Tag: Melbourne Australia

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Rising Aussie Indie Act Poppongene Returns with a Stop-Motion Animated Visual for Tense and Jagged “Don’t Even Know”

Over the past year or so, I’ve written quite a bit about the rapidly rising  Bryon Bay, Australia-born, Melbourne, Australia-based singer/songwriter and multi-disciplinary artist and JOVM mainstay Sophie Treloar, best known as the creative mastermind behind Poppongene, an Aussie dream pop project that finds Treloar performing both as a solo artist and as a full-fledged band featuring Skube Burnell, Gemma Helms, Justin Kuchel and Deanna Ramsey. Between 2016 and 2017, Treloar released three critically applauded singles in her native  Australia “Do It, Girl,” “Belgravey,” and “Esky” — and as a result of the growing buzz surrounding the project, Treloar and company opened for a handful internationally acclaimed acts during their Aussie tours, including  Lucy Dacus, Weyes Blood and Slow Dancer.

Now, as you may recall, Treloar’s Tim Harvey-produced EP Futures Unsure, which is slated for a July 3, 2020 release through Our Golden Friend reportedly marks a distinct step forward in the rising Aussie singer/songwriter’s artistic, musical and personal development: the material generally represents Treloar closing a difficult but rewarding chapter in her personal life, in which she comes to terms and embraces her identity as a queer woman. So far I’ve written about two of the EP’s latest singles, the shimmering and slow-burning, Still Corners-like “Not Wrong” and the ironic and jangling guitar pop ode to doing complacence and effortless hook ups, “Eternally Alone.” The EP’s fourth and latest single “Don’t Even Know” is centered around jagged guitar stabs, a propulsive rhythm section, Treloar’s plaintive yet punchily delivered lyrics, and a razor sharp hook. Although the single may be the most anxious and uneasy single the rising Aussie JOVM mainstay has released to date, it’s inspired by deeply personal experience: “‘Don’t Even Know’ was written in the midst of a relationship breakdown,” Treloar explains in press notes. “It follows the subtle observations of change and disconnection. It’s punchy and direct, both lyrically and tonally. I distinctly remember feeling particularly irked when I wrote this song, a feeling which translates suitably. It feels like a small step away from the usual dreamy nature of my music which is a refreshing change.”

Directed and animated by Carolyn Hawkins, the recently released video for “Don’t Even Know” features painstaking stop-motion animation using handcrafted from materials in Hawkins’ own home, and filmed  over many hours during Quarantine isolation. Throughout the video, evokes several different tensions happening simultaneously — human relationships, the relationship between the country and the city and how they shift and morph seemingly at will. “Being quite a labour-intensive technique, it was the perfect all-consuming iso project… The materials I used to create my hand cut elements came from sources I already had around the house, such as coloured card, wrapping paper, and an old book entitled The Earth and Its History,” the video’s director explains in press notes. “[Poppongene] and I spent a bit of time brainstorming and coming up with some imagery that related to the song, centering around the tensions between nature and the city, geological shifts, and how these things can act as visual metaphors for the changing nature of relationships.”

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Cut Copy Releases a Meditative Visual for Slow-burning New Single “Love Is All We Share”

Initially starting as a bedroom, solo recording project of its Melbourne, Australia-based founding member and frontman Dan Whitfield and expanding into a full-fledge band with Tim Hoey (guitar), Mitchell Scott (drums) and Ben Browning (bass), the acclaimed indie electro pop act Cut Copy have been one of their homeland’s most successful and well-regarded acts over their nearly 20 years together. 2008’s In Ghost Colours, which featured standout singles “Lights & Music” and “Hearts on Fire,” received nominations for ARIA’s Best Dance/Electronic Album and Album of the Year at the J Awards. 2011’s Zonoscope topped the ARIA charts, was nominated for a Best Dance/Electronic Album at that year’s Grammy Awards and won a Best Dance Release ARIA Award. Adding to an enormous, internationally known profile, the members of Cut Copy have gone on a number of successful national and international tours, and have made appearances on the late night TV circuit, including stops on Late Night with Jimmy Fallon and Jimmy Kimmel Live!

2017’s Haiku From Zero was released to international critical applause and was named a Double J Feature Album. But interestingly enough, “Love Is All We Share,” the acclaimed Aussie act’s latest single is the first batch of new material from the band in three years. and the single is a decided departure from the thumping, club anthems that have won them attention internationally. The song is a slow-burning, intimate, and atmospheric track, centered around a sparse arrangement featuring gentle layers of shimmering synths, Dan Whitfield’s plaintive vocals and shuffling beats. Evoking the euphoric highs of love, our seemingly insatiable desire for connection and physical touch, the song finds Cut Copy crafting a Quiet Storm-inspired take on synth pop that’s eerie and timely. Certainly, in a world in which even being near your friends and loved ones takes on a heightened significance and risk, love in all forms takes on a completely different meaning. 

“’Love Is All We Share’ is a song we made using only a handful of sounds, hoping to create an intimate and unworldly atmosphere,” Cut Copy’s dan Whitfield says in press notes “It was written a year ago about the anxieties of imagined future times, as technology becomes more all-consuming. But in light of recent events the song took on an eerie significance. Now, with our immediate future uncertain and people the world over self isolating, ‘love’ more than ever, feels like one of the best things we can share.”

Directed by American contemporary artist Takeshi Murata, the recently released video for “Love Is All We Share” communicates the track’s themes through his work in hyper-realism and computer-simulated imagery. The end result is a mesmerizing and hypnotic visual of interconnected digital, floating bubbles. “Of the ideas we had, the floating bubbles stood out – representing elements of the song best with animation that’s meditative,” Murata says. “For me, the bubbles point to our relationships and their fragility, relevant to the lyrics and time.”

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Peter Bibby Releases a Feverish and Watery Visual for Rowdy and Explosive “Oceans”

Peter Bibby is a rising and critically applauded Fremantle, Australia-based singer/songwriter and guitarist, who started his career when he turned 19, quitting the job he had at the time to busk, eventually landing a few paying gigs. Sometime later, Bibby landed a high paying job that he eventually lost because he would show up hungover from the gigs he’d play the night before. So, he wound up playing even more gigs with a series of different backing bands including Frozen Ocean, Fucking Teeth and Bottles of Confidence while developing a unique, rough and tumble sound and approach — one that many have described as being like Shane McGowan screaming at bleeding laudanum and typhoid hallucinations while his guitar playing with his guitar playing like a dog drunk on rum. 

With the release of his first two album’s 2014’s Butcher/Hairstylist/Beautician and 2018’s Grand Champion, Bibby has also been championed as an inherently working-class and wholeheartedly independent artist, commemorated in the 2018 documentary Chasing Palm Springs, which followed Bibby on a cross-country trip from Perth to Melbourne in a  temperamental van. Along with that, the Fremantle-based artist has begun building up a growing profile as a must-see act as a result of rowdy and raucous live set through headlining shows and stops across the international festival circuit — particularly with stops at Laneway, Falls and SXSW. 

Interestingly, today marks the release of Bibby’s first bit of new material since Grand Champion, his latest single “Oceans,” features his latest backing band, the rowdy and disorderly Dog Act, “Strawberry Pete” Gower (bass) and “Dirty Dave” Taylor (drums) — and the track is a wobbly, boozy and disorderly take on garage rock that’s full of spittle, fury and howled invective, fuzzy and lurching power chords, thunderous drumming and drunken shout worthy choruses that to my ears reminds me a little bit of Johnny Thunders’ “Born to Lose,” John Cale’s “Pablo Picasso” and others — but much more unhinged. 

“‘Oceans’ started out as a little sea shanty-esque poem scrawled on a piece of paper about going mad in the middle of the ocean. With the help of the Dog Act it soon morphed into a fairly raucous tune,” Bibby explains. “I used vibrato on the guitars to give it a wobbly seasick kind of sound, and we had some mates join us in the studio to sing along and clink beers together in the final chorus to give it the vibe of a pack of people getting drunk on a boat. As far as I recall, it is the only song I have written about losing one’s mind out at sea.”

Directed and shot by Duncan Wright, Luna Laure and Rhys Jones, the recently released video was shot around Fremantle and features Duncan as a shabbily dressed merman, a fisherman, a loutish, local drunkard and a drowning man — and each of those characters in one way or another is slowly going mad. It’s a dizzying and lysergic fever dream seemingly inspired by way copious amounts of booze, despair, loneliness and seasickness.  “The video was shot around Fremantle over a weekend by Duncan Wright , Luna Laure and Rhys Jones who came up with the whole idea in no time flat after COVID-19 put holes in our original plan,” Bibby says of the video. “I got to pretend I was a poorly dressed mermaid, a wharfy, a fisherman and a drowning guy as well as have a pretty damn good time doing it. I got a lot of seawater in my mouth for this video, but as we say in the game you have to suffer for the art. This is my second video featuring work overalls.”

Video by William Ruben Helms

Live Footage: Amyl and The Sniffers Perform “Gacked on Anger” at The Croxton

Formed back in 2016, the acclaimed Melbourne, Australia-based punk act Amyl and The Sniffers — Amy Taylor (vocals), Gus Romer (bass), Bryce Wilson (drums) and Declan Martens (guitar) — wrote and self-recored their debut EP Giddy Up. The following year, they released the Big Attractions EP, which was packaged as a double 12 inch EP with  Giddy Up through Homeless Records in Australia and Damaged Goods in the UK.

The band made their international touring debut with an appearance at The Great Escape Festival, a series of sold out London area shows and a Stateside tour opening for JOVM mainstays King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard. They ended a busy year with triumphant return tours to the UK and the US before signing to King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard’s Flightless Records for distribution across Australia and New Zealand and Rough Trade for the rest of the world. They ended that massive year with a Q Awards nomination for Best New Act and won the $30,000 Levis Prize.

Building upon a growing international profile, the Aussie punk rock outfit took SXSW by storm — and they promptly followed that up with their self-titled, full-length debut, which was released to critical applause globally for their feral take on ’77 era punk rock. Adding to a breakthrough year, the band won an ARIA Award for Best Rock Album. 

The acclaimed Melbourne-based punk act released the follow-up to their critically applauded debut with a live 7 inch vinyl, Live At The Croxton, which features dynamic live version of three of their most crowd-pleasing tracks — “Control,” “Gacked On Anger” and “Shake Ya” recorded at the band’s favorite club, The Croxton. Now, as you may recall, earlier this year, I wrote about Live at the Croxton’s first single, the Highway to Hell-era AC/DC meets Headbanger’s Ball-like “Control.” The EP’s latest single is the explosive and gritty mosh pit anthem “Gacked on Anger,”  tells an all-too familiar tale of a Working Jane, who is working her ass off on minimum wage, and  recognizes that everything in the world is s a fucking scam. It’s fittingly captures the frustration and unease of working people everywhere, who realize that they can’t make ends meet because of some greedy fat cat. 

The video is comprised of live footage of the Melbourne-based punk rock act performing the song live at the Croxton — and while the band plays with a muscular insistence, watch for Taylor’s anarchic and feral energy on stage. 

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Rising Aussie Act Poppongene Releases a Hilarious Ode to Dating and Settling Romantically

Sophie Treloar is a Bryon Bay, Australia-born, Melbourne, Australia-based singer/songwriter and multi-disciplinary artist and creative mastermind behind the rising act Poppongene, an Aussie dream pop project that finds Treloar performing both as a solo artist and with a band featuring Skube Burnell, Gemma Helms, Justin Kuchel and Deanna Ramsey. Last year, Treloar released three critically applauded singles in her native Australia “Do It, Girl,” “Belgravey,” and “Esky” — and as a result of the growing buzz surrounding the project, Treloar and company wound up opening for Lucy Dacus, Weyes Blood and Slow Dancer.

Slated for a July 3, 2020 release through Our Golden Friend, Treloar’s Tim Harvey-produced Futures Unsure reportedly marks a distinct step forward in the rising Aussie singer/songwriter’s artistic and musical development. Now, as you may recall, EP single “Not Wrong”  was a shimmering and slow-burning, Still Corners-like track centered around Treloar’s achingly tender vocals that thematically focused on the initial pangs of infatuation, and of the equal thrill and uncertainty of attraction. And as a result, the song was imbued with equal parts blind hope and despair. The EP’s latest single “Eternally Alone” is a deceptively upbeat and dreamy ode to romantic and dating complacence and of hopes of effortless connections centered around jangling guitars, twinkling keys, an infectious hook, an infectious hook and Treloar’s coquettish vocal delivery. But the song is built with a playfully  ironic reasoning — that maybe being alone ain’t so bad. 

“It’s a humorous pop song about wanting warm connection without warped compromise,” Treloar explains in press notes. “It’s me daydreaming about a lovely shimmering romance the I don’t have time for. Less morbid than the title suggests, much more about poking fun at my priorities.”

Directed by Clancy Walker, the recently released video features Treloar heading to a speed dating event at local bar that quickly turns into a frustrating and unsatisfying nightmare that includes a selfie taking jock type, a paranoid spy, a pompous, wine drinking magician, an incredibly nervous woman, who laughs inappropriately, drinks too quickly — and spills a drink all over everything. And with each meeting, you can see Treloar’s character feeling as though her soul is being sucked away from her. “The video is a humorous depiction of the pure chaos faced when seeking a romantic human connection,” Treloar says in press notes. 

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Rising Aussie Electro Pop Artist Alice Ivy Teams Up with Imbi the girl and BOI on a Feminist Anthem

Annika Schmarsel is a Melbourne-based singer/songwriter, electronic music producer and electronic music artist, best known as rising Aussie electro pop sensation Alice Ivy. Schmarsel is the daughter of West German immigrants, who settled in Geelong, Australia in the late 80s — and interestingly enough, the rising Aussie electro pop artist can trace the origins of her music career back to a trip her family took to the ancestral homeland when she was 12: during that trip her grandmother taught her some guitar chords and her uncle taught her how to play Deep Purple’s “Smoke on the Water.” 

As a high schooler, Schmarsel was a member of a 25 member soul big band and a musical project by the name of The Sweethearts. In 2014, Schmarsel relocated to Melbourne to study for a music industry degre, and was introduced to the music software, Ableton. She also learnt about influential electronic producers. including J. Dilla. 

In early 2015, Schmarsel released her debut single as Alice Ivy, “Charlie.” And over the next handful of months, Schmarsel released a handful of attention-grabbing singles, the which helped Geelong-born, Melbourne-based singer/songwriter, electronic music producer and electronic music artist win 2016’s Triple J Unearthed’s Listen Out competition. Building upon a growing national profile, Scharmsel release her full-length debut I’m Dreaming to critical applause in her native Australia and elsewhere. 

Schmarsel’s highly-anticipated Alice Ivy sophomore effort, Don’t Sleep is slated for a July 17, 2020 release through Last Gang Entertainment, and the album finds the rising Aussie producer cementing a reputation for simultaneously being a producer and tastemaker, who has proven to be equally adept at uncovering new dimensions to the sound and approach of established, household names and for helping to break new talent — in particular, female and non-binary producers and pop artists. The album finds her collaborating with a who’s who of up-and-coming Aussie talent, including Thelma Plum, Ecca Vandal, Ngaiire, Safia’s Benjamin Joseph, Odette, Bertie Blackman and Imbi the girl among others. 

Interestingly, Don’t Sleep’s second and latest single, is the swaggering album title track “Don’t Sleep,” which finds Scharmsel teaming up with Imbi the girl and BOI. Sonically, the track is a perfect taste of what the listener should expect from the album: a slick synthesis of dub, trap and alt pop, centered around shimmering synth arpeggios, atmospheric electronics, tweeter and woofer rocking beats, reggae riddims, a soaring hook, tons of irie vibes and a decidedly feminist, girls and non-binary people to the front spirit.

“‘Don’t Sleep’ is one of those songs that came out of nowhere! Imbi, Boi and I were in the studio on the last day of a songwriting camp (shoutout Ricochet!) and at the start of the session we were all feeling pretty burnt out,” Alice Ivy explains. “But something special happened between us and I think it had a lot to do with how inspired we were feeling after a week at an all-female/non-binary camp. We came up with a super powerful song and it’s definitely one of my favourite collabs I’ve ever been a part of. The lyric, ‘Our bodies are ours so keep your hands away’  hits me every time I hear it.”

Directed by May Tusler, the recently released video for “Don’t Sleep” follows Schmarsel, Imbi and BOI dancing and rocking out to the song, while a collective of young Junior Motocross riders race and tear shit up. “It’s an empowering song… so obviously I had to recruit a bunch of junior motocross riders to tear it up in the video!” Schmarsel explains. 

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Watch the Members of Rising Aussie Indie Act RVG Star in a Troma Films-like Horror Film

Over the past few months, I’ve written a bit about Adelaide, Australia-born Melbourne, Australia-based singer/songwriter Romy Vager and her rapidly rising band RVG. Now, as you may recall Vager was a teenaged goth kid runaway who left her hometown of Adelaide and headed to Melbourne. Upon her arrival in her new city, Vager joined her first band Sooky La La, a project that crafter material centered around anger and discordance — and as a result, the band was largely misunderstood, routinely cleared rooms and never found much of a following. Eventually, the band split up. But it resulted in Vager committing herself to write songs that people would actually listen and listen to by attempting to do what countless other aspiring songwriters try (and hope to) do: match feelings of alienation, loneliness, heartbreak and feeling misunderstood with introspection, melody and rousing and soul-stirring hooks and refrains. 

For a while, Vager wound up living at The Bank, an erstwhile recording, rehearsal and performance space that took over an old bank building in Preston, Australia, a suburb about six miles from Melbourne. The Bank was a scene unto itself, featuring a handful of bands that would soon become acclaimed, including Jalala, Gregor and Hearing, who at the time, all played, practiced and lived there. Living in such a space, surrounded by musicians, who were constantly working and honing their work was profoundly inspiring to Vager. 

In September 2015, Vager launched a tape of solo material that hadn’t actually been pressed and landed her first solo show at The Bank’s downstairs performance space. For her live solo debut, Vager recruited Drug Sweat’s and The Galaxy Folk’s Angus Bell, her Bank neighbor, Gregor’s and Hearing’s Reuben Bloxham and Rayon Moon’s Marc Nolte to be a one-off backing band. But once they began playing together, they all realized — without ever having to say it aloud — that they needed to continue as a band. Shortly after that show, they initially formed as Romy Vager Group before shortening it to RVG.

RVG’s 2017 full-length debut A Quality of Mercy was recorded live off the floor at Melbourne’s beloved and iconic rock ‘n’ roll pub, The Tote Hotel. Initially released to little fanfare — no press releases, no music videos, no press photos of the band or any significant press push, the album’s material was heavily inspired by The Go-Betweens, The Soft Boys and The Smiths and prominently featured Vager’s passionate and achingly vulnerable vocals. Much to the band’s surprise, their full-length debut received attention and praise across their native Australia and elsewhere. The album caught the attention of Fat Possum Records, who signed the band and re-issued A Quality of Mercy, which led to a much larger profile internationally.

Building upon a growing profile, the band then went on world tours with Shame and Kurt Vile. Late last year, the band released the Victor Van Vugt-produced single “Alexandria.” Written as a response to the immediate aftermath of Brexit and Trump, the song is appropriately urgent and ardent. Featuring jangling guitars, pummeling drums, a rousingly anthemic hook and Vager’s earnestly plaintive and gravely howl, the song finds the band gaining a subtle studio sheen but without scrubbing the grit and honesty that has won them attention.

COVID-19 pandemic has put the entire known world on an uneasy and indefinite hiatus but the band still hopes that this year will be a momentous year for them: earlier this year, they signed to Fire Records, who will be releasing their highly-anticipated sophomore album Feral on April 24, 2020 throughout the world — excluding Australia and New Zealand, where the album will be released through their longtime label home Our Golden Friend. Immediately after signing to Fire Records, the band released Feral’s second single, the devastatingly earnest and heartbreaking ballad “I Used to Love You.” Centered around a universal tale of suffering in the aftermath of an embittering breakup, the song’s proud and defiant narrator reclaims herself and her life — but while acknowledging that something important to her and her life story had to come to an end. 

Feral’s second and latest single “Christian Neurosurgeon” is a decidedly New Wave-like song centered around shimmering and jangling guitars, enormous and rousingly anthem hooks and Vager’s guttural growl — and while sonically recalling Heaven Up Here-era Echo and the Bunnymen, the song as Vager explains in press notes is “a very simple song about cognitive dissonance. It’s not just a song about bagging Christianity, it’s more about how we have to hold onto certain ideas to be able to survive, even if they’re not true.” 

Directed by Lazy Susan Productions’ Caity Moloney and Tom Mannion, the recently released video for “Christian Neurosurgeon” is a twisted Troma Films-like nightmare that features each of the band’s members: Romy Vager playing a brain that refuses to die, Marc Nolte as a demented and mad scientist and Reubean Bloxham and Isabele Wallace as his faithful and unquestioning assistants. 

“The video was very fun to make for us and hopefully the band too — even though we put them in some pretty weird situations,” Lazy Productions’ Caity Moloney and Tom Mannion recall in press notes. “We just embraced the song and went full surgical horror, using hand developed black and white 16mm film so the video feels almost as lo fi as the medical operation RVG are running in it. It was shot by our DOP Jesse Gohier-Fleet, who did an amazing job making every frame as spooky as possible. We’ve watched the video a lot and still laugh every time so thanks to RVG for bringing the comedy gold!”

Video by William Ruben Helms

Live Footage: Aussie Punk Rockers Amyl and The Sniffers Perform “Control” at The Croxton

Acclaimed Melbourne, Australia-based punk act Amyl and The Sniffers — Amy Taylor (vocals), Gus Romer (bass), Bryce Wilson (drums) and Declan Martens (guitar) — formed back in 2016. During that first year together, they wrote and self-recorded their debut EP Giddy EP. The Aussie quartet then released 2017’s Big Attractions EP, which they released as a double 12 inch EP with Giddy Up through Homeless Records in Australia and Damaged Goods in the UK.

Amyl and The Sniffers made their international touring debut with an appearance at The Great Escape Festival, a series of sold out London area shows and  a Stateside tour opening for JOVM mainstays King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard. The ended a busy 2017-2018 with triumphant return tours to the UK and US — and signing with  Flightless Records for distribution across Australia and New Zealand and Rough Trade for the rest of the world. They also received a Q Awards nomination for Best New Act and won the $30,000 Levis Prize. 

Building upon a growing international profile, the Aussie punk rock outfit took SXSW by storm and released their critically applauded, self-titled, full-length debut, which established their frenetic and feral take on ’77 era punk and won an ARIA Award for Best  Rock Album. Slated for a May 1, 2020 release, the Melbourne-based punk act will be releasing a live 7 inch, Live At The Croxton, which features dynamic live version of three of their most crowd-pleasing tracks — “Control,” “Gacked On Anger” and “Shake Ya” recorded at the band’s favorite club, in their hometown. 

Live At The Croxton’s first single is a live version “Control” which manages to recall Highway to Hell-era AC/DC, compete with a feral and booze-fueled intensity, centered by Taylor’s howling and some explosive, Headbanger’s Ball-like riffage. The recently released video is centered around live footage of the band performing the song — and it should serve as prefect example of what to expect from their live show: Taylor howling and stomping about the stage while the band rips and roars. 

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Melbourne’s RVG Releases an Intimate Visual for Aching and Anthemic “I Used To Love You”

Romy Vager is an Adelaide, Australia-born singer/songwriter, who as a teenaged goth kid runaway left her hometown, drawn to Melbourne, Australia. Upon her arrival in Melbourne, Vager joined her first band, Sooky La La, a project that crafted material centered around anger and discordance. Sooky La La were misunderstood, never found a following and routinely cleared rooms. Eventually, the band split up and as a result, Vager committed herself to write songs that people would actually like and want to listen to by doing what countless other aspiring songwriters hope to do: match feelings of alienation, loneliness and feeling misunderstood to melody, introspection and enormous, soul-stirring hooks and refrains. 

For a while, Vager was living at The Bank, an erstwhile recording, rehearsal and performance space that took over an old bank building in Preston, Australia, a suburb about six miles from Melbourne. The Bank was a scene unto itself, featuring a handful of bands that would soon become acclaimed, including Jalala, Gregor and Hearing, who all played, practiced and lived there. Naturally, living in an enormous space surrounded by musicians, who were constantly working and refining their work was profoundly inspiring to the Adelaide-born, Melbourne-based singer/songwriter. 

Back in September 2015, Vager launched a tape of solo material that hadn’t actually been pressed and landed her first solo show at The Bank’s downstairs performance space. For her live solo debut, Vager recruited Drug Sweat‘s and The Galaxy Folk’s Angus Bell, her Bank neighbor, Gregor’s and Hearing’s Reuben Bloxham and Rayon Moon‘s Marc Nolte to be a one-off backing band. And as the story goes, once they began playing together, they all realized — without having to say it aloud — that they needed to continue as a band. Shortly after that show, they initially formed as Romy Vager Group before shortening it to RVG.

RVG’s 2017 full-length debut A Quality of Mercy was recorded live off the floor at Melbourne’s beloved and iconic rock ‘n’ roll pub, The Tote Hotel. Initially released to little fanfare — no press releases, no music videos, no press photos of the band or any significant press push, the album’s material was heavily inspired by The Go-Betweens, The Soft Boys and The Smiths and centered by Vager’s passionate and achingly vulnerable vocals. Much to the band’s surprise, their full-length debut received attention and praise across their native Australia and elsewhere — and as a result of a rapidly growing profile, the band caught the attention of Fat Possum Records, who signed the band and re-issued A Quality of Mercy, which led to a much larger profile internationally. 

Building upon a growing profile, the band then went on world tours with Shame and Kurt Vile. Late last year, the band released the Victor Van Vugt-produced single “Alexandria.” Written as a response to the immediate aftermath of Brexit and Trump, the song is appropriately urgent and ardent. Featuring jangling guitars, pummeling drums, a rousingly anthemic hook and Vager’s earnestly plaintive and gravely howl, the song finds the band gaining a subtle studio sheen — without scrubbing the grit and honesty that has won them attention. 

2020 will be a momentous year for the rising Melbourne-based band. They recently signed to Fire Records, who will be releasing their highly-anticipated sophomore album Feral on April 24, 2020 throughout the world — excluding Australia and New Zealand, where the album will be released through their longtime label home Our Golden Friend. And to mark this exciting new era for the band, they recently announced Feral’s second single, the devastating and heartbreaking, anthemic ballad “I Used to Love You.” Simple and sincere, the song tells a familiar and fairly universal tale: a narrator, who proudly reclaims themselves and their lives in the aftermath of an embittering breakup. The song’s narrator may be proud and defiant; but there’s the sad acknowledgment of something deeply important coming to an end, iAnd while firmly establishing the band’s reputation for crafting an enormous, heartfelt hooks centered around personal experience, the song manages to recall Concrete Blonde’s “Joey” and R.E.M.’s “One I Love.” 

Directed by documentarian and narrative filmmaker Tom Campbell and shot by Edward Goldner, the recently released video for “I Used To Love You,” is a cinematic and intimate video featuring a contemplative Romy Vager, who at points sings the song’s lyrics directly at the viewer — and with the same earnestness and heartache as the accompanying song. “There’s a lot of power in reclaiming yourself but also a lot of sadness. I adore Tom’s video and feel like it captures the energy of the song perfectly,” RVG’s Romy Vager says in press notes. 

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

New Audio: Rising Aussie Electro Pop Trio Haiku Hands Release a Thumping, Old School Hip Hop Inspired Banger

Splitting their time between Melbourne and Sydney. the Aussie indie electro pop act Haiku Hands, which features a core trio of Claire Nakazawa, Beatrice Lewis and Mie Nakazawa have received attention both nationally and internationally for a sound that draws from hip-hop, electro pop, dance music and house music. Interestingly, the trio is part of a larger collective that engages with and explores social norms with their lyrical, musical and visual content. 

Now, as you may recall last year was a breakthrough year for the Aussie electro pop trio: their high energy club bangers “Squat,” “Jupiter,” and “Not About You” amassed over 3.5 million streams — and as a result, each single landed spots on iTunes charts across the globe. Adding to an enormous year, “Jupiter” was included on Matt Wilkinson‘s Best Songs of 2018 So Far list, and received airplay on BBC Radio 1 and Radio X. Continuing on  the momentum, the members of Haiku Hands went on a month-long North American tour with CHAI that featured stops in San Francisco, Los Angeles, Seattle, Portland and the Market Hotel, an opening date for Cupcake in Chicago, and appearances at a handful of SXSW showcases. 

The Aussie indie electro pop trio’s highly-anticipated full-length debut is slated for release next year through Mad Decent and Spinning Top in Australia and New Zealand. In the meantime, the trio’s latest single, the Mad Zach-produced “Onset” is a brash and infectious banger centered around a glitchy and thumping 808-based, old school hip-hop production reminiscent of Afrika Bambaataa and the Soul Sonic Force’s “Renegades of Funk” and Missy Elliott paired with the trio delivering equally brash and dexterously flows that nod at Khia’s “My Neck, My Back (Lick It),” schoolyard rhymes and chants. As a child of the 80s, this song brings boom boxes, shell toe Adidas and B Boys breaking — but with a modern touch. 

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Rising Aussie Pop Star Elizabeth Returns with a Languorous Sofia Coppola-like Visual for “meander”

Starting off her musical career as the frontperson and primary songwriter of acclaimed Melbourne, Australia-based pop act Totally Mild, an act that recorded two albums before breaking up, the up-and-coming Aussie pop artist Elizabeth has stepped out into the limelight as a solo artist. Interestingly, as a solo artist Elizabeth has been able to reimagine and reinvent who she is an artist — essentially turning herself into the patron saint of anguish, heartbreak and woe. Naturally, that period of reinvention has led her to develop a unique sound, completely apart from her previously released work.  

Elizabeth’s highly-anticipated, solo debut, The Wonderful World of Nature is slated for a November 1, 2019 release through Our Golden Friend. And as you may recall, last month, I wrote about album single “beautiful baby,” which was centered around a Wall of Sound-inspired production featuring shimmering and twinkling keys, gently padded drumming, strummed guitar and the Aussie pop artist’s achingly mournful vocals reminiscing about a recently lost love — and the lonely and uncertain attempt to move forward. Interestingly, The Wonderful World of Nature’s latest single “meander” is a shimmering and anthemic pop ballad reminiscent of Til Tuesday’s “Voices Carry” but imbued with lingering and confusing emotions — namely, desire, lust, shame, guilt and uncertainty.  

Directed by Julia Suddenly, the recently released video is a languorous and slow-burning visual that stars Elizabeth and a handful of women as pretty and achingly sad sisters in frilly 70s-inspired outfits and a Brady Bunch-like home, perpetually grounded by their strict parents. “This song is honestly about a distraction fling, taking a lover outside of your primary relationship and hoping it will solve all of your problems,” Elizbeth says of the song and the video. “The last lyrics of the song (‘a band of gold what a thing to hold me back/a band of ash what a thing to crash this party’) were written in a tiny piano room in the middle of Sydney CBD, sobbed out through gallons of frustration tears.

“I am so happy to have my beautiful band in the video with me. We play the saddest and the prettiest sisters, trapped in a 70s Coppola-esque dream house by our strict parents. We eat jelly, we tend to our bonsai, we find joy only in music, bonnets and each other.”

Single Review by William Ruben Helms
Initially formed as an ambitious octet that played at the London Jazz Festival and other venues across London featuring founding member and creative mastermind Leo Appleyard (guitar, music), Agne Motie (vocals, lyrics), Duncan Eagles (soprano sax), Piers Green (alto sax), Hoagy Plastow (tenor sax), Paul Jordanous (keys) Holley Grey (bass) and Chris Nickolls (drums), the London-based act Urchin has evolved to become the solo recording project of its founding member and creative mastermind. 
Last year, Appleyard took a break from his life as a gigging musician and relocated to Melbourne, Australia, where he took in the city’s renowned music scene — in particular house, disco and modern jazz from the Fitzroy and Brunswick districts. Unsurprisingly, his most recent EP, Take Time, which was released earlier this year is a reflection of the time he spent in Melbourne, soaking up a new scene while drawing from the likes of acclaimed British acts like Bonobo, Maribou State and The Cinematic Orchestra. The EP’s latest single “Night Light” is a breezy and up-tempo dance floor friendly track centered around strutting Nile Rodgers-like guitar, a soaring and infectious hook, thumping beats and atmospheric electronics. Sonically, the song bears a resemblance to When the Night-era St. Lucia, as it’s indebted to 80s synth pop — but with a clean, modern sheen.