Tag: Sydney Australia

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: The Presets Return with an Anthemic Festival Banger Paired with Wild, Psychedelic Imagery

Comprised of Julian Hamilton and Kim Moyes, the Sydney, Australia-based electronic music production and artist duo The Presets can trace their origins to when the duo met while studying at the Sydney Conservatorium of Music. Hamilton and Moyes quickly became recognized for crating a sound that electronic dance music with an arena rock energy and vibe — and as a result, the duo signed with renowned Australian dance music label Modular Recordings, who released their first two EPs and their 2005 debut, Beams.

2008 saw the release of the duo’s critically and commercially applauded sophomore effort Apocalypso, an effort that went Triple Platinum in their native Australia and featured four smash hits, including “My People,” one of their biggest songs. And adding to a breakthrough year, Hamilton and Moyes won 5 ARIA Awards — including Album of the Year, 2 ARIA Artisan Awards, the J Award, the FBI SMAC Award for Album of the Year, and they shared the Songwriter of the Year at 2009’s APRA Awards. 

The duo’s third, full-length effort, 2012’s award-nominated Pacifica featured Rolling Stone Australia’s Song of the Year, “Ghosts,” and was nominated for an ARIA Award, shortlisted for the AMP Award, the J Award and was named the Herald Sun’s Album of the Year, the Daily Telegraph’s Album of the Year and the Sydney Morning Herald’s Electronic Album of the Year. And although, it’s been some time since I’ve personally written about the acclaimed, Aussie electro pop duo, the duo have been busy collaborating with a variety of artists —Hamilton cowrote Flume’s “Say It” and contributed tracks to albums by Flight Facilities, Steve Angello and Meek Mill, while Moyes produced the DMA’s latest album, remixed tracks by The Drones and The Jezabels and started an underground techno label Here To Hell.

“Do What You Want” is the first single from the duo in over four years, and it’s also the first single off the duo’s highly-anticipated fourth, full-length album slated for release sometime in 2018  — and unsurprisingly, the new single will further cement the duo’s reputation for crafting festival bangers with enormous, crowd rousing hooks and thumping beats; but interestingly enough, the new single features a looped, glitchy sample reminiscent of Boys Noize’s “ICH R U,” while also nodding at Tweekend-era The Crystal Method and Come With Us-era The Chemical Brothers. 

Directed by Kris Moyes, the recently released video is a wild, psychedelic homage to doing whatever the fuck you want, as long as it floats your boat, doesn’t harm anyone and is relentless and ridiculous fun. 

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

Although, it’s been some time since I’ve personally written about them, if you had been frequenting this site throughout the course of 2014-2015, you would’ve likely come across a handful of posts featuring the JOVM mainstays and electro pop duo  Du Tonc. And as you may recall, the duo comprised of for his work as the bassist, guitarist and founding member of the Sydney, Australia-based band Van She, and renowned, London UK-based producer, remixer, DJ and electronic music artist Mighty Mouse have released a number of attention grabbing singles since the release of their debut single “Darkness” back in 2013.

The duo recently announced that they recently finished writing their long-awaited and highly-anticipated full-length debut, and on the heels of that announcement, the duo released their latest single “High,” a single which features Van Schie’s ethereal vocals floating over a icy yet cosmic production featuring shimmering and arpeggiated synths and a soaring hook — but additionally, the song features some additional vocals from I Know Leopard‘s Jenny McCullagh. And while nodding at psych pop and dream pop, the single retains the dance floor friendly vibe of their previously released work, complete with an effortless yet hyper modern production sheen.

 

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Break Out From the Banality of the 9-5 World with the Visuals for Wild Honey’s “Break Away”

Comprised of Thom Moore (vocals, guitar), Adam Della-Grota (guitar), Sam Barron (bass, keys), Jackson Love (keys, vocals) and Thomas Eagleton (drums, vocals), the Sydney, Australia-based indie rock quintet Wild Honey quickly emerged with their self-titled debut EP, an effort that was written and recorded by Moore almost entirely in his bedroom and featured lead single “Eye To Eye.” “Eye To Eye” wound up becoming one of the most played songs by an Australian artist on Triple J during the summer of 2015-2016 — and as a result, the band found themselves opening for the likes of several national and internationally recognized bands including The Delta Riggs, The Belligerents, Hinds and Twin Peaks.

Building upon a rapidly growing national profile, the Sydney-based indie rock quintet went into the studio to record their forthcoming, Jack Mofitt-produced, full-length debut album, and the album’s first single “Break Away,” serves as an anthemic call to arms for anyone, who feels like they’re going through the motions. Interestingly, the song finds the band effortlessly meshing classic alt rock, Brit Pop and contemporary indie rock as the song features jangling guitars, an anthemic hook consisting of enormous, arena rock friendly power chords and an earnest call to go out and work your ass off to make your dreams happen — and that there’s more to life than struggling to cover the rent and your bills while working a shitty 9 to 5.

Directed by Kansas Smeaton and Keane, the recently released video, echoes the song’s aspirational message and tone as it follows a dissatisfied and hopelessly bored advertising executive, who in a fit of frustration figuratively and literally breaks out of his boredom — and probably loses his job in an awesome, “take this fucking job and shove it moment.” 

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

Comprised of Thom Moore (vocals, guitar), Adam Della-Grota (guitar), Sam Barron (bass, keys), Jackson Love (keys, vocals) and Thomas Eagleton (drums, vocals), the Sydney, Australia-based indie rock quintet Wild Honey quickly emerged with their self-titled debut EP, an effort that was written and recorded by Moore almost entirely in his bedroom and featured lead single “Eye To Eye.” “Eye To Eye” wound up becoming one of the most played songs by an Australian artist on Triple J during the summer of 2015-2016 — and as a result, the band found themselves opening for the likes of several national and internationally recognized bands including The Delta Riggs, The Belligerents, Hinds and Twin Peaks.

Building upon a rapidly growing national profile, the Sydney-based indie rock quintet went into the studio to record their forthcoming, Jack Mofitt-produced, full-length debut album, and the album’s first single “Break Away,” serves as an anthemic call to arms for anyone, who feels like they’re going through the motions. Interestingly, the song finds the band effortlessly meshing classic alt rock, Brit Pop and contemporary indie rock as the song features jangling guitars, an anthemic hook consisting of enormous, arena rock friendly power chords and an earnest call to go out and work your ass off to make your dreams happen — and that there’s more to life than struggling to cover the rent and your bills while working a shitty 9 to 5.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

Certainly, if you’ve been frequenting the site over the past 12-18 months or so you’ve come across a handful of posts on Melbourne, Australia-based emcee REMI  and his producer and collaborator Sensible J. The duo rose to national prominence in their homeland with 2014’s critically and commercially successful  Raw X Infinity, an album that was named Triple J‘s Album of the Week and the Independent Hip Hop Album of the Year by the Australian Independent Record Association, a well as receiving international attention from OkayAfrica, JUICE, laut.de, NPR‘s All Things Considered among others. And adding to a growing profile, the duo were named “Australian Breakthrough Artist of the Year,” and followed that up with touring nationally and across both the UK and EU with Danny Brown, Vic Mensa, De La Soul, Joey Bada$$ and Damon Albarn.

Last year saw the release of the duo’s critically applauded sophomore full-length effort, Divas and Demons, which paired their strengths — an incredibly adept lyricist and storyteller, whose stories possessed an uncommonly earnest, soul-baring honesty and an incredibly dope and soulful producer, whose sound and production nods at the great J. Dilla, DJ Premier and others; in fact, you’d probably recall “For Good,” a charmingly coquettish love song in which its male and female narrators have misunderstandings, bicker and fight, cheat and drive each other insane in a youthfully dysfunctional relationship featuring a guest spot from Sydney, Australia-based poet, visual artist and singer/songwriter Sampa The Great rhyming and singing over a warm and soulful production that nodded at The Roots and Erykah Badu‘s “You Got Me;” “Substance Therapy,” the album’s second single featured Remi rhyming honestly about how drinking, drugging and womanizing as an escape from himself and his depression only managed to further mire him in depression paired with a production that emphasizes the rapid vacillation of self-loathing, self-doubt, fear, anger, and desperate escapism of the severely depressed; “Lose Sleep” was a deeply personal song that drew from REMI’s own experiences a mixed race man in Australia and in the world — and in some way, he wanted the song to be a message to other mixed race kids about that weird feeling of feeling as though you could never quite fit in; but that his experience and story, as of those of others matters in a much larger story; and the last single I wrote about “Contact Hi/High/I” featured REMI along with a guest spot from  Hiatus Kaiyote‘s Silent Jay rhyming and singing about what seems to be a permanent state of adolescence, which constantly validates itself through vice and excess.

Interestingly enough, this year marks Sensible J’s solo debut — and his first single “Fire Sign” is a a collaboration with his friends and frequent collaborators REMI and Sampha the Great, which features the two rhyming over a thumping and swaggering, soulful groove, reminiscent of the aforementioned J. Dilla, thanks to a production featuring twinkling keys, boom bap-like drum programming and a ridiculous, anthemic hook; in fact, in a playful turn, the trio pay homage to A Tribe Called Quest — and it shouldn’t be surprising because much like the legendary Tribe and De La Soul, the Melbourne-based trio specialize in an overwhelmingly soulful, thoughtful hip-hop, serving as a reminder that the genre and its practitioners have always been wildly diverse; after all, NWA, Tribe, De La, Public Enemy, Kid ‘N’ Play, MC Lyte and others all existed simultaneously.

 

 

New Audio by William Ruben Helms

 

Born in Zambia, raised in Botswana and currently based in Sydney, Australia, the 23 year old poet, visual artist, emcee, singer/songwriter and pop artist Sampa the Great, who publicly has cited Mos Def, Nina Simone, Lauryn Hill, Nneka, and others, as influences. And since the release of The Great Mixtape and collaborations with fellow Australians, pop artist Wallace on the skittering and jazzy single “Beauty” and internationally acclaimed Australian emcee Remi on the neo-soul and conscious hip-hop influenced “For Good,” the Sydney, Australia-based artist has quickly built up a growing internationally recognized profile as she’s opened for the likes of Kendrick Lamar, Thundercat, Hiatus Kaiyote, Ibeyi, Little Simz and Fat Freddy’s Drop, as well as played sets at Golden Plains, Sugar Mountain, Laneway, WOMAD and Vivid LIVE. However, 2017 may arguably be the Sampa the Great’s breakout year as her Rakhi-produced HERoes Act 2 was released yesterday through Red Bull Sound Select, and features the Sydney, Australia-based artist collaborating with Estelle. And while further cementing her reputation for a ridiculously dexterous flow that draws from spoken word performances, old school, hip-hop lyricism, with complex inner rhyme and multisyllabic rhyme schemes, old school soul and the blues and jazz, her latest single “The Plug” features Estelle and Sampa doing their thing with a swaggering, self-assuredness over a Timbaland-like production featuring futuristic bleeps and bloops, industrial clang and clatter, glitchy and shuffling beats and swirling electronics.

HERoes Act 2 is the second part of a two part narrative series of songs and genre-defying collaborative projects with Act being a spoken-world video, 2 track exploration into self-discovery and inner strength within a world that’s gone mad with uncertainty, racism and fear. “The Plug,” like the two other songs on the EP continue in a similar vein while continuing her reputation for crafting material based around her own personal experiences as an outsider, her desire and need to create, and the recognition that as individuals and as a society, that we need to value the strength and abilities of the individual; but in terms of this particular song, the song leans towards recognizing and championing the god-given talents of the individual, while brushing away haters and nay-sayers, with your desire to make a name for yourself at what you can do.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

Wallace Gollan is a Wellington, New Zealand-born, Sydney, Australia-based singer/songwriter, who performs under the mononymic stage name Wallace, and she has received attention across New Zealand, Australia and elsewhere for her jazz-influenced, soulful vocals — and for an overall sound that effortlessly meshes jazz, soul, neo-soul, the blues and hip-hop. And unsurprisingly, she’s been compared by some to the likes of Erykah Badu, Little Dragon and Carmen McRae. Now, if you’ve been frequenting this site for some time, you may recall that I wrote about Gollan’s collaboration with Sydney-based emcee and poet  Sampa The Great “Beauty,” which paired Gollan’s expressive vocals singing a positive message of how we all have the power to transform our lives for the better with a skittering, off-kilter production featuring jazz and hip-hop-inspired beats, twinkling keys and a shuffling bass line.

“Diaspora,” the Wellington-born, Sydney-based singer/songwriter’s first single of 2017 is a collaboration with the Sydney-based, Nigerian-Australian producer and vocalist Crooked Letter and interestingly the single is inspired by Gollan’s own experience of being part of a Diaspora as her Dundee, Scotland-born father had moved to Wellington as a child — and the single features Gollan’s brash and almost coquettish jazz phrasing paired with a production based around a looping Nigerian funk sample, stuttering polyrhythm and chopped up yet ethereal samples of Gollan’s own father appearing briefly within the track.  As Gollan explains in press notes about her latest single and her collaboration with Crooked Letter, “I wanted to highlight the connection that we both feel towards places where we didn’t grow up. We bonded over the idea that looking back at our roots gave us a sense of affirmation and appreciation for what makes us who we are.” And as a result, the song possesses a profound sense of gratitude and connection to something far older than where you may currently call home.

 

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

Guy Brown is a Sydney, Australia-based producer and electronic music artist, best known as Mammals — and as Mammals, Brown has seen attention both nationally and internationally for a production style and sound that effortlessly bridges and shifts between indie rock and electro pop. In fact, if you had been frequenting this site earlier this year, you may recall his shimmering, slow-burning and spectral cover of Telepopmusik‘s “Breathe,” as part of Istanbul, Turkey-based dream pop/electro pop label Drug Boulevard‘s debut compilation, DRUG BLVD.

Adding to a growing profile, Brown’s collaboration with renowned electronic music artist and producer Goldroom “‘Til Sunrise” has received 9 million Spotify streams, has had his work playlisted in the Lost in the Woods (UK), Deep Dark Indie, Evening Chill and Boho + Chill Spotify Playlists and as a result, his own work has received over 7 million Spotify streams. Along with that Brown has opened for internationally acclaimed electro pop/electronic dance music production and artist duo PNAU during their March national tour, and he’ll be opening for fellow countrywoman, singer/songwriter Vera Blue during her national tour, before his headlining tour to support his soon-to-be released EP Chase Your Bliss later this year.

Interestingly enough, Brown has managed to achieve his early successes without having management, without being on a label, having a publisher or a publicity firm to back him. And considering that I had written about him a little while ago, receiving an email from him about his latest single, EP title track “Chase Your Bliss,” was a pleasant surprise. The new single features Brown’s tender and aching falsetto floating over a glistening and shimmering production that features layers of arpeggio synths, buzzing guitar chords, a sinuous bass line, cowbell and handclap-led percussion and a soaring hook — and while further cementing his reputation for a sound that meshes indie rock and electro pop, the single manages to sound as though it draws from In Ghost Colours and Free Your Mind-era Cut Copy and Tame Impala, as the song manages to subtly nod at psych pop.

 

 

 

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

Over the past month or so, I’ve written about the first two singles off the border-crossing, synth pop compilation DRUG BLVD —  ACES‘ slow-burning and tender “Just Cut It Out,” and Astronautica‘s lush and dreamy “Reasons.” Interestingly, the album, which was mastered Barry Grint, who has worked with David Bowie, Radiohead, Prince, Oasis, Beastie Boys, Madonna, Guns ‘N’ Roses and others, the compilation will be the first release from new,  Istanbul, Turkey-based dream pop label Drug Boulevard, founded by Kubily Yigit, the founder of renowned Turkish progressive/trance label Blue Soho Records.

Serving as a Drug Boulevard’s in a attention-grabbing introduction, the record label’s compilation will also introduce global audiences to some up-and-coming talents within electro pop and dream pop including Sydney, Australia‘s Guy Brown. Best known as Mammals, Brown has received a growing profile for a production style that effortlessly shifts between indie rock and electronica, and Brown’s contribution to the compilation is shimmering, slow-burning and atmospheric cover of Telepopmusik’s “Breathe” that’s possesses a haunting, spectral feel.

 

 

 

 

 

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

Comprised of Sophie, Annabel, Cecil and Georgia, Body Type are a Sydney, Australia-based — by way of Perth, Australia and Kiama, Australia — indie quartet that formed a little over six months ago and began receiving attention for material that thematically focuses on navigating heartbreak to the banality of life in in a moldy Redfern terraced house — and for opening for the likes of Gabriella Cohen, Cate Le Bon and The Coathangers. Adding to a growing national profile, the Sydney-based quartet recently signed to Our Golden Friend Records, who will be releasing the “Ludlow”/”264” 7 inch single, featuring their debut single “Ludlow” and their latest single, the moody and slow-burning “264.” While sounding as though it were indebted to jangling guitar pop and Phil Spector’s Wall of Sound-era production, the song manages to feature lyrics that describe the day-to-day life of in and around a shitty little house with a novelist’s attention to detail, a soaring bridge and a sinuous bass line holding it all together. It’s a gently swooning and moody take on a familiar and beloved sound — and it reveals a young band playing and writing gorgeous material with a cool, self-assuredness.