Category Archives: Music

Mark Lanegan Touring Australia – July 2010

In an announcement that has been long awaited by rock fans, Mark Lanegan will perform a series of shows across Australia and New Zealand for The Frontier Touring Company. The July shows will be his first solo tour since 2004, sharing with us an array of his impressive and extensive back catalogue.

With a musical career spawning from the early Seattle ‘grunge’ days, Mark Lanegan is a creature of undying integrity and an ever existing nuance. He has been noted as a poetic misfit whose lyrics remain forever etched in your memory long past first hearing them. Continue reading Mark Lanegan Touring Australia – July 2010

Virgin Mobile announce free surprise gig in Brisbane – 20th May 2010


  The next Virgin Mobile Surprise Gig is set to entertain Brisbane. Popular Gold Coast pop band Operator Please will play a surprise concert in Queen Street Mall on Thursday 20 May at 1pm. The gig is free for all to attend.

In addition to the gig Virgin Mobile is giving away a ringtone of Operator Please’s new single ‘Back and Forth’ taken from their new album ‘Gloves’. The ringtone will be available from Thursday 13 May for anyone to download for free (limited to 500 downloads) from Virgin Mobile’s Members Lounge (memberslounge.com.au/surprisegig).

Continue reading Virgin Mobile announce free surprise gig in Brisbane – 20th May 2010

REGGAETOWN 2010 – Now 2 Days – First Artist Announcement

Cat Empire   With a new look, a new feel and new timing…Australia’s premier Island, World, Roots & Reggae Festival Reggaetown, set in lush tropical Far North Queensland a few kilometres north of Cairns, is back for 2010. And, for the first time, taking place over 2 days — Friday 10th & Saturday 11th of September 2010 — in our idyllic location at Tjapukai Aboriginal Cultural Park. Continue reading REGGAETOWN 2010 – Now 2 Days – First Artist Announcement

Interview with Nik Kaloper of The Jezabels

2nd May 2010: Nik Kaloper (NK) of The Jezabels tells Stuart Blythe (LMM) about band life, touring and lessons learnt along the way.

The JezabelsLMM: You’ll be touring with Tegan and Sara on their Australian visit throughout May. Tell us about the tour and how it came about.

NK: Well, we were lucky enough to tour with Tegan & Sara January 2009 and we seemed to be a good fit for the bill. We really enjoyed what they were doing, and apparently vice versa – we were able to keep in touch and jump back on the bill this time around. It’s even better this time though, because we get to go all the way out to Adelaide and Perth with them – even playing Groovin the Moo festival together, very exciting times. Despite the tour being longer than the last one – we’re looking forward to relaxing in some of the cities. Because there are two shows in Brisbane and Melbourne, we’ll have an afternoon that doesn’t involve driving (something to be cherished when you’re on tour).
Continue reading Interview with Nik Kaloper of The Jezabels

TWINKLE TWINKLE LITTLE STAR – SOUTHERN CROSS SOLOISTS SECOND SHOWCASE SERIES – 1 June 2010

Queensland Performing Arts Centre (QPAC) proudly presents Southern Cross Soloists’ second Showcase Series concert for 2010, featuring guest flautist Wissam Boustany on 1 June 2010. Continue reading TWINKLE TWINKLE LITTLE STAR – SOUTHERN CROSS SOLOISTS SECOND SHOWCASE SERIES – 1 June 2010

DAN PARSONS DEBUT ALBUM RELEASE & TOUR DATES

  Dan Parsons’ debut album is less a case of boy meets girl but rather boy meets world. It’s a snapshot of someone who after spending his high school years emulating seventies heroes on a reel to reel eight track, leaves his bedroom and begins tumbling through one blinding, visceral experience after another.

What Parsons could grab hold of and pin down from experiences such as this, and his first brushes with the Brisbane music scene after growing up in country Queensland, inspired a drastic change to the primarily acoustic sounds that were on his 2008 mini-album Old Brown Shoe.

Continue reading DAN PARSONS DEBUT ALBUM RELEASE & TOUR DATES

Photo Gallery: Jeff Martin @ Corner Hotel, Melbourne 14th May 2010

Photographer: Naomi Rahim
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Jeff Martin with Pear

[Photo: Naomi R]

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Jeff Martin @ Corner hotel, Melbourne – 14th May 2010
Continue reading Photo Gallery: Jeff Martin @ Corner Hotel, Melbourne 14th May 2010

Macabre (USA) Australian Tour – July 2010

  Macabre blends elements of true crime, math rock, nursery rhymes, punk, thrash, folk melodies, death metal, jazz fusion, black metal and more into an energetic, catchy and unmistakable amalgam, refers to Macabre’s signature style. It’s a genre of one. The all-too-true tales of man’s inhumanity to man are delivered with knife-edge precision, interspersed with Corporate Death’s patented (back when he was a toddler) screech.

Fast and heavy, with a focus on things that make happy shiny people cringe, the original members, Corporate Death (guitar and vocals), Nefarious (bass and vocals) and Dennis the Menace (drums) are still together. Macabre have brought mayhem to the world in the past decade, playing dozens countries over the years.

Macabre’s rabid fans, including members of bands ranging from Carcass to Slipknot, relish the band’s tight and increasingly sophisticated music; they exult in their musical chops as much as in the band’s sense of humor, their killer music, and its deadly subjects.
Continue reading Macabre (USA) Australian Tour – July 2010

Interview: Ben Weinman – The Dillinger Escape Plan

By: Ben Hosking
[Click here to listen to the audio version of this interview]

In a scene where many bands tend to follow the latest musical trend and the industry doesn’t know which way is up, The Dillinger Escape Plan stand clearly out from the crowd.
THE DILLINGER ESCAPE PLANFormed in the late 1990s, the group has gone from strength to strength thanks to an unwavering self-reliance and unique ability to churn out some of the most twisted, ugly riffs available. Founder member and guitarist of the New Jersey band Ben Weinman (BW) talks to LifeMusicMedia’s Ben Hosking (LMM) about band dynamics, society’s relationship with technology, illegal downloading and their new album ‘Option Paralysis’.

LMM: How’s the tour going?
BW: Pretty good. Everybody’s a little sick, but we’re holding it together.

LMM: Too much partying or more a case of ‘one guy gets sick, we all get sick’?
BW: I think it’s the latter, man. We’re all on a bus together, so when one person starts hacking up a lung, it just spreads like wildfire.
Continue reading Interview: Ben Weinman – The Dillinger Escape Plan

World Press Photo 2010 @ Brisbane Powerhouse

World Press Photo 2010 marks the fourth year the exhibition has made Brisbane Powerhouse one of its world tour destinations. The annual photojournalism competition that captures ‘the year that was’ will visit the venue from Saturday 5 June to Sunday 27 June. Continue reading World Press Photo 2010 @ Brisbane Powerhouse

Live Review: Jeff Martin @ The Basement, Sydney – 7th May 2010

Review: Ben Hosking
Arriving at Sydney’s iconic Basement at around 8.30pm, one could have been forgiven for thinking that they were arriving early enough to catch a decent viewing point of the stage. Alas, walking into the dimly-lit venue an hour before the scheduled start time – past rows and rows of cattle-like drunken Friday night inner city executives at the bars next door – actually saw punters encounter an already half full concert space.
Clearly, this was going to be a big night.

Thanks to a complete lack of any advertised information, the evening’s opening acts seemed to catch a lot of people unaware, including this reviewer. However, despite the complete rudeness of the audience, both performed well; Brisbane singer/songwriter Pear (aka Stephanie Barros Lees) providing the surprise performance of the night.
Continue reading Live Review: Jeff Martin @ The Basement, Sydney – 7th May 2010

Live Review: Lisa Mitchell @ The Tivoli, Brisbane – 7th May 2010

Review by: Lauren Sherritt
Lisa MitchellHeading to Lisa Mitchell’s gig at The Tivoli on Friday night, I held some pretty general expectations as to what the “Oh! Hark!” tour would have in store for its Brisbane leg. Some of these expectations were met delightfully, others were interestingly challenged, and in all it was a memorable experience.

The Tivoli is undoubtedly the kind of venue you would expect to suit such a whimsical songstress as Mitchell. Upon entering the historic building it was easy to see, with gauzy material curtained from the stage’s rigging and washed colourfully by the bright lights, that this was true. Through strong sets by Georgia Fair and Boy and Bear, who both proved to be stunning choices as a lead in to Mitchell’s set and are definitely bands worth keeping an eye on, the sell-out audience waited, tantalized by the promise such a setting held for a beautiful evening with Mitchell.
Continue reading Live Review: Lisa Mitchell @ The Tivoli, Brisbane – 7th May 2010

Photo Gallery | Xavier Rudd @ Palace Theatre, Melbourne – 30th April 2010

Photographer: Amy Skinder
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Xavier Rudd

[Photo: Amy Skinder]

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Xavier Rudd @ Palace Theatre, Melbourne – 30th April 2010
Continue reading Photo Gallery | Xavier Rudd @ Palace Theatre, Melbourne – 30th April 2010

JOEY CAPE & TONY SLY SUPPORTS ANNOUNCED!

  Joey Cape and Tony Sly are two names synonymous with modern punk rock, frontmen for leading Californian pop punk bands Lagwagon and No Use For A Name respectively. With each having accumulated over two decades worth of credibility and a burgeoning fan base around the globe, this dream team is set to tour Australia this May!

Continue reading JOEY CAPE & TONY SLY SUPPORTS ANNOUNCED!

Rickie Lee Jones (USA) Australian Tour – May/June 2010

  Rickie Lee Jones makes her long overdue return to Australian shores.

The highly influential, Grammy Award winning, multi-million selling US singer-songwriter, performs this May/June on a national tour and at appearance at Sydney’s Vivid Festival. Tickets on sale Monday April 12 2010.

Continue reading Rickie Lee Jones (USA) Australian Tour – May/June 2010