You Beauty’s 2014 album Jersey Flegg is so Aussie it hurts. Named after a rugby player who shares a name with a NSW rugby trophy, the album is local in its lyrical and musical references, the accents of the singers and the attitude of the band. The album begins in the classic vein of artists…
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In 2016, artists of colour have expectations placed on them from both sides of the political spectrum – those on the right would rather they stayed silent about their concerns, while oftentimes those on the left expect each artistic statement to be a political paean and call to arms. This is, of course, an unfair…
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Mothers are the latest in a long and illustrious line of Indie bands from Athens, Georgia, with their hipsteriffically titled debut When You Walk a Long Distance You Are Tired. While they have many things going for them, not least their fantastic singer, the album could benefit from a little more editing and a more…
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Ah, Switzerland – the land of the breathtaking mountain, the epic train journey… and the $20 big mac. Switzerland is known as a travel hotspot for hikers and nature lovers, but unfortunately for those of us on a budget, it also has the reputation of being one of the most expensive countries to visit in…
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Sometimes a piece of art becomes so intertwined with a contemporaneous event that true, unbiased analysis becomes impossible. Just as Wilco’s Yankee Hotel Foxtrot was erroneously seen as a response to 9/11, and Bowie’s Blackstar became his swansong, Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds’ Skeleton Tree comes in the wake of a tragedy. Halfway through the writing of the album’s material, Cave’s teenage son died in…
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If someone says they’re a Wilco fan, it could really mean a lot of things. Maybe they’re wearing a chambray shirt and cowboy boots, in which case they probably mean they like Being There or AM. Or perhaps they’re high and paranoid, in which case they’re Yankee Hotel Foxtrot fans, or they’re high and loving…
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Recently, I’ve embarked on a grand tour of the UK to make up for the gap year I never took after High School. Great Britain has lots of culture and history to offer, but one thing it is not known for is being a budget location. In a country where even going to a public…
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Well. Harry Potter and the Cursed Child is not going to be the easiest thing to review. Not only was the play itself a complete sensory overload, its plot was so intricate that I almost feel like I can’t reveal anything without giving the die hard fans a clue as to what happens. Suffice to…
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Hey Geronimo‘s Crashing Into the Sun may be one of the great mis-timed album releases. When it’s 10 degrees, you don’t long for an album full of summer jams and Beach Boys harmonies. Crashing Into the Sun denotes fun and heat, from the glorious beach-body album cover to the Sgt Pepper’s psychedelia. While it may stand in stark contrast to the…
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Rap music has always had an undercurrent of self-examination to go along with its social commentary, but it seems that now more than ever, we want introspection from our artists. From Kanye West’s lexapro lyrics to Kendrick Lamar’s visionary classic from 2015, verses that could have been ripped from the casenotes of a psychologist are…
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Tribute albums are funny things. Usually formed by a disparate rabble of mainstream artists and indie darlings, they often lack consistency of style and tone. For the most part, Day of the Dead, an extensive tribute collection to The Grateful Dead, avoids this typical problem. Collated by Bob Weir and members of The National, it…
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Let’s get this out of the way right now: A Moon Shaped Pool, Radiohead’s latest, is not the greatest album ever made. The fact that this will be seen as a crushing disappointment by many is a measure of the devotion of the band’s acolytes. Radiohead is often touted as the Only Rock Band That…
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With Feelin’ Kinda Free, the Drones have reasserted themselves as the enfant terribles of Australian music. They’re willing to go where others aren’t, and they bring an unmatched intensity to their music. Anticipation has been building for this release since “Taman Shud” dropped last year, a single that showed that this album was going to…
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The world was treated to a surprising (and hard-rock wet dream inducing) announcement early this year – the great man himself, Iggy Pop, was going to release an album of new material. Not only that, but it was to be produced by another rock legend, Josh Homme of Queens of the Stone Age and Eagles…
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Parquet Courts are like that crush you had in high school – they’re smarter, cooler, funnier and more interesting than you and all you can really do is bow down to them and hope their cred will rub off on you. They’ve had a career that would make any discerning punk rock fan blush and…
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Their first album in four years, The Waterfall is a bracing return for My Morning Jacket, that will reaffirm them in the canon of indie rock. It’s graceful and lyrically robust, while still maintaining the positive vibes of the group. It’s been a while coming, but throughout the album’s run time, it proves a stellar…
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Back in 2013, Savages released a critically acclaimed album, Silence Yourself – a post-punk gem that even had its own manifesto as part of the cover art. The anticipation was high then for Adore Life, an album devoted entirely to love songs. Luckily, Savages have lived up to the hype and delivered another excellent LP. The album begins with the scorching…
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For a while there, it seemed like Blackalicious would be no more – they burst out of the blocks in the early noughties with three classic LPs, before a decade-long silence after 2005’s The Craft. But back in 2015, the duo broke their hiatus in a big way with Imani Vol. 1. The album is not…
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Wednesday marked a momentous occasion in folk/country history, as Gillian Welch and musical partner Dave Rawlings presented their first ever concert in Adelaide. Apparently it had been a long time coming – the duo managed to completely sell out Her Majesty’s Theatre. The crowd was large, and made up almost entirely of either people in…
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2015 was a good year for hometown hero Courtney Barnett, who went from an indie darling into a huge success story and Grammy nominee. 2015 was also kind to the label she started, Milk! Records, when a year of growth and huge sales of Courtney’s debut album was rewarded with an AIR award for Best Independent…
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Announcing their tour for early 2016, The 1975 frontman Matty Healy claimed “only the most dedicated [fans] will get a ticket”. After seeing their sold-out show on Thursday night, I agree with him – there was a line stretching long into the street hours before the gig started, with some people arriving at 6am to…
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It’s impossible to review ★ (Blackstar), David Bowie’s 25th and, devastatingly, last album, in any subjective way given the tragic events that have passed since its release. Lyrics, especially from the title track and “Lazarus”, are now refracted through his death and are hard to interpret without his illness in mind. But, for the record, I bought…
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It’s hard to be happy and interesting at the same time. Often, if you listen to an album that comes from a “happy place,” your most likely reaction is going to be either envy or boredom. The fact is, most great art comes from a place of pain – the prevailing wisdom is that dissatisfaction…
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In any artistic career that lasts decades, there will inevitably be a period where the artist loses touch with their fans, their music and themselves. For Neil Young, this period was the entire 1980s. In a career of weird moves (most notably 2010’s Fork in the Road, a concept album devoted entirely to the benefits…
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Brisbane’s WAAX have been building up a strong live reputation ever since their first two songs – “I for an Eye” and “Wisdom Teeth” – were released. The band hit the studio earlier this year, and back in October, the band released a surprise EP, titled Holy Sick, containing these two songs and two new tracks….
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The Cutting Edge, the latest release in Bob Dylan’s Bootleg Series, is well named – it covers material recorded in 1965-6, when Dylan was at the forefront of rock and roll, and it also describes his songwriting at the time, which was so sharp and on point as to be cutting. The Bootleg Series was…
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Melbourne, Florida finds Dick Diver facing up to an unenviable predicament – their last album, Calendar Days, was released to such critical applause that their follow up release automatically has a huge (and some would say unfair) hurdle to overcome – is it better than the last LP? And the answer is….. maybe. Melbourne, Florida…
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