Category Archives: Artist

Live Review: COG “Between Oceans” Tour @ The Hi-Fi, Brisbane – 11th June 2009

Review by Bec

COG
[Photo: Stuart Blythe]
   Cog fans are a loyal bunch. They’ll come up to you and tell you how great their band is. “Sold out. Melbourne Hi-Fi, and now here,” one fan tells me. (He waits until he sees me write this in my notebook.) They’ll bear the unusually cold Thursday night to happily wait in line. And they’ll keep coming back to see Cog live – for some fans this is their fourth or fifth gig. Little wonder, if you believe what another fan proclaims: “Best live band – ever”. That’s a pretty big call.

Certainly, Sydney-based Cog is a WYHIWUG (what-you-hear-is-what-you-get) band. If you love their CDs then you’ll love their live shows. No disappointment there. Lead singer, Flynn Gower’s vocals, like his stage presence, are deliberate, steady and enunciated. He’s obviously a dedicated musician as are other band members, Lucius Borich, on drums, and Luke Gower on bass who is extremely animated on stage.

Continue reading Live Review: COG “Between Oceans” Tour @ The Hi-Fi, Brisbane – 11th June 2009

Sunday Selection: Texas Tea : 14 June 2009

LifeMusicMedia’s Sunday Selection is your weekly view to Queensland Artists

Texas Tea    Texas Tea are a two piece alt-country act from Brisbane, Australia.

Texas Tea’s debut album, Take A Sip, featured heavily on radio from it’s release in 2006, including ABC, Triple R, PBS, Triple J, 4ZZZ. In 2006 and 2007 Texas Tea took out the Hot 100 on Brisbane’s 4ZzZfm with tracks ‘Macy and Me’ and ‘Whiskey and Wine’.

These tracks also featured as finalists in the Q Music Awards and in 2007 APRA Songwriters Award. Tracks from Take A Sip have been used in several film projects including a film by Tropfest Winning Director Steve Baker and more recently in feature film written and directed by John Jarratt – Savages Crossing.

Continue reading Sunday Selection: Texas Tea : 14 June 2009

Josh Pyke wants YOU to make his next video! (Be Quick – Deadline Midnight July 2nd 2009)

Josh Pyke wants YOU to make his next video!

joshpyke   Josh Pyke has worked with some very talented artists and directors in the past, and now he’s calling on his fans to create the video for his new single ‘You Don’t Scare Me’.

Josh will choose his favourite clip from all those submitted, and the video will be used as the official clip for the single. It will be premiered on Channel Ten’s Video Hits, and will then be serviced to other music video programs and stations. The director of the clip will also be awarded AUD$2500 and signed copies of all of Josh’s albums.

Continue reading Josh Pyke wants YOU to make his next video! (Be Quick – Deadline Midnight July 2nd 2009)

uncharTED Semi-finals Amost Up… Vote Now and Support and Aussie Band!

uncharTED    The uncharTED semi-finals are almost up! A few weeks ago Tooheys Extra Dry uncharTED competition 1 2009 presented Australia with the Top 10 emerging artists chosen by a combination of public votes and uncharTED media partners. uncharTED is now preparing to step into the final round, and is getting set to reveal the Top 3 finalists on 16 June.

Six Sydney artists Bridgemary Kiss, The Falls, OnlyTheSeaSlugs, The Deer Republic, Death Mattel and Sui Zhen, Melbourne-based bands Foxx On Fire and Hot Little Hands, Perth outfit French Rockets and Brisbane band Ellington are all competing for a spot in the Top 3.
Continue reading uncharTED Semi-finals Amost Up… Vote Now and Support and Aussie Band!

CAO FEI – UTOPIA (Visual Arts)

Utopia Second Life is a lab, a world lab, but it consists in a huge global economic system. It brings us business and democracy, at the same time with feelings and culture. We can’t avoid capitalism’s wave; at the same time, we can’t avoid Communist aspirations in our heart. This world is not only dualistic, we’re inconsistent. Communism is our Utopia, Second Life is our E-topia . . . SL is our mirror, it tells us the truth.—Cao Fei

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Review: Judith Lucy’s Not Getting Any Younger – Brisbane Powerhouse


judithlucy-small    Judith Lucy‘s Not Getting Any Younger
Review by Lisa Lamb

I was fortunate enough to first see Judith Lucy perform in the early nineties at the Sit Down Comedy Club and she just gets funnier! Whether she’s talking about the horror of getting older,

global warming or an ill fated trip to Italy with her biological mother where she ended up drinking wine from a cereal bowl, you will laugh until your jaw aches. She is so natural on stage, which is possibly why she has been a successful comedian for the past twenty years, and her audience participation is second to none, especially the Ask a Young Person segment, involving her asking a seventeen year old boy if he shaves his pubic hair?
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Interview: Little Birdy – This is the year!

Interview by Elize Strydom
Photo by Tony Mott
Little Birdy - photo by Tony Mott It’s the album Little Birdy have always wanted to make. So what do you do when all your dreams have come true? Bass player Scott ‘Barney’ O’Donoghue tells Elize Strydom he’s happy to relish the moment. For now.

If at first you don’t succeed, try and try again. Not that Little Birdy’s first two long players – the top-five dazzler Hollywood and acclaimed debut Big Big Love – could ever come close to being called failures. But on their shiny new record Confetti they’ve well and truly nailed it. By now you would have heard the unofficial single – and clear festival fave – Brother and the single proper, Summarize.
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COG’s Sharing Space Goes Gold

cogalbumcover    When Cog kicked off the first show of their Between Ocean’s tour in Hobart last week, they had just received the news that their latest record Sharing Space had reached Gold sales in Australia.

Sharing Space was the bands most stressful recording experience to date, knowing their fans love it enough to break the gold sales barrier makes it all worthwhile.

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Sunday Selection – The Kidney Thieves : 31 May 2009

LifeMusicMedia’s Sunday Selection is your weekly view to a new or emerging Queensland Artists

The Kidney Thieves
The Kidney Thieves sound like a car-chase gunfight between a possessed gypsy and a vigilante clown, cruising the funk freeway at full throttle, leaving a trail of carnage and the faint odour of Parmesan.

Put simply, TKT are a distinctive, genre-busting act blending jazz, funk psychedelic, metal, classical, dance, tribal, latin, drum & bass and western influences. The music is technical, with tempo changes and complex time signatures, yet remains accessible, fun and danceable to a broad range of musical tastes. With a penchant for stage monikers and ludicrous song titles, a propensity toward random costumes and live visual projections, and a soft spot for instrumental epics, this group offers a wildly refreshing experience. The Kidney Thieves are as unpredictable as the name suggests – you can never be prepared or properly dressed for the occasion!
Continue reading Sunday Selection – The Kidney Thieves : 31 May 2009

Interview with Fredrik Saroea – Datarock

Interview by Stuart Blythe
datarock-smlWe caught up with Fredrik Saroea, lead singer of Norwegian punk funk band DataRock ahead of their Australian tour.

LMM: Your tour is in support of your latest release cd, can you tell us a little about the album?

Fredrik Saroea: The album is the best to happen mankind since the C64 and the international means to get through the financial recession.
 
LMM: How would you compare the album to your previous recordings?

Fredrik Saroea: It’s just the same, but better in all ways.
 
LMM: The “Give It Up” video looks like a lot of fun, how did that come about?

Fredrik Saroea: It came to us on a drunken evening but took a hell of a lot of work to make into a video. You won’t believe how many people were involved. And it’s filmed on location at the middle of the night, mid winters in freezing minus degrees. Even the stupid ass dancing became quite a challenge. And we’re doing this in front of a very serious choreographer surrounded by professional Swedish dancers and a big ass film crew. Next time we wanna pay tribute to Michael Jackson’s “Thriller”, “Beat It” & “Bad”, Toto’s “Rosanna”, Coppola’s “Rumble Fish”, Broadway’s musicals, “West Side Story” from ’61 and Romeo & Juliette, please stop us!
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Interview: Judith Lucy’s Not Getting Any Younger

judithlucy-smallJudith Lucy‘s Not Getting Any Younger
interview by Lisa Lamb.

Judith Lucy is one of Australia’s most popular comedians and one of few Australian comics to be invited to the Just For Laughs Montreal Comedy Festival, twice. In 2009 she celebrates twenty years in comedy with her new show Judith’s Not Getting Any Younger.

Judith, you’re a single successful independent girl, is it time those men started battering down your door?
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Sunday Selection – SIAN EVANS : 24 May 2009

LifeMusicMedia’s Sunday Selection is your weekly view to a new or emerging Queensland Artist

Sian Evans    “Sure Sian’s Got a wonderful voice, dextrous guitar chops, lyrical prowess, is a looker and charming as hell……..but what about the positives?” – Tim Rogers……….

Thriving on the complexities of human behaviour and the simplicities of beauty in a philosophical shade. Moved by moments of magic. Excited by the possibilities of endless rhyming sequences created through rolling vals and syllabic rhythms. Best depicted as a contemporary synthesis of Urban Folk-Funk and Twisted Gypsy Jazz, it’s the new black of the evolving Australian Blues and Roots culture.

Born in FNQ, singer/songwriter Sian Evans has played numerous gigs along the East coast with an array of musicians big and small. Supporting the likes of Ash Grunwald, Deborah Conway, Tim Rogers, and guest with Clare Bowditch in her short career.
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UNCHARTED 2009 GETS SET FOR SEMI-FINALS

The Top 10 Artists have been chosen!

uncharTED    For the last four weeks Tooheys Extra Dry uncharted competition 1 2009 round 1 has been live and kickin’, showcasing the country’s Top 50 emerging artists, which were selected from over 2,300 entries. Round 1 has come to an end with the announcement of the Top 10 semi-finalists – as voted by you!

The Top 6 publically voted artists are (in no particular order) Sydney bands Bridgemary Kiss, The Falls, OnlyTheSeaSlugs and The Deer Republic, Melbournites Foxx On Fire and Perth band French Rockets. They will be joined by the four media pick bands, Brisbane band Ellington (The Music Network), Sydney-siders Death Mattel (MTV), Melbourne outfit Hot Little Hands (MySpace) and Sydney songstress Sui Zhen (Street Press Collective). This fine collection of Australian emerging artists are now waiting for your vote, and each has the chance to strut their stuff at this year’s Splendour In The Grass, as well as winning an artist development package worth $25,000! Visit www.uncharted.com.au to look at and listen to the Top 10, then vote for your pick of the pack.

The voting slates were wiped clean bringing all the artists to the same playing level for this round, so register and start voting to make sure your favourite semi-finalist has a chance of making it through to the Top 3 announced on 16 June. This time around there is SMS voting, an uncharTED mobile site and artists widgets that you can upload to your social networking profile, go to www.uncharted.com.au for details. You can submit one vote per hour and the more you vote, the more chances you have at winning prizes.
To vote, or get more information and exclusive content, visit www.uncharted.com.au, or the mobile site – http://uncharted.mobi

UNCHARTED – FINAL WEEK FOR ARTISTS TO CLAIM THEIR SPOT AT SEMI-FINALS

Sydney songstress Sui Zhen is media pick of The Street Press Collective

sui zhen    Over the past few weeks Tooheys Extra Dry uncharTED has been showcasing Australia’s Top 50 emerging artists, hand-picked from over 2,300 entries by our esteemed industry panel and A&R team. The competition 1 winning act will see themselves onstage at Splendour In The Grass 2009, plus win an artist development package worth $25,000. Register online right now and vote for your favourite artist – it’s the last week of voting, so get in there quick!

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Madeleine Paige

Turn off your phone and get out of town
Away from the chaos and deafening sound
And when all is peaceful and darkness falls
You’ll hear The Voice Behind The Noise
   Madeleine Page

This is the concept behind Madeleine Paige’s stunning sophomore EP “The Voice Behind The Noise”. In October last year, on a friend’s recommendation, Madeleine left behind the daily grind and spent some time alone in a cabin in the wilderness and her creativity flourished. Through these visits to the idyllic Mullumbimby countryside, the songs on this glorious EP were born.
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