Some recent reviews for great new Australian music site Crawlspace, on debut records from Pop Singles and Rat Columns.
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Pop Singles - All Gone (Vacant Valley)
The cover of All Gone alludes to a well-established Australian-ness. There’s a silhouette of a Hills Hoist with a few dozen pegs attached to it, and a shrub at the bottom. The yellow-black-red colour scheme looks like it accompanies a Text Classic, the recent book range that repackages popular and prominent works of the Australian literary canon. You’ll hear references to The Go-Betweens, The Church and The Triffids in Pop Singles’ take on melody-driven guitar pop. All signs point to an over-indulgence of Australiana, but it merely acts as a backdrop for something far more universal.
I didn’t know who U.S. based Rat Columns were before this album hit my inbox. A quick Google lead me to discover a series of links back to Australia: Perth expatriate David West leads the trio, it’s got the Mikey Young seal of mastering approval, they’re label mates with Boomgates, and one piece of the band is a touring member for Total Control. It takes a slight cue from that band’s early oeuvre, too. It doesn’t lean so much on sun-blotting synths as Total Control’s proto-punk Henge Beat did, but one need only look as far as the well-recorded scrappiness of ‘Death Is Leaving Me’ for some similarities to Total Control’s earliest 7”, albeit without the manic vocals.
The irrepressible Samson Upton dug out his own little press release for this Saturday's Farewell Show, because that's what he does. Catch him spit some avant-karaoke-pop this Saturday June 9, check the review I wrote of his first album, or watch his much-commented Hobart Music Week YouTube doco. Cross promotion!
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Just been watching the new one from those Tiger Lillies. More Young Loathing and Good Times. We are the Pollywaffles! We hate Good Times (unless of course it involves The Easybeats. Or INXS with Jimmy Barnes to a lesser extent). The flashy light and smoke machine must have cost a bit - they've used it again! Cost so much, they couldn't afford Ossie Ostrich, had to get his cousin. At least it's better than those Pseudo Mutant Ninja Turtles they had last time. But don’t worry, it improves. Just wait for the bar to hit 2:24. A choreographed dance! You know I love nothing better than a choreographed dance. Beats all that earlier arms-in-the-air-woo-fun-and-social-conformity. Wait – hang on... wrong gig...
Here we go, I think this is the right one:
ALEX BENNETTS SELLS OUT
Yes, that's right, Mr Noise Etc himself is moving to the mainland. To commemorate his contribution to local music, Mr Etc will be made an Honorary Eastern Shore Band. But more importantly, the Noise Etc Farewell Tour will be swinging its way into the Poobah's Kissing Room* on June 9. It will be your last opportunity to see the leader of the Hobart Music Cheer Squad before he returns in a few years time all bitter and twisted. Playing on the night will be Hobart's second best lo-fi super group Wasted Idol, Hobart's favourite Speakeasies cover band Treehouse, an allegedly "slightly special" Native Cats, and the band for people who prefer reading: the Pollywaffles. This will be their first live performance since they were kicked offstage at the Alley Cat in November 2010 for playing an entire set of Ceai covers. The Epitome of Cool has been paraphrased in the Socialist Media as saying the Pollywaffles write better liner notes than they do songs (and more recently as saying they are “well fuckable” – so does that mean he got the Fred-Schneider-in-Private-Idaho-film-clip-except-without-moustache homage?).
Pollywaffle fans (yes, it's plural now!) will be glad to hear the band are sticking to what they do best and will be using the Noise Etc Farewell Tour to present their Honours thesis "Get Key to a Nunnery: The Prevalence of Exhibitionism in Keyboardists". The case study examines the full frontal nudity featured on the cover of Polanyi's second album (and soundtrack of the hit TV sitcom) "Everyone Loves Polanyi". Polanyi's co-star, Alvin Purple, will be there on the night to sign autographs. Light snacks and refreshments will be served by Judith the Butler, who will also be signing copies of her new book "Bender Trouble" in which Butler, a long time West Coast Eagles supporter, looks at the Ben Cousins saga from a post-structuralist perspective. There will also be projections during the Pollywaffle set featuring TISM on Review, Monty Python's Dirty Vicar sketch, Paul Hogan’s Pushbike Song sketch, and excerpts from the Are You Being Served? episode "Dear Sexy Knickers". Luce Irigaray will be making a guest appearance and will be reading from her favourite short story "Lucky Lips" by Paul Jennings. There will be prizes for anyone who comes dressed as Ivan Maric. And if that’s not enticing enough, the Pollywaffles will also be previewing a few tracks from their Freudian-themed third album “Do Girls Wear Socks?”
PS. Hobart Music Week: Episode Two – Attack of the Outsiders of the Outsiders is coming soon!
*I would like to complain about this misleading room title. I have not even been groped in this room, let alone had my face sucked off in it. If there are others out there like me who have been disappointed by this room please write to Pollywaffle PTY LTD, PO Box 69, The Glorious Eastern Shore.
w/ The Native Cats, Treehouse, Wasted Idol, Sam Upton & The Pollywaffles
The Blog Formerly Known As Noise And Words And Things And Shit (hereafter referred to as “TBFKANAWATAS”) brings you another night of vine-ripened local produce at the Grand Poobah’s Kissing Room on Saturday 9th June.
TBFKANAWATAS (hereafter referred to as “Noise Etc, Hobart music blog”) presents The Native Cats, Treehouse, Wasted Idol, Sam Upton & The Pollywaffles, in what’s being billed as a ‘going away party’. That kid who writes things on the internet is leaving the State, let’s celebrate his exile/departure!
THE NATIVE CATSare masters of their own game, conquerors of the Hobart Domain. With a treasure chest of new material since the release of the sublime “Process Praise”, come experience some minimalist/moodist beauty, 2k12 stylee. There's something special in the way they menace, in the the way they dance.
I don’t think they’ll play Party but they’ll probably party nonetheless. TREEHOUSE are at it again, noise pop with a punkish bent or punk pop with a noisy bent or something. Rob said that they were the “best band in Hobart at the moment for sure” about 10 days ago. Fresh compliments!
In their second ever live show, WASTED IDOL are your new favourite no-wave no-care trio. Featuring members of Bears, Treehouse and Manchester Mourning, they’ve released a tape on Steamboat Records. They play music.
SAM UPTON & THE POLLYWAFFLESis makin’ low-key pop music in C. You really should read the liner notes to his latest, self-produced album.
Come on down for Noise Etc, Hobart music blog’s (hereafter referred to as “Noise Etc”) farewell jamboree in the Poobah Kissing Room. Smoochy smoochy. Doors at 9:00, first act at 9:30, last train home TBA.
The Kissing Room (The Grand Poobah) Event page $5 entry 9:00 PM
Sam Upton's 2010 debut solo package We
Make No Apology went by with little acknowledgement of it's own
existence. It was quietly 'launched' at a show for his band
(Manchester Mourning) and, apparently, three people bought a copy on
the night. You can probably now find it at the back of Tommy Gun
Record's local rack but you'd be forgiven for skipping over the
plain, sticky-taped paper product. "2 albums in 1" the
front declares.
We Make No Apology is completely
self-aware. The plain white packaging reveals itself to be an
imitation 12" sleeve, with a secondary windowed sleeve inside
holding the CD. Two albums, two sides; a small paper insert to match.
The front cover boasts "Quantity Low Quality", an honest
statement. This is bedroom pop to a fault.
The first 'album' on the disc is
Samuptonamonagroanamysharonadaytona500. 'Annoying Intro' is a
kitschy 80s interpretation of 'future space music', that kind of
synth bridge music usually found in educational videos from the era;
those educational videos still shown in schools today. Where the
album first reveals its preoccupation with wasteful bureaucracy and middle/upper-class
misgivings, its still playful: "Trendy Salamanca, trendy
Salamanca; rhymes with something else." There's a subtle humour
at work.
Everything bleeds on. 'The 2nd Intro',
naturally, follows the annoying, while the high society
disillusionment is traced further into 'Mates With Moorilla':
"Sitting in
Salamanca, Sipping a latte, Outside a cafe, with Brian
Richie Talking about the arts, and his biodegradable house."
I'm not sure of Upton's intentions here –
it's mostly just low level annoyance at the Art World's equivalent to
"the Man" – but it's worth pointing out that this was all written prior to MONA's opening; and that's mostly worth mentioning in
the context of Hobart 2012's minor backlash against the art gallery
behemoth.[citation needed] Later, 'Friends With Federal'
charts a similar course to 'Moorilla', lined with poker machine
ka-chings! where the latte
sips previously sat.
In the midst of this home produced
electronic pop showcase comes 'Ruining The Mood' and... it's all in
the name. It's a bit of a fucked-up Sci-Fi rollercoaster, changing
the pace for 'Spacious Audacious', a brief track that touches on
indulgent rocketship wank (read: Sonic Youth's 'Providence'). And
indeed, much of this album comes off as reverential satire of the
indie rock canon. One track references the fade-in/fade-out/fade-in-again intro of 'Some Girls Are Bigger Than Others', except in the outro; while dialogue concerning "that guy from
the Velvet Underground" etc pops up elsewhere.
The most noticeable hallmark of this
album is its self-effacing humour and reflexivity.
Samuptonamonagroanamysharonadaytona500 is
so deliberately plotted and aware of its virtues, aware of its own
slight silliness and bedroom niche. It never hides song-writing behind
lo-fi gimmick – a commonplace pitfall for this kind of no-budget
pop – and instead chooses to take this self-referential approach.
Making note after note of your own album on your
own album isn't exactly groundbreaking by any means, but it provides
something of a conceptual framework for Upton to play with.
Side 2, Morov Thesame, is almost completely
forgettable. The humour, although still self-aware and toying with
the form, is mostly one-shot. 'Roundup To The Nearest Minute' clocks
in at 59 seconds, while 'Track 4' only exists to inform you that
track four has been deleted. Although Side 1 featured passable,
melodious bedroom pop, Morov Thesame
is just lo-fi cleverisms ad neuseum. The joke isn't funny anymore.
More than sixty
minutes of this sonically limited pop is too much. It becomes wearisome beyond the first "album" and regardless of its excess, Morov Thesame isn't particularly worth revisiting. You could scrap the entire second half of We Make No Apology and present a solid debut. This is bedroom pop to a very considered fault. It is amateurish and sometimes grating, enjoyable and worth engaging.
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You can download a new Sam Upton & The Pollywaffles album for free here.
This band. This fucking band. It's Hobart's perennial Bad Luck Charms, playing a surprise afternoon show at the Brisbane one Sunday in February. I wasn't there but Julian's camera left us loose lot with some footage to fawn over.
Introduction + Frank Daft/The McDonald Sisters
Impossible Love
Match Made In Heaven
Fever
The grapevine tells me a deulxe edition anthology titled The Baddest, The Luckiest, The Charmingest is due for release in 2018, with a bonus disc 'Collected Heckles'. I hear they're rerecording all the heckles though, with professional actors and High-Quality Recording Gear™, so expect Liam Neeson chanting "Don't stop playing that riff, keep playing the fucking riff", et al.
At the end of last year, It was pretty saddening to learn that Charles Du Cane -- the psyudenom of Launceston-based musician/creator Fred Showell -- would be finishing up. Ceasing to exist, hanging up the boots, &c. It's all for a good reason, mind you. Let's celebrate.
He was one of a few early artists who defined local music for me while I still in those teenage years. I started listening to Charles Du Cane in high school. I can't remember how, but I used to trawl through a combination of MySpace and this new Triple J Unearthed website thing, searching for TASMANIAN acts. From memory, MySpace was easier to navigate (yes, queue laughter), but you could download the songs for free from Unearthed! What a revelation. I nabbed the available tunes and threw them onto my Lexar 256MB MP3 player, and listened to those three 128kbps badboys on the walk to school.
The three tracks, of course, were lifted from Charles Du Cane's debut. Tomahawk was the quirky electro-indie-pop thing that sat distanced from any other local 'indie-pop' I had encountered. The sample-based makeup of the album was a personal point of interest after having gone through a dance/electronic music phase the year before, but it was all tidy and structured and just nice, which wasn't something I found in most of my music collection at this time (it was probably filled with indie-rock, Sonic Youth/Joy Division stylee, that's how the end of high school goes right?).
I came back to Tomahawk after high-school, when in college I broke the same MP3 player and ended up defaulting to the trusted Discman. It forced me to choose a CD and stick with it - carrying extra discs was inconvenient and changing albums was clumsy. So it was, Tomahawk spun through my College days, studying/procrastinating in the library. It wasn't as twee as indie-pop could get (although definitely the most twee of all Du Cane records) but still mighty accessible in its approach to electronic pop music. It was fun ('Don't Sit The Woofer Near Your Wham! Tapes, Sweetheart'), light-hearted ('We'll All Be Together') and varied; a subtle antidote to that Year 11 boredom. Crayfish Legs came for dinner and we got to know each other.
Of the three Du Cane albums, 2009's Poets is both my personal favourite and, if I've surveyed critical reception correctly, his most popular release. (By "critical reception" I should really say 'judging from my friend's reactions', really.) Poets starts off incredibly strong with 'Granny Smith' before shifting into a few guitar-lead rock numbers, then landing on 'Judgement Day', an engaging, memorable song that shows off a darker and more lyrical Du Cane.
"I'm a nationalist, I'm a patriot / I'm a believer, I'm a believer," rang out opening number 'Granny Smith'. Poets, I think,has a lot to do with identity, and the identity of history. With my limited historical knowledge, much of the content could be all mock and I wouldn't know. His third record, Port & Rail, is heavily entrenched in true history, a retrospective world where war tempers the usual topics of art, love, life, et cetera. I never managed to grasp much of the historicalities of Port & Rail, but where I found Poets succeeded for me is that it didn't dwell in the details. It created this painted pastiche of a setting (inspired by a creatively rich jaunt in India) that strayed far from the positively electro-pop juts of Tomahawk, and perhaps further than any Australian pop artist of the time.
In about April-March 2011, I wrote 700 or so words for a review for Port & Rail that never found publication. The review felt unfairly finished, neglecting any appraisal of the lyrical content. The lyrics, full of their historical nuances and World War references, appeared delicately sweated-over; and passing over such a central part of the album irked me. Around the same time I got an email from Fred asking if I wanted a CD copy of the album, and I enquired about a possible lyrics sheet. He responded:
"The CD doesn't come with lyrics, but they're all up at http://charlesducane.net/port-and-rail-lyrics
if you're interested. I actually considered adding footnotes & a
bibliography at one point, as it's pretty dense with references that may
not be apparent, but want to leave at least a touch of mystique to the
whole thing."
The URL is now dead and the lyrics can now only be found in the songs (where they should be, really) and not in a booklet or webpage for me to obsessively/compulsively align some abstract review with; but looking back this exchange lead to the clarification of my criticisms. Whereas Poets' referential delicacy in its construction allowed for an unspoken mystique, Port & Rail was too concrete, too indebted to history to ever craft this same touch. If it helps, though, you can now tackle Port & Rail with new linear notes, which act as a kind of guide for those who want to dig a little deeper into the record. It's probably worth it.
It seems that Port & Rail is the point where Fred Showell, kingpin of Project Charles Du Cane, had learnt all he could in the realm of sample-based, beat-inspired pop oddity. It feels a deliberate step away from the inventiveness of earlier work and towards a more naturally instrument-based construction. It's his guitar album, you could say. In a way, it was dually ambitious and laconically accessible: ambitious in its attempts to converge the Du Cane pop universe with heritage rock; yet laconic in its championing of the latter's tropes and conduct. This could be an exaggeration on the whole, as several songs from the record are propelled by those trademark sample-heavy beats, but sometimes even the sampling feels especially fitted for the occasion, with lively 1930s carnival brass filling out 'Best Bent Wire'. As an album that leaned towards this heritage rock, the album material was far more viable to perform live than earlier tracks. Although I think I've only ever seen Charles Du Cane in solo karaoke mode once, the Port & Rail band outshines the funny phoenix singing along to his own backing track via laptop.
I remember the first time I met Fred - a week after our email back-and-forth - in which he gave me a copy of Port & Rail on
CD and excitedly remarked on how the recycled digipak stock smelled
like wood. In this old-time record set with the task of summoning an era
far before digital - a time of port and rail - it was genuinely
delighting to its creator to have this physical analogue. This
authenticity that Charles Du Cane had worked towards in the writing,
conceptualising and recording of the album was evident in the music, and
this little wooden aroma of the packaging was a validation of it all.
Listening to the newly released Rarities collection, the contrast
between demo tracks and finished album arrangements is staggering.
These early takes aren't simply skeletons, but that doesn't
make them mere stepping stones in a grander scheme. They're vague shapes
of eventual pop beauties and though these demoes It's exciting
to imagine the work gone in to reconstructing these malleable walls,
framework piano/guitar mixed down (or out) and replaced by plasters of
considered sampling. The clear, sometimes gaping gap between early and
final version is indicative of the talent at work here. Fingers crossed we hear something from Camp Showell in the future.
On Rarities, one of the unheard covers is "Make Your Own Kind Of Music". It kind of epitomises the reason Charles Du Cane ever existed in the first place; a manifesto of sorts. I don't think you could ever slight Charles Du Cane for having tread in unoriginal art – this was wholly unique, enjoyable pop music. Stylistically, it stands up on two feet as its own kind of music. It faltered at times, sure, but the three solid, individual albums are all something to be proud of; all something to sing along to.
"You've gotta make your own kind of music, Sing your own special song, Make your own kind of music, Even if nobody else sings along."
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Join the final Du Cane bows at the MONA FOMA Festival Club @ the Grand Poobah tonight. $10 entry / free if you have a ticket to Girl Talk. Capacity will be tight so get in early, doors at 10:30pm.
You can now download the entire Charles Du Cane discography for free on his website.
A sampler of a few artists appearing at this years' MONA FOMA - the Museum of Old & New Art Festival Of Music & Art. You can find all the details here (it kicks off tonight if you didn't already know) but I'm just going to leave you with this totally hot MOFO mixtape. This doesn't represent even a third of the lineup but hey, take it as it is. Mediafire for authenticity. RIP Death Grips.
Just a small new year treat for you, a video of a full 14 minute set from noise artist Oceans at The Brisbane Hotel, utilising a contact-mic'd steel bowl; plus a live rendition of "Wearing The Killer" by The Native Cats in the Grand Poobah's side-room. Fun stuff.
