All posts tagged 2010

  • Mess+Noise story: ‘The Lost Weekend: How A Festival Featuring The Drones, Dinosaur Jr Went Down’, March 2012

    A story for Mess+Noise. Excerpt below.

    The Lost Weekend: How A Festival Featuring The Drones, Dinosaur Jr Went Down

    Almost two years to the day since he pulled the pin on his fledgling festival, the founder of Brisbane’s Lost Weekend speaks for the first time about what went wrong and why punter apathy is the biggest threat to would-be promoters. Interview by ANDREW MCMILLEN.

    Billed as a three-day camping event located at a conference centre 45 minutes south-west of Brisbane, a 2010 music festival named The Lost Weekend seemed a worthy contender for the interests of Queensland rock fans who couldn’t afford to head south for Golden Plains. Headlined by Dinosaur Jr, The Dirty Projectors, Wooden Shjips and Nashville Pussy – among Australian bands like The Drones, Tumbleweed, Little Birdy and Whitley – the festival shared several of Golden Plains’ bigger names. Unpowered camping ticket prices ranged from $166 to $207, for a two- or three-day pass, respectively. Hardly a princely sum, considering the ever-increasing costs of competing events on the annual calendar.

    Alarm bells began ringing three months after the initial announcement. A month out from its debut, The Lost Weekend was downsized to two dates and relocated to the Brisbane Riverstage due to apparent licensing disputes. The two-day ticket cost dropped to $150. A M+N news story reported that organisers were determined to make the event in March the “perfect end to the festival season”, and not another Blueprint”. And then, just days out, organisers pulled the plug citing “insufficient time to achieve critical mass”. Unlike the aborted BAM! Festival, an overly ambitious camping event that was set to be hosted at the same venue, The Lost Weekend at least had the foundation of an appealing event by booking a strong, rock-centric line-up.

    It also had festival promotion brains and experience behind the operation. Founder Michael Kerr, 38, had hosted the Sounds Of Spring festival at Brisbane’s RNA Showgrounds in 2008 and 2009, and appeared to be slowly growing the event: the second year saw 14,000 fans take in artists like The Living End, Tex Perkins, My Disco and Giants of Science (the latter two in the midst of a rare dust storm). Yet as The Lost Weekend disintegrated, Kerr went to ground, and hasn’t publicly commented since the public failure of his latest festival attempt. Sounds Of Spring has yet to return, either.

    I meet Kerr for the first time in March, two years and two days after the event would’ve debuted – if only he’d sold a few more tickets. He sips a hot chocolate while we sit at a cafe outside the Queensland Performing Arts Centre. During a wide-ranging conversation, I find Kerr to be quite upfront about his mistakes, slightly disdainful toward the unfortunate habit of Brisbane concert-goers to postpone buying tickets until the last minute, yet optimistic about the possibility to organise future events here in Queensland. He also laughs a lot, even though the topic we met to discuss isn’t particularly funny – or so I thought.

    What was your original desire with The Lost Weekend?
    There was nothing going on. Generally, you try to do events because nothing comes to Brisbane, and we miss out. So we got onto the guys at Golden Plains, and agreed to share some bands but not all, and grew from there. [Laughs] Just to make a good weekend. It was never going to be that large. Never wanted it to be that large. [I wanted it to be] something I want to go to.

    So the Golden Plains connection was pretty integral to making it all work?
    Yes, and no. We probably picked that weekend so we could [make it work], but if nothing happened there wasn’t a big issue. There were enough bands around otherwise to make it work. We did pick up seven or eight of their bands, but not all of them. And that was a deliberate thing we spoke about, because we didn’t want to just do what they were doing, and they didn’t want us to do what they were doing as well.

    Why Ivory’s Rock [Convention Centre]? Had you looked at a few other locations before that?
    We looked at a number of places; particularly it was a really good site. It had all the facilities, had an undercover amphitheatre, had everything; places for food stores, toilets, loos, showers. [It had] everything, everywhere to deal with; where everything else was getting port-a-loos and sleep in the bush. It had proper, flat, perfect camping areas. And no neighbours to disturb.

    How did you come across it in the first place? I had never heard of it until The Lost Weekend was announced.
    Neither had I, actually. Ipswich City Council, who actually were really supportive of doing something, and I originally spoke to them because I was interested in using the Archerfield Speedway area, and they said, “Oh, you should check this place out.” So I checked it out and it worked. [Laughs] Nothing will ever happen there now, though; they don’t want to do anything. They had a change in management and the new managers – it’s run by this religious organisation. The guru from India comes out and speaks there every couple of years and they have like 6000 grannies there. Well, not just grannies but all these people come and hang out there, and pay 500 bucks to hear him talk for five days.

    That sounds interesting…
    The manager at the time wanted other things to go on there, and he pushed really hard to get events in. He’s gone, and the new management don’t want to do a thing.

    So they don’t like the idea of a rock music festival?
    They don’t like the idea of anything else. It’s their little land just for them.

    As you know, after you, BAM! Festival tried to go there. It’s interesting to know nothing at all is going to happen there now.
    Nothing’s going to happen out there.

    To read the full story, visit Mess+Noise.

  • Interviewed: ‘5 Minutes With’ for ITJourno.com.au, 2011

    After being named as a finalist for ‘Best New Journalist’ in the 2010 Microsoft IT Journalism Awards last week, I was interviewed about my (limited) experience as a tech journalist for ITjourno.com.au.

    The interview isn’t public – ITjourno is for IT journalists only, as you might have guessed – so I’ve republished the Q+A below, with permission.

    5 minutes with Andrew McMillen
    by Allie Coyne, Tuesday 29th March 2011

    Where do you work and what do you do?

    I am a Brisbane-based freelance journalist. The majority of my writing is for the arts and entertainment space, for publications like Rolling Stone, The Weekend Australian, The Courier-Mail, TheVine.com.au and Mess+Noise. Tech journalism is a relatively new field for me; since October 2010, I’ve written about the video game industry for IGN Australia.

    Why did you decide to become a tech journalist?

    In mid-October 2010, there were rumours floating around that a video game development company named Krome Studios had fired all of its staff at both the Brisbane and Melbourne offices. At the time, they employed around 200 staff and were the largest game development company in Australia, so it was kind of a big deal. Yet it appeared that in the aftermath, no media outlets were investigating whether these rumours were true; and if so, why did the company collapse? So since I couldn’t find the answers elsewhere, I pitched the story idea to the editors at IGN Australia. It was the first time we’d been in contact, and they were immediately supportive of the story. I reached out to several former employees of the company, who anonymously provided their thoughts on why Krome collapsed. After speaking with those contacts, I got in touch with Krome Studios’ CEO, Robert Walsh, who agreed to provide his first media interview on the subject.

    I worked all of the above into a 2,800 word feature story which gave a comprehensive overview of the situation surrounding Krome Studios’ demise. This was the first time I’d written anything related to the games industry. As mentioned earlier, it only came about because I was curious to know the facts, and because no-one else was reporting on it. It wasn’t so much a decision – “that’s it, time to become a tech journalist!” – as it was a natural instinct to investigate an interesting and mysterious business development. It just so happened that the business was a video game developer. This led to further stories with IGN.

    What are you most proud of?

    In tech journalism terms, I’m most proud of securing the Krome story within a couple of weeks. It was an international exclusive, and judging by the response and coverage my article received afterwards, a lot of people wanted to know what went wrong with Krome Studios. That story immediately set the bar quite high for my ensuing feature stories for IGN. Since then, I’ve looked at Australian video games education and Australian big-budget game development. While neither were Krome-scale scoops, I’m proud of all three. But the Krome story was my favourite, because I was going where no-one else had gone before.

    Outside of tech journalism, I’m proud of making the most of the five minutes I had to interview hip-hop artist Big Boi – best known as half of the American duo Outkast – backstage in Sydney last November, for TheVine.com.au. It was tough to get something new out of Boi, since he’d been doing interviews – while playing video games – all day, but I eventually broke through with a few well-chosen questions.

    What are some top tips you can give PR pros for working with you most effectively?

    Get to the point. Don’t waste my time, and I won’t waste yours. If you’re emailing or calling me, you should be reasonably sure that I’ll be interested in hearing what you have to say because you’re representing a client who works within an industry that I write about. If this is not the case, don’t email or call. Find someone else who specialises in that particular area. There’s a lot to be said for tailoring your pitches to the right audience, rather than carpet-bombing as many journalists as you can find.

    What did you want to be growing up/ what would you be if not a tech journalist?

    One of my first career aspirations was to write about video games for Hyper Magazine, which I loved dearly throughout my childhood and adolescence. As it turned out, my senior editor at IGN Australia is Cam Shea, who edited Hyper between 2005 and 2007. So in a way I’ve ticked that box, though I tend to write about the business side of games rather than the beautiful graphics and totally sweet gameplay. Which is fine by me.

    Secret hobbies/ talents?

    I’m a passable bassist and competent guitarist. (There’s some evidence on YouTube, but it’s all pretty old footage.) I’m also decent at both IRL soccer and FIFA 11.

    What inspires you?

    Curiosity is my biggest inspiration. I can’t think of anything worse than sitting around, passively reading and accepting information. I want to be out there asking questions and challenging assumptions. That is the role of a journalist.

    Top 5 albums of all time.

    Led Zeppelin – Houses of the Holy
    At The Drive-In – Relationship Of Command
    Minus The Bear – Highly Refined Pirates
    The Drones – Wait Long By The River And The Bodies Of Your Enemies Will Float By
    The Knife – Deep Cuts

    Top-anything lists are ridiculously tough to answer, especially for a music critic. So these are five albums that I love dearly, whose place in the top five feels justified at the time of writing. (Whether I’d still feel that way tomorrow is another question.)

    What magazines/ publications do you subscribe to?

    Rolling Stone is the only magazine I subscribe to. I read The Weekend Australian and The Courier-Mail‘s Saturday magazine, Qweekend, religiously. Pretty much everything else is consumed online.

    What is the most important lesson you’ve learned about journalism?

    You can’t substitute curiosity, nor fake it. Remove curiosity from any journalistic equation, and it all comes crumbling down. If you’re not genuinely curious and enthused about a particular interview subject, industry, or topic, it’s going to reflect in your writing – in the worst possible way.

    What would your epitaph say?

    “I’ll leave it there.” I tend to say this at the end of every interview. It seems apt.

  • Finalist for Microsoft IT Journalism Awards of 2010

    I’m a finalist at the ninth annual Microsoft IT Journalism Awards of 2010 – also known as the ‘Lizzies’ – under the category of ‘Best New Journalist’. Details below:

    2010 Lizzies finalists announced

    MediaConnect is proud to present the finalists in the individual categories for the Microsoft IT Journalism Awards for 2010. The winners will be anno unced on Friday April 8th at the Awards ceremony held at Doltone House, Sydney.

    More than two hundred entries were received for the 9th Annual Awards, which will recognise excellence in technology media and journalism for the year of 2010.

    Best New Journalist

    Andrew McMillen
    Ben Grubb
    James Hutchinson
    Josh Taylor
    Lisa Banks
    Luke Hopewell
    Spandas Lui

    For the full list of nominees, visit the Lizzies website.

    This nomination is a result of my coverage of the Australian games industry for IGN Australia. Key stories include:

    Krome Studios: Things Fall Apart, November 2010

    It’s the question that’s been reverberating around the corridors of the Australian game industry for three weeks: what causes Australia’s largest video game development studio to close its doors? Andrew McMillen investigates, and discovers that Krome’s current situation isn’t as clear-cut as first reported.

    Australian Games Education: A 2010 Report Card, December 2010

    Do you want to work in the games industry? The good news is that over two dozen education institutions across Australia offer games-related degrees. But how valuable is having a degree? Are they keeping up with the changing face of development in Australia? And with so many studio closures how many jobs are there anyway? IGN AU finds out…

    A Matter Of Size: The State of Triple-A Game Development in Australia, February 2011

    IGN AU looks at whether the Aussie scene can still support big studios… and whether it should even want to.

  • A Conversation With Yannis Philippakis of Foals, 2010

    I interviewed Yannis Philippakis [pictured right], singer/guitarist of the British pop act Foals, for Scene Magazine in late December 2010, ahead of their Australian tour as part of Laneway Festival 2011 (which I reviewed for The Vine).

    Our interview originally ran in condensed form as the cover story of Scene Magazine #811. Here’s the full interview transcript.

    Andrew: I’ve got a confession to make. [Foals’ second album] Total Life Forever is one of my favourite albums of 2010.

    Oh, thank you very much.

    I discovered [Foals’ 2008 debut album] Antidotes a couple of years ago, but Total Life Forever sounds like an entirely different band. I like this band more. Do you?

    Yannis: It’s not a different band…

    I know it’s not, but the sound definitely has changed quite a lot.

    Yeah. I mean, I don’t really like the idea of making albums adversary to each other. I find the whole ranking, hierarchy that happens every year kind of repellent and equally… I don’t really have the same perspective on it, obviously, as an externalist, but to us in the band it’s a very linear progression. It never really felt like we had a break, even after we finished Antidotes. I think the production is a hell of a lot more fully realised on Total Life Forever. At least to me, I still have a fondness for a lot of the songs on Antidotes, but I don’t listen to that record largely because of the production. I think that it’s great that people are acknowledging the progression, but to us it is one linear thing. We want to make a body of work. It’s not us trying to eradicate our past, as such.

    Was there any self-doubt within the band, when your style of song writing started shifting after Antidotes?

    There’s self-doubt every day. Of course. Not to do with writing new things, but there’s just… most of them comes from a wish to complete something that isn’t whole. Self-doubt is part of the game. It’s been there always and unless we write ‘Symphony No. 3’ by Gorecki – which we can’t, because it’s already been written – I don’t think we’re ever going to feel sated or complete. It’s just part of the fun as well, the masochistic element of it.

    The moment we stopped recording Antidotes, we started doing b-sides for Antidotes, it started to change a lot, and there was much more experimentation. We started to implement a lot of the things that we learned from Dave Sitek, and make stuff that I think actually bridges the two albums quite closely. There are some b-sides; one in particular called ‘Gold Gold Gold‘, and another two called ‘Titan Arum‘ and ‘Glaciers‘. That’s what I mean; it felt linear. It didn’t feel like we ever stopped, we just always worked on stuff.

    All that really happened was that, at the beginning when we started the band, there was a very definite and conscious process. It was a conscious aesthetic, that we wanted, and it was to do with techno, it was to do with a style of guitar playing, a visual aesthetic. Everything was very conscious and we wanted to have parameters on it. We were in love with the idea of bands like Devo that had a distinct world that they occupied.

    Everything since then, once we felt like we attained that, everything now is about undoing that process and getting to a point which is kind of the reverse of that, where nothing is conscious and if I had the choice, I’d have a lobotomy and cut out the conscious part of my mind, so that I could just make music direct from the gut. I don’t know. Did that answer your question?

    For sure. You mentioned the style of guitar playing the band has. I’ve always been fascinated by those little needly, palm-muted riffs that you guys come up with. Were there any particular artists that inspired that style of playing?

    I think it was just something that we heard. I think there are a lot of bands, a lot of styles of guitar or even just playing strings [instruments], everything from string players in a classical piece, to [‘math rock’] bands like OXES and Don Caballero, and African Senegalese guitar. I think the main thing, at least personally for me, there was something about that way of guitar playing that just attracted me. I was never that fascinated by chords, and I actually neglected to learn how to work chord sequences and stuff. Instead, everything became about these ‘guitar tattoos’. It was more I had a lot of different types of music and different types of bands and wanted to cannibalise it and make it our own.

    That’s always been a main bit of the band. We start playing stuff lower down the guitar. We play with chords sometimes now, but I think that will always be part of the sound because that is just the way that I play, naturally. It’s become muscle memory, now.

    It’s certainly one of the band’s most distinctive elements. Did you always intend that to be the case, or did it arise when you started playing together?

    You kind of progress, but yeah, it’s always been there, it predates the band. It’s how I learned how to play the guitar. I used to mimic and ape the guitar lines I liked, and they usually were like staccato, tight little phrases, that’s how I liked it. As I said, I was never really attracted to chords, or distortion pedals. I like the idea of a transparent guitar sound; a guitar sound that’s unashamed to be a clean guitar. I think that you can get as much power out of a clean guitar as you can out of a distorted guitar.

    You’ve been touring pretty heavily this year, as we discussed. You’ve played a lot of shows. I’m interested to know how you keep it sounding fresh and feeling fresh night after night.

    Just do loads of drugs, basically. That’s pretty much it. [laughs] Do you mean like the shows, or the actual lifestyle, or my body odour? What do you mean?

    The music. If you’re playing the same songs each night, does it feel like you’re doing the same thing over and over?

    It depends. I definitely think there’s a point at which bands stop touring and sometimes you can’t tell when that point is going to be, and you have to keep on playing for a bit longer. But that rarely happens. Each show is different, and we don’t play exactly the same set every night. Even if we were playing a similar set, we have quite a lot of room to improvise… well not improvisation, exactly, but we have negative space that we’re allowed to do different things. We allow space for chaos in the set, so that it’s not so tightly rehearsed, that it’s mechanical. It’s not choreographed, in that way.

    I think that helps keep it fresh. I get tired of touring sometimes, but it’s not really often to do with the shows, more to do with the kind of… I don’t know, I’d probably be able to answer that question later on in the year because we’ve still got two more tours [note: this interview was conducted in mid-December 2010]. At the moment I feel pretty good about playing. I’m starting to feel restless about writing new things. I’ve been writing so many things and I think the more that appetite opens, the more pedestrian touring seems in comparison. The further we get away from the completion of the last record, the more difficult touring becomes, I think. Not because of playing the same stuff, just because there’s a new appetite that emerges, of wanting to do things.

    When I was researching for this interview, I was surprised to discover your age. You’re two years older than I am. Was it a challenge to get people to take a bunch of teenagers seriously when the band first started?

    How old are you?

    22.

    What do you mean? For who to take us seriously?

    People in the music industry, as you were getting introduced to labels, and so forth.

    I don’t know. I think that for a lot of young bands, that’s when the prime is, sometimes. I think people are savvy to that in the music industry. They kind of want to feed off young blood. You have a naivety. You’re not jaded in any sort of way. I think, if anything, it wasn’t an issue of persuading them, it was more like trying to have them not suck our blood. I’m the youngest, but I wasn’t that young. We’ve all been playing in bands for a long time. I don’t know, I didn’t really feel that. I don’t feel as young as I used to, though.

    Do you feel that as you get older you’re being taken more seriously?

    It depends on what you mean. Are we talking about people that listen to records, are you talking about critics?

    All of the above.

    Yeah, I think so, in some way. I think the critics, there is something that make critics recoil if you seem like a young, cocky upstart. When we started doing interviews and stuff, I really didn’t have that much of a filter on my brain. A lot of time I really didn’t know where I was, in terms of how things would be relayed in the press. I think that with time comes an understanding. I understand myself better now. I think as you get older – what were you like when you were 19?

    I was a dumbass.

    [laughs] Things change. I think it’s not just to do with age. It’s to do with the fact that we made the second record, and hopefully it didn’t stink, and the people believe in you that little bit more because you’re not just putting out a hype record that, in theory, is a one-hit wonder, and also a compilation of songs that you spent 10 years to write. I think that we’ve conducted ourselves, at least since the beginning, in a way that we feel proud of, and hopefully people have a belief in a certain type of integrity – or an attempt at integrity – which will mean that we gain some respect in that field.

    Yeah, sure. Before we finish up, I wanted to ask you about Oxford briefly. Earlier this year I came across a documentary called Anyone Can Play Guitar, which I note you’re involved with. I’m particularly interested in Oxford because I love both Ride and Swervedriver.

    Right.

    When you were growing up in the city, was there a sense of wanting to follow in the footsteps of other Oxford bands like those two perhaps?

    Yeah, it wasn’t those two, but there were other ones. There was a band that was pretty much our contemporaries, but a little bit older: Youthmovies. Oxford definitely was like a big factor in the way we started to think about music. I obviously knew about Radiohead and Supergrass, but Ride and Swervedriver in particular, I wasn’t that aware of. When I was growing up I paid attention to local fledgling bands. Those bands [Ride and Swervedriver], I don’t think they were really playing Oxford when I was growing up, so I wasn’t that aware of them. A band called Youthmovies had pretty much the biggest influence on Oxford in general and people my age, and it’s still being felt now. I think it’s a very interesting place to live, if you’re not an academic.

    Is there a sense of being able to give something back to the scene that helped foster Foals, now that you’ve got some attention?

    Yeah, we take bands that we like on tour with us, and I try to talk about them in interviews. But not really out of a sense of… there’s nothing magnanimous about it, it’s just that we like the bands and a lot of them are our friends. I’d rather talk about my friends, because it’s more personal to me.

    Last question. A friend asked me to say “pretty please, will you leak the Dave Sitek mix of Antidotes?”

    [laughs] Ehh, maybe.

    Okay, good. Thanks for your time mate.

    A pleasure. Thank you.

    ++

    For more Foals, visit their website. The music video for their song ‘Blue Blood‘‘ is embedded below.

    Elsewhere: a review of their 2010 album, Total Life Forever, for The Vine.

     

  • Mess+Noise interview: Chris Bailey of The Saints, February 2011

    An interview with Chris Bailey for Mess+Noise. Excerpt below.

    Interview – Chris Bailey: ‘I Really Enjoy Being An Old Slut’

    Ahead of a one-off performance in Sydney tonight, ANDREW MCMILLEN speaks to Chris Bailey about his multiple plans for 2011; his on-again, off-again relationship with Ed Kuepper; and what he learned from American singer Judy Collins.

    When it comes to Chris Bailey, you’ve probably already heard it all before. If not, a potted history: Bailey is co-founder and vocalist of Brisbane-born punk rock act The Saints, who formed in 1974 and relocated to England in 1977 after signing a three-album contract with EMI and thumbing their noses at the limited opportunities for their music to be heard and supported here in Australia. They burned bright enough to release all three records within 18 months, before being dropped by their label after the jazz-influenced Prehistoric Sounds (1978) was a commercial flop. Despite three-quarters of the band departing soon after – including co-founders Ed Kuepper (guitar) and Ivor Hay (drums) – Bailey soldiered on with The Saints moniker, releasing an additional 10 albums, up to and including 2006’sImperious Delirium. (Kuepper, annoyed by Bailey’s ongoing usage of the name, formed The Aints and performed reworked versions of vintage Saints material.)

    An accomplished solo singer-songwriter with seven full-length releases to his name, Bailey’s only ever really done music. Born in 1959 to Irish parents in Kenya, he was 17 when The Saints took off, and he’s yet to let age slow his artistic progress. If anything, he seems to grow hungrier with each passing year: as he reveals in our 20-minute phone conversation, he’s got three albums due for release within the next six months; each separate projects, with different musicians.

    Though we’re speaking ostensibly because of a planned show tonight (February 11) at Trackdown Studios in Sydney, it seems foolish to overlook the series of residencies that Bailey undertook with his right-hand axeman, Kuepper, throughout May last year – during which much was made of the tension, both real and perceived, between the two feted musicians – as well as the last occasion that The Saints (proper) played in their hometown of Brisbane, as part of the 2009 All Tomorrow’s Parties festival. Bailey – now based overseas – is a lively conversationalist. During our interview, I get the impression that there’s little difference between his playfully pompous stage manner, and the man himself.

    To begin, let’s talk about the upcoming show. How did you come up with the idea to re-imagine some of your well-known songs?
    In January, I actually came out [to Australia] to do some dates with [American singer] Judy Collins, and while a lot of people thought that was very odd, I really like Judy. I think she is in fact what the Americans call the “real deal”, and the opportunity to spend a couple of weeks in very close company, I just couldn’t resist because I have bucketloads of respect for the woman. I’ve got to tell you; it was the best couple of weeks of my recent life. It was really quite stunning. We were doing club shows and the occasional theatre, and in either environment, in a club show she was a 17-year old girl in New York in 1964. And then when we were doing theatres, she was this incredible show diva. When a performer knows how to take control of a room, it’s actually stunning. It was the best couple of weeks.

    So ostensibly, that’s the thing that got me out there. The gig that’s coming up on Friday week is, for many years, I’ve been part of what we call the “Trackdown family”. We started off in very humble origins, and they’ve gone off to become a pretty major player in lots of areas. For the past couple of years [managing director] Geoff and I have been talking about going back and doing something rootsy. Even though I’ve just finished an album in France, and I’m not planning another Saints album until later in the year, I thought it would be just a really good opportunity to come back to this particular studio, which I love. I’m actually in here with an engineer at the moment, and we’re building up an album. That’s then linked to the fact that Geoff was going to do a little showcase for his new label, the Highway 125, which of course I shall play a part of, and he thought that it would be good if I put together a combo and re-imagined a couple from my catalogue. In fact, I’m just going to put together an eclectic little bunch of musos, all acoustic, and we’re just going to bang out some songs.

    The press release says you’re planning a “surprise line-up”. What can you reveal about who’s playing?
    [Puts on German accent] “It will be people. People, not machine. Man defeats machine.” Okay, I don’t usually write press releases, obviously. I mean, it’s not a rock band … In fact I’m going to be using a piano, lots of cellos; probably a banjo, because I quite like that instrument at the moment. Geoffrey just gave me carte blanche because they’re a scoring stage, so we have all these musicians on tap. I can indulge myself. Which is what I fully intend to do.

    For the full interview, visit Mess+Noise.

  • The Vine interview: James Williamson of The Stooges, December 2010

    An interview with The Stooges‘ guitarist James Williamson for The Vine. Excerpt below.

    Interview – The Stooges

    Fact: The Stooges are one of the most influential rock bands of all time.

    Fact: Raw Power is one of the most influential rock albums of all time.

    Released in 1973 to sparse acclaim and an underwhelming commercial performance – Raw Power peaked at #182 on the Billboard charts – the album eventually spread like a virus throughout the next generation of rock musicians, many of whom would introduce their own fans to The Stooges. Among them: Kurt Cobain, who named Raw Power his all-time favourite; Johnny Marr of The Smiths (and, more recently, Modest Mouse and The Cribs); Henry Rollins (who has the words ‘Search And Destroy’ tattooed across his shoulder blades); and Steve Jones of The Sex Pistols, who says he learned to play guitar by taking speed and playing along to Raw Power.

    Of the album’s guitarist, James Williamson (main pic, far left – 1972), Johnny Marr said: “I’m his biggest fan. He has the technical ability of Jimmy Page without being as studious, and the swagger of Keith Richards without being sloppy. He’s both demonic and intellectual, almost how you would imagine Darth Vader to sound if he was in a band.” Williamson first joined The Stooges in 1971 as second guitarist, but the band was dissolving before his eyes. Only a recording offer from David Bowie to Williamson and vocalist Iggy Pop got them back together for one last stab at rock stardom as The Stooges. With the Asheton brothers in tow – Scott (drums) and Ron (bass at the time, but he’d later play guitar during more recent incarnations of the band, up until his death in 2009) – Williamson co-wrote Raw Power with Iggy and played all of the guitar parts. Despite Bowie’s involvement, though, the record didn’t perform commercially, and the band again split. Williamson went on to collaborate with Iggy as a writer and producer for a couple of Pop’s solo ventures (1977’s Kill City and 1979’s New Values), but after falling out with the singer over Soldier’s recording methods, the pair remained estranged for 16 years.

    What happened next is one of rock music’s strangest tales: James Williamson gave up on music entirely, graduated from California State Polytechnic University with a degree in electrical engineering, and went on to work for Sony Electronics for 25 years. Most of his colleagues had no idea of Williamson’s involvement with The Stooges, despite Iggy Pop doggedly working himself into a position of international notoriety as one of rock’s most outlandish performers. The Raw Power guitarist wanted nothing to do with it. It took a university essay written by Williamson’s son, entitled ‘Coffins In The Corner’ – in reference to his father’s guitar cases sitting up against the wall, unopened all throughout his childhood and adolescence – to provoke the guitarist to finally accept Iggy’s offer to reform the band in the wake of Ron Asheton’s death last year. It also helped that Sony offered him a generous early retirement package from his role as Vice President of Technology Standards. Now Williamson, aged 61, is touring the world, playing The Stooges’ celebrated catalogue to a new generation. The Vine connected with the guitarist ahead of the band’s appearance on the Big Day Out tour in January and February 2011.

    Andrew, how are you doing?

    I’m very well, thanks. It’s 7 a.m.

    7a.m.? [laughs] I’m sorry to put you through that, but I guess we could find the time we could both do it.

    Absolutely. It’s an honour, mate. I found your website while I was researching for this interview. I was intrigued by a couple of things. First, what’s the origin of your nickname?

    Oh, Straight James? After The Stooges had split up, Iggy came out with an album called The Idiot, and he had a song on there called ‘The Dum Dum Boys’ (link). In that song he talks about “Ron did this,” and “Scott, he did that”, and then “What about James? He’s gone straight”. So after that, I tongue-in-cheek named my publishing company ‘Straight James Music’ and it kinda stuck from there. I’ve had it ever since.

    For the full interview, visit The Vine.

    For more of The Stooges, visit your local record store / online outlet and immediately buy/download their three albums: The Stooges, Fun House, and Raw Power. Thank me later.

  • Mess+Noise Critics Poll, December 2010: Tame Impala, My Disco, You Am I

    Each year, the Mess+Noise critics are asked to choose their 10 favourite Australian albums of the year. In 2010, I chose:

    1. My Disco – Little Joy
    2. You Am I – You Am I
    3. The Gin Club – Deathwish
    4. Parades – Foreign Tapes
    5. The John Steel Singers – Tangalooma
    6. Tame Impala – Innerspeaker
    7. Washington – I Believe You Liar
    8. Faux Pas – Noiseworks
    9. We All Want To – We All Want To
    10. Halfway – An Outpost Of Promise

    My top 5 Australian songs of 2010 were:

    1. My Disco – ‘A Turreted Berg’
    2. Halfway – ‘Sweetheart Please Don’t Start’
    3. Parades – ‘Marigold’
    4. You Am I – ‘The Ocean’
    5. The John Steel Singers – ‘Sleep’

    I was asked by my editor to write a short summary of three albums that placed in the top 10: Tame Impala (#1), My Disco (#5), and You Am I (#9).

    1. Tame Impala
    Innerspeaker (Modular)

    Following Wolfmother’s success in recent years, Tame Impala’s premise was never going to be particularly risky. By gazing into the past and mining the annals of psychedelic rock, this Perth act – a quartet when playing live – produced a debut full-length characterised by spaced-out guitars, lyrics of social dissociation, and complementary, distant vocals.

    Led by singer/guitarist/conductor/producer Kevin Parker, Innerspeaker is very nearly a solo album – he plays the vast majority of the instruments – but upon hearing the finished product, you wouldn’t pick it. His ear for song dynamics is remarkable, and at no point does it sound like anything other than a full band jamming in a smoke-filled room. The cover art requires a double take to process, but the music doesn’t: Parker’s production is immaculate, and his songwriting accessible. Ultimately, Innerspeaker struck a chord this year not because of the human fascination with revisiting sounds of the past, but because Tame Impala threw themselves so entirely into ensuring a high quality experience. “It’s all we really do at home, think about music or record music in some way or another,” Kevin Parker told M+N earlier this year. Long may they continue.

    5. My Disco
    Little Joy (Shock)

    This Melbourne trio have defined themselves through minimalism, repetition and unrelenting force. On Little Joy, they’ve amplified all of the above to craft their finest set yet. “It was the longest we have ever spent time-wise on a record,” guitarist Ben Andrews told M+N, “and I think it really shows with the finished product”. He’s not wrong. Every sustained guitar sound, every metronomic drum part, every chanted lyric is calculated to precision, yet none of the inherent, confronting bleakness and brutality of their music has been lost (despite their decision to stick Scott Horscroft – best known for his work with The Presets and Silverchair – behind the mixing desk). My Disco adhere to the old-school aesthetic of album-as-document; as a result, cherry-picking individual tracks from Little Joy doesn’t really work: its potency is derived from the mood they conjure and sustain. From Andrews’ first jarring chord (‘Turn’) to the record’s elegant, all-inclusive conclusion (‘A Turreted Berg’), My Disco have bettered themselves in every way, and the outcome is nothing short of joyous.

    9. You Am I
    You Am I (Other Tongues)

    Recorded over “a couple of days” and driven by a mutual desire to impress each other, You Am I’s ninth album is an enduring delight – and it’s largely because the band sounds so at ease. Their role as forerunners of contemporary Australian rock music has long since been assured, and it’s telling they’ve no one to impress now but themselves. In ‘Shuck’, the album’s lead single, Tim Rogers sings of a desire to shuck “the past, my poise, the background noise”, and it’s this insular approach – four musicians in a room, banging it out, fuck everyone else – which has certified the album as a true classic. It’s a genuine anomaly for a band’s ninth record to rate among their best work, but You Am I once again remind us just how vital their contribution to Australian music has been, still is, and will continue to be.

    For the full 2010 critics poll, visit Mess+Noise.

  • The Vine festival review: Parklife Brisbane, October 2010

    An extended live review of the 2010 Brisbane Parklife Festival for The Vine. Excerpt below.

    Parklife Brisbane, 2010

    There’s nothing quite like rain to fuck up a festival. As clouds loom ominously overhead, we wonder how many tears are being shed in Parklife HQ as wet weather threatens to disrupt the national tour’s first stop. Such thoughts are momentarily cast aside when, soon after hopping off the CityCat nearest Brisbane’s Botanical Gardens, we’re accosted by a friendly undercover policeman, who has us empty our pockets. “Has anyone offered you any drugs?” he asks. “Not yet,” we reply. With a laugh, he sends us on our way – despite having neglected to check my back pockets or earplug case, both of which are chock-full of illicit substances.

    After passing through the VIP entry soon after gates open at 12pm, we encounter Last Dinosaurs, a young local indie pop act who are playing to eight people at the Kakadu Stage. As we walk past, three of them leave. We’re just getting settled in at the better-attended Atoll Stage, where triple j Unearthed winners Teleprompter are playing, when the clouds break. And don’t let up for the rest of their set. For the 50 of us who don’t dash for the nearest cover, this makes the quintet’s set more enjoyable, somehow: dancing in the rain to their slick take on indie-punk which calls to mind the late Melbourne act Damn Arms. Inexplicably, they’re all dressed in Star Wars get-up: the singer’s Luke Skywalker, the keyboardist’s Darth Vader, and the drummer’s Boba Fett. It’s a stupid gimmick, but it’s funny nonetheless. They sound good, and they clearly don’t take themselves too seriously. The Force is strong.

    Full festival review at The Vine, as well as photos via Justin Edwards.

    I don’t usually publish my live reviews here – instead, they’re linked over in the right column, via my Last.FM journal – but I’m making an exception in this case, and I’ll likely do the same for longer reviews in future.

  • The Vine interview: Tom Larkin of Shihad, October 2010

    An interview for The Vine. Excerpt below.

    New Zealand/Melbourne rock act ShihadInterview – Shihad

    After 22 years together, the Melbourne-based, New Zealand-raised rock act Shihad are still kicking. September 24th 2010 marks the release of their eighth studio album, Ignite, which – like its predecessor, 2008’s Beautiful Machine – was self-recorded in drummer Tom Larkin’s studio. Unlike that largely pop-favouring release, though, Ignite marks somewhat of a return to what the band have always done best: huge, riff-heavy guitar rock suitable to be blasted at both clubs and stadiums.

    Shihad have played both kinds of shows, many times. They supported AC/DC on the New Zealand leg of the Black Ice tour earlier this year, and soon after touringIgnite across Australia’s capital cities in November, they’ll play national tours with Guns N’ Roses and now-labelmates Korn (Ignite is the band’s first release with Roadrunner Records). In July and August, Shihad played a handful of exclusive shows in Sydney, Melbourne, Christchurch, Wellington and Auckland wherein they performed their classic albums Killjoy (1995) and The General Electric (1999) in full. And so TheVine’s conversation with Tom Larkin begins…

    Before we discuss Ignite, I want to touch on the shows you did last month for Killjoy and The General Electric. Did you enjoy yourself?

    Of course. A lot. It was one of those things we had planned for a long time. We’d left it on the sidelines, and we’d get busy and then go back to the idea and keep coming at it, but it was really, really enjoyable for us to do. And great for us to revisit that stuff and revisit the material we hadn’t played for a long time. It was great.

    Read the full interview on The Vine.

    This interview was a little strange for me, as Shihad are a band I’ve respected for a long time – for a few years, around 2005-2006, I readily named them as my favourite band. My interest their music (especially the lacklustre newer stuff) has since plateaued, but still, they’ve played a large part in my life. It was a pleasure to speak with Tom.

    More Shihad on MySpace; the music video for their Ignite single ‘Lead Or Follow‘ is embedded below.

  • Mess+Noise Mid-Year Report 2010: my top five

    Mess+Noise asked their critics to pick their top five Australian releases so far this year. I chose these:

    Mess+Noise: An Australian music websiteThe Gin Club
    Deathwish (LP, Plus One Records)
    With nine songwriters in the mix across the genres of rock, folk and pop, The Gin Club’s fourth full-length could easily have fallen victim to too-many-cooks syndrome. It didn’t. Instead, it’s one of the best Australian albums of recent memory.
    Read Andrew’s review here.

    Halfway
    An Outpost Of Promise (LP, Plus One Records)
    This Brisbane alt-country act contain as many members as The Gin Club, but on this release, the songwriting of core duo John Busby and Chris Dale is informed by the direction of Go-Betweens co-founder (turned album producer) Robert Forster. The result is 10 finely-honed songs that bear a homely, barroom feel.
    Read Andrew’s review here.

    Nikko
    The Warm Side (LP, Tenzenmen)
    Another Brisbane band – swear I’m not biased. Post-rock with vocals done well.
    Read Andrew’s review here.

    Faux Pas
    Noiseworks (LP, Sensory Projects/Heroics)
    Outrageous, otherworldly electronic pop written in a Melbourne bedroom. An outstanding debut.

    Parades
    Foreign Tapes (LP, Dot Dash/Remote Control)
    This one was overwhelmingly dense upon first listen, and took a few listens to reveal its genius. Unconventional pop songs dressed up in the always-awkward “art rock” tag. I’m glad I gave it time. You should too.

    Visit Mess+Noise to see the rest of the critics’ picks.

    What are your top five Australian releases of 2010 so far?