The “Unipalosers” may have only played to about twelve people in Canberra, home of our national treasures but little more besides, so finding a wealth of punters at the Shenton Park Hotel could have been quite a surprise for the tired gaggle of Murmur stablemates. And “yip”, they burped, for this was the last gig of their five week Australian tour and Vanessa (Jebediah) was sick of sharing vans with nine stinky lads.
Category: Music
Tyranny of Distance? Save your Pity For Yourselves
Article for The Australian – Western Australia feature (Sept, 1996): WA music industry
It was during a small, suburban park cricket match in late 1995 that many of us finally realised that Western Australia’s largely unheralded music ‘renaissance’ had finally broken through. Halfway through the Treadmill Eleven’s dashing batting effort on a slow but true pitch against Perth’s X-Press Magazine, the booming strains of Ammonia’s Mint 400 album came wafting across the field from a brick and tile suburban dwelling.
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Weathervane; Burnside, Rosemount Hotel, August 17, 1996
It was only a few weeks earlier, when Flashing Tablet broke the sound barrier at a party in the Rosemount, that I realised what a great room it could become. Being just down the road from Perth’s gig and indie club epicentre at Planet and encapsulating all the goodness of the olde pub environment, sweet Saturday gigs at the Rosemount looked to be the go, followed perhaps by a post-gig crawl down the hill.
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broadcast | Tripping Daisy’s Mark Pirro, 1996
Tripping Daisy, out of Dallas, Texas, mashed it all up with their 1995 album I Am An Elastic Firecracker. Adam speaks to Mark Pirro about their diverse montages (1996; 16 mins)
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Eos, Swanbourne Hotel, August 9, 1996
When a local band puts in the effort, it’s quite amazing how their organisational energies, lighting rig and fervent sticker distribution can turn a beer barn shindig into a sweltering mass of pogoing punters. Allow the band a little more room to act like rock stars – as in keeping the audience waiting in near darkness with smoke machines and red lights upping the atmosphere – and once again the exotic dizziness of a rock concert comes to the fore.
The NAD Campus Band WA State Final, Planet, August 7, 1996
A dash of guitar grunt, a sprinkle of exquisite harmony, a few deft lines of lolling bass, all topped with some hit-squad homey humour … this year’s campus band competition ran the full gauntlet. And after experiencing simply a smidgin of the WA contingient, I’ll wager a barrel of pickled fish on each and all of these folk dominating finals for more years to come.
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Flashing Tablet; Bluetile Lounge; Tucker Bs; Adam Said Galore; Apartment 99; Panelbeater, MX and Grosvenor Front Room, August 3, 1996
words – 610 (though with 6 bands! please?)
For the first time, by my memory anyway, the thoroughfare between the Grosvenor’s front and back rooms was finally opened to the trampling of the ordinary punter through the Grosvenor’s pool room. When both rooms are open, as in an impromptu mega-gig like Saturday’s, this little corner in East-ish Perth becomes a veritable hive of scenesters and shysters simply celebrating the opportunity of choice between snug pub or big venue, soft or loud, a bar to lean on or carpet to jump upon. All power to choice, I say.
6 Mile High; Lounge; Surveyor 4, Planet, July 27, 1996
Picture, if you will … the dark Planet innards dusted with stage smoke, brilliant streams of coloured light cutting the fog, the chamber full of 6 Mile High flunkies bounding to the beats and, through the floor from the basement below, the physical rumble of Napalm Death flexing their vocal chords for hundreds of extreme metal fans.
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Air Ensemble; Squidfinger; Triggerfish, Fly By Night, July 19, 1996
i know it’s a bit long but there’s a lot of comment which has to be said here. the crowd were absolutely cuddly.
With the recently thriving Fremantle community of musicians throttled by the closure of almost every venue in town, I have oft wondered what this huge and extremely loyal base of bands and fans do now. Do they hang out in the pinball arcades? Do they go fishing a lot more? Or maybe they just spend an extra ten hours a week at the cafe?
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Prickle; Kerb; Tucker Bs; Freud’s Pillow, MX, July 13, 1996
I get a little misty-eyed when a totally empty room at about 8pm suddenly transforms into a happening gathering by about 10, all in the name of seeing some virtual unknowns make a hell of a racket. From being the sole punter, trying to raise the barkeeper’s hopes, I was soon happily engulfed by an impressive cross-section of folk who simply needed a reason to dance. Jolly good stuff.
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