music

Beth Hart: “Who wants to deal with being a recovering drug addict?”

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beth hart

BETH HART is a singer-songwriter, storyteller and survivor all rolled into one.

Hand-picked to play Byron Bay Bluesfest after director Peter Noble saw her earn multiple standing ovations supporting Stephen Stills, the Californian will help the festival mark its 25th year.

“We put on an eclectic show,” she says. “It has blues, jazz, soul, rock ‘n’ roll and some singer-songwriter stuff. I’ll usually play a couple of songs from all my past records and then focus on the last two or three. There’ll be lots of energy and hopefully it’ll be a good time. I do a different show every night anyway, so it’s fun to play with it at a festival. I’ll watch the audience a little bit and kind of get a feel for what the vibe is or what kind of festival it is. Then we’ll work up a set before we go out and hope it works. It really drives some of my band members crazy when I change things around halfway through, but it’s important to be in tune with what’s going on, put on a good show and give people what they want. If I get the feeling they’re wanting something a bit harder or more aggressive I’ll change the set and throw something else out.”

As she speaks candidly about her past battles with the addictions that sent her spiralling out of control and saw her spend a stint in jail, Hart remains pleasingly upbeat.

“It’s a one day at a time thing,” she says. “Thanks to being involved with people that have come before me and have gotten sober I’ve had a lot of help. It’s been a little over thirteen years since I took drugs, thank God. I still have my little slip-ups here and there with alcohol but I’m healthy and married to a wonderful man, and I thank God I still get to make music and I’m still really excited about it. In the last couple of years I’ve gone in some different directions as a writer and that’s been really challenging in a good way. When I was on drugs it had got so bad that I wasn’t able to leave the house. When I was going through early recovery I had agoraphobia, so it was definitely a rough recovery, but I think that’s what’s kept me from ever going back. I would never survive it again. Is there a part of me that wishes it never happened? Sure. Who wants to deal with being a recovering drug addict; it never really goes away, but I think of it as a real gift and I mean that. It’s an opportunity to share something and they are the points in my life when I lean on people I love and my ego gets smashed. It’s like ‘holy crap, what am I going to do?’ It changed me and it still does, but the changes I’ve found are things like the ability to care for other people who are struggling instead of judging. It’s been a blessing.”

Since becoming sober, Hart’s resumé boasts a series of A-list collaborations with Slash, Jeff Beck and Buddy Guy, and two albums with guitarist Joe Bonamassa.

“It just kind of clicks with Joe,” she says. “He and I really get off on similar genres of music. We both feel very passionately about the music, and when it comes to the songs that we chose for the Don’t Explain and Seesaw records we were both so invested in trying to bring something that was honest. I love him for that; he has such integrity and total commitment. I think he’s such a great artist; just fucking fantastic.”

Another positive aspect of having a sober and rehabilitated Beth Hart back in business is the prolific nature of her musical output.

“I’m making a new record in August with Rob Mathes,” she says. “I should be making another record with Joe Bonamassa a little bit after that, while simultaneously writing the following record after that as well, as it’s going to be with Kevin Shirley instead of Rob Mathes. So I’ll be doing lots and lots of writing in the upcoming months, which I love, so I’m having a good time and it’s flowing. There’s nothing worse than trying to write and being in one of those stalemates where I can’t move or come up with a thought; that’s always terrifying. I’m having a good time with that right now. I’m going to be touring, making a record, and then back to touring in the fall. That’s how I make my living; lots of time on the road. Last year I got a bit run down, so I took off with my instruments into the mountains where there was no TV or anything like that. Getting away from everything and everybody was really helpful for me. I’d never really rejuvenated like that before.”

Despite mixing it with big names in North America, it’s in New Zealand where Hart has had her biggest chart success to date, hitting the top spot in 1999 with single ‘LA Song (Out Of This Town)’. Her explanation for her success there?

“Oh God, I would be the last person to ask that,” she says. “I have no idea; I’m just happy when we can connect in some way.”

BETH HART PLAYS BYRON BAY BLUESFEST APRIL 17-21, THE BASEMENT SYDNEY APRIL 12 AND THE CORNER MELBOURNE APRIL 15.

Live review: Richie Sambora – The Tivoli, Brisbane – 20/2/14

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Richie Sambora

IF YOU BELIEVE EVERYTHING that you’ve read in the majority of music press, it would seem that the past week has been a turbulent one for Soundwave. Bands pulling out of the festival, a multitude of timetable changes and a flurry of what promoter AJ Maddah has referred to as “pissing contests” between bands have all contributed to an impression of a festival in trouble. If you look past the melodrama, however, you’ll realise that there remains a festival of almost a hundred bands of such impressive diversity and talent to make any such trivialities irrelevant, and with more rock credentials than any music fan could spend a day shaking several sticks at.

A pleasant bonus to having Soundwave roll through town is of course sideshows, and tonight’s gig from ex-Bon Jovi member Richie Sambora would be a more than pleasant addition to that roster.

With a set beginning at the early time of 8pm and with no support bands on a stiflingly humid Brisbane evening, it could be suggested that Sambora might have his work cut out to make the gig work, but this is one rock stalwart who has played more stadium gigs than some of the fans here tonight have had hot dinners, so it’s no surprise that the old master works the audience into a frenzy with a series of classic rock tracks and plenty of between-song banter. The only question remains is how much Bon Jovi material will he play, and will he mention his old song-writing (and latter day sparring) partner?

At around 8:30 the lights dim and AC/DC’s ‘Thunderstruck’ comes over the PA, announcing the arrival of the healthy looking Sambora and Australian guitarist Orianthi among a six-piece setup. Starting off with the first two tracks from his most recent album Aftermath Of The Lowdown, ‘Burn The Candle Down’ and ‘Every Road Leads Home To You’, he directs his audience to “wave your hands motherfuckers,” and said motherfuckers respond in the appropriate fashion. Explaining that his last album was a cathartic one for him to write and record, and receiving an amiable ribbing from a few people in the crowd for drinking water instead of alcohol, the 54 year-old says that “there’s too much shit around music now; people just want to hear people communicate music and jam out,” in reference to over-production and adding too many electronic elements.

Working through ‘Taking A Chance On The Wind’ followed by an excerpt from ‘Bridge Over Troubled Water’, Sambora leads the first huge sing-along of the evening for Bon Jovi number ‘I’ll Be There For You’, although there’s no mention of Jon as yet. Platinum-blonde guitarist Orianthi is a hard-rocking delight throughout; trading riffs and owning large sections of songs, while not stealing the limelight at any point. Its easy to see why she has been voted one of the top female guitarists in the world by several guitar magazines.

A cover of INXS’s ‘Don’t Change’ is wedged appropriately into the show at this point, before ‘Sugar Daddy’ and ‘Weathering The Storm’ provide rocking riffs and a spot of cheese-rock balladry respectively.

“I wrote this song about my fucking ex-wife,” says Sambora, to ridiculous levels of cheering, before playing the opening chords of ‘Learning How To Fly With A Broken Wing’ and finally the first reference to Jon Bon Jovi comes as he introduces ‘These Days’. “This is the title track of our 1995 album,” he says. “I know which songs are mine, and which were his.” Cue more cheering. “When he coughs up some dough I’ll probably go back.”

By now, everyone can feel that a big number is coming, and as Sambora dons a hat that looks like it was picked due its resemblance to that of Crocodile Dundee, the band kick into ‘Beds Are Burning’ by Midnight Oil, which after a couple of verses becomes ‘Living On A Prayer’. Like a time-bomb going off, the release of energy is inescapable, and for three or four minutes it feels like a stadium gig circa 1987, or every bad birthday party you’ve ever been to.

An obligatory encore including ‘Wanted Dead or Alive’ is enough to finish off this audience, and if tonight’s gig reinforced anything, it’s that Soundwave is going to be special. Oh, and Richie Sambora doesn’t need the help of any old ‘friends’ to put on a kick-ass rock show.

RICHIE SAMBORA APPEARS AT SOUNDWAVE FESTIVAL STARTING IN BRISBANE FEB 22.

Record review: Drowners – Drowners (2014, LP)

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drowners

Named after Suede’s 1992 debut single, Drowners is a New York quartet fronted by a 25 year-old male model with all the pop pretentiousness of Morrissey circa 1985 and the unashamed retro-leanings of The Strokes on their 2001 debut; but don’t let that put you off. Being so obviously indebted to certain bands (including Camden likely lads The Libertines, and thus – to a lesser extent – The Clash) could either be a blessing or a curse (it worked for Casablancas & Co. after all), but Drowners have just enough chops to pull it off on this self-titled debut. Frontman Matthew Hitt moved stateside from his home in Wales while on the hunt for modelling work, but ended up forming a garage-rock quartet, releasing a little-known EP and supporting the likes of Foals and The Vaccines on their North American tours – as you do. Despite being three-quarters American, the band’s sound sits much more comfortably in that sweet spot directly between ramshackle and tight that so many groups of underfed and over-posh groups of London lads have done in the past couple of years. Spurts of Smiths-esque self-loathing, longing and alienation come from the likes of ‘Watch You Change’ and ‘A Button On Your Blouse’, while opener ‘Ways To Phrase A Rejection’ and single ‘Luv, Hold Me Down’ get amongst the angular guitar lines with alternating Johnny Marr-like control and Pete Doherty urgency. While sounding like a microcosm of garage-rock isn’t going to be enough for Drowners to build a career on, this is a pretty good starting point. (Frenchkiss)

Interview: Paul Smith of Maxïmo Park

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paul smith maximo

FORMED in 2001 in the north-east of England, Maxïmo Park are true mainstays of the alternative and indie-rock scenes. Their fifth and latest album, Too Much Information, has just been released, and was recorded and self-produced by the band in Newcastle and Sunderland with additional production duties from The Invisible’s Dave Okumu and Field Music’s David and Peter Brewis. The album is the follow up to 2012’s critically acclaimed The National Health. I spoke to singer Paul Smith, currently touring Europe with the band.

Hi Paul, how are you? How do you feel now that the new album is released?

Yeah, really good. I’m just on the tour bus; up bright and early. We’re in Amsterdam today after being in Brussels last night. [The album release] feels really good. I think if you believe in a bunch of songs and think other people are going to like them you should put them out, and if not don’t bother. Other people put records out just because it’s part of their job or something like that, but for us it has to be something that’s worth offering to the world. We’re feeling very good about the songs and it’s nice to go out and play them after completing them before Christmas. There’s a kind of honeymoon period where you think you’ve made the best record in the world (laughs), then everyone else gets to hear it and some people probably don’t think that. You put it out into the world and go out and try to spread the word about it.

How have the songs been going down so far?

Really well, it has to be said. Every time you put something out there is an element of nervousness as we wonder if anyone will like it. We like it, that’s a given; but what’s the response going to be? I think people have really enjoyed songs like ‘Brain Cells’ and ‘Leave This Island’ which we’ve offered to the world a little bit earlier than the rest. It’s almost like getting people used to the idea of the evolution of the band and putting out songs that prick up the ears of those who haven’t heard the band before, or perhaps have preconceptions of what the band is. Again, that could potentially put some people off; those who like a certain sound about your band, but we try to transcend any issues people might have with the songs and they’ve just taken them to their hearts and responded really well. The nervousness is over now.

You mentioned the evolution of the band. In what way has this album evolved your sound?

I think we’ve probably become more confident. After the last album and having a break we were never quite sure how it’d be when we got back together, and sure enough it was quite difficult to start writing again. Once we got back in the groove we wanted to keep going and write songs in a certain way, and move on and put more things like literary references into the songs. I think beforehand they had been more subconscious, but this time around there are mentions of Lydia Davis and Audre Lorde and in the album booklet I’ve put in a few recommended readings and things that inspired the songs. That’s one way the lyrics have moved on a bit; there’s more of a storytelling thing there and each verse is kind of episodic. In saying that, we’re not throwing the baby out with the bath water, yet there are moments on the album where there are no guitars, which is something that we wouldn’t have done before. We’ve been more bold on this record, and we decided that whatever the song needs we’ll do it and not be bothered about an album being really coherent or something like that. One of the earmarks of the record is that it’s pretty eclectic. If we needed no guitars we removed them, if we needed loud guitars we turned them up, if I needed to sing soft I did it, and so on and so forth. It’s an album of extremes, but it’s nice to still have the essence of Maxïmo Park in the end.

Tell me a little about some of the bonus tracks on the album. You have ‘Middlesbrough Man’, a slightly altered cover of ‘Edinburgh Man’ by The Fall. Why did you pick that?

There are a few songs that we all really love, and a few albums that we all really love. After that, we all have quite individual tastes. With the covers on the album, we decided to just do things we like. ‘Edinburgh Man’ was a song we used to play when driving down to London or somewhere to play gigs before we got signed. It’s a bit of a sing-along for The Fall; some of their tracks are quite out there, and when we were doing this cover I started singing “I want to be in Middlesbrough” instead. Syllable-wise it all fitted in, and we did two versions before deciding to go with the Middlesbrough one as I’m from the area. Somehow all the lyrics fitted; from going walking on bridges at dawn and the cobbled streets which reminded me of going to football matches at Ayresome Park when I was a lad. There’s even a folklore festival in my hometown, and [Fall singer] Mark E. Smith sings “keep me away from the festival”, which is obviously about the Edinburgh festival, but it reminds me of being a kid.

What do you think he’d make of your cover? Did you have to ask his permission?

We did have to ask permission and we regretted it, but he’d probably hate it! (laughs)

You also have some Nick Drake on there.

Yeah, Nick Drake was one the first people who got me more seriously into music. I was listening to stuff like The Smiths and grunge when I was 12 or 13 years old; that’s what was happening at the time. Then I heard Nick Drake for the first time and it got me really into folk music and made me want to pick up the guitar. My dad had a Spanish guitar and we would get it down and strum it and it wouldn’t sound very good, but listening to Nick Drake’s beautiful finger picking would encourage me to play more. Having said that, it’s me playing the guitar on the record and it’s more strum-y. I had played at a Nick Drake night with people like Robyn Hitchcock and Scritti Politti’s Green Gartside and played ‘Northern Sky’. The version you can hear on the album is my demo they used to play the guitar at the event as I was too scared. But yeah, I’m a massive fan of Nick Drake; his music strikes a chord with where I’m from and where I grew up.

What are your plans for the rest of the year? Touring?

Yeah, we’ve got loads of touring to do. Once you’ve got the songs you’ve got this puppy dog-esque enthusiasm for wanting to play the songs and for people to hear them. You want to mix it up and play old songs next to the new ones. People have responded in a very enthusiastic way. If we can get across to Australia, that would be great. We’re off to Japan soon as well; we’re playing there on the third of April. That’s one of the perks of being in a band, being able to see a little bit of the world, as well as being a rock star! (laughs)

TOO MUCH INFORMATION BY MAXIMO PARK IS OUT NOW.

Record review: CEO – Wonderland (2014, LP)

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ceo

CEO – or ceo as it was previously stylised – is the solo project of former The Tough Alliance member Eric Berglund. The 32 year-old Swede released his debut album White Magic in 2010, and while four years is a long time between drinks, this forgetful collection of synth-pop staleness won’t have you requesting a refill any time soon. The addition of a child’s vocals on opener ‘Whorehouse’ is more annoying than cute, and don’t let the title allow you to believe there might be an edge to the track; it’s about as soft as electronic tracks come. ‘Harakiri’ is schmaltzy but not entirely alienating, and the swirling ‘In A Bubble On A Stream’ can at least be forgotten almost instantly. Third track ‘Mirage’ also adds children’s voices to what sounds like a bad day at the playground, as the overall feeling is one of a poor man’s Gypsy and the Cat, or label mates The Presets and Cut Copy. The title track plumbs new depths, in that it manages to sound like a mish-mash of ’90s Eurotrash techno-boneheads 2 Unlimited and the shameless karaoke barrel-scraping of The Vengaboys, before a limp attempt at a chorus seals the deal. Elsewhere, the vocal effects on ‘Ultrakaos’ are outright annoying, and closer ‘OMG’ should ideally be called ‘WTF’. While Berglund has seemingly wanted to make a record spilling over with art-pop sophistication of intercontinental scope, what he actually made is a completely bog-standard, formulaic electronic pop record of ultimately fairly dire proportions. (Modular)

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)

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)

/ Paul McBride / 1 Comment

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.