SEXY BISTRO
OPENING UP
There were lots of drugs involved in the making of the new Lords Of Wong album. Gerald and Michael Wong get down to brass tacks with Brendan Telford. here ain’t no party like a Lords Of Wong party. The Wongs have been meeting people’s lowered expectations for a few years now, and their ramshackle sleaze and shimmy has been perfectly captured on their newest release, Club Bistro. The five-piece relocated to the unlikely surrounds of Maleny, and among the partying managed to come away with a record.
Ryan Miller of Sydney mavericks The SideTracked Fiasco, opens up to Tony McMahon about the band’s softer side.
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“I wouldn’t call it a nightmare, more a series of small mishaps pasted together,” bassist Gerald Wong states wryly. “There were difficulties along the way and it took a few days to get into the groove of things. Donnie [Miller] did well with the recording; he was tearing his hair out, but we are used to tearing our hair out over Jimmy [vocals]. Still, Donnie’s still speaking to us, so it can’t have been that bad.” A blistering listen, Club Bistro captures the visceral nature of the band, but a few eyebrows are likely to be raised over the sprawling title track. “We normally have one change in a track, pace or tempo, but there are none there,” Michael Wong (guitar) states. “We had intentions of getting a couple of jam songs out when we were up in Maleny. We also really wanted someone on the album who could sing, and Sabrina [Lawrie] really fills that void for us. There was a lot of banter about Club Bistro, and the whole album kind of built around that title and song. It came out really well actually, even though it just plays over and over; there were a lot of drugs involved to be honest, as you can probably tell from the lyrics.” The album has been created to succinctly sum up the Lords Of Wong live experience, complete with banter and talking between tracks. “We wanted to have an album that you could play right through in one sitting, as if it was one track,” Gerald explains. “We didn’t want it to sound like a whole lot of different stuff put together. We went up there with a bunch of songs we thought we could record, then wrote some songs while we were there, then pieced everything together so that
it sounds something like a set. We wanted something intimate, as if you were there with us – a little image of ourselves. We can bring you down to our level.” Another interesting factor about the album is its consistency, especially considering that three consecutive tracks have the same playing time (3.01). “There is nothing planned, yet the weird thing is that on the first record, we had about six songs that came in at 4.01,” Michael admits. “But we figured 4.01 was far too long for an average song so we settled on 3.18. If you play at 120 beats a minute, verse and chorus, you will land on 3.18, and that is close to the average single length of three-and-a-half minutes. Really, we are shaving 12 seconds of filler off to give everyone what they clearly want – enough time to get a quick beer and sit down ready for the next song.” Club Bistro is the perfect document of Lords Of Wong that you can get outside of the live arena, but it’s on stage that the band truly shines. “I don’t want to give too much away, but it’s going to be very sexy, in a Wong way,” Gerald asserts. “We will be creating a beautifully colourful cocktail for the evening, which I believe will be called a Bistro Bliss, and we want to encourage people to dress sexy. There may be a key bowl too. Leave your inhibitions – we are classy like that.” WHO: Lords Of Wong WHAT: Club Bistro (Independent) WHEN & WHERE: Friday 16 November, Beetle Bar
NO SLEEP ‘TIL CYBERTRON New Zealand dubstep mastermind Optimus Gryme gives Chris Yates a brief rundown on how he has found himself at the cutting edge of the most omnipresent electronic musical movement in a generation.
Even when he did take the plunge and started making his own music, he was in no hurry to rush into getting it out there, preferring to wait until he knew he was ready for the world to hear it. “I made music consistently for seven years and had made over 400 beats before I sent them to anybody,” he says. “I knew the sound I wanted and I wanted to wait ‘til I got it before I sent the beats around. Too many people send tunes to producers and labels after they’ve been writing for a few weeks. I’ve had people send me the very first tune they’ve made and say, ‘What do you reckon?’ Geez, it’s your first tune and you’ve been making beats for two days – what do ya think I reckon?!” The self-taught producer says that he learnt everything he knew messing about in the studio, and it’s this informal training that has no doubt shaped the unique, dark sounds he’s producing. He handles all the elements of production himself, right down to the engineering and tech side of things, which he says is common in New Zealand. He’s pretty sure his Polynesian tribal roots have influenced his love of heavy beats, and have contributed to his sound in a subconscious way, admitting he was always surrounded by music growing up.
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While this was obviously the primary motivation behind the release of the track, Miller admits that his band also wanted to avoid being pigeonholed. “We also wanted to bring something out that showed another side of what we do. This is the third song we’ve released this year, and the other two were quite fast paced and manic. It was kind of a toss-up between this one and Squeeze The Monkey, which is a much heavier song. We just thought we’d show another side, yeah.” But The SideTracked Fiasco are already a band that can and do surprise in the space of a song, with their music containing elements of funk, thrash, reggae and hip-hop. When Miller touches on the genealogy and philosophical underpinnings of the band, all becomes clear. “I first started the band in the garage with my brother. I grew up listening to punk and metal, basically. In the last sort of 12 years I’ve gotten right into hip hop. But I didn’t want to make something that was either this or that. It’s like ‘Let’s play some music. If we want to play some metal, we’ll play some metal. If we want to play some reggae we’ll play some reggae’. We’re
Talking of fun and philosophy, TSF have just completed a seventeen-show tour and are about to hit the road to do it all over again. “[Touring’s] really fun,” Miller says. “We get to meet a whole lot of great bands and great people. We just want to get out on the road and tour as much as we can. What could be better? We take not taking ourselves seriously very seriously. We want to get people dancing and see them go crazy. Yeah, it’s just awesome fun.” Miller and his band are beginning their latest tour in Melbourne, and in talking about this he reveals a surprising fact that should have local punters proud of their town’s status wanting to right some wrongs. “Melbourne’s been a little quiet for us, in all honesty,” he says. “It hasn’t been our busiest town by any means. We’re hoping to change that because we’ve had some really good nights out in Melbourne just drinking and socialising – it’s an awesome place – but as far as shows go, yeah, a little bit quiet. Part of it might be that there’s such a good music scene there. Maybe there’s a lot of competition, I don’t know? You can go out and see really awesome bands seven nights a week in Melbourne. We’ll have to see what we can do to change all that.” WHO: The SideTracked Fiasco WHAT: Enter The Motivated Sasquatch (Green/MGM) WHEN & WHERE: Thursday 15 November, The Beer Garden, Gold Coast; Saturday 17, The Brewery, Byron Bay;
REBIRTHING arlier this year, many in the Aussie punk community were gutted to hear that A Death In The Family were pulling the pin. Things weren’t flowing as they once had, and with increased commitments came less flexibility for band members to give their all to the cause. Few would’ve believed, however, that it was to be the last we’d hear from Jamie Hay. The group’s husky guitarist had dabbled with solo work in the past, so it seemed natural to explore that path further, the end result being King Of The Sun, a body of work that’s as raw and emotion-charged as anything he’s done with the volume turned up.
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“I DJed hip hop for about six years before delving into drum and bass. I also formed a rap group when I was fifteen. There were three of us in the group and we sucked big time,” he laughs.
“Lyrically it’s about a bit of a messed up relationship, on both parts, but mostly myself. It’s basically apologising, I guess. It probably makes it stand out from the rest of the EP. It’s definitely our most mellow track – possibly the most mellow track we’ve ever recorded. The rest of the EP is much more manic and quite a bit heavier.”
not trying to fit into any mould or scene or anything like that. We just play the music we feel like playing. It just makes it so much more fun for us as well.”
After the split of Melbourne punk stalwarts A Death In The Family, Jamie Hay wasn’t in the mood to mourn. As Benny Doyle finds out, there were solo songs still to be sung.
ptimus Gryme (real name Charlie Brown) has been carving his niche in the NZ electronic scene for more than a decade, tackling a variety of genres and styles that have ultimately led him to where he is today. He’s the first to admit that he hasn’t always been on the forefront of all things beats related. Before he became a producer himself he dabbled in some nearby neighborhoods, but didn’t really always fit in.
ndecision is the new single from Sydney funkcore roustabouts The SideTracked Fiasco, the latest from their EP, Enter the Motivational Sasquatch. As befits an outfit whose members don body paint and chequered full body suits on stage, the song is simply way too much fun. Interestingly, though, Indecision also represents something of a departure for the band, dealing as it does with personal and introspective matters. Frontman Ryan Miller explains the reasons for the sudden about face, and they’re much more brutally honest than anything to do with musical direction.
“A lot of my family could pick up a guitar and play, so there was always a gat in the house. I would always sit around our stereo and play 45s when I was a kid, then tapes when I got older. For years I would sleep with the radio on, which was awesome because I’d wake up in the middle of the night when a song I liked came on then drift off to sleep listening to it. I feel a lot of music got engraved into my soul by doing that.” “I always knew I would make and play music. When I was fourteen years old I setup a stereo in the corner of my garage. I pretended the garage was full of people and they were all dancing to my DJing. I didn’t have any DJ gear or anything, I just pretended to mix and scratch,” he laughs again. “It’s funny because it would have only taken twenty people to fill the room!” Despite the growing recognition his music is receiving and the opportunities that are opening up for him, Charlie still has his feet on the ground. “I’m just gonna keep making music,” he says straight out. “I will make music until I can’t make music anymore. I don’t have any goals like ‘I wanna be famous’ or ‘I wanna make a platinum record and be number one on the charts’. None of that matters to me. I literally just wanna make quality music – music that touches people. As long as I can do that, I’m happy!” WHO: Optimus Gryme WHEN & WHERE: Friday 16 November, Coniston Lane
“I guess I just write about what I feel needs to come out, and I don’t really think too much about it – I leave it up to others to say whether they like it or not,” he explains, pondering how these songs reflect the bearded man with the six-string. “I don’t really [mull] over what a song represents to me, because a lot of the songs have a different vibe with different instruments and stuff like that so it’s not a one-trick pony kinda record. I wanted to go out there and show I could do a bit more.” To bring out “more”, Hay called on a bunch of mates to assist with the album, including former ADITF bandmate Matt Bodiam, Carl Burnett from Arrows, The Scandal’s Liam White and Blueline Medic’s Adrian Lombardi. But listening to the reflective Fireworks In The Distance or torch song Rabbit On, it’s clear that this is versatile music suited to any guise. “We had a jam last night and we worked out another song to get happening with the band,” he informs. “But there’s some [tracks] that I felt didn’t need anything else on it, I just wanted to keep it bare. That’s the great thing – I’ve got a real good bunch of mates who’ll get onboard with whatever crazy idea I have.” The former Novocastrian didn’t return home to lay down the LP, nor did he stay in Melbourne, where he currently resides. Instead, he crossed Bass Straight to connect with a Tasmanian friend.
“I actually went to south Hobart to record it,” Hay tells. “My mate Lincoln Le Fevre’s house, I went down there for eight days, I recorded some drums at a different studio but most of it was at his house in his little studio/ bedroom. It was good to just focus on the task at hand rather than... well, my experiences before, you go to the studio, then you go home and go back to familiar things. This just takes you out of your comfort zone and immerses you in the recording with everyone there.” Aside from Lombardi, every additional player made the journey south too, with the closeknit vibe permeating through the record. “Some of the time I’d have things worked out that I had in my head for a while, but a lot of the songs I’d just let the guys work out and we’d do it between us,” he expands. “But when there was something that I was 100% sure would sound good I’d try and push it out. I didn’t want to be too much of a hard task master, though.” But for all the support on hand, this record is Hay’s, and his only. “I can’t help it – I need to write,” he resides. “Singing about certain topics can be hard but you’ve just got to work through that stuff.” WHO: Jamie Hay WHAT: King Of The Sun (Hobbledehoy) WHEN & WHERE: Thursday 22 November, X&Y Bar; Thursday 17 January, The Wasp Factory, Lismore; Friday 18, The Shed, Byron Bay (all ages); Saturday 19, Crowbar