Record review: The Jezabels – The Brink (2014, LP)

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Sydney quartet The Jezabels have become such an integral part of the Australian indie-rock landscape that it’s easy to forget that their debut album is just a little over two years old. While much of their time has been spent overseas since that well-received debut, The Jezabels are back with a bang and treating their Australian fans to an album release over two weeks before the rest of the world, and that can only be good news for us.

Intense, brooding and full of their trademark grandeur, The Brink picks up where Prisoner left off, albeit with slightly darker undertones and a few new sounds. Soaring anthems are what The Jezabels do best, and ‘Look of Love’, ‘The End’, ‘No Country’ and the title track are the best examples, while ‘Angles of Fire’ adds a touch of Kraftwerk-esque synths and ‘Psychotherapy’ is the token slow-burner.

Hayley Mary’s voice is the unquestionable highlight and places her near the top of the pile of Australian female vocalists plying their trade right now, and when everything else seemingly falls into place so easily, it makes for another strong showing from one of the country’s best exports.

Record review: Dum Dum Girls – Too True (2014, LP)

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DDG

What began in 2008 as a bedroom musical project for Dum Dum Girls singer-songwriter Dee Dee Penny must surely now be regarded as a pretty big deal. This third album from the Los Angeles native’s group comes bursting at the seams with an exhaustive list of influences that sees the band’s sound further moving away from that found on 2010’s I Will Be and 2011’s Only In Dreams. Opener ‘Cult of Love’ comes out of the traps at pace, like some sort of nightclub-noire rockabilly Blondie, and is closely followed in a similar vein by ‘Evil Blooms’; a swirly, fuzzy, The Cure-esque number, and ‘Rimbaud Eyes’, which plunders the sound of Michael Stipe and R.E.M. at their darkest. Elsewhere ‘In The Wake Of You’ gets punchy and lo-fi, ‘Lost Boys and Girls Club’ reeks of The Jesus and Mary Chain, and closer ‘Trouble Is My Name’ comes off like a gloomy yet laid-back Siouxsie Sioux. While some of the Dum Dum Girls’ earlier work could be called scuzzy, the production here is spot on; big where it needs to be, and restrained when it should be. In saying that, there’s a definite ’80s feel running throughout the album, and while to some that might sound like an insult, in this case it’s a compliment. Penny takes influences from only the best of that much-maligned musical decade – from New Wave, college rock, and most of the better indie-pop, and combines them with her trademark pop hooks to make a record that’s as catchy as it is charming. (Sub Pop)

Stephen K. Amos: “I’m going to tell you what I want”

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Amos

AUSTRALIA can’t get enough of Stephen K. Amos, but there’s one thing he wants to clear up.

“I met an Australian outside a show in London a few days ago,” he says. “And he just went ‘Oh my God, I didn’t know you lived in England!’ Of course I live in England! When I’m in Australia I tend to do a lot of television shows in a short space of time, and they get shown throughout the year, so people assume I actually live in Australia and everything is live.”

While television appearances will likely feature, a new stand-up show is the main reason for the Londoner’s visit this time around. “My new show is full of belly laughs and I like to throw a couple of things out into the audience to get their reactions,” he says.

“If anything happens in the audience or the venue and it’s funny or worthwhile I’ll run with it. The show is tentatively entitled ‘What Does The K Stand For?’ and it will basically answer all the questions that people ask me. I get asked the same sort of things that anyone would get asked; if someone has a funny name, looks a different way, is from a different place, or has different religious points of view and beliefs. I also get asked if I’m in a relationship, so I’ll be talking about break-ups and make-ups. I’ll also be looking at mortality, as I’ve done some calculations and worked out that I’m halfway through my life already.”

While generally known for his black humour and observational comedy, Amos’ new material is of a more personal nature than anything he’s performed before. “I was dumped rather grandly a couple of years ago. I didn’t see it coming at all, and I was given those ‘it’s stopped being fun’ and ‘it’s not you, it’s me’ lines. I thought it was all bullshit and crap, and I’m sure a lot of other people have been through that as well. We’ve all had relationships and know what it’s like to be loved and fall out of love. One of the questions I ask is, ‘is it better to be the dumper or the dumpee?’ I never seek permission from any of the people I talk about on stage. It’s up to me; if I was involved, that makes it my story.”

When asked if he has any regrets about switching from a potential career in law to one in comedy, the 43-year-old answers strongly. “Comedy is the one job in the world I can think of where you can say exactly what you want. There are no set regulations or compliance laws.

“With being a lawyer, the chances are you’ll be defending someone you know to be guilty or cross-examining someone you know to be innocent. It always makes me laugh when I see people’s Twitter accounts and they have ‘these views are my own’ on there. Oh, really? You had to put that there? Do we not all have a personal life any more? You’ll never see me saying anything like that. If I go to my bank manager to ask about a loan or something, they’ll tell me what the bank wants them to tell me. If you come see my show, I’m not going to tell you what you might think I’m going to tell you, I’m going to tell you what I want.”

Despite not actually living here, Amos keeps an eye out for anything topical he can add to his Australian shows, while avoiding other aspects of tour life. “I did shows last year in Australia, just at the moment when the battle for leadership between Rudd and Gillard was happening. That was such good fun as it was so ridiculous. I still can’t believe Julia Gillard was challenged for her leadership and they took it to a vote; only in Australia could this happen.

“When I’m doing festivals overseas a lot of comedians tend to hang out together. Bearing in mind that doing a festival means you’re away from home and loved ones, so the only people you know well are the people you’ve worked with for a number of years. The one thing we don’t do, which would be very annoying, is to sit around trying to out-joke each other. That would be unbearable. I’m currently on tour in the UK now, and finishing in February. I’m doing another radio series at the same time, and putting the final pieces together for the tour in Australia. After that, it’s back to the UK for another show, then a tour of America.”

Stephen K. Amos has the following Australian shows:

Feb 12-16, 18-20 – Adelaide Fringe at The Governor Hindmarsh
Feb 26-28, Mar 1-2, 4-10 – Brisbane Comedy Festival at the Powerhouse Theatre
Mar 12-16 – Adelaide Fringe at The Arts Theatre
Mar 17 – Adelaide Fringe at The Governor Hindmarsh
Mar 23 – Geelong Performing Arts Centre
Mar 24 – Frankston Arts Centre
Mar 28-30, April 1-6, 8-13, 15-21 – Melbourne International Comedy Festival Athenaeum Theatre
May 9-11 – Sydney Comedy Festival at Enmore Theatre
May 16-18 – Perth Comedy Festival at Astor Main Space

Live review: Aviici + New World Sound + Joel Fletcher – Brisbane Riverstage – 24/1/14

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One of the most in-demand DJs in the world right now, 24 year-old Tim Bergling – a.k.a. Aviici – brought his True album tour to Brisbane’s Riverstage on a nastily humid Friday evening for his first major Australian concert. Not since Future Music Festival have so many pairs of short shorts been on a single patch of grass at once, as an all-ages crowd collectively champed at the bit to have their eardrums assaulted by Sweden’s finest.

After an opening set by Melbourne up-and-comer Joel Fletcher, Gold Coast duo New World Sound get the sold-out audience bouncing with their trademark high-energy dance tunes and calls to the audience to get excited for “our boy Aviici”.

By the time our boy arrives at the relatively early time of 7:55, there is a palpable sense of release among the diverse audience as chants of “Aviici, Aviici” reverberate around the natural amphitheatre of the Riverstage and the DJ opens with the country-house number ‘Hey Brother’, followed closely by the piano-led ‘Long Road To Hell’. When it’s time for ‘You Make Me’ several hundred people are bouncing in unison in front of the stage, as thousands of streamers, jets of smoke and retina-searing lasers engulf the audience, and the sound is probably loud enough to be heard in the DJ’s homeland. By the time his remix of Calvin Harris’s ‘Sweet Nothing’ rolls around, the Swede has the audience eating out of his hand; and this is the scene which plays out until the venue’s curfew of 10pm, when the audience file out of the exits a little drained, but very elated.

Stella Mozgawa of Warpaint: “We’re still learning from our mistakes”

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stella mozgawa

PLAYING new songs live for the first time never gets any easier, explains Warpaint drummer Stella Mozgawa.

“We played our first show in New York two nights ago and it was pretty nerve-wracking,” she says. “There were definitely a few band members ready to throw up at the drop of a hat. There’s always anxiety, but we survived, and we’re still learning from our mistakes, so this time around we know how much preparation goes into executing something like that.”

Warpaint’s excellent new self-titled album – only the Los Angeles quartet’s second since their 2004 formation – sees the band’s sound evolving in unexpected ways.

“It’s a little bit different to our last record,” says Mozgawa. “We weren’t really a fully functioning live band when we recorded before. We spent about two-and-a-half years promoting that record and performing live, and finding out the type of band that we actually were, just naturally throughout that process. I think during the whole process of touring the last album and then working out what we would want to do for the next one we realised that we wanted more space in our music.”

“I feel that the first record has a lot of excitement in it, but it’s a lot of teenage excitement and it’s not very measured. When we wrote the new songs they kind of went somewhere else, and we wanted to maintain the focus, but it’s hard to say what they’re like stylistically, as every song is a bit different. The album is just the most natural expression of who we are as a band at this very moment. It’s been called minimalist, and that was intentional I guess; to do things a bit differently, but I don’t think there was necessarily a strong, overriding theme of minimalism. That’s just what we found worked at the time, but we are still a band very conscious of not being over-produced and still having that natural element. Minimalism certainly has a lot to do with how we operate. We recorded it in Echo Park, Los Angeles, at a studio called Fivestar, and we mixed the majority at Assault and Battery in London, which is our producer’s home studio.”

Despite the clear vision the band had for the album, they found that one final ingredient was missing. Enter English producer Nigel Godrich, sometimes referred to as the “sixth member” of Radiohead.

“I think we got to a point towards the end of the mixing process with two songs – ‘Love Is To Die’ and ‘Feeling Alright’ – where we really needed some kind of objectivity, as we had been living with the album for many, many months,” says Mozgawa. “We needed someone who could see it from another angle, and we were really lucky to have Nigel available to us to do that. He’s really much more of an artist than a producer, and he made a real difference to those two songs.”

Not satisfied with simply releasing an album and embarking on a world tour at the same time, an upcoming documentary will accompany the album, which Mozgawa says will show the band in a new light.

“There are little pieces of it being released systematically over the next few months. It will tie in to the different elements; from the single release onwards. Eventually it will be a fully-formed piece. It’s being done by Chris Cunningham, who doesn’t do things in an obvious way, ever. It’s going to be more of an art-form that a conventional documentary; quite personal and something a little bit different.”

As part of their world tour, the band will make the trip to Australia to vie for audience attention as part of a stellar indie-rock Laneway Festival line-up, among the likes of Lorde, Haim, Kurt Vile and The Jezabels.

“We played Laneway three years ago and came back in July of that year as well, and we’re a different band in many ways,” she says. “We’ll be playing new songs as well as old, and hopefully people will have heard the new album before we come.”

WARPAINT PLAY LANEWAY FESTIVAL, RNA SHOWGROUNDS FRI 31 JAN. WARPAINT IS OUT NOW.

Record review: Elizabeth Rose – Elizabeth Rose (2014, EP)

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Sydney producer, singer and synth-twiddler Elizabeth Maniscalco – a.k.a. Elizabeth Rose – has had a pretty stellar last twelve months. With a debut EP, performances at festivals across Australia and North America, and collaborations with the likes of Sinden and Flight Facilities under her diminutive belt, it’s time for the traditionally difficult second record. Luckily it’s something the twenty-three year-old takes in her stride, as this five-track EP is a fine collection of dreamy, layered electro-pop, warm synths, and flashes of R&B and dance spread over a cool twenty-one minutes. In many ways her voice is the most appealing aspect of Maniscalco’s music, as on opener and lead single ‘The Good Life’, which has had plenty of airplay and critical acclaim thus far. Smooth, clean vocals wash over edgy and angular synth sounds on second track ‘Out of Step’, with plenty of echo and reverb thrown in for good measure, before third track ‘Is It Love?’ presents a lighter, more airy vibe. ‘Sensibility’ continues in a similar vein, and final track ‘Only Me’ features Sydney R&B vocalist VCS in a strong finish. This EP – Maniscalco’s second – puts her in a similar bracket to a small group of young Aussie producers and performers (think Flume, Chet Faker etc.) doing plenty of great things with electronic music. Based on this evidence, 2014 should be a pretty good year for Elizabeth Rose. (Inertia)

Interview: Andy Gill of Gang of Four

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gang of four

AS guitarist, songwriter and founding member of iconic post-punk quartet Gang of Four, Andy Gill’s body of work is as influential as it is recognisable. To mark thirty-five years since their debut record Entertainment!, Gang of Four will tour Australia, playing the album in full. I fought possibly the crackliest phone line in existence to speak with Andy about the longevity of Entertainment!‘s appeal and rumours of new Gang of Four material.

Hi Andy, what have you been up to recently?

For the last few months I’ve essentially been locked down in the studio getting the new record finished. It’s thirteen songs, as yet untitled, and it’s been a culmination of a couple of years work. I’m probably getting a bit obsessive about it as I haven’t really been seeing the light of day sometimes.

It’s a new Gang of Four album, as opposed to solo stuff, yes? When do you expect to have it finished?

Yes it is. It will definitely be finished soon; when exactly it will come out is subject to quite a lot of debate at the moment; between labels and stuff. We’re trying to figure out if we can have it out by about June.

On this tour you’ll be playing the Entertainment! album in full, but will you be playing any of the new songs as well?

We’ll be doing firstly Entertainment! , or most of it at least. There’s a song on there called ‘Contract’ which we never play. We’ll do one but not both of ‘5:45’ and ‘Guns Before Butter’. There will be new songs, but there will be also newer songs; songs not necessarily from the new record, but our last few. We’ll have one or two things from Shrinkwrapped and some others as well; things that always appeal to our audience.

Why is now the right time to play Entertainment! in full?

I think as it’s been thirty-five years it’s a record that people can see laid down the band’s methodology and as such it’s an important record.

Which of the songs was least familiar to you during rehearsal?

There are some songs on there which we always play, like ‘Anthrax’, ‘Damaged Goods’ and ‘Natural’s Not In It’, and we’ve streamlined some of them, but ‘Guns Before Butter’ and ‘5:45’ would be the most unfamiliar.

Do you think that a lot of the themes on the album are still relevant today?

Absolutely. Very much so. The thing about the lyrical angles is that current affairs were a big part of our theme. We didn’t particularly sing songs about particular events, although sometimes we mentioned them in passing, but more often observations about our lives and the type of people around us, and this advanced capitalist society which we occupy. The new material is similar.

What are your plans for the rest of the year after the tour?

The record will be out at some point, and we’re going to tour all over the world. After Australia, there will be China, Japan, all over Europe, South and North America; so there’ll be plenty going on. Now we’ve got [singer] John Gaoler involved we can do live gigs, and that’s a really strong aspect of what we’ll be doing.

GANG OF FOUR AUSTRALIAN TOUR DATES:

Wednesday 19th March Corner Hotel, Melbourne
http://www.cornerhotel.com.au

Thursday 20th March Metro Theatre, Sydney
http://www.ticketek.com.au

Saturday 22nd March HiFi, Brisbane
http://www.oztix.com.au

Sunday 23rd March Capital, Perth
http://www.oztix.com.au

Live review: Misfits + Graveyard Rockstars + The Wrath – The Zoo, Brisbane – 16/1/14

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New Jersey horror-punk legends the Misfits may have had more line-up changes than Kiss, Thin Lizzy and The Ramones put together (possibly), but with founding bass player and vocalist Jerry Only still at the helm of the iconic band, they seem to be in just as good a shape as ever.

Brisbane’s The Zoo is packed and humid as a sell-out audience takes position to catch the make-up toting trio, with almost as many skulls on T-shirts as tattoos and chains hanging from a variety of facial features. First up is Sydney quintet The Wrath, who put in a strong opening set as the venue fills, followed by fellow Sydney-siders Graveyard Rockstars, whose performance is a mashing together of white horror-punk make-up, head-banging dreadlocks and foreboding tales about death and what might be lurking “six feet under the floor”. “This next song is a doomsday anthem,” says frontman Ash Rothschild. “You can take it how you will. That sounds a bit gay, doesn’t it?”

With a stripped-down stage show for their Australian jaunt, the Misfits themselves don’t take long before lowering the lights and appearing before an audience now collectively losing its marbles. Almost from the second Jerry, Dez and Eric take to the stage a mess of frenzied moshing breaks out front-and-centre, and the energy doesn’t let up for ninety minutes. Jerry Only is the focal point throughout; his trademark devilock hairstyle hasn’t changed a bit since 1977, and his spiked shoulders and skull-encrusted bass head reflect spotlights and drip sweat in tandem.

With Ramones-like speed the songs are reeled off, from ‘Land of the Dead’, ‘Scream’, ‘Attitude’, ‘Angel Fuck’ and ‘She’; the latter written when Only was seventeen, and seemingly about a hundred others. The inevitable crowd-surfing breaks out during ’20 Eyes’, and the band continue unperturbed as a sea of elbows, knees and beer bottles bubbles and boils beneath them.

Almost as quickly as it started the set is over, and I’m left with a feeling that despite the horror-punk label the band is given, there is so much more in their arsenal; from punk, speed-metal, rockabilly, and good old fashioned rock ‘n’ roll. They just don’t make ’em like this any more.

Record review: Bruce Springsteen – High Hopes (2014, LP)

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While the arrival of a new year brings new hopes and changes to many, some facts of life remain satisfyingly steadfast; and one of those is that The Boss never disappoints. Forty-five years and eighteen studio albums into a monumental career, the sixty-four year old New Jersey native shows no sign of slowing down; the fact that the majority of this album was recorded on the road, before being completed with covers, out-takes and reworked versions of songs that didn’t make the cut on previous releases is testament to that. The plundering of unpolished gems begins with the title track, a song originally recorded by The Havalinas in 1990 before appearing on the 1996 Blood Brothers EP. Aussie fans will notice a faithful cover of The Saints’ 1986 classic ‘Just Like Fire Would’, and I’ll be damned if it doesn’t sound like it came straight from the mind and fingers of the man himself, but it’s originals like ‘American Skin (41 Shots)’ and ‘Hunter of Invisible Game’ that really pick you up by the lapels, and set you down again with a soulful bump. The E-Street band is in fine form throughout, and given that the material is taken from a time period as long as ten years, recently-deceased members Clarence Clemons and Danny Federici both feature, as well as Rage Against The Machine’s Tom Morello on the excellent ‘The Ghost of Tom Joad’. While the coherence of previous Springsteen records is somewhat lacking and there’s a definite thrown-together feel to the record, the song-writing and execution are as masterful as ever, making this another fine addition to an already legendary catalogue. (Columbia)

Live review: Pond + Doctopus + Peter Bibby – The Zoo, Brisbane – 14/12/13

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Pond

In the future, when I think back to the time I saw Pond just before Christmas 2013, the main memories I’ll have – besides the outstanding performance of the bands themselves – will be ones of sweat, perspiration, humidity, and even more sweat. That’s what happens when Brisbane’s aircon-less The Zoo is sold out in summer, but what the hell; it’s Saturday night, the cold beers are flowing, and everyone’s getting loose in preparation for Pond.

After a set of folky, charismatic songs by Peter Bibby, the ramshackle trio of Doctopus take to the stage and batter their way through a fantastic collection of sweaty, lairy and hairy tunes, complete with sometimes unintelligible banter between. Theirs is a straight-up, fire-’em-off approach that is both exciting and catchy at once; a coarse but finely-executed set of rough-at-the-edges garage rock. Any band with an instrumental song called ‘QI/Stephen Fry’ and who fly-kick each other in the middle of songs is okay by me. (TIP: their album Buddies is free on Bandcamp – get on that thang).

The Zoo is heaving long before Pond is due to take the stage, and it’s refreshing to see that the crowd is seemingly entirely full of good vibes and enthusiasm for the head-liners, and there’s a generally great atmosphere despite the amount of perspiration going on. The Perth six-piece are in fine form, as they power through ‘Whatever Happened To The Million Head Collide’ and ‘Xanman’ early on, before moving through a set heavy with Hobo Rocket numbers. I’d seen Pond previously (at Laneway Festival last year) and while they put on a good show on that occasion, something about being enclosed on the smaller stage makes frontman Nick Allbrook a more engaging and entertaining mix of rabid posturing, banshee-like wailing, and clear enthusiasm for everything the band is doing.

‘Fantastic Explosion of Time’ is an obvious highlight, but it’s the pulsating juggernauts of extended jams throughout and a manic finish (including the expected level of crowd-surfing) that make the gig – and the band – such a unique one.

Record review: Leona Lewis – Christmas, With Love (2013, LP)

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Leona Lewis

Wow, Noddy Holder must really be quaking in his boots. The Slade frontman has more and more competition every year for the title of most-played Christmas song, with close to a dozen major artists taking a stab at the dying art this year. Leona Lewis isn’t going to trouble the ’70s legend with this substance-light ten-song collection of festive standards though, and you have to wonder why one of the most successful former X-Factor winners is lowering herself to make such a crappy record. Then you realise which record company she’s signed to, and the unmistakable whiff of Simon Cowell becomes as clear as day (Lewis is signed to the mogul’s Syco label); it’s easy to imagine him looking at the Christmas charts with glowing dollar signs in his eyes. Lewis has a strong and soulful voice, but listening to the cheesy schmaltz on this album made me want to tear down the tree, set fire to the tinsel, drop-kick the turkey off the balcony and cancel Christmas forever. Opener ‘One More Sleep’ is a dire start and probably the low point of the album, while ‘Winter Wonderland’ and ‘White Christmas’ are almost as painful but at least allow Lewis to flaunt her impressive vocal range. ‘O Holy Night’ makes a slight improvement, but then the horror of ‘Ave Maria’ drags the record back into the gutter. Perhaps Christmas albums shouldn’t be taken seriously, but this one is just another piece of evidence in the case against television talent shows. (Syco/RCA)

Mark Hosking of Karnivool: “It was a nice cap on what has been a very busy year”

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karnivool

THEIR LATEST ALBUM might have won them an ARIA, but don’t expect Karnivool to go changing to try to please us, says guitarist Mark Hosking.

“I certainly didn’t expect it to happen with this band, you know?” he says. “We were nominated for a couple, I think, and hard rock is such a weird area. We don’t even really define ourselves as hard rock, and it’s hard to say what we even are. The new album is quite challenging, but we don’t make apologies for that as it’s part of what we do. I think all awards need to be taken with a little bit of humble pie, but it’s a nice accomplishment. You never know how these things are going to go, so it was a nice cap on what has been a very busy year.”

More than four years in the making, the Perth quintet’s third full-length record sees the band once again pushing the boundaries of rock music.

“Asymmetry is a continuation of the journey that this band is on,” Hosking says. “We’ve always said we’re never going to do the same album twice. With this one we really had a chance to try a few things we’ve never tried before. The process of taking a long time to write music, turning every stone over and making sure we always find something we can use to our advantage is just the next phase of how we’re trying to be creative with this band. If we had our way we’d do an album every year, but we just know that’s not physically possible with the kind of stuff we’re doing. We do need time to breathe, and to be honest there are a couple of songs on the album that have come together in weeks, and others that have taken six to seven months. We’re happy because if we wanted to change it we could, but we seem to keep falling back to this period of time which tends to be around three to four years, when it feels like it’s cooked, if you know what I mean.”

Australian fans won’t have to wait long to see the band, with a national tour locked in for January.

“We definitely back our live show,” he says. “It’s something we feel is strong and we love to do it. There’s always trepidation about how new songs will be received; some people are going to like them and some people aren’t. On the live front, some people hear the more challenging songs and it clicks, or they get it more when they hear it live. We know that live, we have a better chance of getting our music across to people and they can better understand what you’re trying to do.”

Despite the ARIA win and plenty of recognition at home and abroad, Hosking is clear that the band won’t be resting on it’s laurels.

“We’ve just had a discussion about what’s happening in 2014,” he says. “It’s all a bit of a balancing act as we all have other things going on in our lives now and we’re no spring chickens any more. In saying that, we’ve made a big commitment to tour, tour, tour this album hard. We’ll be doing at least another run around Australia. There are some festivals overseas, more European action, and hopefully we’ll be getting to the States, as we’ve promised so many people we will. Around that, we’ll be trying to get these new ideas out of our heads and starting to form the next album.”

KARNIVOOL PLAY THE SHOWGROUNDS MARQUEE JAN 11.

Interview: Matt Neumann of Scotdrakula

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scotdrakula

MELBOURNE’S Scotdrakula are currently supporting the outstanding Mac Demarco on his Australian tour. I caught up with the band to find out what they’ve been doing this year, and if Christmas songs suck.

Hi Matt, how are things in the Scotdrakula camp? What have you been up to recently?

Things are hunky dory. Recently, we’ve been writing some new stuff and releasing our new single, ‘Break Me Up’. It came out a few weeks ago and since then, we’ve just been rehearsing and hanging out.

How did you meet and start making music together?

I met Evianne at The Empress where I was bartending and she was bar-flying. Dove and I met through our mutual friend Amanda and a bunch of beer.

Supporting Mac Demarco sounds pretty awesome. What can fans expect from your show?

I think it would be safe to expect roughly forty minutes of rock ‘n’ roll music interjected with some dancing, eye contact, quippy and somewhat obtuse onstage banter and smiling. Then we’ll leave all sweaty.

What’s the reaction to ‘Break Me Up’ been like so far?

Pretty good! I read someone describe the video we made for it as ‘genuinely unsettling’, which is massive compliment. It’s weirdly great to hear that something you made could unsettle someone. Wow…

You’re in the tour van or dressing room before a gig. What music is playing?

We’d just be tossing and catching switchblades and staring at the door.

You seem to have a reputation as a bit of a party band. What would be on your ideal rider?

The ideal rider would probably be just a few hundred dogs in a room to roll around with before and after we play.

Christmas songs: are they just a bit of fun or a festive pain in the arse?

It depends. Some are great, but every Christmas song written after my birth is a piece of shit. The worst Christmas song of all time is that Beach Boys song, ‘Santa’s Beard’. It sounds like they fucking made it up as they went. The best one is ‘Merry Christmas (I Don’t Want To Fight Tonight)’ by The Ramones.

What has been the band’s highlight of 2013?

We got to do some awesome stuff so far this year, but the standouts were probably playing Camp A Low Hum and getting to go play in Singapore. That was friggin’ neat.

SCOTDRAKULA PLAY THE ZOO BRISBANE 18th DEC.

Interview: Vinnie Fiorello of Less Than Jake

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Less Than Jake. Vinnie Fiorello, second right.

Less Than Jake. Vinnie Fiorello, second right.

SKA-PUNK legends Less Than Jake will head to Australia in 2014 to play Soundwave Festival, bringing with them over twenty years of finely-honed gigging experience. Drummer and lyricist Vinnie Fiorello tells me why the Gainesville, Florida band’s hunger for making music and performing is stronger than ever.

Hi Vinnie, what’s been happening in the Less Than Jake camp of late?

We were just on the Fat Wreck Chords tour around the United States; that was a five-week tour with Anti-Flag and a few other bands. A few weeks back we released our ninth studio record called See The Light, and that was on Fat Wreck Chords. Generally speaking reviews have been good, and we had a great time writing and recording it, and there you go; you’re caught up, man.

Tell me a bit about See The Light. How does it sound compared to your previous material?

Well, I think it’s most definitely the sum of all its parts. We took our time in writing and crafting the songs, and it progressed naturally as we let it kind of percolate at its own pace. We wrote and recorded it at our bass player’s studio in Gainesville, and from that point we had friends of ours mix it, and frankly, because of those parts it sounds like Less Than Jake, or a very refined version of the band that people have come to know for the last twenty years. There’s parts of very gruff point rock, there’s some minor punk in there, there’s classic ska-punk, and there’s some third wave ska. It’s very much influenced by ourselves and only by ourselves. It’s a very weird and crazy thing to be able to say that, but it’s true.

How much do you enjoy the recording process? Some bands find it a chore.

Not to fuck around, but there’s been times in the studio when it’s been a chore, and times when it’s been way too dramatic or silly. This time around we did it in Gainesville, and it was a very relaxed atmosphere and fun. It was cool to do it where I could go home at night as well.

I saw an interview you did a couple of years ago in which you said the album format is dead. Why change your mind now?

For the last five years we’ve mainly been doing EPs, and firmly I think that the album format is limping along. In the case of our album, when we started writing songs, we wanted a collection of songs that were similar thematically, and not only musically but lyrically too. You can’t really get that with EPs, so we went back to the full-length format. When we started to write it it fell together naturally and it was cool.

Do you still think albums have a future?

I guess it depends on the genre. I mean, the album format for pop music is already dead. If you take Katy Perry; she can sell one million singles, but only 100,000 copies of her album, and while those numbers are nothing to sneeze at, they are definitely not what they were three, five, eight, ten years ago. It’s insane how much it’s down. Punk rock has never been about the single, it’s been much more about the album format, and I think that might be the last stand, so to speak, for the album format. I had a great time doing the EPs, and I think it’s good for fans to be able to get music every eight or nine months instead of waiting three years.

What have you got planned for Soundwave Festival?

I think we’re prepared to have a good time like we always are. We’re going to show up, we’re going to play some songs, take some requests, rile the crowd, and have fun playing. It’s twenty-one years in, man, and if you’re not having fun being in a band and playing live there’s a serious issue, so we’re going to do what we do best; have fun and make the crowd have fun with us.

An outdoor gig in Australian summer. How do you deal with the heat?

Dude, I’m from Florida, and Australian summer has nothing on Florida. So to answer your question, I’m going to feel exactly like I feel when I’m at home, so therefore it’s going to feel good. It’s funny that you should mention it, because every time we’ve been in Australia prior to this, it’s always been Australia summer, it’s always been a great time, and it always feels like Florida to me. When I’m there it always feels like home, so it’s a great place to be. The crowds always love music and are always there to have a good time. They’re always passionate about the music they’re paying to see, and that’s exciting for anyone in a band, and certainly exciting to me.

Is there ever any trepidation playing new material live?

There’s always nerves. We sort of had a trial by fire this tour just finished. We would come straight out and do a new song, and people would look at us like they had no idea what it was. Later, when the record came out, you could see the slow surge of people knowing the songs.

What are your plans for 2014?

We’re just back from tour four days ago, so we’re off for a few weeks. Starting next year, we have an eighteen-date tour in the U.K.. Then we have three days off, then we come over for Soundwave Festival, then we come home. I can’t say what tour it is, but we just confirmed a summer tour for the United States, so we’re just working for the rest of the year. I’m sure there’ll be Europe in there for late 2014, and there’ll be South America in there somewhere. We have a new record out, so we have to put our feet as many places as possible.

SOUNDWAVE FESTIVAL DATES & VENUES – FEBRUARY/MARCH 2014

SATURDAY 22 FEBRUARY – BRISBANE, RNA SHOWGROUNDS
SUNDAY 23 FEBRUARY – SYDNEY, OLYMPIC PARK
FRIDAY 28 FEBRUARY – MELBOURNE, FLEMINGTON RACECOURSE
SATURDAY 1 MARCH – ADELAIDE, BONYTHON PARK
MONDAY 3 MARCH – PERTH, CLAREMONT SHOWGROUNDS

TICKETS ON SALE NOW: http://soundwavefestival.com/

Interview: Jerry Only of the Misfits

/ Paul McBride / Leave a comment

Jerry Only

AS iconic and influential a band as you’re likely to find still touring today, horror-punk Godfathers the Misfits are known as much for their genre-swapping music as they are for their Halloween-themed image. With line-up changes, legal battles and reunion tours behind him, bassist/vocalist Jerry Only continues to fly the band’s flag as loudly and proudly as ever. I spoke to the energetic frontman from his tour bus near Pensacola, Florida.

Hi Jerry, how are you? What have you been up to recently?

We’ve been up to just about everything, to be honest, I guess. We have a whole bunch of new releases all in different categories, we’ve been working on our label, and doing a world tour right now. We’re just finishing up the last leg in the United States and then we’re down in New Zealand and Australia after the new year break.

Tell me about the current line-up of the Misfits. Who have you got in there?

The current line-up of the Misfits has been around for going on thirteen years now. We have Dez Cadena, who was originally Black Flag’s frontman, and he was guitarist when Henry Rollins came on board. In 2001, I brought him out as a special guest for our 25th anniversary, he’s been with me ever since, and we’ve been doing some really great stuff together. He adds a dimension to what we do that we didn’t have earlier. He’s very fluent and has the ability to do some very fancy chords and stuff like that; his dad used to run a jazz and blues label. Dez basically grew up around the studio, so he’s got a really great ear, so when we do a cover of Elvis’s ‘Blue Christmas’ he can add some guitar over the top of it that’s still very punk rock, but fits very well with what we’re doing. He’s also working on a thing called Flag right now, which is the original members of Black Flag minus Greg the guitar player, and that’s going extremely well for him. I tell him that he must be a professional musician now, as he’s got more than one gig going at a time! Then we got Eric Arce, or as we call him ‘The Chupacabra’. He joined up with us back in the day when we had some issues and he was in Murphy’s Law, who were on tour with us at the time. When the band kind of melted down in the middle of the tour he filled in for us, and in the early 2000s he kept filling in for Robo every time he had a problem with his Colombian passport, and he would fly in and do the job. He’s young, hungry, and really aggressive with his very strong double-kick drumming, so he gives us this extra element of surprise. Now, we’re right up to speed with the tools needed to pull off some really thrash-y stuff these days. And me, I’ve been doing this shit forever!

What can Australian fans expect from your shows?

We try to be consistent, you know? I mean, for those of you who’ve seen us before, we have some new material which we think is amazing. We’ll be bringing that all with us, and as far as the fans go, they can expect pretty much more of the same. I tell people that every day we get a little better, and one day we’re going to be the best, so it’s a work in progress. It’s not something I’m going to change; I’m not going to try to come up with some sort of new gimmick for you. Our material speaks for itself, and you’re getting what you expect when you come, and we hold no reservations there. It’s just a matter of if you like the Misfits, come on down, and if you don’t, stay the hell home.

I notice you’ve made a Christmas record…

Yeah! I haven’t got one in my hand yet. I’m getting my first one tomorrow, and I’m very excited. I grew up watching all kinds of Christmas shows; as a kid Christmas always started around Thanksgiving, and I’d be looking in the catalogues thinking about what I want for Christmas, and The Grinch would always be in there. We re-did the song for that; it took a little while to figure out the formula to make it really, really cool, but it came out great. Then we did a cover of Elvis’s ‘Blue Christmas’. Now, back in the day when Glenn was in the band we had done a quick spurt of ‘Blue Christmas’ in Max’s Kansas City one night. I always wanted to redo it, and I always thought it was a cool song, and that’s where Dez comes in and shines. If you listen to it, it’s a punk song, but it has all the little Elvis innuendos that really make it amazing. We also did a song called ‘Island of Misfit Toys’; now I don’t know what Christmas programmes you have down below, but we have what’s called Rudolf the Red-Nosed Reindeer, which is kind of an animated cartoon with clay puppets, and they have what’s called the Island of Misfit Toys, where all the toys that have been fucked up, have got something wrong with them, or nobody wants them, or whatever the problem is, go to this island, and this song is based on that idea from that Christmas show. For me, it’s like being a kid in a candy shop again. I get the songs about all the stuff I liked as a kid, and use them, and I’m very happy with it. I was thinking of pumping gas, but this might have changed my mind!

You’re often credited with inventing the horror-punk genre. When you started out, did you have any idea that you were starting something like that?

Well, I’ll put it to you this way. I thought we did the same with speed-metal and hardcore as well. We’re a very diverse band, and our subject matter and our image is definitely a horror and science-fiction based image, but our musical extravaganza is all over the board. We go from songs like ‘American Nightmare’, which is a pure rockabilly Elvis Presley/Gene Vincent kind of a song, to something like ‘Earth A.D.’, which is pretty much the speed-metal bible when it comes down to it. We got songs like ‘Halloween’, we got ballads, we got thrash, we got metal, we got it all you know? A lot of time that leaves us in a position where we’re kind of in a class all of our own; it’s really hard to lock us down. A lot of people tag that horror-punk thing on us. Are we a horror-punk band? Of course. But do I think a horror-punk can sustain itself without having great songs? No I don’t. The longevity is in the music, not the look. We’re almost finishing up our fourth decade, we’re going into our 38th year, and my job is to try to keep the band together for fifty. In that time, I’ll build my catalogue to a point where I have stuff all over the place, so when people make movies in the future, they can come back to a Misfits catalogue and pick a really great song that fits any application. I’m not limiting myself to being a horror-punk band. Did we father it? Sure. But we also fathered the Metallicas and the Anthraxes of this world. We have a lot of influences, and it’s based on simplicity and tasteful vocal melodies. I think Glenn really struck a chord when we did something like ‘Earth A.D.’ and he’s really crooning through this stuff, you just realise that it’s a matter of doing tasteful stuff, and I like to think we have a little bit of taste.

What would you like to do in music that you haven’t yet done?

Right now it’s funny, because I kind of covered a lot of things with this Christmas record. Covering ‘Descending Angel’ again, which is a song I wrote for my dad about 1999 when he was sick, and he just passed and didn’t get to hear the song before it came out, is important. I’ve realised the importance of trying to get things done as quickly as you can and not put things off, but the B-side of that is ‘Science Fiction Double Feature’ which I’ve always wanted to cover. We’ve always wanted to do a fifties project; we’ve done that. The new album, I’m very happy with. Right now, I want to go back into the studio and do a lot of the Elvis tracks that I’ve always wanted to do. Also, with the Christmas record, we missed the shelf time for it to actually be bought, and we’d like to get a full-length album out of it for next year, and really go for the Christmas angle with some really cool artwork. We also have images of Marilyn Monroe wearing our T-shirts all over the country now; that’s something I always wanted to do. I mean, if you can align yourself with Elvis Presley and Marilyn Monroe and people like that, I don’t see how you can’t be recognised as a force, you know? And we’re doing it in a tasteful way too. People who see our skull on a T-shirt know exactly what it means, and those who don’t are still attracted to it. It’s like a moth to a flame; we’re just trying to make that flame as big as we can to get as many of those little moths in there as possible.

What are you most looking forward to about coming to Australia?

The only throwback about coming to Australia is the distance between cities, so for us to actually make it economical, we need to fly between shows, so we do kind of come bare-boned. In saying that, if there’s any band out there who can come and take it to the hoop for you guys, it’s us. We’d love to come down and do some of the big festivals in the future, where we can bring all our stage gear, lighting and set. At the same time, seeing the Misfits in our raw form is what it’s all about anyway. We haven’t been there in three years, so I think it’s going to be refreshing for those who have seen us, and for those who haven’t it’s going to be an experience. So, I hope that does you!

MISFITS AUSTRALIAN TOUR DATES 2014:

Thursday, 16th January
The Zoo, Brisbane

Friday, 17th January
Corner Hotel, Melbourne

Saturday, 18th January
The Factory Theatre, Sydney

Sunday, 19th January
Amplifier, Perth