: 03 9081 9600 26 Napoleon Street Collingwood Vic 3066 Sydney Ph: 02 9331 7077 Level 2, 230 Crown St Darlinghurst NSW 2010
Happy listening.
Brisbane Ph: 07 3252 9666 info@themusic.com.au www.theMusic.com.au
Andrew Mast Managing Editor
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CLUES: 1. ...... Australia announced a game-changing baggage allowance for musicians at BIGSOUND 2011 2. Brisbane-based songwriter Emerson ..... was awarded the Levi’s® Music Prize at last year’s BIGSOUND 3. Music legend and keynote speaker Paul ..... performed a surprise show at BIGSOUND 2018 4. Risqué signed this Melbourne future pop duo after seeing them at BIGSOUND: .... Kyss 5. You can save $100 on your BIGSOUND Purple Pass by booking before 31 ....
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Our contributors
This month Editor’s Letter We predict the major AIR Awards winners
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Emma Russack
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Album reviews
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Helen Smith Helen is IMPALA’s Executive Chair. One of her pet sayings is all artists are born equal. Originally from Scotland, now based in Brussels, Helen is very happy to live in another country
Guest editorial: Executive Chair Of Independent Music Companies Association IMPALA, Helen Smith
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Warpaint
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Pic: Tam Cader
Thelma Plum, A Swayze & Meg Mac talk Splendour In The Grass
Little Simz Spilling her heart out on record
that loves to make whisky (yes it’s true, Belgium is not just about beer and chocolate…).
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The best arts of the month
Film & TV reviews Booksmart and Lambs Of God
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36 Kane Hibberd Kane Hibberd is an average photographer at best. He’s been around so long that people
Adani’s construction Why it’s caused consternation and how the fight against it continues
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The Big Picture Defend, Conserve, Protect
Em Rusciano Harnessing the power of female rage
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P i c : K i i A re n
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VOIID
Mini Mansions Writing and recording in real time
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His internet presence is unremarkable and so is his taste in music, but people seem to enjoy having him around. Go figure.
Your Town Winter comfort food
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Bello Winter Music’s mentors
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This month’s local highlights The best of YouTube’s weird music recommendations
work in the music industry is based on pity.
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Robert Forster
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generally feel sorry for him so most of his
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Allday
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Queensland Music Festival’s Immersion series
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The end
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Stephen Amis Stephen Amis is a producer, director, writer, editor and two-time AACTA-nominated cinematographer. Cutting his teeth on childhood Super 8 epics, Stephen graduated from Swinburne Film & Television School and went on to make films including The BBQ, The 25th Reich, Virus and The Real Thing.
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We’ve seen their Endgame but Marvel’s far from finished. This time around your friendly neighbourhood Spider-Man is going abroad, but Nick Fury and a fractured multiverse aren’t on board with Peter Parker’s chill Eurotrip plans. Spider-Man: Far From Home is in cinemas 1 Jul.
Kaiit
Glow up Starting from 12 Jul, ascendant neosoul star Kaiit is heading on tour with her latest single Miss Shiney. The tour will stop in Melbourne, Sydney, Brisbane and Perth, with a quick detour for Splendour In The Grass.
Podcast of the month: The Green Room With Neil Griffiths The Music Podcast is back with a fresh new revamp... say hello to The Green Room With Neil Griffiths. From house calls with Jimmy Barnes to Dean Lewis’ wild 12 months, subscribe to get a peek behind the curtain with the world’s biggest artists.
Stranger Things
Stranger danger The kids are back and they’re all grown up in season three of synths’n’scares ‘80s homage, Stranger Things. It looks like there’s a new beastie to battle, besides hormones, as the Upside Down continues to hassle the town of Hawkins. Out on Netflix 4 Jul.
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Live music
Something To Believe In
The latest novel from the author of cult fave Pig City: From The Saints To Savage Garden, Andrew Stafford’s Something To Believe In is a must-read memoir detailing a life spent head over heels in love with music. Available from 2 Jul.
AIR Awards predictions
LANY. Pic: Emma n Mo
ntalvan
This 25 Jul Australia’s Independent Music Industry Record Labels Association will come together to celebrate the country’s independent artists. Here’s our tips for who will take what.
Best Artist Nominees
Courtney Barnett | Gurrumul | Julia Jacklin | Laura Jean | Methyl Ethel
Winner
After a barnstorming year from Barnett, there’s a strong chance Jen Cloher’s 2018 award will have some company back at Milk! Records HQ.
Best Album Or EP Nominees
Courtney Barnett – Tell Me How You Really Feel | Emma Louise – Lilac Everything Gurrumul – Djarimirri | Laura Jean –
Maliboogie LA alt-pop outfit LANY are back in Australia from 13 Jul with their second album Malibu Nights. Here just last March for a quick three-stop jaunt, this time the trio have shows in Brisbane, Sydney, Melbourne, Adelaide and Perth.
Devotion | Rolling Blackouts Coastal Fever – Hope Downs
Winner
Gurrumul’s deeply affecting final album Djarimirri has proven time and again that it’s impossible to ignore.
Best Single Nominees
AB Original – Blaccout | Courtney Barnett – Nameless, Faceless | G Flip – About You Laura Jean – Girls On The TV Mojo Juju – Native Tongue
Winner
Eliott
With Native Tongue, Mojo Juju sparked a conversation in a way few artists ever truly manage. It’s also just a killer track.
Breakthrough Artist Of The Year Nominees
Hip to the groove
Confidence Man | Didirri | Emily Wurramara | G Flip | Hatchie
After supporting Matt Corby and Dean Lewis earlier in the year, Eliott heads on her own east coast headline tour this month to celebrate her new single, Shaking My Hips. The run kicks off on 5 Jul in Queensland.
Winner G Flip came in hot with About You. Going from unknown to household name in a matter of months is the definition of ‘breakthrough’.
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Making sense of Europe’s copyright debate Ahead of her keynote at the Indie-Con Australia conference, Helen Smith – the Executive Chair of IMPALA, the Independent Music Companies Association, which represents indie labels and trade organisations – explains the impact changes to copyright legislation have had on the independent music sector.
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opyright reform to boost the digital music market — what’s next? Few could have missed hearing about the copyright debate in Europe. Amid cries of “upload filters”, “censorship machine”, “robocopyright” and other buzzwords, the move to bring copyright up to date came under heavy fire. The battle raged for nearly three years. The final directive was published in May. It’s an impressive result for the music sector in particular. The legislation marks a turning point for copyright rules in Europe and beyond. All eyes are now on EU member states as they start implementing the directive into their national laws. Of course, this will bring its own share of challenges. We know the lengths some parties will go to try and hold on to the status quo. So what was all the fuss about? It started when the EU decided it was time to clarify what the courts had already been saying about platforms. They provide access to music and other copyright material uploaded by citizens, so they need a licence and can’t rely on safe harbour legislation. As you can imagine, this wasn’t music to everyone’s ears. Citizens and decisionmakers had to endure an unprecedented level of manipulation, disinformation and intimidation. There is only one answer to that. Greater controls and sanctions have already been called for in Europe and elsewhere. Certain players will regret showing just how far they were prepared to go to influence public opinion and democratic processes. But back to the new copyright rules. For the first time anywhere in the world, we have legislation clearly stating that platforms such as YouTube and Facebook are covered by copyright. At the same time, the new regime is nuanced. Non-profit platforms, online encyclopaedia, open source software platforms and online marketplaces are excluded. Wikipedia, for example, will still be there to provide you with a full analysis of Games Of Thrones’ most epic battles when nostalgia strikes, as we move further away from winter (or summer, depending what hemisphere you are in...) Small start-ups benefit from a lighter regime and in certain circumstances platforms can limit liability if they pass the right tests and comply with strict stay-down requirements. The final directive was about balancing the interests of all stakeholders. Citizens are at the core of the new rules and that’s the right approach. The directive ensures people can continue to make and share memes and gifs, listen to their favourite artists and of course watch videos online. Tutorials, movie reviews, music clips — they’ll all still be there once the directive is implemented. The directive also makes it very clear that rules on privacy and personal data will be respected, and that general monitoring is prohibited. This won’t change. So what does change? Responsibility will be transferred from citizens to the platform as licences now cover the user’s uploads. What’s also new is the redress mechanism for citizens to make sure that videos they uploaded are not taken down unreasonably.
At the centre of the debate was what became known as the “value gap”. That’s the difference between the economic value produced by a creative work for a platform when it’s uploaded, compared to the money that trickles back to its creator. The debate in Europe wasn’t just about money of course. It is equally important to have a say in how your music is used online, and the new rules do that. Artists are direct winners. By tackling the value gap, the directive will ensure that revenues increase. Authors and performers will also benefit from new rules to improve their relationship with their contractual partners through new reporting requirements and a contract adjustment mechanism, among other provisions. IMPALA supported this, in line with the commitments the independent sector already made nearly five years ago with the WIN digital deals declaration. One of the directive’s leitmotifs is levelling the playing field and that extends to music services. Competition between user-generated content platforms and services like Spotify and Deezer will be fairer as a result of the new rules. And that’s good for everyone — fans, artists, labels, publishers, platforms. No more claims about safe harbour, no more “take it or leave it” deals, more accountability — that’s how to have an ecosystem that’s sustainable for all. The sale of UMG is also a key issue here. Google, Tencent and others have been talked about as potential suitors. That level of vertical integration would pose considerable risks for competitors and citizens. The good news is that we can’t imagine any regulator in Europe or Australia or elsewhere approving such a move. It’s the last thing we need if we want to maximise the boost for the digital market that the copyright directive promises. The new copyright regime in Europe is an opportunity to grow the digital market in a way that’s fair and sustainable. Of course this isn’t just an issue in Europe. Other countries are also looking into the same questions. Wherever you are, the storyboard for the independents remains the same. We have embraced the user-generated economy for 20 years and it’s time for the legal framework to catch up with the market. As legislators rose to the challenge in Europe, IMPALA’s sister organisations like AIR and others spread the word about how the eyes of the world were on the EU. This was an important factor that encouraged decision-makers to see it through. Imagine how powerful we are when we speak with one voice and learn from everyone’s experiences. This is why events like Indie-Con Australia are so important, and we look forward to continuing the debate in Adelaide, 25 & 26 Jul. This is ultimately about boosting the digital market and working together with all music services who foster unique relationships between fans and artists. Music lovers in Australia and across the globe, watch this space.
The new copyright regime in Europe is an opportunity to grow the digital market in a way that’s fair and sustainable. Of course this isn’t just an issue in Europe. Other countries are also looking into the same questions.
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Indie-Con is on 25 & 26 Jul at Lot Fourteen, Adelaide.
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the field
Stories from
Bryget Chrisfield hears from Splendour In The Grass rising stars Meg Mac, Thelma Plum and Andrew Swayze (of A Swayze & The Ghosts) about chance backstage meetings that turned into collabs and more. Cover and feature photos by Kane Hibberd.
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uring set-up for The Music’s Splendour In The Grass cover shoot at photographer supreme Kane Hibberd’s Cremorne studio, Andrew Swayze wanders out and settles into a booth in the office next door for this interview. “I’m pretty hungover, to be honest,” he confesses. He’s scrubbed up alright, though. “Have I? Good,” he chuckles. “Yeah, a bit of eye make-up and a shower can do wonders.” The band he fronts, A Swayze & The Ghosts, played their first-ever Corner Hotel show last night supporting West Thebarton (“Slayed it, it was a sick show”) so obviously post-show celebrations were in order. Speaking of firsts, this will be A Swayze & The Ghosts’ debut Splendour In The Grass performance and Swayze enthuses, “It was definitely part of our goals that we sorta defined a few years ago... When we found out, we were pretty elated to be able to tick that off — I think it’s a bit of a rite of passage for up-and-coming Australian bands.” “This’ll be my third Splendour,” another of our Splendour cover stars, Meg Mac, wearing her trademark wide-brimmed hat, reveals. “My first Splendour was just after my first EP [MegMac] had come out and I’d never seen that many people in my life! I didn’t look out in the audience before I went on and I was like, ‘Woah!’ She is all set to grace the GW McLennan stage in 2019 and Mac explains, “I’ve played the same stage each time, but the time slots have changed.” Her increasing popularity sees Mac edging closer to headliner status with each passing Splendour appearance. “I remember last time, I played towards the end of the night so I was too nervous to watch anything before and then everything was kinda over by the time I ended up getting backstage, and I didn’t get to watch anything.” She usually likes to “hop around” the festival site wearing her artist lanyard, though: “It’s fun, ‘cause you can kind of see things from side of stage and you can get to see a lot more and get a different perspective.” Mac has never attended Splendour In The Grass as punter, but Swayze certainly has. “It was wild,” he recalls. “I’ve never been to a festival with that many people [in attendance] before and it took me, like, a day, I reckon, just to get my head in it, the seas of people moving between stages and things like that, but, yeah! It was great. I had a sick time. I loved it. I saw The Cure play and, like, I’d always wanted to see The Cure.” When Swayze graced Splendour with his presence in 2016, he “stayed at a friend’s aunty’s place and caught the shuttle in and out”. Thelma Plum, who rounds out our Splendour cover shoot trio, recounts the “most epic” camping experience occurred after a “really last minute” decision to attend the festival. “The Skaters boys, from New York, were playing and I’d met them the night before in Melbourne, and they were like, ‘We’ll give you tickets to Splendour if you come.’ And I was like, ‘Great!’ But we hadn’t organised any accommodation so me and my friend — we had a friend there and the three of us stayed in the back of his ute, and it had no cover over it and I remember just being so cold [laughs]. Yep, we did get rained on and it was pretty wild,
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but, yeah! It was pretty fun — we had a really good time that year.” Having grown up in nearby Brisbane, Plum is a bit of a Splendour regular and admits, “It’s pretty exciting being on the bill, that’s for sure. For years I’ve wanted to play at Splendour, but I guess now’s just the right time. I’m gonna release my album [Better In Blak] only a couple of days before Splendour, which is really exciting and so I was like, ‘Thank you very much!’” The title track from Plum’s forthcoming debut album was released in April and the Gamilaraay woman acknowledges she noticed this song in particular, and its accompanying music video, “resonated with people”. “I had people messaging me and being like, ‘We saw your film clip on Channel [V] and MTV and stuff,’ which is awesome, ‘cause that’s something that I don’t think has happened to me that often.” Of the video, Plum tells, “I had a lot of my friends in it who are Aboriginal women, and my two sisters were in it, and I feel like that was quite special.”
Splendour in the grass
Even though Mac’s second album, Hope, only dropped last month, her postSplendour plans include “recording and writing the next record”: “I got back from LA yesterday, so I’m still a bit wired,” she shares. “I had a break so I just went over and I was meeting producers, doing some sessions and working with people.” It was actually at Falls Festival 2015/2016 that Mac met Leon Bridges and his band, which inspired her to make her 2017 debut Low Blows in Fort Worth with the very same people with whom Bridges worked on 2015’s Coming Home: “It only lined up in Marion Bay, in Tasmania, that he was on the same day as me and we were sort of, like, backstage in the same area. They watched my set and then, yeah! It just went from there.” When asked whether she’s ever met an artist backstage at a festival that she’s gone on to collaborate with, Plum shares, “One of my really beautiful friends, Emily Wurrumara — whenever we’re in the same city she gets up and sings with me in my set — I met her at Woodford [Folk] Festival, back-
Phony Ppl
What kind of setlist can we expect from you at Sp lendour and your sideshow? “Bringing the heat and nothing less at all of our performances!” — Elbee Thrie
Phony Ppl’s sideshows are from 23 Jul
stage. We had our tents next to each other and that’s kind of how we met and started singing together.” Splendour In The Grass tends to lure its fair share of surprise guests to the stage — hello, Client Liaison featuring Tina Arena (2017) and DZ Deathrays featuring Murray Cook aka the OG Red Wiggle (2018) — and Plum muses, “Maybe this year there’ll be some good ones. Maybe I’ll have a few people come up...” On whether she’s ever done a guest spot during someone else’s set, Plum enthuses, “Yep, I sure have; I love doing it... Mostly just with my friends and if we’re on the same bill, or if we’re in the same city at that time.” When asked whether any particularly memorable performances spring to mind, she offers, “I guess Briggs is always a good one. I get up quite often with him and with AB Original ‘cause we have a song together [I C U].” After discovering she’s never invited a guest artist to share the stage during one of her previous Splendour appearances, we suggest now is the time for Mac to start
considering the possibilities. “Maybe,” she hesitates, “maybe I should plan something special.” “I don’t think we know enough big, famous people to be able to pull that kinda shit off, you know?” Swayze laments. “Maybe we’ll bring out-who would I bring on? Ah, I dunno. A hologram of Tupac?” A Swayze & The Ghosts are no strangers to sharing a stage, though, and Swayze reckons his band has become a bit of a magnet for stage invaders. “I never really invite anyone, they just get up and do stuff — pick up the tambourine or whatever — which is ok,” he says. “I mean, it’s fun as long as they don’t get in the way. Henny [Hendrick Wipprecht], our guitarist, he’s averse to it — if you get in his space he’ll just hit you with his guitar, like, me included! We’ve gotta tape up all our pedals; every lead that we have [has] gotta have tape around it, ‘cause I just kick stuff out, you know? And Henny will just whack me with the guitar. So if it’s some random person, like, they’re putting their lives at risk by getting on stage with Henny on the stage, I think.”
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After playing a series of club shows all around the globe, Swayze says he’s definitely looking forward to performing on a bigger stage at Splendour In The Grass. as well. “For someone like myself who’s fairly uncoordinated but likes to move around a lot, it’s good to have some space. I fully slid off stage the other night,” he laughs. “It was the first song and seriously — these shoes, right? They’ve got no grip and I just slid off, fell off the end.” Did he somehow manage to turn his stack into a crowdsurf? “No, there was nothing cool about it, it was just lame, hahaha. It just sucked.” Sounds pretty punk-rock, though. “Yeah, that’s the good thing about branding yourself as a punk band is you can just get away with anything. It’s good. Handy.”
Splendour In The Grass is on from 19 Jul at North Byron Parklands.
Splendour in the grass
Will you get much time in Australia beyond Splendour and your sideshows? “Yes! We’ll have a few days off and we are desperately hoping to hold a koala and visit the Bondi Beach Icebergs pool!” — Eva Hendricks
Charly Bliss’ sideshows are from 19 Jul
C h a r ly B l i s s
Check The Guide on theMusic.com.au for more details.
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tella Mozgawa, the Sydney-born, LAbased drummer for indie-rock band Warpaint, recalls going to Splendour In The Grass when she was younger. She also vividly remembers her band’s first set at the muddy winter festival, back in 2011 — the headliners were Coldplay and Kanye West — when the venue temporarily shifted from the NSW coastal town of Byron Bay to Woodford in Queensland, about an hour out of Brisbane. “I was hyping up Byron Bay to my bandmates,” Mozgawa begins, referring to Warpaint guitarists Emily Kokal and Theresa Wayman and bassist Jenny Lee Lindberg. “It’s the most magical place, and we’ve been there a couple of times as a band just to have a holiday. So I just kept talking it up and then when we got there it wasn’t terrible or anything, it just wasn’t a classic Byron Bay experience. “I was wearing a blue sweatshirt with horses on it, that’s what I remember. I did a really silly photoshoot with Jen [Lee Lindberg] — looking back at those photos I always regret it.” Warpaint finished off a tour supporting their friends MGMT in May, and return to Australia this July with a string of dates in support of Foals: “We’ve been friends with those guys for a long time,” Mozgawa says, adding that the two bands met on the touring Laneway line-up, also in 2011. “We’ve seen them grow into this massive, massive band, and that’s just really exciting. I’m really proud of them,” Mozgawa gushes. She won’t be pressed on any potential guest appearances over their run of shows — whether Warpaint in Foals’ set, or Foals frontman Yannis Philippakis in theirs. “I wouldn’t be surprised if something fun happens that we figure out when we get together.” Last year, the band opened for One Direction’s Harry Styles for his world tour dates in Asia. Usually, Mozgawa says, Warpaint’s tour offers make sense: “This one was one of the first to be quite surprising. Then we just decided, why not, why wouldn’t we do that?”
Styles’ drummer, Sarah Jones, of Hot Chip and NYPC (formerly New Young Pony Club), is a friend of Mozgawa’s, and Warpaint found they had plenty of mutual friends with Styles’ touring band. “It just actually really felt like another tour with friends, except for the fact that this person is the biggest pop superstar in the world.” Still, Mozgawa does note that Styles’ fans are obsessive compared to Warpaint’s — but it’s the kind of weighty devotion to an artist a young person feels when they’ve first found something they really connect to. She describes people waiting at hotels when they’d return after a show. “Somehow they found out where he was staying and somehow found out when the band was leaving the airport,” Mozgawa explains. But in terms of demographics, the differences between a typical Warpaint fan and the audiences at Styles’ shows didn’t “feel crazy different”: “Music lovers are music lovers wherever you go. It was a pretty interesting experience for us. It was really exciting. The reception that we got was really warm and lovely.” This year, the focus for Warpaint is recording their fourth studio album — their first since 2016’s Heads Up. When The Music speaks to Mozgawa, it’s their first week solidly working on it: “We’ve done a couple of songs already and we’ve got a lot of ideas floating around.” Not touring — “just being domestic and living a different kind of life” — is a form of self-care for Mozgawa. The months earlier this year before the tour with MGMT were “the longest that [she] hadn’t toured personally in 12 years”. “I just realised that I really, really like my life as a non-touring musician and as just a human, living day to day. Being in the same city every day, or being where you have chosen to be every day, is a true holiday for me. “I’ve always loved touring and I enjoy getting better at it, but I think as you get older you have to really be vigilant about taking care of yourself and remembering why it is that you do this thing. It’s not band camp all the time. It is a job and you’ve gotta take it seriously and have fun while you’re doing it.” So what does come to mind when Mozgawa needs to clarify why it is she does this whole working musician thing? “I was obsessed with music — I still am obsessed with music. It’s a complete disease that I’ve had since I was really quite young. I’m just always not even trying. I just am thankfully still excited to play music.” Warpaint tour from 15 Jul.
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Stella Mozgawa of California’s Warpaint talks to Hannah Story about getting to play gigs with friends, like MGMT and Foals, as well as with one of the biggest pop stars in the world, Harry Styles.
Little Simz aka Simbiatu Ajikawo talks to Cyclone about being more personal than ever on her third, breakout album, GREY Area.
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he UK rapper, musician and innovator Little Simz (aka Simbiatu “Simbi” Ajikawo) is on a roll. In 2019, she has unveiled her most high profile album, GREY Area, and hit Coachella for the first time. Now she’s destined for Splendour In The Grass. “I’ll be coming out with my band, which will be fun,” Ajikawo says, from the road stateside. “I haven’t played in Australia with my band yet. All the times I’ve been out there, it’s just been me and my DJ. So I’m really excited to come out with my show as it is now
Check The Guide on theMusic.com.au for more details.
When Bryget Chrisfield sits down with Allday (aka Tomas Gaynor), they discuss the rapper’s ongoing search for “cosmic inspiration”, the prophetic nature of some lyrics and his Guns N’ Roses Appetite For Destruction club.
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fter we bags a couple of stools facing the side window of a cafe in the heart of Melbourne’s CBD, Tomas Gaynor (Allday on festival line-ups) orders a green juice. The Adelaide rapper is based in LA “at the moment” and enthuses, “I’ll be driving through the canyon [Hollywood neighbourhood Laurel Canyon] and be like, ‘Oh, this is right where Joni Mitchell used to live.’” Still, he admits he would have preferred to call the City Of Angels home circa 1971: “I’m thinking of, like, Joni Mitchell and Crosby, Stills & Nash — that’s the sort of stuff I like, so...” What about the height of the ‘80s Sunset Strip hair-metal scene? “I was living right in Hollywood when I first moved there,” Allday reveals. “I was a bit into that [music] growing up as well, my friends and I have a Guns N’ Roses Appetite For Destruction club — well, just three of us — and we make sure we meet up once a year and listen to [the album] in full, and usually in a car just ‘cause it was our thing.”
Starry Night Over The Phone (ONETWO) is out this month. Allday tours from 20 Jul.
As such, Allday was stoked to spot Rock N’ Roll Ralphs on Sunset: “They’ve got it printed on the doors... ‘cause that’s where they all used to hang in the hair-metal days and, like, meet up before they’d go to the clubs. I was just like, [snaps his fingers and points] ‘Rock & Roll Ralphs.’” Allday then shares “the main reason” he decided to relocate stateside: “I wanted to learn how to write quicker... They just go in the studio and just make songs and they don’t care if it’s good or bad [in LA], so I wanted to, like, get a dash of that and try to combine it with the cosmic inspiration I’m always searching for.” We discuss prolific Brill Building-era songwriting teams such as Carole King/Gerry Goffin, and Allday offers, “It’s that’s old adage, ‘Inspiration exists, but it has to find you working.’” He recently watched Rocketman with his mum and we marvel at the depiction of Elton John’s speedy songwriting process throughout the film. “I mean, sometimes it’s almost like that,” Allday allows. “Sometimes that first idea is ‘it’ — an amazing feeling. Maybe it is like that for Elton John? “I think hit songs — not that I’ve had a hit song, but the thing with hit songs is you feel like you’ve heard it somewhere before; it’s like an instinct. So usually if my brother says to me, ‘I dunno, I feel like I’ve heard this one before.’ I go, ‘Oh, this might be a good one!’”
Little Simz tours from 18 Jul.
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So does Allday then Shazam the melody to make sure he hasn’t accidentally plagiarised a famous tune? “I drive myself pretty crazy with that,” he confesses. “I’ve, like, deleted a lotta things that I’ve stolen from other people. I accidentally did a Midnight Oil melody on a song and I was like, ‘This is fantastic! I’ve written a great chorus!’ and then it was just like one of the big Midnight Oil songs.” After an advance listen to Allday’s forthcoming album, this scribe gets the sense that his past relationships may have suffered while he’s “been busy blowing up”. “I haven’t been very good at keeping relationships so far in my life,” he admits without hesitation, “but I’ve been very good at keeping friendships. “The album ended up being more written when I was in a relationship, with lots of negative stuff about the relationship ending. And sometimes I found that you end up writing about stuff that hasn’t happened yet, that you haven’t really accepted is about to happen, in your conscious mind. And then when you look back you’re like, ‘Oh, I was just writing about everything that is about to unfold...’ But the lyrics are really what’s embedded in your mind.”
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and let you guys see what we’ve been doing around the world with it.” Live, she’s favouring GREY Area material, because “the support on it has been so crazy and every song is just so performable — every song is really fun to perform.” The North Londoner launched her career in the performing arts. In 2010, Ajikawo starred in the BBC’s kids fantasy show Spirit Warriors. But she then dedicated herself to music, studying production at college and circulating mixtapes and EPs. Ajikawo premiered officially with 2015’s cerebral album A Curious Tale Of Trials + Persons, which housed the gothic Dead Body. Next came the trippy narrative of Stillness In Wonderland, its single Poison Ivy featuring spiky guitar (which Ajikawo strummed on 2017’s Australian tour). Ajikawo ushered a bold experimentation into grime, even as she transcended it. She also challenged hip hop’s gender inequality, declaring herself a “King”. Resolutely independent, Ajikawo received a co-sign from Kendrick Lamar. Still, it’s only with her third outing, GREY Area, that she’s been embraced by wider audiences. Ajikawo cut GREY Area primarily with producer Alex “Inflo” Baranowski, who, on the side, has composed things like the score to the Nureyev documentary. And the music is expansive, spanning electro (Offence, the lead single) and groovy neo-soul. Ajikawo recognises the LP as a watershed. “I definitely feel the change this time around. I think just maybe peeling back more layers and being a bit more direct with what I’m saying, conceptwise, and the production as well — this sound where we chose to go musically with the record — just opened it up and connected with more people in a way that I could only have hoped for.” The response has been “very overwhelming”, she admits, “but good nonetheless”. Indeed, GREY Area is more immediate, and less conceptual, Ajikawo revealing her inner life: the anxieties and frustrations. She simply needed to “vent”. “I didn’t go in the studio with the mentality of, ‘I wanna make a #1 record,’ or, ‘I wanna make a smash hit.’ It wasn’t that at all. It was, ‘I’m just going in the studio to spill my heart,’ kinda thing. I don’t have to pour my heart out every album I do, but I think, at this time in my life, I just had some things I wanted to address.” The affecting closer, Flowers, a duet with London folkie Michael Kiwanuka, is especially sublime. Ajikawo was chuffed that he was already a fan. Ajikawo has other unusual features in her discography. Early, she collaborated with Raleigh Ritchie — who, as the actor Jacob Anderson, is famous for portraying Grey Worm in Game Of Thrones — on his hip hop banger Cuckoo. Ajikawo was familiar with Anderson from Noel Clarke’s film AdULTHOOD. She then discovered his music. “I thought he was sick.” The pair were introduced by their managers. “Raleigh’s really cool. He’s obviously flying right now — he’s doing amazing. So it’s good to see your peers doing great.” More recently, Ajikawo worked with Damon Albarn’s virtual band Gorillaz, blessing their song Garage Palace and joining them on tour. And, while describing Gorillaz as “a very big world to be in”, Ajikawo commends Albarn for giving guest artists space. Albarn reassured her, “We want you as you,” she recalls. “That was really, really helpful. It took the pressure off loads.” Ajikawo is re-establishing a presence in television. GREY Area’s Boss was synced for HBO’s acclaimed Insecure. But she’s likewise auditioned for acting roles. Ajikawo will appear in the cult crime drama Top Boy, which — starring the credible Ashley Walters, onetime So Solid Crew MC, and Kane “Kano” Robinson — was saved by Drake and Netflix when it was canned by Channel 4 in 2014. “I guess my character’s like the love interest of Ashley’s character, [the hustler] Dushane,” she teases. “So, yeah, a lot of my time on set was with Ashley.”
Will you get much time in Australia beyond Splendour and your sideshows? “I’m not sure how much time I’ll have but, if I have time, I do really want to experience Melbourne and Sydney in between shows. I’ve been wanting to go all my life so I’m super stoked.” — Tim McEwan
The Midnight’s sideshows are from 17 Jul
Adani has officially begun construction: what now?
Adani has officially begun construction of its controversial Carmichael coal mine. Maxim Boon takes a step back to ask what Adani is, why the mine has caused such outrage and what is now being done in the fight to stop it. Illustration by Felicity Case-Mejia.
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ollywood has long toyed with the notion of a global apocalypse, awesomely captured in disaster-porn blockbusters full of earthquakes and tidal waves and volcanoes. And in those epic cinematic struggles, as humankind faces the bleakest of odds, the solution to the calamity is often doable by a small band of intrepid heroes, who pit their very lives against extraordinary dangers to pluck civilisation from the jaws of doom. But as it turns out, Hollywood is full of shit, at least when it comes to saving the planet. Instead of a thrilling, action-packed adventure starring a buff AF leading man, the reality of the climate crisis is a more gruelling and frankly insurmountable global challenge. Several major ecological nightmares are in the process of converging, as a perfect storm of modern life’s demands — gigawatts of power, an inexhaustible abundance of food, and a culture of constant waste — are finding form at terrifying speed. Global warming driven by greenhouse gas emissions is the undisputed poster boy
for climate change, but plastic is hot on its heels as one of the surprise ecological bogeymen to emerge from this intersection of environmental horror. A study by US scientists in 2017 found that in the past 70 years alone, more than 8.3 billion metric tonnes of plastic has been created, and of that colossal volume, only 30% remains in practical use today, with just 9% having been recycled. The rest — 6.3 billion metric tonnes — has been dumped into the environment; such a gigantic amount that the geological record marking the Anthropocene period (the one where humans took over the world) will be saturated with the stuff. But it’s not just planet-wide issues that deserve our ire. There are plenty of local concerns that are just as dangerous. In Australia, one in particular has become a lightning rod for eco-activism, but thanks to another of mankind’s toxic inventions, namely the social media hashtag, the enigmatic #StopAdani slogan may have left you scratching your head. So here, dear reader, is everything you need to know about Australia’s homegrown climate threat.
So, what is Adani?
Simply put, it’s the Adani Group’s proposed Carmichael mine in Northern Queensland poised to excavate a massive coal reserve, which was granted the go-ahead by the Government in June. It’s been estimated that the burning of said coal would release 4.6 billion tonnes of CO2 into the atmosphere, but it’s not just the gas release that has people concerned. Mining activity has been linked to the ongoing decline of the Great Barrier Reef, and the proposed mine would also irreparably destroy sacred and ancestral grounds of First Nations Australians. Between the environmental and cultural costs implicated, the Carmichael mine has become a piping-hot political potato.
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Numerous polls have shown that the majority of Australians oppose the mine. But the creation of the mine — which would be one of the biggest ever in Australia — will generate more than “10,000 jobs”, significantly bolstering the Queensland economy (Adani’s own consultant debunked that number in court, stating that the mine would only create around 1,464 ongoing jobs. Pro-Adani Senator Bridget McKenzie went as low as 100). At the Federal Election in May, which turned out to be firmly hinged on the outcome of the Queensland ballot, the pros and cons of the Carmichael mine and the opposing Adani stances of the Labor and Liberal parties (Labor mixed, Liberal very much for) proved pivotal in the eventual outcome.
Australia has a bunch of mines. Why are people so cheesed off with this one?
A combination of factors are in play, but they all come under the umbrella issue of climate change. The coal Adani currently has its eyes on is not the only reserve in the Galilee Basin, so whatever legal and commercial precedents are set by the opening of the Carmichael mine will likely pave the way for future mining, adding to the destruction of the local environment while pumping billions more tonnes of CO2 into the atmosphere in the long run. The Climate Council, a peak body representing a collective of Australia’s top climate scientists, say the Liberal Government ignored its findings into the environmental damage the mine would cause, even going as far as to misrepresent approvals and recommendations that were allegedly made to the Adani Group. “Prime Minister Scott Morrison and [former] Environment Minister Melissa Price have repeatedly ignored experts on climate change,” Amanda McKenzie from the Climate Council said. “The
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science is crystal clear: we cannot open new coal mines if we are serious about tackling climate change and protecting the Great Barrier Reef. Burning coal drives climate change and Australians are already living with the impact of this. We just endured the ‘Angriest Summer’ with temperatures nudging 50 degrees and bushfires ravaging rainforests. Adani has the potential to be a carbon bomb. It’s time the Federal Government started listening to the scientific experts.”
What’s being done about the situation?
Despite the green light having been given to Adani with construction officially underway, the fight continues on multiple fronts. A land use agreement that would allow the Queensland Government to disregard the native title rights of the Wangan and Jagalingou people, on whose land the mine is set to be dug, was upheld last year. However, the Family Council have said they will be fighting the ruling, and that they are prepared to take the matter to the Human Rights courts in The Hague if necessary. A wave of youth activism has been building in intensity over the past year, in no small part due to the #SchoolStrikeForClimate movement spearheaded by 16-yearold firebrand Greta Thunberg. One group Down Under is the Australian Youth Climate Coalition (AYCC). Their strategy has been to flood MPs with demands for action, demanding accountability of political representatives at any public forum. Thunberg’s pioneering face-to-face approach is inspiring a generation of engaged youth to shrug off the ethos of inert armchair activism that has been prevalent in recent years. The result has been a crescendo of passionate, politically informed voices, and today’s schoolage activists will be tomorrow’s leaders, so while the short term may look grim, the future feels a little brighter.
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obert Forster’s newly minted seventh album Inferno brings things almost full circle to the early days of his solo career, after celebrated outfit The Go-Betweens, which he co-founded in Brisbane in the late ‘70s, Described recently by UK magazine disbanded in 1989. After six revered albums Uncut as the “greatest living Forster had retired to Bavaria Australian” amid the release of to lick his wounds alongside his new solo album Inferno, the his future wife, so when time came for his inevitable debut irrepressible Robert Forster tells solo statement it made sense conduct those recording Steve Bell that he’s surprised to still to sessions close by in Berlin. be writing songs at all. To produce the project he enlisted fellow Aussie Mick Harvey — whose then-current band Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds were at that staged based in the German capital — and banged out the ensuing Danger In The Past in a quick 12-day burst, pulling together a band comprising a couple Bad Seeds, and assisted in the studio by another Australian expat, young engineer Victor Van Vugt. Now, not quite three decades later, Forster has returned to Berlin to reunite with Van Vugt — these days an in-demand producer with his own studio in the German capital — again putting together a new band for the occasion and wasting no time bashing the album into perfectly refined shape. But while Inferno — a concise and focused batch of songs showcasing Forster’s unique, literary take on rock’n’roll — was recorded in Berlin, its songs have their genesis in Brisbane where they were stockpiled in the years following his previous solo effort, 2015’s Songs To Play. “A few of them were started when I’d been travelling, but they were all essentially done here [in Brisbane],” the singer explains. “Which is one of the reasons that I also wanted to travel away from Brisbane to make the record, because I was very, very happy with my last album that I did here in Brisbane — I recorded it up at Mount Nebo with Jamie Trevaskis and I was enormously happy with that — but I’d written all of those songs here and I’d written [2016 autobiography] Grant & I here, and I just felt that I wanted to do something outside of Brisbane. I just wanted to take it out of the city, which is what I did. “[Choosing Berlin] was purely because of Victor. He’s been there at his studio for about four years, before that he was in New York for about 15 years or something, and I hadn’t seen him for a long time. “We’d sort of stayed vaguely in contact, and then a German edition of my book came out and I was in Berlin at a launch for it in a bookshop and Victor turned up! So it was lovely to see him, and that was the start of it all really.” During the creative phase Forster wasn’t writing with a specific album in mind, rather just seeing where the individual songs would take him. “That’s generally the way that I go,” he admits. “I don’t write quickly enough in a way — I’m grabbing, I’m not one of those songwriters who goes ‘I’ve got an album coming up, I’m going to go away somewhere for two months and write 20 songs.’ I don’t know how people do that — some people do it and are good, but I couldn’t do that. Those songs tend to have a real sort of ‘one batch’ type of feeling to them, where I write one or two or perhaps three songs a year, and I’ve done that since the early ‘80s. “So I can’t really get on top of it all and go, ‘This is where I’m going’ and ‘I’m listening to this record so I’ve got this feeling I’m after’ — I’m writing over years. But the songs are all fairly consistent with each other: I’m working in a particular field, I know that. “I’m surprised I’m still writing songs: I just thought with my limited guitar technique and my limited musical knowledge that I might have written myself out at 40 or 45, so the fact that melodies and songs still come is now a real plea-
Pic: Bleddyn Butcher
Burning desire to write
sure. Because I enjoy songwriting — although it’s hard work, it’s rewarding. “And you get to go to Berlin and record them and all those wonderful things — it’s not like I’m writing songs and they’re not being recorded and just going onto a shelf or something. It’s very satisfying that if I do write something good then it gets recorded. I have to work hard at it, but ultimately they just appear — it’s still something of a mystery to me.” Forster’s solo career used to be considered an adjunct to his work with The Go-Betweens, but after seven albums it’s now a canon of great depth and substance in its own right: is he proud of the music he’s managed to accrue under his own name over the years? “Look I am, I really am,” he admits. “The ‘90s albums apart, having done The Evangelist (2008) and Songs To Play this is sort of crowning it — it feels like I’ve done three really good records that I’m really, really happy with. I could almost tour just on those three albums — I could put together an amazing set taking my favourites, 18 or 20 songs, from those three albums. “Now people are talking about reissuing the old solo albums on vinyl, which is something I want because I want to tour more over the next year, so I’m hoping to take my back catalogue out on the road and play and have those solo albums there. “But it is, it is something of its own, and you can’t imagine how satisfying that is. Because everyone knows and holds The Go-Betweens in a certain amount of regard, and it’s good that I’m happy and I can sense the quality of what I’m doing as a solo artist: that’s a good feeling.”
“The fact that melodies and songs still come is now a real pleasure.”
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Robert Forster tours from 5 Jul.
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Check The Guide on theMusic.com.au for more details.
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Queensland Music Festival is an initiative of the Queensland Government through Arts Queensland.
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The Big Picture
Defend, Conserve, Protect Tracking four months of skirmishes between marine conservation group Sea Shepherd and a Japanese whaling fleet, Australian documentary Defend, Conserve, Protect is part-cat and mouse chase, part-passionate activist polemic. Director Stephen Amis shares what it took to bring the film to the screen. Can you describe what’s happening in this image? In regard to the Japanese whaling fleet’s MO in Antarctica, usually it’s their smaller, nimbler harpoon ships that target, harpoon and slaughter the whales. Sometimes the fleet will target the females of the pod first, knowing the males will come to their rescue, which draws them in closer. Once the whales are harpooned (as depicted in this picture), then the harpoon ship makes a bee-line for the gigantic factory ship — the Nisshin Maru — which is essentially a massive floating abattoir. The whales are then transferred to this factory ship and butchered. If the whale isn’t completely dead from the brutal, explosive-tipped harpoon, then the Japanese whalers will use a 22-calibre rifle to finish the job.
Photo by Glenn Lockitch.
What were the unique difficulties faced in capturing what is essentially a prolonged, sea-born guerrilla campaign against the Japanese whaling fleet? The film was shot by a range of professional and non-professional camera people from many different countries. I personally shot much of the underwater footage, interviews and B unit photography. There were ten cameras across each of the four Sea Shepherd vessels including a handful of GoPro cameras mounted in strategic positions. There’s many challenges in shooting on the ocean — from sea sickness when you look through a camera lens, to technical problems with the frigid, hostile conditions impacting battery life, condensation on the lens, and salt and water potentially impacting the equipment.
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You’ve said Defend, Conserve, Protect captures the spirit of global activism — what does that mean to you? The UN recently came out and said we have 12 years to radically overhaul all of our industries if we are to combat climate change. The terrifying thing is a five-year-old child alive today will struggle to make it to retirement — that’s how dire our environmental predicament is. Governments are obviously trying to be non-alarmist, and humans are naturally optimistic, so the real truth of how grave things are is being sugar-coated. Ten years ago it was predicted we’d have a two-degree rise by 2050. It’s now ten years on and we’ve already had a one-degree rise [above the pre-industrial baseline*]. Scientists are now predicting a 3.4- to four-degree rise [by 2100*], which is enough to wipe out most life on Earth. So of course the environmental modelling is underestimating the problem. Defend, Conserve, Protect is as much about the importance of activism as it is about anti-whaling and saving species. It’s going to be up to all of us to get out of our homes and neighbourhoods and go out into the world to make radical environmental change — it takes courage and tenacity to do that, and our film captures the spirit of that determination.’ *UN World Meteorological Organisation Defend, Conserve, Protect screens from 25 Jul
Secret algo-rhythms Regular internet user Donald Finlayson dives deep in the ‘Up Next’ wormhole to bring back some long-lost gems uncovered by YouTube’s recommendation algorithm. Illustration by Felicity Case-Mejia.
Mariya Takeuchi — Plastic Love (1984) In the world of Youtube algorithm-core, no song is a bigger meme than Mariya Takeuchi’s Plastic Love. With over 12 million combined views, it’s a perfect example of the internet’s weird power to resurrect dusty and forgotten pieces of media for our present enjoyment. We’ve even heard it playing at H&M! A slick piece of Japanese city-pop, a fad genre of ‘80s Japan, Plastic Love easily could’ve been the theme song to a Tokyo spinoff of Miami Vice. This one is definitely best heard while cruising through the city in a classic Supra on a rainy night.
Ryo Fukui — Scenery (1976) Turtlenecked jazz gatekeepers will tell you there are much better hard-bop albums out there than Ryo Fukui’s Scenery. And they’re right, but that doesn’t mean that this ‘70s Japanese piano LP isn’t worth your time as an uplifting piece of background music. An album of covers and standards, the main appeal of Scenery lies in just how charming these classics have been arranged and performed. With only six years of self-taught piano experience under his belt (that’s six months in jazz years), Fukui’s melodic yet modest playing is what makes this such an appealing entry point into one of music’s more inaccessible genres.
Mort Garson — Plantasia (1976)
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ost of the time, the algorithm for suggested videos on YouTube can be a real annoying bastard. There you are, minding your own business, just trying to watch a video of a Japanese man making a knife out of pasta, and YouTube has the audacity to recommend you something like UK’s Scariest Debt Collector (Full Length), or Why Star Wars: The Last Jedi Is A Complete Cinematic Failure. It’s all so tiring. But then, possibly in an effort to redeem itself, the invisible, time-wasting hand of YouTube also manages to take us to places of ancient musical wonder. A world of forgotten J-pop hits, smooth ‘70s jazz numbers, early progressive electronics, bizarre vaporwave rappers from the distant past and so much more. With no one truly knowing how the recommendation algorithm works or why it continues to bring us these obscure gems, we’ve decided that it’s a mystery best left unsolved. Not all recommendations are created equal, however. So next time you sense you’re about to go down a recommendation wormhole, we recommend you click on these classics instead of that Mac Demarco imitation horseshit that YouTube also keeps trying to push.
A quietly influential album of whistly electronic tunes, Mort Garson’s Plantasia sounds like the soundtrack to a Super Nintendo RPG that never was. Unlike the cold and futuristic soundscapes that haunted the work of his early electronic peers, Garson used the synthesiser to craft a warm and colourful album that feels like getting a hug from Mother Nature. Listening to it now makes you wanna replay EarthBound and start a vegetable garden. Basically pornography for people with a fetish for Moog synths, rarely do bleeps and bloops ever sound this earthy and comforting.
Lonnie Smith — It’s Changed (1977) Talk about smooth, baby! A buttery work of easy listening and jazz fusion, a song like this is probably what plays on loop when someone with mutton chops dies and goes to ‘70s purgatory. Though written by American jazz organist Lonnie Smith, it’s the guitar playing of the legendary George Benson that really makes this so enjoyable in a The Sims 1 soundtrack kind of way. Of course, it’s been sampled to hell and back by hip hop producers ever since it popped into the YouTube sidebar a few years ago. Why go crate digging like one of the Amish when you could just disable auto-play and let the algorithm find a new beat for you?
Spooky Black — Without You (2014) If you muted the audio and just watched the video by itself, you’d be forgiven for thinking that Spooky Black’s Without You was just one really long Tim & Eric skit. Dressed in a white turtleneck with gold chains and a durag, the video features Corbin, who used to go by the name Spooky Black, softly singing his way through the pain of a breakup while wandering through the woods and posing on his couch. A visually ridiculous piece of cloudy R&B that can also become genuinely affecting should you ever stumble upon it at 3am in your underpants.
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THELMA PLUM Better In Blak
(Warner Music Australia) Incredibly this is the former Brisbane scene mainstay’s debut album, and even more incredibly she roped in names like Paul Kelly and Sir Paul McCartney to bring her thrilling political treatise to life!
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LACHLAN DENTON & STUDIO MAGIC
MCKISKO Southerly
A Brother
(Little Lake Records)
Former The Ocean Party frontman pens beautiful tunes reflecting on the tragic passing of his brother and bandmate Zac Denton just last year, high art from the most heartbreaking of losses.
Much-loved Brisbane songstress McKisko releases the vinyl incarnation of the her stunning and immersive third album Southerly, a minimalist affair of great subtlety and beauty.
(Osbourne Again/Spunk)
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Fever Dream
Everything Hits At Once: The Best Of
Third album from Icelandic dream weavers is a playful new batch of songs delving into themes of female empowerment and equality in a modern construct, equally poppy, bright and thought-provoking.
New career-spanning ‘greatest hits’ compilation collates the finest moments from Texan indie rock stalwarts’ incredible 25-year stint at the musical coalface, a cavalcade of catchy underground guitar-pop.
(Republic Records)
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Keeping it real
D
ressed in full rockstar mode — black pants, boots, shirt with all-over white teardrop print and leather jacket (in the summer heat) plus slicked-back Brylcreemed ‘do and dark shades — Michael Shuman turns heads as enters The Journal Cafe in Melbourne’s CBD. He’s carrying a guitar case, but you’d definitely have him pegged as a muso even before noticing his instrument. Earlier today, Shuman performed a few acoustic numbers — including a cover of Blondie’s Heart Of Glass — in the office of a daily tabloid. On incorporating covers into setlists, Shuman shares, “I think it’s a smart thing to do. We did Heart Of Glass because we were going on tour really quickly after
we started the band and we were, like, having a song that people recognise — even if you do it totally differently — it just subliminally will make them go, ‘Oh, they’re great! I like this song!’” After pouring himself a glass, Shuman offers, “Would you like some water?” The Queens Of The Stone Age bassist is in the country playing as part of Arctic Monkeys’ touring band, with Mini Mansions also scoring support duty for most of the English band’s North American Tranquility Base Hotel & Casino shows as well as these Australian dates. At the tail-end of 2018, Mini Mansions released a four-track EP, Works Every Time, which features a cracking version of Edwyn Collins’ A Girl Like You that soils the classy original with lascivious, rock’n’roll sleaze. It’s so good! “Thank you. I always thought that song was, like, a massive hit,” Shuman recounts, “but it wasn’t really a hit in the States, you know what I mean? And in the UK I think it was massive, obviously, but, yeah! In the States it wasn’t. So I was just like, ‘That song should’ve been a fuckin’ hit. Maybe we can make it a hit?’ And then we didn’t,” he laughs. GummyBear, the lead single from the band’s forthcoming Guy Walks Into A Bar... album, was released just ahead of Mini Mansions’ aforementioned Australian shows. Keys stabs usher in a trippy synth line before subtle hihats underscore Shuman’s sultry delivery. Another of this scribe’s favourite Mini Mansions songs, This Bullet, from their 2018 EP, features a demented-sounding synth solo and has us tipping Shuman rates The B-52’s. “I love B-52’s,” he confirms. “I don’t know if anyone knows this, but on that last record [The Great Pretenders] we had this song called Cheap Leather and it ended up being a B-side — it didn’t make the record — but it’s a real quirky song and it goes like, ‘[sings] Cheap leather!’ And we kept hearing Fred [Schneider, of The B-52s]’s voice so we called ‘im up — or emailed him — and said, ‘Will you sing this song?’ and he did! So we have a song featuring Fred Schneider.”
they did some really interesting things that you just wouldn’t
industry. I think it’s just so empowering to say,
find in any other genre,” she explains, excitement building in
you know, ‘Not for you!’” she explains.
Pic: Brian Tamborello and Lo Nguyen
Bryget Chrisfield sits down with Michael Shuman of Mini Mansions to discuss his love for The B-52’s, duetting with Alison Mosshart and writing songs based on reallife experience.
Enter the VOIID VOIID bassist Antonia Hickey talks to Belinda Quinn about her love for Norwegian black metal and American desert rock, resisting sexist objectification, and, ah, planking.
Tracks like Drunk are reminiscent of
her voice. Hickey joined VOIID just a month after she’d started learn-
Splendora’s You’re Standing On My Neck, the
ing bass. Original members Anji Greenwood (vocals) and Kate
Daria theme tune. But the thrashy garage-
McGuire (guitarist) formed the band in 2015 in Rockhampton.
punk stems from a myriad of ‘90s influences,
When they relocated to Brisbane, drummer Jasmine Cannon
from Nirvana to Sonic Youth. “I think it’s just
and Hickey joined the ranks. “All four of us are just best friends,
something that definitely comes out in our
so we end up doing the stupidest stuff we’re on the road,” says
music because it’s something that all of us lis-
Hickey of her bandmates. “Whenever we’re driving to NSW,
ten to all the time. I don’t know. There’s just
we’ll always just plank on things at the rest stops.”
something about it, music from the ‘90s — it’s
Hickey’s rollicking, jolty, and heavy bass lines pay homage
just so good,” says Hickey.
to desert-rock and influences like Kyuss and Queens Of The
Drool was produced by Alistair Richard-
Stone Age (she even recently found herself picking the brain of
son (The Cairos, Zefereli) out on his farm near
both band’s former bassist, Nick Oliveri, after playing a festival
Boonah, about an hour drive out of Brisbane.
together in Lennox Head). “That genre also has a really inter-
“He has a little shed, but it’s like, a nice shed,”
ive shows that radiate loose fun, an obsession with ‘90s
esting history because it sort of started in Palm Springs in the
Hickey says. “It’s his recording studio. It was
music and fashion, and a curiosity for genre movements
‘80s,” she says. She goes on to detail how Palms Springs was
so nice to get out of the city and just work on
that made history: that’s Brisbane four-piece VOIID for
a tourist town where kids would take generators out into the
music for a few days.”
L
you. The band have classified their sound as “hellish girl-shriek”, and after listening to their most recent EP, Drool, they’ve hit
desert, and how the scene grew out youth boredom.
VOIID will tour the EP in July. Putting on
“I’m trying to succinct this down a bit, because I could talk
a wild show is important to the band. “As an
about this for hours,” Hickey says, breaking into laughter. “I just
audience member, those are the most mem-
A cheery Antonia Hickey picks up the phone. The VOIID
love those genres because they all invented something or did
orable shows,” Hickey reflects. “People are
bassist is in Sydney to study an Ableton course at Surry Hill’s
something so different, and they were out there — it’s what
paying to come and see you live. They could
Liveschool. She’s spending her uni break — Hickey is complet-
made them great bands.”
just listen to your music at home. You pay for a
the nail on the head.
ing a music degree — learning as much as she can about digi-
In mid-June, VOIID released Drool, the seven-track follow
tal production. After just a few minutes listening to her pour
up to 2017’s Pussy Orientated. They’ve stuck to singing about
over her favourite genres, it’s clear Hickey is naturally curious
drinking, sexism and social dynamics, only now they’re sound-
about sound.
ing bigger, louder and more self-assured.
Deathcrush by Mayhem was the first Norwegian black-
Asked what Not For You means to Hickey personally, she
metal record she ever picked up, and it was love at first listen.
shares, “I think it’s just such an empowering line, because so
“There’s so much history in [black metal]; I think that’s why I
much of the time, historically, women are always so objecti-
love it so much. And if you look into their recording techniques,
fied, and not taken seriously, especially in things like the music
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show, so we want to put on that show.”
Drool (Independent) is out now. VOIID tour from 6 Jul.
Guy Walks Into A Bar... (Fiction/Caroline) is out this month.
Check The Guide on theMusic.com.au for more details.
Check The Guide on theMusic.com.au for more details.
Pic: Dannika Horvat
The second single to be lifted from Mini Mansions’ upcoming set, Hey Lover, is a duet with Alison Mosshart (The Kills). Shuman points out he prefers duetting with friends so that “they’re not coming in there to just do their part and get the fuck out”. “She cared about the song, she liked the song,” he stresses. “That song in particular... It’s a conversation back and forth... And it’s, yeah, a male and female talkin’ to each other,” Shuman explains. “We’re singing, but it’s a dialogue.” Guy Walks Into A Bar... was “recorded and written basically in real time”, Shuman says. Over what period of time? “It was about a year and a half. So I met this woman and we got engaged halfway through that time... It started awesome and then, you know, ended. “I just happened to be starting to make the record so it worked out for me, I guess; I got a lotta good material out of it... It was real, so, like, ‘Ok, let’s do something real not just put out songs just to put out songs.’” So has Shuman played these songs to the woman who inspired Guy Walks Into A Bar...? “She hasn’t heard the final versions of some, because, ah, they were demoed in a certain way and then when it started to end, and we broke up, I changed the lyrics... She’s heard a few, though. [EP track] Midnight In Tokyo’s about her, too, and... What are you gonna do? It’s real.”
Seasons change Ahead of the release of her fifth album Winter Blues, Emma Russack tells Steve Bell that the only way she knows how to write songs is from a position of vulnerability.
inger-songwriter Emma Russack is in
S
“I guess I’m fairly confused at the moment about a lot
the process of wrapping up her law
of things going on in the world, I find a lot of the songs tap
degree at a high-profile Melbourne
into that,” Russack muses. “Especially, for some reason, social
university but at the same time she’s jug-
media is really getting to me — and it always has, I’ve always
gling the myriad obligations surrounding
written about it — but I guess a lot of the songs come from
the release of her beautiful fifth album, Win-
a place of distress actually, but I’m trying not to be too emo
ter Blues.
about it.
The songs were recorded to tape over
“I’m just putting it out there and saying, ‘I feel a bit strange
the course of a year in the studio of producer
about this but maybe that’s ok?’ The hope being that maybe
John Lee and captured in single live takes.
a few people will listen to it and go, ‘Yeah, I feel a bit strange
Not even Russack’s band were shown the
about that happening too and that’s ok.’”
songs until the day of each session, the singer
Alongside Be Real, songs like the title track and album
firm in her belief that the resulting immedia-
closer Never Before are rife with heart-on-sleeve vulnerabil-
cy atoned for any little imperfections that fil-
ity. “Every album cycle I get asked the question, ‘Do you find it
tered through as a result of this unorthodoxy.
hard to be vulnerable?’ and maybe I do, maybe that’s why I’m
“I find from past experience that the
such a fucking mess, I don’t know,” she sighs. “It’s the only way
more takes I do, the more detached I become
I know how to write songs: that’s my style. I didn’t study poetry
from the actual song. I become really con-
when I was growing up and I read my first novel when I was 21
scious of tiny mistakes and continually start
so I’m not using metaphors and I’m not talking about pigeons,
over again,” she reflects. “So if I’m feeling it
I’m just really saying all I know — I’m just talking about what I
and the band are feeling it — even if it’s a little
know and that’s all I can do.
bit crap — we’ll keep that take. On the Winter
“Maybe my decision to go into law and get some more
Blues album there are heaps of little mistakes
stability and security in my life is a result of me being a little
throughout, but I’m willing to overlook them
spent — I’ve kind of given it my all, and the fact that I am so
because it felt right and I know I won’t feel
vulnerable in my music means that it kind of matters so much
better with any other take.
to me because I do put so much of myself into it.
“It’s kind of a risk that I’m willing to take.
“So I’ve gotten to a point where I do feel pretty worn out
I don’t know if it comes down to being a bit
by the whole thing, but that’s not enough for me to go, ‘I’m
lazy and not very dedicated, but I’m not aim-
going to start writing top lines and work with big producers.’
ing, I suppose, [for] technical perfection — I’m
I don’t want to do that. I know that everything I do is my own
not going for an overproduced sound, so I’m
decision and that comes with consequences I have to live
not aiming for perfection in that sense — I
with, and that’s fine.”
just want to feel good about how I felt in that take. I’m all about the feeling, because you gotta be real.” Be Real is appropriately a track on Winter Blues — an entrancingly catchy slice of agit-pop that encapsulates the mood of the album perfectly with its analytical lyrics and assured delivery.
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Winter Blues (Spunk) is out this month. Emma Russack tours from 7 Aug.
Album Reviews
Highly anticipated is an understatement when it comes to the debut album from Aussie singer-songwriter Angie McMahon, whose past singles have left fans constantly craving more. In the last two years we’ve witnessed the impressive rise of the Melbourne artist; the release of her now Gold-certified debut single Slow Mover in 2017 setting her on a trajectory that’s led to sold-out international shows, appearances at huge festivals including Splendour In The Grass and Laneway, and, earlier this year, the prestigious Grulke Prize for Developing Non-US Act at SXSW. Previous releases set the bar high for this record, but for those who got hooked on songs like Missing Me and Keeping Time, the additional tracks that make up Salt will not disappoint. She doesn’t deviate from her tried and tested recipe for great songs, with strummed electric guitar, warm bass, simple drums and her unique, low vocals the sole ingredients. It’s a combination that’s fairly simple but incredibly effective. That said, 11 songs occupying the same sonic space does become a little monotonous. While the album as a whole might lack a bit of light and shade, every song individually is notably dynamic, with hushed, intimate verses swelling into punchy, soaring choruses. It’s hard not to be drawn to McMahon’s
Angie McMahon Salt
Dualtone / AWAL
HHHH½
Bleached
Don’t You Think You’ve Had Enough? Dead Oceans / Inertia
HHHH There is a distinct push and pull between dynamics and attitude on punk sister-act Bleached’s latest. It’s always been there, since their 2013 debut and now in their third LP. The Clavins straddle upbeat poppunk and gritty, raw rock housed beneath arching, melodic vocal lines, giving much of their output a grungy late ‘80s/early ‘90s vibe. Lyrically things haven’t always been as strong, but this album pulls their more visceral songwriting into sharper focus, capitalising on introspective battles and melodies that are fun but still edgy. Carley Hall
Dope Lemon
voice, which is left isolated and exposed within the sparsity of opener Play The Game and Push, while gritty production adds to the rawness of Soon and Mood Song, their deeply personal lyrics softly crooned as sweet melodies. Pasta, a carb-heavy lethargy anthem, provides a welcome gear change, building perfectly to express an experience shared by many 20-somethings — feeling lost and unmotivated, but still trying. Honest storytelling coupled with McMahon’s powerful voice make slow burner And I Am A Woman, her favourite song on the album, a standout. McMahon sings with soul-baring hurt, anger and frustration about the idea that “our bodies and the spaces around us are our homes, and that everyone deserves to feel safe and respected in theirs”: “You are in my home now/And I am a woman.” Beautifully unpolished If You Call offers something different; the almost eight-minute long lo-fi closer softly lulls the listener with a whistled melody and gentle vocals. McMahon’s long-awaited full-length release meets all expectations. Her relatable lyrics and emotive vocals make connecting to her music easy. Madelyn Tait
Allday
Smooth Big Cat
Starry Night Over The Phone
BMG
HHH½
ONETWO
HHH½
Dope Lemon strikes again with the aptly named record Smooth Big Cat. Opening singles Hey You and Salt & Pepper are a warm introduction to the album with Angus Stone’s voice both whispering and speaking on top of a mellow lead line. While the album may not provide the same echo-like experimentation on the vocal and instrument mix of his earlier work, it still showcases the same relaxing persona of old. This is an album that will have people picking up acoustic guitars for the foreseeable future. It’s layered yet simplistic, creating a relaxing vibrancy
Starry Night Over The Phone shows a maturity of soul and sound without washing out Tomas Gaynor’s signature hybrid of hip hop and pop. Ultimately though, he does very little to shine on his own. Gaynor’s choice in collaborators brings a certain depth to his music, and there’s a sleek and steady simplicity to be appreciated here, but it gets repetitive. This record does what it says on the tin — puts down some bittersweet sentiments with a maturity we’ve not seen from Gaynor, but without the cameoes it would be pretty bland.
Taylor Marshall
Anna Rose
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Album Reviews
Emma Russack Winter Blues Spunk / Caroline
HHH½
Emma Russack is asking a lot of questions on Winter Blues. Her fifth album spends a lot of time investigating core drives without getting answers. That’s the point — Russack is too savvy to think the answer to What Is Love is more interesting than the question. By framing these philosophical inquiries using her trademark slow-mo, blue-tinted chamber-pop, Russack takes the sting out of self-interrogation. This record is another win for an idiosyncratic artist exploring her angst without histrionics. Its minimalist approach is striking, creating a beautiful fragility which underlines Russack’s openness and trust. Matt MacMaster
For more album reviews, go to www.theMusic.com.au
Gravemind
KOKOKO!
Mini Mansions
Olympia
Greyscale Records
Transgressive / [PIAS]
Fiction / Caroline
EMI
HHHH
HHH
HHHH
HHH½
The debut album from this Melbournebased five-piece is brutally, blisteringly heavy. It pounds the listener into happy submission with its relentlessly crushing although interestingly off-kilter grooves, enormous guitar and drums sounds and throat-ripping vocals, which are delivered with angst dredged up from the darkest part of frontman Dylan Gillies-Parsons’ soul. Gravemind display a maturity lightyears beyond their relative newcomer status. There is a nous in the songcraft and a sense of dynamics here that should elevate them above the cookie-cutter crew.
The dance music collective bring together traditional polyrhythmic beats and flourishes of hip hop - with plenty of raw grit and an exuberant energy. It sounds like KOKOKO! make music from whatever they can get their hands on, which gives it an organic electro-acoustic vibe. Much of this album feels like improvisation edited into something tighter. French producer Debruit adds polish to the mix while framing everything within a slick European electronic aesthetic. There’s also a euphoric post-punk bounce to many of these tunes that brings to mind ESG.
With its distorted bass lines and playful melodies, Mini Mansions’ third LP mixes ‘80s synth nostalgia with modern rock’n’roll. Guy Walks Into A Bar... follows the story of a whirlwind romance, which begins playful and fun before quickly getting cheeky. We fall harder and love burns strongern and before you know it things have taken a turn and hearts are breaking in Time Machine and Works Every Time. Tears In Her Eyes is the perfect slow-burn ending to an album of ups, downs and in betweens that perfectly depicts the soul-crushing voyage of falling in and out of deep love.
Flamingo is a creature that mildly saunters along then dazzles with colourful, slightly avant-garde displays, without stepping too far away from the herd. The Wollongong artist originally carved a neat little niche within the indie-pop realm. There Olympia hung her hat on her stark but feminine vocal and guitar nous, making debut Self Talk an underappreciated success. Where that debut pleased with angular, resonant guitars amid uncomplicated, upbeat motifs, Flamingo adds a little more lacquer by slightly glossing over these elements. A polished if not perfect second album.
Rod Whitfield
Guido Farnell
Emily Blackburn
Carley Hall
Spod
Sum 41
Thy Art Is Murder
Lachlan Denton & Studio Magic
Rice Is Nice
Hopeless Records
Human Warfare
A Brother
HHH
HHHH
HHHH
Spunk
Well here’s a blast from the indie ‘90s and ‘00s. Wonderfully weird and weirdly wonderful, the one-man band (with a few mates) is back, as he puts it in the final track, “to have one more Golden Gaytime”. The resulting album, Adult Fantasy, will satisfy fans from back in the day, and likely confuse those who weren’t there. Not that this is a bad thing — young kids, go back, google and see what you missed. Think Unit-era Regurgitator but with a rougher edge. To be fair, this album probably won’t win any awards, but if the listener gets half as much fun listening as it seems Spod had making it, then that certainly is a win.
Punk rock? Punk not! Canadian band Sum 41’s brand new album Order In Decline is their darkest, heaviest release to date, one that puts its foot down on an accelerator that drives unapologetic lyrics, gnarly riffs and an unsuspecting beauty. It’s all a rush of fervent emotion and magnificent melodies, compiled in such a way that you won’t miss any of the juicy elements that make this album such a great listen. It’s a strong case of Stockholm syndrome here — the longer Sum 41 have you in their grasp, the more likely it is you’ll fall in love with this beastly side of the band.
Human Target is a record that largely continues, rather than reinvents, what the band is all about. Drawing from previously mined sources, such as Behemoth’s blackened fury and Decapitated’s proficient battering, Human Target will be familiar to their dedicated audience but nonetheless packs a brutally satisfying sonic gut-punch. Lee Stanton’s distinctive drumming is missed somewhat, although new sticksman Jesse Beahler injects tangible groove and technical sensibilities. Thy Art Is Murder have honed their material in such a way as to streamline the group’s vision. This ensures Human Target hits its mark.
Liz Giuffre
Anna Rose
Brendan Crabb
Conduit
Adult Fantasy
Fongola
Guy Walks Into A Bar...
Order In Decline
The Music
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Flamingo
HHHH½ There are millions of songs about love and loss, each of them seeking to express a feeling that ultimately seems inexpressible. Rarely are they as heartfelt and direct as the songs on Lachlan Denton’s latest album, A Brother. The loss of a loved one is enough to render anyone speechless, and the sudden and tragic passing of Denton’s brother and bandmate, Zac Denton, last year is an experience of grief that seems incomprehensible. Denton doesn’t burden himself with understanding though. Instead, his response is to love and remember. Roshan Clerke
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World Press Photo Exhibition Every year the World Press Photo Exhibition tours the world, telling the biggest – and often most confronting – news stories from the past 12 months through photojournalism and digital storytelling. The winners of competition categories across environment, contemporary issues, general news and more include Akashinga – The Brave Ones by Brent Stirton, pictured. The photograph is of an Akashinga woman, which translates to “the brave ones” in Zimbabwe’s Shona dialect, a member of a community of women dedicated to conservation. These women from disadvantaged backgrounds – some the victims of rape, domestic abuse and exploitation – come together, in opposition to trophy hunting, to restore and maintain wilderness areas and nature reserves. The exhibition also includes the World Press Photo Of The Year, John Moore’s Crying Girl On The Border, and the World Press Photo Story Of The Year, The Migrant Caravan by Pieter Ten Hoopen.
The World Press Photo Exhibition runs from 12 Jul at Brisbane Powerhouse.
The best of The Arts in July
1.
1.
Silica This Grace Blake exhibition, including Cuts, pictured – which launches on the same day as Nicholete Brocchi’s Flash Lights In Low Visibility – uses the compound silicon dioxide and its ties to the organic and the artificial to postulate a living science-fiction future after human civilisation. From 24 Jul at Metro Arts
2.
2.
Storm Boy Melbourne and Queensland Theatre Companies collaborate on Storm Boy, an adaptation of the beloved 1964 Colin Thiele novel about the connection between a boy and his pelican, featuring life-size puppets from Brisbane’s Dead Puppet Society.
3.
From 29 Jul at Playhouse, QPAC
3.
Sammy J’s Major Party Comedian Sammy J – sorry, no Randy – returns for his first solo tour since 2017, skewering Australian politics in the satirical style that has seen him become a fixture on the ABC. There’ll be stand-up, sketches, songs and character work, and plenty of LOLs too. 19 & 20 Jul at Powerhouse Theatre, Brisbane Powerhouse
4.
SBS World Movies SBS launch a new free-to-air, 24-hour TV channel this month, dedicated to world cinema. The first month of programming features cult hits from Japan’s Studio Ghibli like My Neighbour Totoro, as well as subversive Kenyan queer romance Rafiki, pictured.
4.
From 1 Jul on SBS World Movies
5.
100 Years Of The History Of Dance Joseph Simons, under the oversight of director Emma Canalese, sums up 100 years in the history of dance in just one hour, using physical theatre and intricate choreography to explore the lives of choreographers like Martha Graham, Paula Abdul and Roudolf Nureyev.
5.
From 31 Jul at Brisbane Powerhouse
6.
6.
School Of Rock The Musical Helpmann nominee Brent Hill takes a hearty crack at Jack Black’s iconic role from the 2003 film, faking it as a substitute music teacher at a private school who teaches his new students about the power of dirty rock’n’roll. From 12 Jul at Lyric Theatre, QPAC
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O n IN J u ly
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Film & TV Lambs Of God
HHH½ Airs from 21 Jul on Fox Showcase
Reviewed by Guy Davis
A
ustralian-made but set in England, the four-part Foxtel miniseries Lambs Of God at first seems to be an enclosed story about the Sisters Of St Agnes, living an isolated existence on a small island, when their primitive but idyllic life is turned upside-down by the arrival of a young priest ordered by the Catholic Church to evaluate the property for sale. As one might expect, complications of all kinds ensue. What one may not expect are the twists, turns and swerves taken by this tale as the characters wrestle with secrets, scandals, trauma, repression and redemption, and the story itself veers from moody Gothic thriller to indictment of the Church’s patriarchal structure to missing persons investigation to family melodrama. This switching of lanes isn’t always successful — the first few ventures away from the island and its inhabitants is necessary for the story to progress but slacken the tension established so well by screenwriter Sarah Lambert and director Jeffrey Walker — but
the assembly of talent on both sides of the camera must be praised for their deft balancing of Lambs Of God’s myriad tones. It’s a story that captivates and carries the viewer along, sometimes offering surprises and more often than not delivering satisfaction. In keeping with recent homegrown Foxtel productions such as Picnic At Hanging Rock, it’s technically superb — veteran Australian cinematographer Don McAlpine deserves kudos for the visual palette that conveys the beauty and menace of the nuns’ island home. And it’s tremendously acted: the supporting cast is studded with quality performers (Damon Herriman continues his run of sterling work as the Church’s unscrupulous fixer), and the core quartet of Essie Davis (The Babadook), Jessica Barden (The End Of The F***ing World) and the ferocious Ann Dowd (The Handmaid’s Tale) as the trio of Sisters, and a very impressive Sam Reid as the self-righteous interloper, make nary a false nor predictable move.
Booksmart
HHH½ In cinemas 11 Jul
Reviewed by Anthony Carew
I
f The Breakfast Club is the definitive teen movie, it’s no surprise the genre has been built on stereotypes. Echoing the way teenagers search for self-identity and belonging by adopting (and often discarding) guises, teen films have been a world filled with freaks, geeks, and cliques. Olivia Wilde’s directorial debut, Booksmart, initially feels like a new polish-up of those old ideas, the simple jocks and nerds of yore swapped out for self-branding hypebeasts, theatre gays, and non-binary skaters. But the charm of the film is the way it becomes an examination of those stereotypes, its great lesson being that to judge or pigeonhole is perilous to both those judging and those being pigeonholed. Beanie Feldstein and Kaitlyn Dever play a pair of overachievers who’ve spent their high school years in isolation from, and opposition to, their peers. They’ve avoided the regular rites of passage — sex, drugs, socialising with anyone outside their two-person bubble — in favour of a devo-
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Reviews
tion to good grades and future careers. But they discover that all the kids who did the sex and drugs ended up at prestigious colleges too. So, on the eve of graduation, they pledge to cram a whole high school of partying into one night. The result plays like a female spin on Superbad (Feldstein is even Jonah Hill’s sister). There’s comic hijinks, lawlessness, and misadventures, but also a surprisingly deep study of a somewhat obsessive platonic friendship, wavering in the face of that great teen movie separator: going off to college. Our heroines have to learn who they are when apart, and in the world beyond high school. That discovery mirrors the great revelation that other people are complex, not so easily dismissed. It’s an empathetic approach to a familiar tale, illustrated by the fact that there’s no antagonist, no generic mean girl or jock bully. Where so many teen movies are built on hostility, Booksmart abounds with empathy.
Rage, rage against the dying of the light Em Rusciano tells Hannah Story about how the anger and pure joy of the last year fed into her new the Rage And Rainbows tour.
“You can’t just stand screaming into the abyss because then nothing moves forward and nothing changes.”
E
m Rusciano’s The Rage And Rainbows tour is, in the writer, comic, singer and broadcaster’s own words, “a way to celebrate and encourage the expression of female rage”. “I really wanted to encourage women to name what’s making them angry, to not eat it, to not drink it, to not shop it, to not do all the self-medicating that we do to be socially acceptable. I wanna make it socially acceptable for women to express their dismay and I think once we do that we let the poison out.” She developed the show after she managed to get to a really good place, following a year that upended her life — she turned 40, had a baby, and left her job as the co-host of the 2DayFM radio breakfast show, after being widely painted across the media as a “difficult woman”: “I swung between very angry moments and absolute moments of pure joy.” The 2DayFM gig, she says, made her feel powerless, gagged by her contract from speaking out publicly about the way she was being portrayed as a “diva”. The media storm picked up when she made comments on Wil Anderson’s Wilosophy podcast about those perceptions and the dynamics between her and newly installed co-hosts Grant Denyer and Ed Kavalee, who replaced Harley Breen in 2018. Crafting The Rage And Rainbows helped Rusciano to process her emotions about the whole tense saga. “I realised when I left that job, I was pregnant and it took me three months of recovery time, my soul was just completely depleted. And then this show came pouring out, and it’s a really joyful show. “I’ve never done anything like it. I do tackle hard shit — last year I did a stand-up show on miscarriage and I’ve done one on divorce. I like taking big, meaty, hard, heavy topics and shining light and humour into them. This show is a channelling of that rage and then ultimately the acceptance of it and the releasing of it into the universe.” Other subjects that anger Rusciano run the gamut of being tasked, as the mum, with the majority of household tasks, to the restrictions placed on her two teenage daughters, Marchella and Odette, in the wake of a spate of male violence against women in Melbourne over the last year. “I resent the fact that they can’t walk alone at night without arming themselves with a set of keys,” Rusciano says. “That they’re being policed on what they have to wear, that they’ll walk out into a job already disadvantaged just ‘cause of their gender.” Rusciano sees anger as an emotion that — unlike sadness, which is passive — can embolden us take action: “It makes you wanna get up and change shit.” Still, she warns against getting trapped in seething rage, her show acting like a release of those negative emotions. “You have to see past [anger],” she notes. “And you have to see where you wanna go. You can’t just stand screaming into the abyss because then nothing moves forward and nothing changes.” Rusciano released an EP of songs from the stage show, co-written with Kate Miller-Heidke and her partner Keir Nuttall, in April so audiences could learn the lyrics ahead of time. “The singing along is cathartic — you just scream out those words. I wanna see shiny, glittery, happy-slash-angry faces, screaming the words I wrote back at me,” Rusciano says. The collaboration was “one of the most joyous” Rusciano has ever taken part in: “Luckily for me my weirdness and her genius was a great combo.”
She notes that Miller-Heidke had likely never worked with a self-taught musician like Rusicano before — “She’s normally working with really credible, amazing musicians” — but took a “real leap of faith” to jump on board the project. “When we got into it, she was like, ‘Oh my God, are you gonna sing these things out loud?’ I said, ‘Yes, I fucking am.’ She loved it. Kate’s a mother. Kate’s a woman in her late 30s and she got it all.” The Rage And Rainbows tour isn’t all rage — there’s still the rainbows part, which comes through in sequins, bright colour, confetti and four costume changes. “I guess I want [the show] to be the big rainbow beacon of light so that everyone doesn’t feel quite so overwhelmed all the time, and they remember that there is joy at the end of the rainbow. “While I was in the depths of despair when my baby died a year-and-a-half ago, two years ago, I’ve been able to get to this moment now where I can talk about it and celebrate how I’ve got to here. You can go from really, really dark to really, really light and it’s ok to go back to dark, just know that you can come out again.”
Em Rusciano tours from 19 Jul.
Check The Guide on theMusic.com.au for more details.
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TICKETS AVAILABLE ONLINE WWW.THENORTHERN.COM.AU
Fortitude Music Hall Opening Night Brisbane’s newest music venue is set to open with a bang this month with an explosive night of Queensland music. Hosted by Patience Hodgson, the launch of the Fortitude Music Hall this 26 Jul will feature performances by Ball Park Music, DZ Deathrays and Tia Gostelow on top of special guest appearances from Bernard Fanning and Ian Haug (Powderfinger), Thelma Plum, Dave McCormack (Custard), Busby Marou, Sahara Beck, pictured, and Jeremy Neale.
A lot on your plate Practised eater Sam Wall chews the fat — a look at food that makes you feel good. Illustration by Felicity Case-Mejia.
T
he middle months of the year are tough. The weather blows, work’s hectic, the holidays are long gone, and they’re not coming back anytime soon. It’ll all pass of course, but until then, sometimes you just need a nourishing plate of indulgent eats. A solid blend of carbs, calories and convenience, with maybe a touch of nostalgia, to trip the pleasure centres of the brain. After throwing the topic to an office vote, we’ve compiled a list of the most effective comfort foods and where to find them.
Pad Thai
Lamb shanks with mash
Pad Thai’s got a surprisingly similar history to ramen - they’re both thought to have been introduced by China, they both jumped massively in popularity due to rice shortages during and after WII, and they’re both crazy delicious. The textural contrast between the bean shoots and the rice noodles, the light sweetness backed by a rich aromatic punch - it can’t be beat.
In this writer’s opinion mash potato is bland, starchy nonsense. You’d be better off eating handfuls of ceiling insulation. But The Music is a democracy and the people have spoken - bland, starchy nonsense for the win. Lamb shanks I’m all for, but if you’ve got your hands on some maybe consider throwing them in a slow-cooked casserole till they’re fall-off-the-bone tender.
Staff pick: Pawpaw Cafe, 898 Stanley St
Staff pick: Meat At Billy’s, 241 Waterworks Rd
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Burger
Ramen
Everything is better between two bits of bread, and since pretty much anything can go in a burger if you’re brave enough, it’s essentially the perfect meal. Fried chicken, portobello mushrooms, haloumi, pulled pork - all delicious, all elevated when slapped in a brioche bun. It’s like the food pyramid has fallen into perfect harmony just to give you a triple bypass.
Every couple of years someone writes an article about the weirdest inventions to ever come out of Japan, always careful to include the baby mop/onesie. But in the country’s own opinion, by poll, the greatest creation to come out of 20th century Japan are instant noodles. Throw them in tonkotsu broth with half a boiled egg and some bamboo shoots and we’re inclined to agree.
Staff pick: Lucky Egg, 322 Brunswick St
Staff pick: Hai Hai Ramen, 102 Latrobe Tce
Any soup
Lasagne
What’s more wholesome and comforting than soup? Not to mention versatile. Laksa, minestrone, gazpacho, borscht, bouillabaisse, solyanka, miso, tom yum - liquid gold, the lot of them. You can make it out of anything too. Throw the smell of an oily rag in hot water and so long as there’s half an old potato about you’re laughing.
You’ve got to love a meal with depth, and lasagne’s got layers for days. Break the crispy surface and marvel at the glorious pasta strata, alternating with saucy beef mince or some fresh butternut pumpkin and run through with rich cheese deposits. Creamy carb-loading at its absolute finest, just like mama used to make.
Staff pick: Taste Gallery, 334 Mains Rd
Staff pick: Bucci Restaurant & Bar, 11/15 James St
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Your Town
A word from the wise
Bello Winter Music’s Mentorship Program returns in 2019 to pair up young emerging performers with established artists on the festival line-up. We asked this year’s mentors to share an early piece of career advice that they’ve continued to follow through to this day.
Claire Anne Taylor “I remember a dear friend of mine said to me right before I went on stage once: ‘Knock ‘em alive!’ These days when I play live shows, I often hear his voice in my head right before I step on stage and it reminds me of the job I am going out there to do and the energy and emotion I am trying to bring out in my audience.”
Joe Newton “Thinking back can be a blur sometimes, though the first piece of advice I remember was when I was 12... And it was ‘Try to finish a whole song.’ That one definitely stuck with me. Though I think the best advice that struck a chord with me was from Jimi Hendrix when I was 15. I remember reading it in a magazine. It’s all about patience and persistence. I remember reading: ‘You have to stick with it. Sometimes, you are going to be so frustrated you want to give up the guitar, you’ll hate the guitar. But all of this is just a part of learning, because if you stick with it, you’re going to be rewarded.’”
The Maes
Hat Fitz & Cara
“This advice came from Luke Plumb, who produced our first record Housewarming. He said to us very early on that you will never be happy in your music career if you compare it to other people’s. You are always going to be surrounded by people who are more proficient, accomplished or successful than you are from your optic and you are only going to be happy with yourself as an artist if you are only comparing your growth to yourself.”
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Cara: “Be inspired by others, learn from your mentors and don’t forget to sing, perform [and] write from your own heart.” Fitzy: “’If the note does not feel right don’t play it.’ That was from my father...” Bello Winter Music runs from 11 Jul in Bellingen.
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This month’s highlights
Dead nice
Mammal
Brisbane’s largest heavy music and arts festival Dead Of Winter Festival returns this year for its tenth anniversary. With over 60 acts on the bill, including Disentomb, Mammal, Bodyjar and Kyuss Dies!, playing at The Tivoli and Jubilee Hotel this 13 Jul, it’s sure to warm your cold, black heart.
Approachable Members Of Your Local Community
Breaking new ground
Join the club
Don’t stop us now Missed out on Queen tickets? Eatons Hill Hotel are hosting tribute act Queen Forever this 20 Jul. Now all we need to do is find somebody to love.
Rael. Pic: Jorge Bispo
Polish Club are taking their brand new album Iguana on the road and are stopping by The Northern in Byron Bay with Dulcie and Approachable Members Of Your Local Community. It all goes down this 10 Jul.
Queen Forever
Australia’s “fastest growing country music festival” Groundwater returns to the Gold Coast this month to celebrate all things country music. Don’t miss acts like Lee Kernaghan, Fanny Lumsden and Tex Perkins this 26-28 Jul in the heart of Broadbeach CBD. Did we mention it’s free?
Logan Live Music Month goes down from 4-30 Jul and will feature over 75 gigs from acts like Majelen in cafes, clubs, breweries, markets and venues across the City of Logan. For the full gig guide visit loganlive.com.au/music.
Rael good time Feel like dancing? Brazilian singer Rael is heading to Australia for the first time ever this month playing shows in Brisbane, Sydney, Melbourne and the Gold Coast. Samba the night away at Woolly Mammoth this 28 Jul.
Fanny Lumsden
Majelen
Face the music
JULY 5
JULY 19
FRIDAY
FRIDAY
APATE JULY 6
SATURDAY
JULY 12
FRIDAY
w/ guests In Deception, FANG + Cold Blood
JULY 20
TBISH 1995
First ever headline show!
SUBURBIA The Music
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SATURDAY
JULY 27
SATURDAY JULY 28
SUNDAY
Your Town
GREEDY BOYS
“Hambugger Tour”
POPSCENE
RAEL
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JAMESMORRISONMUSIC.COM
Part of Queensland Music Festival, Immersion is a boutique and intimate concert series where artists will perform in hotel rooms across Brisbane. Here we grabbed some of those taking part to get their thoughts on performing in hotels and more.
Immerse yourself To read the full story head to theMusic.com.au
1.
2.
4.
3.
1. Pink Matter
2. Emily Wurramara
3. Jack Carty
4. Asha Jefferies
When you tour, do you always stay in hotels?
Are you always on the lookout for playing different types of shows like the Immersion series?
Have you ever played a gig as intimate as in a hotel room like the Immersion series will be?
Do you think you’ll play a similar set for the Immersion show to what you would in a regular music venue?
We’ve tried two very different styles so far. The first one being very nice Airbnbs and the second one being friends’ houses, which was so lovely and helpful! It usually depends on how much time we have in each city. - Kerry Raywood, vocals
Yes, I’ve played a beautiful gig called Folk In A Box over in the UK. It’s one song, [performed] to one person at a time in a little wooden box. It was a scary, lovely, amazing experience.
I think it’s awesome to have a variety of shows for the experience and it’s a very intimate environment.
Check The Guide on theMusic.com.au for more details.
I’ll be playing a lot of new songs that I’ve written in the last six months. They’re very personal and intimate and were written in my bedroom. So playing them to other people in a bedroom kinda makes sense!
The Immersion series begins from 5 Jul.
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4-30 July 2019 Over 75 FREE music gigs Majelen, Bollywood Revivers, Krazy Horse, Forever Road, Bam Duo, John Butagig, Mayan Fox, Tokyo Twilight, Briana Dinsdale, Angie Grace and more.
Full program at loganlive.com.au/music
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the best and the worst of the month’s zeitgeist
The lashes Front
Back
Pic via Sam Neil’s twitter
Pic: Getty via NC Management
Pic via Miranda Tapsell’s instagram
Pic via Kim Kardashian’s instagram
Ducking awesome
Our Ash!
Fair play
NOPE
Twenty to zero
RIP Big Kev
Proud dad Sam Neill
At time of print, Ash Barty is
For the first time, Play
Kim Kardashian drew plenty
Perhaps the way to avoid
Big Kev, the beloved fibre-
acknowledged the efforts
world #1 and top-seeded for
School welcome a First
of ire at the end of last
being bombarded by the
glass brontosaurus on the
of his duck Charlie – who did
Wimbledon. At just 23, the
Nations doll to the toy
month – first for promoting
devoted fan base of K-pop
Stuart Highway in Darwin, is
two flights in one weekend,
true blue sporting legend
chest. Her name’s Kiya, from
full-body make-up, which
superstars BTS, Channel 9
due to be dismantled by its
after years as an earthbound
is the first Aussie woman to
Nyoongar country in Perth,
no one has the time for,
and 20 To 1, was to not air
new owners, Bunnings – and
duck! – with a video posted
cop the top ranking since
and she’ll be introduced to
and then for releasing a
a baldly thoughtless seg-
social media is aflame, with
to Twitter. Extremely whole-
Evonne Goolagong Cawley
Aussie kids by Miranda Tap-
line of shapewear with the
ment about the superstar
locals mourning the loss of a
some content.
in 1976.
sell during NAIDOC Week.
bafflingly insensitive
boyband being a fad?
true icon.
name Kimono.
The final thought
I’m getting intolerant of the number of times I have to bring up the intolerance paradox.
W
Words by Maxim Boon
ell, here we are again. A failed attempt by the multi-millionaire Christian fundamentalist and social media troll Israel Folau to raise the $3 million funding for his legal bid to be an anti-LGBTQIA+ hate-monger has once again led us to that dilly of a pickle, the in-
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tolerance paradox. This nifty bit of beardstroking intellectual philosophy has become something of a torch song for these troubled times in which we live as freedom of speech, expression and religion has morphed into freedom to discriminate (at least according to Mark Latham, Rupert Murdoch, and that one uncle you try to avoid at family BBQs). So (and probably not for the last time) here are the cliffs notes on why axing a GoFundMe campaign attempting to raise cash for the express purpose of persecuting a minority doesn’t count as an “attack on freedom.” Firstly, you need to know that tolerance is not really a thing. For the absolutely tolerant, tolerance is a binary state; you either are, or you’re not. You cannot be somewhat tolerant, or a bit tolerant, or tolerant every now and then. True tolerance demands that you be unanimously unwavering in your commitment, and this includes tolerance of intolerance. If someone is actively participating in acts of intolerance, like using their celebrity kudos to promote the idea that gay people are going to burn in hell, those who are truly tolerant cannot speak out against this, since to do so would itself be an act of intolerance. Does your head hurt yet? Well it should, because regardless of what a mindfuck this moral Morpheus loop may be, this toler-
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ance catch-22 has been conveniently weaponised by the likes of Folau, who hope to defend the indefensible under the banner of free speech. Clearly, this is a model that simply doesn’t function, primarily because it gives one side of the equation all the power while the other is hamstrung by their own principles. Yet, the notion of boiling down ethical choices to their bluntest, most maddeningly simplistic state is one that plays to the antiintellectual sensibilities of arch conservatives. Hate doesn’t have to be logical or stand up to reasoned scrutiny, it can simply be: “I hate the things I hate because I hate them.” And yet, to dispassionately stand by while hate is being promoted is to be complicit in that act, so while total tolerance might be the most zen behaviour, it is the least rational. As summarised by philosopher Karl Popper in The Open Society And Its Enemies: “If we extend unlimited tolerance even to those who are intolerant, if we are not prepared to defend a tolerant society against the onslaught of the intolerant, then the tolerant will be destroyed, and tolerance with them.” And there we have it. Nope, Folau, mate, you’re not having your freedoms impinged because your apparent right to attack an entire community does not cancel out their right to live with dignity, equality, and safety. Sorry, not sorry.
SWEATING
COLD SWEATS
BRONCOSPASM
EA BR US
YN IET A
NOSE BLEED S
G
AIN TP
REDU CED A TTEN TION
ITIN
MUCOUS MEMBRAINS
THROAT SORENESS
ES CH
R ANX EVE
IA
ES TROK
OMN
OF S
INS
RI S K
VOM
SM UXI F
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