Hardcore and punk with Sarah Petchell. Email punk news to wakethedead@timeoff.com.au Off!
A few weeks ago I mentioned that punk rock supergroup Off! would be heading out to Australia this December as a part of the Meredith Music Festival, and that I had my fingers crossed for sideshows. Last week I was able to successfully uncross my fingers when they announced over their Twitter, “Australia, you didn’t think we would be coming all that way just for one show, did you?” If you don’t know who Off! are, here’s a quick rundown. Featuring Keith Morris (Black Flag/The Circle Jerks), Dimitri Coats (Burning Brides), Steven McDonald (Red Kross) and Mario Rubalcaba (Earthless/Hot Snakes/Rocket From The Crypt), the music is fast, confrontational and pure punk rock. From their explosive debut (with only a handful of songs and no stage time) at 2010’s South By Southwest to now, Off! are resurrecting the rawness of hardcore punk of the past and bringing it into the present. Check out their First Four EPs compilation if you want a summary of what you can expect (musically at least) from the shows. On Sunday Dec 4 they play an 18+ show at The Zoo in Brisbane and then on Tuesday Dec 6 there is an all ages show at Sun Distortion Studios. Sticking to the semi Black Flag theme that I’ve got going so far, Henry Rollins looks to be heading back out to Australia (again!) in May 2012. Feel Presents announced last week that Henry would be in Perth around that time to do two spoken word shows as a part of the Perth International Comedy Festival. The presumption from this is that he will be doing shows across the whole of Australia at the same time, which fits in nicely with a blog post he recently made on his site of a proposed schedule of his touring plans for next year. If you haven’t checked Rollins’ spoken word show out before, I strongly recommend it. His wicked sense of humour combined with the no-holds-barred
delivery of his opinions and observations makes the shows equal parts entertaining and thought provoking. Stay tuned, as national dates are expected to be announced in the coming weeks. If you haven’t heard of Into It. Over It now is your chance to check them out, as the most recent album, Proper, is in stores now via No Sleep Records/Shock. Into It. Over It is a one man show, with Evan Weiss playing all the instruments on the album. But what sets him apart is the full band sound, rather than the regular acoustic sounds that seems to typify punk/hardcore-based solo acts. The album is heady and beautifully melodic, drawing inspiration from the likes of Sunny Day Real Estate, Death Cab For Cutie and Dismemberment Plan. It’s definitely worthwhile checking out the rest of Weiss’ back catalogue (including the EP from his full-band project, Stay Ahead Of The Weather) as he caught the attention of No Sleep Records four years ago with his 52 weeks project: for a year Evan wrote and recorded one track per week, which was eventually released by No Sleep in June 2009. Always a favourite, The Gaslight Anthem have announced that they will be releasing a series of live tracks as a part of their iTunes Sessions, expected to be available from Dec 13. Recorded at the Magic Shop in New York on Jul 25, it contains an unreleased original track titled Our Father’s Sons; four covers that have never before been put to tape, a re-imagined version of Boxer and the track (and my favourite TGA song) The Navesink Banks. I found some of the choices for the covers intriguing (Baba O’Riley by The Who and State Of Love And Trust by Pearl Jam) but it goes to show how diverse this exceptional band’s influences actually are. According to a post on their Facebook page, Converge have demoed the first 12 songs for their forthcoming album, and apparently that is only the tip of the iceberg of songs they have for this release. The as-yet-unnamed album will be Converge’s eighth full-length studio release and is the follow-up to 2009’s Axe To Fall (which was definitely atop my album list for that year). A release sometime in the first half of 2012 is anticipated, and just to build the hype some more, drummer Ben Koller has described the new material as “bonkers”.
This Thursday The Matador and IRONHIDE join forces with The Passenger to bring the heaviness to Snitch at X&Y Bar. Say one of the band’s names at the door to get in for $10 as opposed to $12 after it opens at 9pm. The massively proportioned Doomsday Festival kicks off this week at the Jubilee Hotel on Friday night. Headlining is US sludge masters Cough, Melbourne’s Clagg, Sydney’s Looking Glass and Summonus with local openers Fear The Setting Sun. You can grab a ticket through Moshtix for $29, with the music starting a bit earlier than normal at 8pm. For the rest of the country, Doomsday arrives in Sydney on Oct15, Adelaide on Oct21 and Melbourne on Oct 22. A gathering of all ages brutality is set to occur at Sun Distortion Studios this Saturday evening. It’s their last show Australian show before old school death/black metallers Impetuous Ritual and Grave Upheaval embark on a tour of the USA throughout November. They’ll be joined by black thrashers Mongrel’s Cross, who will be launching their 7” EP Whorseanna. $10, 8pm. Brisbane thrash metallers Malakyte will play a free show at Basement 243 in the Valley next Wednesday night. Joining them will be Scars Of Fury, Konskriptor and Breach Enemy Lines. Doors open at 7pm. Don’t forget that French black metal project Alcest is playing at the Globe Theatre with Melbourne’s Heirs on Thursday Oct 20. Opening up the show is rare live appearance for post-metal/rock megagroup From Whence It Come and ‘Neath, complete with Defamer’s Sam Alcock filling in on bass. Pre-orders for the new Hunter 10” and CD from Heirs will be available on Oct 31, with pre-orders going up on the band’s Bandcamp page this week. Another new Lynchmada track entitled Earth I Walk is up on their ReverbNation profile. It
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Bert Jansch
to Fleet Foxes and Kurt Vile have been open about how much the songwriting and guitar playing of Jansch has affected their own music. Neil Young once said, when comparing Jansch to the great Jimi Hendrix: “As much of a great guitar player as Jimi [Hendrix] was, Bert Jansch is the same thing for acoustic guitar… and my favourite”
I was all set for a very positive Roots Down this week as there have been plenty of cool shows announced over the past week or so, but on Wednesday night I got word that the legendary Bert Jansch had passed away so regrettably I must make the bulk of this week’s column somewhat mournful. Jansch was one of the true legends of the British folk music revival that sprung up in the 1960s, many referring to him as the British Bob Dylan. He had a style of his own though (not to mention he was a far better guitarist than Dylan) and one which kept his followers enraptured for over 45 years, during which time he released over 20 solo records as well as a heap of records with the very successful folk supergroup Pentangle, of which he was a founding member. In 1965 he recorded his debut, self-titled record which was sold to Transatlantic records for a mere £100; the record went on to sell 150,000 copies and still stands as one of the truly great records of that era. In 1967 Jansch founded Pentangle, a British folk supergroup that also featured John Renbourn, Jacqui McShee, Danny Thompson and Terry Cox. The band’s initial time together was a short five years, but their brand of “folk-baroque”, which had a heavy reliance on the amazing intertwining guitars of Jansch and Renbourn, was quite successful commercially for a band playing such complex music. Their 1969 album, Basket Of Light, reached the number five position on the UK album charts. While never enjoying any huge commercial success, it was the widespread influence of Jansch that made him such a revered name in the world of music. Countless artists from the likes of Donovan and Nick Drake all the way through
Up until recently Jansch was still performing live, still attracting rave reviews for his low-key approach to performing and his far from low-key technical talent and songwriting finesse. Last year he co-headlined a tour of the United States with Neil Young. He has had myriad plaudits and honours bestowed upon him; everything from BBC lifetime achievement awards to Mojo Merit awards and was even awarded an Honorary Doctorate of Music by Edinburgh Napier University in recognition of his outstanding contribution to the UK music industry. He passed away on Wednesday Oct 5 and was 67-years-old. I’d strongly recommend getting a copy of that 1965 debut record – it’s brilliant. Anyway I don’t want to be a complete gloommonger this week so here’s some good news. One of the major highlights of this year’s Big Day Out festival was London’s Jim Jones Revue, an amped up garage rock freight train that didn’t let up from go to whoa. I’d been a big fan of their Burning Your House Down record from last year and had pretty high expectations after hearing reports of their live show and they didn’t let me down. The rollicking piano driven blues rock is feisty and fun, packs a punch but makes you want to dance and the band shed all manner of blood, sweat and tears to ensure that no one can accuse them of phoning anything in. The band were recently announced to be back in Australia as a part of the Falls Festivals in Victoria and Tasmania, but they’ve also announced that they’ll be heading north for a show at The Zoo on Tuesday Jan 3. Tickets are available from OzTix right now for $39 + bf, and let me tell you it will be worth every cent – miss this gig at your own peril!
Pop culture therapy with Adam Curley
Metal with Lochlan Watt Confession, Thy Art Is Murder and Antagonist A.D. bring The Long Way Home tour to Queensland this weekend. Catch them on Friday evening at The Beenleigh PCYC with The Lane Cove.
Blues ‘n’ roots with Dan Condon rootsdown@timeoff.com.au
comes from their forthcoming sophomore album To The Earth. Unlike the already unveiled and particularly melodic number Relic, it shows the band pushing into heavier extremes with their stylised sound. The band will launch their album at The Hi-Fi on Oct 21 with Down Royale, The Construct, Tyrants! and A Breach Of Silence. Pre-sales are available through Moshtix for $10, or you’ll pay $15 at the door after it opens at 8pm. Texan natives Absu will bring their crushing mythological occult metal to Australia in January with the Sunshine Coast’s blackest oddities Portal and Tasmania’s grim Ruins, playing the Globe Theatre on Jan 12 with Defamer. The touring trio will then go on to Sydney on Jan13, with Melbourne and Hobart on the Saturday and Sunday. Huge! If you’re a fan of metal but haven’t heard about Soundwave 2012’s line-up yet you might be living in isolated misanthropy out in the middle of nowhere. Though Adamantium Wolf supposes that it’d be unlikely for Time Off’s circulation to reach your cold abode, just in case it includes System Of A Down, Slipknot, Mastodon, Limp Bizkit, Dillinger Escape Plan, Marilyn Manson, Hatebreed, Machine Head, Coal Chamber, Trivium, Meshuggah, Devin Towsend Project, Raised Fist, Meshuggah, Chimaira, Gojira, Kvelertak, Hellyeah, Dragonforce, Biohazard, Cro-Mags, Watain and dozens more non-metal bands like Steel Panther, with more to be announced. Feb 25 it hits the RNA Showgrounds, with tickets going on sale at 9am on Thursday Oct 20 through Oztix and the Soundwave website. Switzerland’s resident djent lovers Sybreed have announced their debut Australian tour for March. They’ll play at the Chaos ACT VI festival in Canberra on Mar 3 alongside Elysian, Anno Donimi, Mytile Vey Lorth, Alice Through The Windshield Glass and Brisbane’s The Schoenberg Automaton. Something called ‘Moshpere’ has been announced for Brisbane on Mar 19, and further information on that does not yet appear to have been made public.
Is everyone sick of talking about Lana Del Rey already? I write ‘already’ because it has only been a couple of months since her single, Video Games, started getting attention on YouTube, which isn’t a long time in a life of any kind (real, media, artistic or otherwise). But there has been enough said and written of the New Yorker in those months to cause major exhaustion and/or boredom. However, the reverse is also true: there have been enough things said about Lana Del Rey to cause a fully-fledged media and artistic life. And that’s something to talk about. Since Video Games started racking up the view credits in August, there’s been a fairly natural, large-scale thought process about the musical project of 24-year-old singer Lizzy Grant. The first, for many, was “Wow.” No points for intrigue there, but it’s certainly worth noting that a decent number of people were really, actually, not-forced-to-be impressed by Grant’s song, her vocal and, sure, her appearance in the clip (which is no crime). The second was, “Who is she and where does she come from?” As the answers to that question were sought – spurred on in equal measure by curiosity and scepticism over her sudden manifestation – a third question was being pondered: “What does she stand for and why do ‘we’ – the anonymous everyone – like her?” That third question wasn’t troubling, but the answers proffered have been: Lana Del Rey is a 1950s housewife throwback; a glorification of the Hollywood starlet as victim; a sign of cosmetically enhanced vanity plaguing society. Valid or not, why is it that women singers are readily held accountable for popular culture’s problems while men are not? Why is it that they must be mirrors of our collective inner feelings? Amy Winehouse was our mass desire for self-destruction. Katy Perry is our mass fickleness. Lana Del Rey is our mass shallowness and misogyny. But let’s backtrack to the second question: Who is she and where did she come from? What was discovered was surprising to some, irrelevant to others and scandalous to a vocal percentage. One of those was ‘Carles’ from the blog Hipster Runoff, who claimed to be “exposing” Lizzy Grant when
he blogged about her former career as a pop singer under her own name, signed to a major label and unsuccessfully marketed prior to her name and image change (including – that tricky, conniving bitch – apparent collagen injections). As the story got out, more voices jumped on the ‘Lana as created product’ bandwagon. Her online marketing was portrayed as a sneaky scheme enacted by a major corporation vying for the dollars of those with innocent intentions. The act of pitching the Video Games clip to music blogs, the cut-and-paste aesthetic of the clip (apparently the owned aesthetic of the ‘credible’) – indeed, the act of uploading the thing onto YouTube at all was seen as a con. And all those little indie kids wanted was a hero to believe in. Of course, the bigger story wasn’t that ‘indie’ kids were getting scammed. It was that Grant was taking the back door to fame. She was being widely pegged as the ‘next big thing’ even by her detractors, but those in the know had the real scoop. She was a pretender. Watch out world, you’re about to be had – and you don’t know the truth! Well, the truth is that Lana Del Rey isn’t about to be given a career by the ‘mainstream media’, or the blogosphere. She already has a career. While an old stalwart of the print media like New York magazine might act like it’s their job to “break it down” about Lana Del Rey for their readers – ie. let them in on whassabeen ahappenen on the web – the fact is that this shit already got broke down. Millions have seen the Video Game clip (or less have watched it multiple times) as well as the clip for the single’s B-side, Blue Jeans. Lana Del Rey’s first live shows in the States are being upgraded to bigger venues. News of those shows, and footage from them, is reaching a large audience – primarily online. The online media is no longer the realm of those ‘in the know’ or those whose job it is to lead things to the ‘mainstream’ – and to tell them when something isn’t right. It’s not just bloggers wanting their opinions validated by traditional media or cool kids shooting off. It’s the realm of everyone. And the sooner we realise that, the sooner we can start talking about something other than Lana Del Bloody Rey.