Tag: Melbourne Australia

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

New Audio: A Cat Named Monty Shares Jangling, Hook-Driven “Welcome to Life”

David Jennings is an Aussie-born, Germany-based singer/songwriter and musician, who is an Australian Songwriting Club winner and a two-time Australian Songwriting Association runner-up, who has been a part of the Melbourne music in some fashion since the late 90s as the creative mastermind of A Cat Named Monty, which released six EPs to some critical acclaim.

Since relocating to Germany, A Cat Named Monty features members spread out across the globe. The project’s latest single “Welcome To Life” is a hook-driven tune that brings Blur, The Beatles, The Soundtrack of Our Lives, and New Zealand jangle pop to mind that take a hilarious — yet sobering — look at the difficulties of living in the modern world. Yes, first world problems but problems all the same.

New Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Delivery Shares Club Friendly Art School Rock Tune “Measuring Cup”

Rising Melbourne-based indie outfit Delivery — Bec Allen (bass, vocals), James Lynch (guitar, synths, vocals), Scarlett Maloney (guitar, vocals), Jordan Oakley (guitar) and Liam Kenny (drums, vocals) — emerged from their hometown’s COVID pandemic lockdowns and quickly established a sound that blends elements of post-punk, punk, garage rock and dance floor rhythms into something distinctly their own. The quintet have built moment with the release of last year’s Force Majuere, which Rolling Stone called a “statement of intent” and relentless touring to support the album, becoming one of Oz’s most compelling and restless rock bands.

The rising Aussie quintet’s highly-anticipated third album Zone 3 is slated for a February 26, 2027 release through Heavenly Recordings. Zone 3 reportedly marks a new chapter for the rising Aussie quintet. Written in the wake of extensive time on the road, the album captures Delivery as a fully-formed unit that’s confident enough to trust their instincts and adventurous enough to push beyond the sounds that initially defined them.

Conceived as a late-night record, Zone 3 is specifically for crowded bars, packed dance floors, darkened clubs and the hazy hours before sunrise. Sonically you’ll hear rigid drum-machine driven grooves, synth pulses, wiry guitar bursts, hypnotic baselines and vocals that effortlessly shift between detached cool and infectious urgency.

Recorded in a furious 12-day session at Melbourne-based York Street Studios with producer Dan Lusscombe and engineer Stefan Blair,. the Aussie quintet’s third album reportedly finds them at their most focused, playful and expansive — and may arguably be their boldest effort to date.

Znne 3′s first single “Measuring Cup” is hook-driven tune anchored around a hypnotic, motorik groove, wiry post-punk guitar lines and pulsing synths paired with coolly delivered vocals. The result is a song that sonically to my ears is one-part Sonic Youth-like art punk, one-part pub rock and stoner rock bombast, one-part dance punk.

“There is a certain kind of pressure in modern society to be vigilant about who someone is, what they stand for and if they are ‘your people,'” Delivery says. “But it’s not necessarily a bad thing. It’s a challenge to engage positively with people who hold different values or stances, and a celebration when you know you’ve found someone who aligns with you, whether that’s politically, socially, or personally. ‘Measuring Cup’ is like an invitation to get on a level together and join the club.”

Directed by the band’s Scarlett Maloney, the accompanying video for “Measuring Cup” features the members of the band as they plan and then commit a perfectly planned, perfectly executed heist, complete with an inside man. And the only way it could have been possible was that they were all with their people.

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Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Julia Jacklin Shares Introspective “If I Had The Hand of God”

Acclaimed Melbourne-based singer/songwriter and musician Julia Jacklin will be releasing her highly-anticipated fourth album, the Robert Muiños and Jacklin co-produced, 10-song album  The Gem through 4AD Records digitally and on CD, cassette and vinyl on September 25, 2026. Exclusive color vinyl editions with retailers will include turquoise, green opal, ruby and rose quartz. Pre-order information can be found here.

The album will include the previously released “Get Away From Me (I Think I’ll Love You),” the album’s closing track ” “I Wish” feat, Aussie folk sibling duo The Maes, “The Hardest Thing,” and the album’s latest single “If I Had The Hand of God,” a jangling that’s one-part song-as-story bit of country and one-part indie rock anthem. Written about a surreal trip to Nashville, “If I Had The Hand of God” is a lived-in, introspective meditation on the life of a touring musician and the importance — or unimportance — of legacy that’s both earnest and drenched in a bit of irony.

Directed by Nick Mcck, the accompanying video for “If I Had The Hand of God” begins with Jacklin making a call in a hotel room, before allowing the acclaimed Aussie wandering around Las Vegas with equal parts awe, exhaustion, bemusement and confusion. Oh and there’s a feathered showgirl hat at some point that looks incredibly heavy.

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Julia Jacklin Returns with Anthemic “The Hardest Thing”

Acclaimed Melbourne-based singer/songwriter and musician Julia Jacklin will be releasing her highly-anticipated fourth album, the Robert Muiños and Jacklin co-produced, 10-song album  The Gem through 4AD Records digitally and on CD, cassette and vinyl on September 25, 2026. Exclusive color vinyl editions with retailers will include turquoise, green opal, ruby and rose quartz. Pre-order information can be found here.

The album will include the previously released “Get Away From Me (I Think I’ll Love You),” the album’s closing track ” “I Wish” feat, Aussie folk sibling duo The Maes, and the album’s third single, “The Hardest Thing.” is a proudly heart-worn-on-sleeve anthemic ballad featuring a narrator, whose relationship on the brink, detailing a relationship at a crossroads — or about to peter out to an inevitable conclusion. Lyrically, the song is rooted in small, lived-in details that give the song a personal yet deeply universal touch.

Directed by Danny Cohen, the accompanying video was shot in one lengthy take and filmed from a helicopter winding through Melbourne’s skyline, gradually showcasing the acclaimed artist performing the song on top of skyscraper.

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

New Audio: Erica Tucceri Shares Breezy, Dance Floor Friendly “Grazie Ragazzi”

Erica Tucceri (pronounced like “two cherry”) is a Melbourne/Naarm-born, London-based producer, composer and flautist, who first cut her teeth as a prolific collaborator, working with Surprise Chef, ZEFX, Don Glori, Alexander Flood and a list of others from the local jazz scene while amassing a cult following for her signature tonal control and explosive solos.

Tucceri stepped out into the spotlight as a band leader and composer at 2024’s Melbourne International Jazz Festival, where her anticipated “Take Note” composition for 10 piece ensemble with strings was a triumphant sold-out headline debut that also showcased her continuing evolution as an artist.

Since relocating to London, the Aussie-born producer, composer and flautist signed to DeepMatter Records, who will be releasing her highly-anticipated full-length debut. Route 96. The album, which is slated for a November 27, 2026 release is part-diary, part-love letter to Melbourne/Naarm that was conceived during an unlikely stint moonlighting as a tram during during COVID-19 lockdowns. The rhythms and every day patter of the city and city life are translated into a blend of percussive, flute-driven cosmic jazz, informed by psychedelia and the dance floor. “This album is what happens when you leave a moonlighting musician alone in the drivers cabin of a Melbourne tram for a few years,” Tucceri says. “The compositions took shape while I drove. Influenced by the city around me, I’d sing ideas into my phone at the end of my shift, tying the fabric of the music to the sights, sounds and memories of the city. My only rule: if it was catchy enough to have remembered throughout the shift, it was worth capturing.”

Sitting on a growing stockpile of ideas, it wasn’t until the return of longterm friends Lewis Moody (keys, production) and Ziggy Zeitgeist (drums) to Melbourne/Naarm in late 2022 that she realized she actually had an album’s worth of material. Her backing band is rounded out by Matthew Hayes (bass) and Ray Pereira and Javier Fredes, two cross-generational masters of percussion and scene stalwarts, who contribute Cuban and West African-inspired percussion reuniting for their first collaboration together in twenty years.

The album follows upon the critical success of previously released single “Hey Bear” and “Flute Trip,” which received airplay across Australian community radio stations, including PBS FM and Triple R, and broke through onto UK national radio with airplay from Gilles Peterson, Jamz Supernova and BBC 6 Music’s New Music Fix Daily, as well as Jazz FM, Rinse FM and more. And adding to a growing profile, she has toured the world with various projects and has showcased her own music at EFG London Jazz Festival and at Ronnie Scott’s Jazz Club.

Route 96‘s first single “Grazie Ragazzi” is a breezy and strutting bit of disco-tinged jazz funk, anchored around African-inspired percussion, a deep dance floor friendly groove, an incredibly catchy melody and some fiery and passionately improvised solos. Sonically resembling a mix of 70s jazz fusion and contemporaries like Surprise Chef, Mildlife and L’Eclair, the track captures — and evokes — the lingering buzz of joy of freedom, of seeing sweaty bodies moving and grooving and the appreciation of collective experience after a show at Section 8.

“I will never forget the way the energy of the whole room turned. It was heaving,” Tucceri recalls. “Everyone in the space turned to face the stage, the band were on fire and the dance floor went completely nuts, almost as one. I’ve spent many a night at Section 8, but I’ve never seen that again.”

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

New Audio: King Gizzard and The Lizard Wizard Return with Muscular and Menacing “Kill For The Steel”

Wildly prolific Melbourne-based JOVM mainstays King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard — Stu Mackenzie (vocals, guitar), Ambrose Kenny-Smith (harmonica, vocals, keys), Cook Craig (guitar, vocals), Joey Walker (guitar, vocals), Lucas Harwood (bass) and Michael Cavanaugh […]

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

New Audio: Velatine Returns with Dead Radio Remix of “Playing With The Orbits”

Producer, songwriter and musician Loki Lockwood is the creative mastermind behind the Melbourne-based darkwave/goth recording project Velatine. For the bulk of the project’s history, Lockwood collaborated with different vocalists while creating a unique and fresh […]

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

New Audio: Julia Jacklin Teams Up with The Maes on Introspective “I Wish”

Acclaimed Melbourne-based singer/songwriter and musician Julia Jacklin will be releasing her highly-anticipated fourth album, the Robert Muiños and Jacklin co-produced, 10-song album  The Gem through 4AD Records digitally and on CD, cassette and vinyl on September 25, 2026. Exclusive color vinyl editions with retailers will include turquoise, green opal, ruby and rose quartz. Pre-order information can be found here.

When Jacklin first moved to Melbourne from Sydney back in 2017, she discovered a little bar on a back street in Collingwood, a suburb just outside of downtown, where bands pushed dining tables to the side and set up in a corner on the floor. She didn’t know anyone in town, but knew she wanted to make the city home, so she started hanging out there, facing herself out of her comfort zone. That pub was named The Gem. 

Eight years later, Jacklin had released three acclaimed albums, 2016’s Don’t Let The Kids Win, 2019’s Crushing and 2022’s PRE PLEASURE — and was looking to write and record her fourth. Her contract with her previous label had ended. She was searching for a manager. And with time on her hands, she decided that she would make her fourth album in Melbourne, something she’d never done before. 

She called up an old drinking buddy Robert Muiños, owner of Rat Shack Studios, which is just above The Gem and brought in her friends Jacob Diamond (guitar), Mimi Gilbert (bass) and Jess Elwood (drums). Recording happened in close quarter, in converted hotel room accommodation upstairs at the pub. Because The Gem was in a residential neighborhood, they couldn’t record late into the night for fear of bothering neighbors and sound bleed was a glorious constant: foot traffic to the hairdressers and lotto parlor next door and loud music from the bands and the kitchen staff downstairs. But if anyone needed a break during the sessions, they would head downstairs and watch a local band play. Jacklin and her friends even played two unannounced shows there to try out the album’s material before recording them. 

They originally thought they’d be able to finish the album in two weeks, like she’d always done previously, but this time that wasn’t the case. In fact, it took nearly a year of tinkering to arrive at something Jacklin could get behind, “The Gem felt like a metaphor for the whole process, because a lot of it did feel like digging. I felt like I was doing it almost in the dark, just trusting I was going to find something,” Jacklin says. While conjuring images of excavation, of reinvention, of trusting your instincts and surrounding yourself with the people and things that make life worthwhile, the album documents the songwriter’s journey back to herself. 

“I want to love and be loved, but I also want to be free. The tension between those two things has been the central question of my life,” says Jacklin. That theme underpins the album’s material. 

The album will include the previously released “Get Away From Me (I Think I’ll Love You)” and the album’s latest single, the album closer “I Wish” feat, Aussie folk sibling duo The Maes. Channeling Crosby, Stills, and Nash, “I Wish” features Jacklin’s gorgeous and expressive vocal and the Elsie and Maggie Rigby’s impeccable harmonies beneath strummed acoustic guitar. The song is an introspective and a bit melancholy note from one’s older, wiser self to their younger self, essentially saying “girl, if you knew then what you know now . . . ” There’s quite a bit of awe, forgiveness and love for the narrator’s younger self, full of the recognition of the things she experienced and survived made her into who she is now.

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard Share Glitchy and Club Friendly “Level 5”

Wildly prolific Melbourne-based JOVM mainstays King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard — Stu Mackenzie (vocals, guitar), Ambrose Kenny-Smith (harmonica, vocals, keys), Cook Craig (guitar, vocals), Joey Walker (guitar, vocals), Lucas Harwood (bass) and Michael Cavanaugh (drums) — have a long-held reputation for being restlessly creative and never standing still musically, exploring everything from prog-tinged thrash metal, primitive synth-rock, down-home jam rock and on recent releases feel-good symphonic rock.

The Aussie outfit’s remarkable 28th album Alien Metal follows on from 2023’s The Silver Cord — and grew out of last year’s “rave shows,” in which traditional instruments were abandoned, with the band gathering around an expansive modular synthesizer setup they named “Nathan,” each member making their own manipulations to create a mind-altering whole. And what initially began as an experiment soon became an obsession, inspiring what may arguably be one of the band’s most ambitious albums to date. “It completely rewired my brain,” Gizz’s Stu Mackenzie says, having discovered the possibilities of the Eiurorack synthesizer format on the recommendation of bandmate and self-confessed “techno head of the group” Joey Walker. “I was like, ‘I’m going to forget everything I know about music and relearn it all from scratch.”

The album was far from straightforward to make. Over the course of several years, the band scrapped countless recordings and abandoned entire creative directions while searching for the album’s identity. “We’ve never scrapped so much material as we have for this album,” Mackenzie says. “Entire albums, entire universes that were formulated, created, recorded, deleted and started again.”

The breakthrough finally arrived during a late night, improvisatory jam session that went over an hour. That spontaneous jam became the foundation for the entire record with every track on Alien Metal evolving from the same source performance. The result is a seamless, constantly shifting journey through techno, hardcore, house and jungle influences, filtered through King Gizzard’s unmistakable psychedelic lens. Pulsing rhythms, distorted textures and unexpected twists collide across material that’s at once futuristic and uniquely their own. “It sounds so crunchy, but also beautiful,” says Mackenzie.

“Alien Metal goes really hard, but it also goes to really interesting places,” adds Joey Walker. “And it feels unique – it feels like us, still.”

Alien Metal‘s first single “Level 5” sees Mackenzie’s heavily vocodered vocals beneath a mind-bending bit of industrial techno featuring glistening and glitchy synth textures paired with skittering, machine gun staccato beats that showcases how hard the band’s material typically goes while arguably being the most club friendly song they’ve released to date.

Directed by Hayden Somerville, the accompanying video places the viewer in a dystopian hellscape in which a collection of scientists perform a weird experiment on a humanoid mutant to hilariously weird effect. Not to spoil things too much, but it involves an autopsy and a connection to a modular synthesizer.

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Julia Jacklin Shares Jangling “Get Away From Me (I Think I’ll Love You)”

Acclaimed Melbourne-based singer/songwriter and musician Julia Jacklin will be releasing her highly-anticipated fourth album, the Robert Muiños and Jacklin co-produced, 10-song album The Gem through 4AD Records digitally and on CD, cassette and vinyl on September 25, 2026. Exclusive color vinyl editions with retailers will include turquoise, green opal, ruby and rose quartz. Pre-order information can be found here.

When Jacklin first moved to Melbourne from Sydney back in 2017, she discovered a little bar on a back street in Collingwood, a suburb just outside of downtown, where bands pushed dining tables to the side and set up in a corner on the floor. She didn’t know anyone in town, but knew she wanted to make the city home, so she started hanging out there, facing herself out of her comfort zone. That pub was named The Gem.

Eight years later, Jacklin had released three acclaimed albums, 2016’s Don’t Let The Kids Win, 2019’s Crushing and 2022’s PRE PLEASURE — and was looking to write and record her fourth. Her contract with her previous label had ended. She was searching for a manager. And with time on her hands, she decided that she would make her fourth album in Melbourne, something she’d never done before.

She called up an old drinking buddy Robert Muiños, owner of Rat Shack Studios, which is just above The Gem and brought in her friends Jacob Diamond (guitar), Mimi Gilbert (bass) and Jess Elwood (drums). Recording happened in close quarter, in converted hotel room accommodation upstairs at the pub. Because The Gem was in a residential neighborhood, they couldn’t record late into the night for fear of bothering neighbors and sound bleed for a glorious constant: foot traffic to the hairdressers and lotto parlor next door and loud music from the bands and the kitchen staff downstairs. But if anyone needed a break during the sessions, they would head downstairs and watch a local band play. Jacklin and her friends even played two unannounced shows there to try out the album’s material before recording them.

They thought they’d be able to finish the album in two weeks, like she’d always done previously, but this time that wasn’t the case. In fact, it took nearly a year of tinkering to arrive at something Jacklin could get behind, “The Gem felt like a metaphor for the whole process, because a lot of it did feel like digging. I felt like I was doing it almost in the dark, just trusting I was going to find something,” Jacklin says. While conjuring images of excavation, of reinvention, of trusting your instincts and surrounding yourself with the people and things that make life worthwhile, the album documents the songwriter’s journey back to herself.

“I want to love and be loved, but I also want to be free. The tension between those two things has been the central question of my life,” says Jacklin. That theme underpins the album’s material.

The Gem‘s first single, “Get Away From Me (I Think I’ll Love You)” is mischievously charming and hooky bit of 80s inspired jangle pop that captures the neurotic yet yearning push and pull of a narrator, who can’t quite figure out yet how to be free and be loved simultaneously. And while informed by the songwriter’s own-lived in experience, the song is rooted in something that’s both universal and youthful.

The video created by Jacklin reimagines the album’s cover art with images of Jacklin singing and strumming her guitar, and gems on other instruments.

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Velatine Returns with Brooding, Trip Hop-like “Playing With The Orbits”

Melbourne-based songwriter and producer Loki Lockwood is the creative mastermind behind the darkwave/goth recording project Velatine. For the bulk of Velatine’s history, Lockwood collaborated with different vocalists while crafting a unique and fresh take on the familiar and beloved darkwave/goth sound. 

Last year’s “Till Death Do We Art” saw Lockwood collaborating with Nocturna. Lockwood discovered Holly Purnell through an Instagram ad. Purnell collaborated on “Oh See Me — The Siren,” and while working on that song, she joined as the project’s full-time vocalist.

Released in April, “Whisper Park,” the first Velatine with single with Purnell as a full-time member was a change in sonic direction, showcasing a more forceful goth and doom-like direction. Their latest single, “Playing with the Orbits” is a return to form featuring Purnell’s siren-like delivery over a broodingly atmospheric and glitchy production that seemingly draws from trip hop, industrial electronica and darkwave.

Written five years ago, “Playing with the Orbits” is inspired by Bianca Devins and her unfortunate murder. As Lockwood says, “her story shook me, and if you know the story, then the lyrics reveal its underlying complexity. It’s a song about her murder, it required sensitivity in its delivery. I didn’t see her naive, she was intelligent, creative, an individual, but sadly missed that this was coming. She was exposed and became a target, A song that somehow waited for Holly to express all of this.”

“Bianca was 17 when killed by an obsessed man, who she met online. Referred to as an ‘E-girl’ by the media, she was hardly that,” Lockwood continues, In her teens she had struggled with anxiety, depression and the net had been an escape where she had bonded with others with similar struggles. She worked hard to resolve her own personal issues, finished school and planned to study psychology.

“In her case, her killer spread photos of the aftermath on social media that exploded her into ‘stardom.’ Hardly an influencer, just popular and likable online, she had about 2,000 followers on Instagram when her short life ended. Within days of her murder though, that number had risen to more than 160,000. Incel groups were the main perpetrators spreading the pictures, also sending them to family members with vile messages, such as ‘She deserved it’,”says her mother Kim Devins. “Bianca was everything they hated. She was a really smart girl, very pretty; a lot of guys liked her. She was also intuitive and aware. She recognized grooming in her online community and had helped a lot of girls get away from some dangerous situations.”

Had she got this attention when she was alive surely she would have used it to warn others, but sadly she missed the signs herself. We all crave to be liked, but like her, most of us are happy to expose ourselves to others we don’t know. Innocent normal behavior right? Well it should be, but it’s also about what happened after she was killed that triggered the song. One of the last ‘brag’ posts her killer made was ‘You’re going to have to find someone else to orbit you fuckers.’

Her murder was a carefully planned and executed affair by someone who wanted to maximize their own notoriety. His images were seen, spread and celebrated by an online community of ‘Incels,’ who called her killer ‘a legend.’

There is plenty on-line if you want to dig deeper and so no need for me to say more except read the lyrics and hear Holly’s performance, the story is there,” Lockwood explains in a statement that includes some repurposed and edited material from articles written by Anna Moore, which appeared in The Guardian.

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

New Audio: Velatine Shares Forceful “Whisper Park”

Melbourne-based songwriter and producer Loki Lockwood is the creative mastermind behind the darkwave/goth recording project Velatine. For the bulk of Velatine’s history, Lockwood collaborated with different vocalists while crafting a unique and fresh take on the familiar and beloved darkwave/goth sound.

If you were frequenting this site over the course of last year, the Aussie producer and musician collaborated with Nocturna on “Till Death Do We Art” and Holly Purnell, who was discovered through an Instagram ad for “Oh See Me — The Siren.” While working on “Oh See Me — The Siren” Purnell joined Velatine as the project’s full-time vocalist.

Velatine’s latest single “Whisper Park” is a subtle change in sonic direction, seeing the band leaning more towards a forceful, goth and doom-like direction than their previously released material. Anchored around slashing, angular guitar attack and dramatic drumming, the cinematic “Whisper Park” channels contemporary fare like Bonnie Trash and others, while showcasing Purnell’s remarkable vocal.

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: CAVS Shares Gorgeous and Groove-Driven “First Light”

Best known for drumming with acclaimed JOVM mainstay King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard, Michael Cavanagh is the creative mastermind behind the solo instrumental project CAVS. Cavanagh’s sophomore CAVS album Sojourn is slated for an April 24, 2026 release through p(doom) records.

Unlike the fantasy and sci-fi driven storytelling found in much of his work with King Gizz, Sojourn‘s 10 compositions builds its world entirely through music, shaped by Cavanagh’s long-standing interest in spiritual jazz, prog rock and krautock while simultaneously moving beyond traditional genre boundaries. The album’s material follows an imagined journey, using shifting moods, textures and rhythmic structures to suggest exploration, confrontation and transformation.

The King Gizz drummer began developing Sojourn during the recording sessions of his solo debut, 2021’s CAVS, a percussion-only album. Determined to expand his musical palette, he took on the roles of composer, arranger and musical director for his sophomore album — despite not playing pitched instruments. Early demos were constructed from sampled bass, drums and synthesizers, which were expanded and further fleshed out through collaboration.

Cavangh’s key collaborators for Sojourn included Mildlife‘s Jim Rindfleish, who co-arranged the material, alongside a group of Melbourne musicians that included Adam Halliwell (flute, guitar), Siwei Wong (harp), Archibald Pommelhorse (sax), Selene Messinis (keys), Robbin Poppins (percussion) and his King Gizz bandmate Joey Walker (bass). Recording sessions combined structured takes with free-flowing improvisation, which were later edited and arranged to retain a cohesive, live-sounding feel.

Drawing from artists like Herbie Hancock, Alice Coltrane, Tony Williams, Billy Cobham and Harvey Mason, Sojourn‘s material emphasizes atmosphere and groove over technical prowess.

Sojourn’s second and latest single “First Light” evokes the woozy yet awe-inspiring moment of capturing a brilliant burst of dappled light across rippling water while sonically nodding at Midllife and 70s jazz fusion with the composition being anchored around a deep, funky groove.

“The first rays of a gentle sunrise touching a river’s glassy surface, painting the water in soft hues of gold and emerald,” Cavanagh says of the new single. “Slowly, your eyes flutter open — not to the velvet darkness of the night before, but to an unfamiliar brilliance that seems almost too vivid to believe.” 

“Two persons and a yowie got a room at a halfway house motel for the night with three beds but only one was ripped apart, the others left in tack [sic]. This is real footage, Cavs is now a Cavsquatch and this proof that sasquatches are real,” the video’s director Jackson Devereaux says of the accompanying video. “Sojourn is an odyssey of an album, and so we wanted to add another chapter to the story, building off the first music clip. In the video for ‘First Light,’ we follow Cavs transition to his new tree form, and his first stages of coping with this new reality. We found a literal halfway house and booked a room for him to tweak out.”

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

New Audio: Jimmy Kirra Shares Upbeat Banger “Change”

Melbourne-based singer/songwriter, multi-instrumentalist and producer Jimmy Kirra, who started writing songs when he was 12. Since then his work has been rooted in the sounds of the 1970s, 1980s and 1990s rock and pop. Although […]

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Tom Woodward Shares BruIsing Neil Young-like “Phoney Messiah”

Over the course of the past two decades, Aussie singer/songwriter Tom Woodward has crafted a unique brand of baroque folk-rock, cosmic country psychedelia and fuzzed out lo-fi jams through the release of 11 albums and 10 EPs.

During that same period, Woodward has lived a deeply fascinating life, writing songs that document his thoughts and experiences: He cut his teeth and honed his craft in the Canberra and Melbourne music and arts scene in the mid-2000s before touring across Australia, Japan and the States.

2015’s Beautiful Shadows received critical acclaim from international media outlets including For Folk’s Sakes and The Huffington Post, and earned him a Canberra Critics Circle Award. Adding to a growing national and international platform, Woodward has played sets at the National Folk Festival and The Multicultural Fringe Festival, as well as opening slots for Abbe May, The Drones, Mikelangelo & the Black Sea Gentleman, Cash Savage & the Last Drinks, Machine Translations, Steve Poltz and a lengthy list of others.

Back in 2023, Woodward put down his guitar and embarked on a two-month walk up Australia’s east coast, which ended with a hospital stay and a hard-earned respect for the fragility of life. 18 months later, he got deported as an illegal alien from the USA.

Woodward’s 11th album, the recently released Adam Casey-produced Come Come Karma features the previously released “Termination Day” and “If You Wanna Stay Alive,” “Sails In Your Heart,” and the album’s latest single “Phoney Messiah.”

“Phoney Messiah,” is bruising song that seemingly channels Crazy Horse-era Neil Young, anchored a swirling haze of fuzzy power chords and Woodward’s urgent, incantatory delivery as his song’s narrator guides the listener through a world of conmen, carnival barkers, gurus, strongmen and internet demagogues prey on our hunger for meaning and her need for easy answers to deeply complex solutions.

The accompanying video is an uneasy, reeling fever dream featuring a collage of our current hellscape, presented as entertainment and clickbait, which further emphasizes the song’s critique’s of false prophets in the digital age.