Archive for 2014
While I’ve been writing this I’ve felt like that french balancing guy, though more like a young, attractive, Australian version with plenty of friends and the critical journalistic respect of his peers. Not because I’ve chosen the carny life and ditched my three by two meter cubicle to start walking literal tightropes -that’s ridiculous- but because I’m struggling to be as positive as I feel this Laneous single deserves without losing all written form and spilling into an amorphous mass of press release.
Look, I want to be grounded about this, but it seems as if I can’t help but heap high praise onto this song. The fact of the matter is that it may be the best new song that I’ve heard this year, and that comes from a man who has heard something in the vicinity of twenty to thirty songs thus far. Laneous themselves are less new with a handful of years under the belt and have released more songs now than Client Liaison have released music videos which is- wow, ok, only four. Way more than that then. As a travelling troupe of lovable misfits they’ve teetered delicately across the ‘great live divide’: playing club tours and major festivals alike, and have maintained their balance throughout.
I want you to know the key things here but you mostly just need to know that this song is sort of groundbreaking. It’s actually everything you like about music- think boatloads of sitar-esque noises contrasted with bright synth bounce which combines into what we in the business, ladies and gentleman, like to call modernism. I’m drawing a limp bowstring here but the closest thing I can parallel it to is Kirkis combined with tUnE-YaRdS and if that doesn’t whet your appetite then it’s best I simply stop writing and you start listening. Here we go then.
They’re playing a few East coast shows from the end of the month onward which you would be a straight fool to miss.
Some days it’s hard to come to grips with the idea that anyone with the name Rick Scully isn’t a private investigator. First it’s anger, then it’s grief and usually just before lunch it’s acceptance. It’s a pain mitigated by the knowledge that though the name is near wasted, this one particular Rick Scully is doing something that clearly suits his skill set better than any sleuthing ever might have. He lives out Burwood way making guitar based beats of quality commensurate with his relevant musical background. You see readership, Rick Scully is one third of Yon Yonson. Your collective gasps will suffice to show you understand the gravity of the situation. Correct, you are in the digital presence of a mastermind, Burwood’s truest muse. The EP is a cheerful four tracks long and is calm but warm, moving forward slowly but forward none the less. I’ve chosen Nestle for your single song pleasure but listen to the whole EP through because each of the four songs reveals something different about Rick Scully as a musical entity.
JP Klipspringer (Real life name Jack Poulson) today shares with you [via me] his debut EP in its entirety. If you’re an Australian music devotee then you may have already heard the first two Klipspringer singles but he’s given over his remaining 50% for yours truly to round out the release. Fortunately he’s kept some ammunition in the chamber in the form of Anastasia, my favourite from the EP.
The inimitable Simon Lam has used some precious annual leave from his regular projects I’lls and Klo to leave his fingerprints on this one. He never overshadows Poulson on any of these songs, allowing some warmth and padding to underpin the vocals and cradling the existing melodies in a technicolour sheen. The full EP, here, now, for you.
Stop what you’re doing, listen to the new song from Jack R Reilly. Maybe get a tea or something, whatever you need to do to settle yourself fully before dedicating three and a half minutes to unbroken listening. Jack R Reilly’s new recording is a detailing of the physiological process of a debut panic attack which is perfectly hilarious in that this song is effectively the antithesis of an axious moment. He’s found that particularly sweet spot that’s served Fionn Regan admirably over the years, a tandem assault of gently strummed acoustic guitar verses and a big, harmonised chorus. I truly hope JRR finds the right ears because I can’t help but think this is going to resonate very, very strongly with a lot of people should they only have the chance to hear it. I’m certainly one of those people. His first song made an interested listener of me, his second has made me a fan.
The new song from Crooked Colours stays roughly in the same domain previously allocated to the band so don’t come to this expecting 13 minutes of experimental ambient rock. There was a couple of seconds at the start of the track where the guitar lick gave me deja-vouz sensations akin to smelling a very familiar smell that you just can’t quite pin down but I *think* it makes me think of Paul Simon’s Graceland. I know that sounds completely absurd but I’m talking only of that one micro moment, nothing more than a hint of fragrance. That same Alt-Jism to the vocal part is there which isn’t so obvious as to be derivative and lends the necessary flavour to make this stand out among some of it’s competing Australian contemporaries. Toms for good measure and you’d have to feel, at this point, that Sweat It Out might just have something decent on their hands.
Artists you need to know rn
| 1. 1300 |  |
316 |
| 2. Voidhood | |
259 | 3. jamesjamesjames | |
186 | 4. Zan | |
174 |
| 5. Sesame Girl | |
147 |
