Seven New Songs of Mt Eerie

This is one of my favourite records:

A few years back my then room mate - now next door neighbour - Ben Thompson went to see Mt Eerie perform at Rics (no you didn't read that wrong - can you imagine it now?). He actually bought a copy of this CDr and we played it to death around the flat. I think it even came for a ride in the Iron On tour van as well. I have memories of listening to it in regional QLD where Wooly Mammoth's Absence's steady strumming seemed to roll along like the dry countryside.

I don't think anyone knew back then that it would become a rare and collectible item.

Anyway, it's legally available free-of-charge here.

One Instance Of Deftones Liking Experimental Sound...

Following on from this post, in a recent Deftones interview for Quietus, vocalist Chino Moreno talks about the influence of experimental sound on the band's work:

"Well, we love drone and stuff like that. The majority of the music I listen to is purely instrumental. Not that I don't like singing or singers, it's just that I feel that there's so much optimism in wordless music. The idea that it can take you wherever you want and not confine you to these thoughts or words... It's just music as a feeling, you know? Bringing different soundscapes into our music is always something that we've tried to do. I mean, that was Frank's whole role in the band when we brought him in. At that time, he was just a DJ and his only instrument was a turntable. White Pony was when we really started to experiment with sound more. We were trying to create this disgusting sound with the instruments on that record."

Omissions

I've written about this academically but it came up again on the weekend at Unconvention where I shared a panel with Andrew Stafford, author of Pig City.

My critical stance is this: I love the book but I don't like some of the uses it's been put to; none of which are Stafford's fault, mind you.

My problem?

To me, the historical lineage of Brisbane music is very, very clear. The Saints put out an independent record and played in houses when they couldn't find venues. Thirty years later Brisbane bands put out their own records and play in houses/warehouses when they can't find venues. Why? Because the city can still be violent and culturally parochial (something Stafford himself has taken to pointing out lately).

So with all that in mind...

I argue that you can't acknowledge the story of Brisbane's professional development in the music sector without also acknowledging that other group of musicians - the majority of musicians - for whom the actual week-to-week practice of music has gone largely unchanged. The ingenuity of the city, its humour, its good-natured wretchedness and slothfulness, the way it sweats and throws up and sings out of tune, off mic, all that has to be there alongside the story of The Veronicas or the story of our city isn't history, it's a press release.

Both stories are true. They speak directly to the other.

We need to celebrate both.

I can't taste this gin, put some more in...

Five weird things that happened to me on the weekend:

1. I went to the Down Under Bar. Worse still, I dimly remember being pretty excited about it.
2. Unconvention Brisbane took place for the first time. I chaired a panel on Music As Culture and during which Andrew Stafford, the author of Pig City: The Saints To Savage Garden, broke into song. Fellow panelist Everett True had decided that if we were asked a question we didn't wish to answer, we had to sing. What did I ask Andrew? Oh just something light and breezy: 'So what was the worst thing that happened to you because you wrote Pig City?' (I made Everett sing as well).
3. I walked around Highgate Hill at 3am with a cocktail.
4. A taxi driver told me that we should just shoot people who wish to immigrate to our country. 'Just shoot them, it doesn't cost a lot to shoot people.' And I tipped him. This morning I couldn't remember why. Then I did. I tipped him because I was scared he was going to kill me and dump my severed body parts in the river.
5. Walking up Merthyr Road last night, not 15 minutes after Ted Bundy the taxi-driver, a car pulled up next to me as I walked along. The driver said 'You want a lift.' I told the driver I lived closeby so it was cool. I was eating a packet of crisps. Then the driver said 'Do you want me to suck your cock?' and I said 'Nah man, I'm good' and he drove off.