music

by

Tycho Brahe – live and free

Tycho Brahe with us on our wedding night.

Tycho Brahe with us on our wedding night. Pic: Kim Thomsen

Tycho Brahe are an awesome Brisbane band who were kind enough to play at our wedding. They rocked out and were absolutely fantastic. They also produced a lovely cover of The Cure’s ‘Lovesong‘, which was our theme song.

And now, I’m ecstatic to say, there’s a version of the cover available online. The ’80s-lovin’ band had an, um, interesting live session in a recording studio, in which they aimed to produce a ‘live in the studio’ ep. The ep is now available for free download from CDBaby. You might also like to sample their other output: maybe the uber-catchy ‘1985’ single or one of their albums — Atlantic is probably a good place to start, and work your way back!

I’d also mention that the other band who played at our wedding, the divine Brissie Celtic outfit Sunas, have an album coming out kind of soonish through the ABC. These guys performed a simply beautiful instrumental version of ‘Lovesong’ for the processional, then added vocals while we signed the paperwork. And then they too rocked out! You don’t have to wait for the ABC album (I don’t know if their ‘Lovesong’ cover will be on it, but wouldn’t it be cool if it was?): they have a perfectly engaging self-produced album available now.

Wedding background music

While I’m reminiscing, here’s the tunes that were on the iPod’s wedding playlist for when our pals weren’t shaking Bar Soma.


Angel, Massive Attack
Beautiful Day; Lucky Day: Stringmansassy
Ain’t No Cure for Love; Dance Me To the End of Love: Leonard Cohen
I Let Love In; Into My Arms: Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds
Grace; Hallelujah: Jeff Buckley
Fade Into You, Mazzy Star
Beyond the Field We Know, Sunas
Lovesong; Love Cats: The Cure
A Promise Made (Wedding Day), The Cruxshadows
Building a Mystery, Sarah McLachlan
London Rain, Heather Nova
Amazing, Johnette Napolitano
I Love You, Jeff Martin
Such a Night, Dr John
Let’s Stay Together, Tina Turner
White Wedding, Billy Idol
Living Dead Girl, Rob Zombie (touring!)
Science Fiction, Divinyls
She Sells Sanctuary, The Cult
Stripped, Rammstein
Temptation; Shadows on the Mountainside: The Tea Party
Seven Nation Army, The White Stripes
Disarm; Ave Adore: Smashing Pumpkins
Wild is the Wind; Heroes: David Bowie
There Is A Light That Never Goes Out, The Smiths
Love Will Tear Us Apart, Evelyn Evelyn
Easy, Faith No More
Come As You Are, Nirvana
The Ship Song, Concrete Blonde
Together in Electric Dreams, The Human League
Paint It Black, Inkubus Sukkubus
Last Beat of Your Heart, Mission UK
Tainted Love, Marilyn Manson
To Lose My Life, White Lies
Zero, Yeah Yeah Yeahs
What You Waiting For?, Gwen Stefani
True Faith 94, New Order
Temple of Love, Sisters of Mercy
No Ordinary Love, Sade
I Will Find You, Clannad
I Do, Placebo
If I Was, Midge Ure
I Just Died in Your Arms, Cutting Crew
Pictures of You, Berlin
Evil Night Together, Jill Tracy
Ampersand, Amanda Palmer
Love in Motion, Icehouse feat. Chrissy Amphlett
Vienna, Ultravox

by

Deborah Conway and Willy Zygier – live and lovin’ it

I trundled along to the very funky Pure Pop Records in St Kilda last night to catch Deborah Conway and partner Willy Zygier perform.

I saw them only weeks ago, supporting Leonard Cohen in front of thousands, so this gig, with 30 or 40 people comfortably arrayed around the record store’s brick courtyard, was something of a contrast.


But not in terms of the performance, strangely enough. The couple, with three daughters in the audience, were just as chilled, their rapport just as warm and endearing, though the interplay between the two was magnified thanks to our proximity.


Normally, the thought of spending 90 minutes listening to two folks armed only with acoustic guitars is nerve-wracking: should I bring a pillow? A razor blade? Ear plugs?


No such fears of folksy warbling or surfy somnambulism here; not with that voice, and not with that guitar — in fact, Willy pulls out (and isn’t it handy to have kids for roadies?!) a steel guitar, a ukulele and a mandolin in addition to the acoustic, while Conway plays rhythm. He also provides a wonderfully complementary background voice, accenting choruses and certain lines.


It’s a little surreal, hearing Conway, who burst onto my radar way back when with Do Re Mi singing about pubic hairs on pillows and hopeless men and defiant women, now turning her lyrical wit to suburbia, but the moment passed quickly. Such a voice! (Conway is included in the free Rock Chicks exhibit at the Arts Centre).

Conway and Zygier played tunes predominantly from a new album, Half Man Half Woman — available in a plain cardboard slipcase with origami insert — and a few from the more traditionally packaged Summertown. Songs of love abound, though it might not always be the peaceful happiness of Lying Next To You but rather a glimpse of that Do Re Mi fire in, say, Say Goodbye to What is Left, and there’s uptempo thumpers, too, such as the eight-minute saga of Take Pity on the Beast.

A highlight of last night’s gig was seeing the three daughters Syd, Alma and Hettie aka the Zygierettes perform two numbers, one a capella, revealing promising voices each with their own distinct qualities. (Conway and the girls stayed in the store to sign albums afterwards.)

The venue was also part of the attraction, with a tarpaulin covering the open area of the roof sometimes ruffling in the breeze, a small bar set up in one corner at the back, a coffee machine inside on the counter, vegetarian pizzas and open melts on the menu, and universally friendly staff.

All in all, it was a damn fine way to spend an overcast Sunday evening.

by

Birthday Massacre / I:Scintilla

iscintilla dying and fallingThe Birthday Massacre album Pins and Needles

Two young and rockin’ electro-oriented bands have newish albums on the shelves, and both share a further commonality: gradual evolution rather than revolutionary advances in sound or technique.

Canadian outfit The Birthday Massacre (Metropolis) offer a melange of influences melded into a gorgeous blend of heavy rock drums and metal guitar with pop sensibility and the juxtaposition of a cherubic female singer, the uber cute Chibi.

It’s been two years since I caught this entertaining outfit at Brisbane’s venerable Zoo (check out a review here my interview with Chibi here) and the band retain their signature sound on album Number 4, Pins and Needles. It blasts open with In the Dark, but then settles into familiar territory with less gruff metal and a few nods to 80s big hair riffs. You have to listen closely to enjoy the nuances and lyricism. The title track is possibly the catchiest, but there is plenty to reward patience (Shallow Grave, for instance).

Similarly, I:Scintilla are caught in their own wake on album Number 3, Dying & Falling (Alfa Matrix), sounding unmistakably like their fusion of metal and electro-pop with distinctive if slightly underpowered singer Brittany Bindrim up front. There’s a fair swag of studio noodling going on here, whether on uptempo dancefloor numbers or the more intriguing slower tracks: again, you need to listen closely to appreciate the effort, with too few really reaching out to grab the ears on casual listening. The title track is delightfully cruisy, with a raft of vocal and sound effects enhancing the appeal.

I bought the 2CD version, which has 11 remixes and a couple of additional tracks, including the engaging Hollowed; the majority amount to pleasant background noise.

Fans should be pleased with these solid outings but newcomers might find greater instant gratification on the most excellent earlier offerings, TBM’s Violet or I:Scintilla’s Optics.

by

Leonard Cohen in Melbourne – bravo!

In terms of performance, I don’t anyone at Melbourne’s Rod Laver Arena last night could say that they didn’t get their money’s worth. Leonard Cohen promised he and his brilliant band would give everything they had, and they certainly delivered: for nigh on three hours.

The hits just kept coming: ‘Suzanne’, ‘Bird on a Wire’, ‘I’m Your Man’, ‘Hallelujah’ …

He’s a fascinating performer, Cohen, the quintessential gentleman on stage, full of grace and modesty. When was the last time you heard an act thank their sound and lighting guys by name?

The night got off to a splendid start thanks to Deborah Conway and Willy Zygier, offering an acoustic set that was a mite too short, their rapport and her pipes proving to be a winning combination (it’s been a long time since Do Re Mi and the Sweet & Sour soundtrack, eh?).

And then it was time for the main event, complete with intermission, and thanks to the venue for letting food and drink be taken into the auditorium, a glass of red the ideal accompaniment on a rainy night.

There was a similarity to the set list in terms of mood and tempo, occasionally breaking out of the meditative lounge setting to trot or waltz — ‘Everybody Knows’ (such a brilliant song, I highly recommend the Concrete Blonde version), ‘First We Take Manhattan’, ‘Take This Waltz’. The musicianship was superb, clarinet and bass doing wonderful melds, Javier Mas on bandurria adding that hint of otherworldliness, Bob Metzer’s electric guitar adding some glue, the Hammond organ… each got their moment in the spotlight, often with Cohen singing their praise, but it was the combination that made the night, all those pieces fitting together, humbly, to make the big picture. And then there were the backing singers: Cohen’s long-time collaborator Sharon Robinson, who got her solo on ‘Boogie Street’, and the Webb sisters, Hattie with her almost-Celtic vocals and Charley with a dusty quasi-Stevie Nicks rasp.

Lighting and sound deserved their kudos, from what we could see and hear from way up side-on to stage. I never did see the drummer, the big screen being sufficiently tilted to cover him without actually showing much of a view of the action, and both bass and guitar being mostly obscured by a pylon. If I had a gripe about the evening, it was the undisclosed sub-standard seats for the price (buyer beware at the Rod Laver Arena!).

But it was the words and the man that the crowd was there for, and they were paramount. With each song offering Cohen’s gorgeous phrasing, delivered with such distinctive aplomb — the man picked up his guitar for a stretch, too, making those almost 80-year-old fingers do their thing, and delivered spoken word on ‘A Thousand Kisses Deep’ — you’d have to be made of stone not to be impressed, if not carried away. Love lost, love found, melancholy nights on the street, a touch of gospel and a slice of Bible story, cynicism and self-deprecation and songs about songs and those rays of hope, all sitting so seamlessly side by side.

There were two encores, the Webb sisters performing ‘If It Be Your Will’ with guitar and harp in the second before Cohen and Co. brought the curtain down with ‘Closing Time’. Outside, the puddles on the pavement and the mist hanging over the city’s neon heights were the perfect setting for the post-show walk to the station.

Songs we heard (I’ve probably missed some, and they aren’t in order): Dance Me to the End of Love (opener), Suzanne, Bird on a Wire, I’m Your Man, Hallelujah, A Thousand Kisses Deep (spoken word), Boogie Street (Robinson), Sisters of Mercy, Take This Waltz, The Gypsy Wife, In My Secret Life, Everybody Knows, There Ain’t No Cure for Love, Waiting for the Miracle, Feels So Good, A Singer Must Die, Born In Chains, Tower of Song, Chelsea Hotel #2, The Partisan, The Future, Anthem, first encore: So Long Marianne, First We Take Manhattan, second encore: Famous Blue Raincoat, If It Be Your Will (Webb Sisters, spoken intro by Cohen), Closing Time (closer).

by

Pat Benatar at the Melbourne Palais

heat of the night by pat benatar

Andy, I think you would’ve loved it. We already had a bit of a thing for Pat Benatar, didn’t we, harking right back to that punk-lacy 80s heyday and tracing back to In the Heat of the Night: that debut that put that unmistakable voice on the world stage (and the guitar of songwriter Neil Giraldo, not to be forgotten).

She’s still got it, mate. In spades. Even if the mix at the Palais on Wednesday night felt at times as if I’d put my head inside a Rotorua mud pit. Her voice, all mid-tour husky but still hitting and holding the highs, a little croon here, a snarl there. OK, not so much of the snarling, 58 next January and all, and dressed in a suit with white cuffs, barely raising a sweat I shouldn’t think with that stage saunter. But she can still belt it out: All Fired Up to open, Love is a Battlefield to close, a trail of major and minor hits in between.

She and Giraldo have got the husband-wife banter down pat (no pun there, don’t hit me, damnit), as you’d expect after 29 years of wedded togetherness. It came to the fore when they straddled stools and “Spider” swapped his electric for an acoustic and, well, there was a feel, he said, like we were all sitting in their lounge room, which was on the money but also weird, given that when they’d finished passing the water cup back and forth, they belted out their trademark power pop: You Better Run, if I remember, and definitely I Don’t Want to be Your a Friend. Banter-rock-banter-rock, a tale for almost every song: that’s how the night went, never really finding any momentum but fun all the same.

Giraldo played piano intro on a couple of tunes, but I reckon – don’t know if you’d agree about this — that they could’ve got a keyboard player in and saved them the heavy lifting and us the backing tape. Still, great drums and bass when they were in play, which you need to give this kind of pop music real grunt.

It made me feel a little sorry for the Bangles, who supported, the now-trio coming across on stage as a little rusty — not that they ever really had the vocal chops, as much as we might’ve enjoyed Manic Monday or Hazy Shade of Winter back in the day. Walk Like An Egyptian got the punters up, I’ll give’em that, and there’s a new album on the way next year, and you’ll be happy to know they still look poppy though I was too far back (but in the centre, mate, Pat right in front, yes indeed) to see if Susanna Hoffs still has the cute eye-roll thing going on.

Benatar was where it was at, for an on-schedule 90 minutes. There was the new take on the torch song, Benatar exhorting the crowd to hold aloft their lit-up mobiles — ‘take pictures, I don’t care’ — for the arm-waving We Belong, and Giraldo finished off the encore with a neat little Godfather riff (an ode to his Sicilian heritage, I gather, given a previous reference).

You know the thing that really kicked? The spare seat next to me. It’s been bugging me for years now, in one form or another, and funnily enough it was Shadows of the Night — only the second song in — that really made it bite. You can never tell what’s gonna get you, can you?

It’s been a hell of a year, brother: The Cult, Concrete Blonde, Benatar. Wish you were here.

**

  • Set list (not in order and probably not complete, 27/10): All Fired Up (opener), Shadows of the Night, Hell is for Children, Invincible, You Better Run, We Belong, Somebody’s Baby, Hit Me with Your Best Shot, I Don’t Want to be Your Friend, Love is a Battlefield (closer), encore: Let’s Stay Together, Heartbreaker.
    **

    There’s footage at YouTube of Giraldo and Benatar singing I Don’t Want to be Your Friend taken at the previous night’s gig — Benatar played back-to-back shows in Melbourne. The song starts around the 3:30 mark.

    Set list (not in order, not complete): All Fired Up (opener), Shadows in the Night, Hell is for Children, Invincible, Promises in the Dark (?), You Better Run, We Belong, Hit Me with Your Best Shot, I Don’t Want to be Your Friend, Love is a Battlefield (closer), encore: Stick Together and Heartbreaker.

    15 years since her last tour to Oz; sidelined by child-rearing.

    31 years together with guitarist ‘Neil Spider’ Geraldo (29 as husband and wife),

    Turning 58 in January

    Acoustic guitar, stools, passing water in open sign of marital bliss

    Piano intros on some tunes, but maybe adding a keyboardist to the drummer and bassist could have saved them the trouble and also allowed them to dispense with the annoying backing track.

    Mobile phones aloft – safer than lighters, certainly – for the We Belong lovers’ anthem.

    A Godfather instrumental into closing song Heartbreaker.

    • by

    Billy Thorpe – a eulogy from Tangier

    I saw Billy Thorpe play twice, back around 2006 supporting touring internationals, and there was no mistaking the man’s talent with voice and guitar, and charming, unaffected stage presence. He rose to fame with the Aztecs, a veteran of Australia’s formative rock n roll years, and he was in fine fettle still. I was particularly impressed with new material he played from a forthcoming album to be called Tangier, inspired and influenced by his time living in Morocco. And then he died, in February 2007, and Tangier was a work in progress still, and there was a real feeling that we’d not only lost a music great, but a special piece of music as well.

    Fortunately, Thorpe’s family and mates have rallied and Tangier is now on the shelves. It’s a beauty, too.

    There are Middle Eastern influences aplenty as songs range from Zeppelinish rock to slow-burning, percussion-led numbers and the foot-tapping, hand-twirling instrumental Gypsy. Jack Thompson adds spoken word to two, and there are plenty of strings of choiral backdrops that make this a lush, atmospheric production.

    Since You’ve Been Gone, a dirge for his mother powered by acoustic guitar, organ and hand claps, carries extra weight.

    Songs such as Marrakesh and Tangier, the latter with news broadcasts incorporated into the text, are clear odes to the country and its profound impact on Thorpe, while seven-minute Fatima funks it up.

    Long Time, the album’s second instrumental, is a contemplative affair with guitars leading the journey that leads into the grandiose, martial In a New World, a cinematic spoken word with Thompson doing the honours.

    Further adding to the album’s diversity is We Will Be There, a gospel-flavoured track that’s almost a capella, segueing beautifully into the closer, the rapturous Out of Here, a bopping track showing off Thorpe’s vocal high range.

    With songs referencing angels, death and loss, Tangier carries an extra emotional level, but even stripped of that, it stands as a damn fine album. It serves as a fitting farewell that shows us not only what we’ve lost, but what we gained from a life lived large.

    by

    Concrete Blonde storm Melbourne’s Palace

    bloodletting by concrete blonde

    The penultimate gig of their Australian tour, at Melbourne’s Palace theatre last night, found Concrete Blonde in fine form indeed as they celebrate the 20th anniversary of their breakout album, Bloodletting.

    Lead singer Johnette Napolitano is clearly relishing performing: she was relaxed and smiling, utterly gleeful as she called support band Melbourne-based Graveyard Train up to provide backing vocals on the whimsical Ghost of a Texas Ladies Man and the grin never left her face.

    For the Brisbane gig, four nights before, I’d hugged the barrier to catch every expression from this big-hearted singer, but this time I hung back on the rail of the balcony to take in the scene and let the music do its stuff.

    The lighting was simply effective, the stage bathed in lancing red spots for the opening Bloodletting (again segueing from a tape of the ominous bassline of Bauhaus’s Bela Lugosi’s Dead) flicking to greens and blues for the chorus, and thereafter continuing to reflect the mood and highlighting solos.

    With Jim Mankey on guitar — occasionally smiling, a big display from a man who tends to not give much of himself away on stage preferring to let the guitar do his talking — and Gabriel Ramirez on drums, Johnette laid down some thundering basslines as the band rocked out.

    But Johnette’s voice was the key instrument, showing nuance and power as she cajoled, mourned and raged. When I was Fool exploded, Your Haunted Head became a jam, Run Run Run was as hard and heavy as you please. The crowd sang along, the chorus especially noticeable on Happy Birthday and the closer, Tomorrow Wendy (about a woman with AIDS who commits suicide), during which Johnette issued a plea to support gay teenagers and reduce the instance of suicide. She changed the finale of the song, saying she’d think everything would be all right, yes she did.

    It was a shame there were a few in the packed house who didn’t respect the band’s request to forgo taking photographs — honestly, dickheads, do you really think flash from a distance is going to achieve anything but annoyance for the artists and those around you? (sigh: that’s a rant for another day)

    There was a lovely dig at BP on Everybody Knows (she plugged the upcoming Leonard Cohen tour after this cover) — the Gulf has not been forgotten — and she added what sounded like a Native American chant to the cover of Midnight Oil’s Beds are Burning.

    Humble and self-effacing, yet passionate and possessed of one the most striking voices, Johnette — in her 50s — appears to occupy a happy place indeed in her musical career.

    How fortunate we are that she continues to share the love.

  • The set list was, as far as I could tell, the same as in Brisbane, though they played Someday last night and I didn’t note it on Tuesday; possibly I missed it in my recollection, though last night’s gig did last the best part of two hours, a little longer than Brissie.
    • by

    Concrete Blonde rock Brisbane

    bloodletting by concrete blonde

    Any doubts that Concrete Blonde might have mellowed as a rock band were put to rest in Brisbane’s Hi-Fi Bar on Tuesday night. So too any doubts not already dispelled by the Scarred solo album that frontwoman Johnette Napolitano has not grown into a consummate performer who is content, if not happy, in her skin.

    Melbourne’s Graveyard Train — horror movie lyrics to a country-blues beat rounded out by banjo, double bass and a well-hammered length of chain — ably softened up the sizeable crowd who comfortably filled the tiered, industrial-themed room (bare bricks, exposed ducts, concrete and — just so you know you’re in a rock venue — a sticky timber floor).

    Our posse lined the barrier directly in front of Johnette’s mic, prepared to sacrifice sound quality for a close-up of one of the few singers I would call an idol: talented, emotive, uncompromising.

    We were not disappointed.

    Johnette’s bass — unadorned gloss black with simple, sweeping lines — combined with the drums of Gabriel Ramirez (who stepped up to the sticks for the Group Therapy tour when drummer Harry Rushakoff fell off the radar, and has stuck around) to lay down a thumping beat, at times reaching into the chest to alter the heart beat, at others tickling the throat or making a mild tremor under the feet. The velvet curtain hanging at the front of the stage billowed in time like a lung.

    And Jim Mankey, Johnette’s foil and anchor, stood unflappable and so very casual, whether filling in the background with his trademark guitar wail and chug or cutting loose on a solo for Hendrix’s Little Wing.

    The stage was simply lit, emphasised with an occasional billow of fog, and was adorned only with black muslin around the drum kit and a scatter of huge red roses — this tour marks the 20th anniversary of Bloodletting, a breakout album with vampire themed tunes leading the way.

    The stage belonged to Johnette Napolitano.

    Wearing a Spanish-influenced black dress, her movements were laced with Flamenco in bare feet and deliberate movements of the hands and arms; at other times, she would twirl the bass as she rocked out, at others pluck the strings as if each was a thorn to be pulled. A tattoo of a cross, filled with Celtic knotwork and surrounded by simple stars, adorned her chest, and her long, black hair at times fell as a curtain across her so very expressive kohl-darkened eyes, lending a hint of Japanese horror movie, a sense of mystique.

    Watching her descend into the emotional space for When I Was A Fool, led by Jim’s guitar, was an exquisite pleasure, and then to be carried aloft as the song built to its explosive crescendo …

    There were many such moments — Heal It Up, Your Haunted Head and more — in a set that ran almost to two hours and offered at least 21 songs drawn from the band’s studio catalogue (with Bloodletting most highly represented, naturally), skipping only the Mojave album (and the band’s debut, the eponymous Dream 6 before they took on their current moniker).

    A rock aesthetic ran through much of the set, kicking off with opener Bloodletting and putting fire into typically slow-burning tunes such as I Don’t Need a Hero. The pace eased when Jim took up the acoustic and Johnette rested the bass for a ballad set — Mexican Moon with Flamenco dance included — and was brought to a close with the poignant Tomorrow, Wendy, which saw Johnette slowly fold to hands and knees as the lament for lost life and innocence wound down, to arise on knees with a single red rose held aloft into a perfectly aimed spotlight.

    Unexpected delights such as Run, Run, Run, Your Haunted Head and Days and Days raised the roof — Johnette crossed herself before laying down a massive, manic bassline to intro one — and her voice soared, with Janis Joplin-like verve at times, on tunes such as Heal It Up. The encore consisted of the Midnight Oil hit Beds Are Burning and the raucous Still in Hollywood.

    It was one hell of a way to open their Australian tour, and signalled there’s plenty of life left in the trio yet.

    Songs, not in order: Bloodletting, Joey, Scene of a Perfect Crime, Someday, When I Was A Fool, Run Run Run, Happy Birthday, God Is A Bullet, Ghost of a Texas Ladies Man, Haunted Head, True, Little Wing, Everybody Knows, Mexican Moon, Heal It Up, Caroline, Days and Days, Tomorrow Wendy, I Don’t Need a Hero, Lullabye, Beds are Burning, Still in Hollywood.

  • A remastered anniversary edition of Bloodletting is available, with six extra songs.
    • by

    Heart back on track with Red Velvet Car

    THE new album from Heart — fronted by Ann and Nancy Wilson — grabs the ear immediately with a blues-soaked There You Go: there you go indeed, because from that the opener it’s a drive through some scenic territory.

    Heart have a wonderfully varied catalogue, from Zeppelin-style Middle Eastern influenced soft metal to crunching hard rock to 80s torch songs to folk and blues.

    This album harks mostly back to the earlier years of folk rock and blues — they debuted with Dreamboat Annie in 1976 — with the sisters showing a joy and verve that didn’t come across in their previous studio LP, Jupiters Darling (in 2004, breaking a decade’s hiatus).

    Check out the railroad rhythm of Wheels, the acoustic strum and drive of Safronia’s Mark, the urgency of WTF, the slow yearn of the title track, complete with strings, the nostalgia of Queen City.

    The sisters make a powerful combination, between Nancy’s guitar work and Ann’s impressive vocals that can smoulder down low or skyrocket (she does both thrillingly on Death Valley, adding verve to the second half of Red Velvet Car).

    This, Heart’s 13th studio album, doesn’t explore new territory and makes the occasional rest stop, but even with one eye on the rearvision mirror, it changes gear often enough to provide an engaging journey.

    by

    Graveyard Train to support Concrete Blonde

    Huzzah! The support for Concrete Blonde’s 20th anniversary tour of Bloodletting has been announced: Melbourne’s Graveyard Train. Get your rockin’ darkly tinted blues n country gumbo here (apparently). Net snippets suggest they’ll be a superb match. Only a week before the curtain goes up!

    That would be Tuesday, rather than, um, Someday:

    SPEAKING of Melbourne bands, it was sad to read that The Vagrants played their last gig in September. I’d only just stumbled across their bluesy Aussie rock — innocuous but mighty fetching, and I had a hankering to catch them live to see if they’d go all firecracker like they sound as if they might on their album Be True. A shame. Here’s a taste of what we new chums missed out on: