Live Reviews

For those unfamiliar with Filter Magazine’s Culture Collide Festival, now in its fourth year (and third year of exclusive Australian coverage on the AU) the best way to describe it is as a smaller version of BIGSOUND. Two days of talks as part of the Creative Summit, introduced last year, and three days of live…

Having moved past the jetlag that delayed my first day of the annual Austin City Limits event, I kicked into the festival grounds early to catch Parquet Courts opening the second day, well ahead of the anticipated headline performances from The Cure and Kings of Leon. Parquet Courts deliver interesting fast paced, high energy, punk…

Having missed them at Austin City Limits over the weekend, and witnessing way too little of their set at Splendour earlier this year, I was pretty excited to get the chance to see Irish up-and-comers Little Green Cars at the intimate Echo in Silverlake, California. In what is the band’s second US jaunt since they…

Following their four WAM nominations, Perth’s Rainy Day Women returned home from a national tour to launch their latest single “Ain’t It Time?” at Perth’s Amplifier Bar. Completing the bill were fellow locals PUMBA, Our Man In Berlin and 44th Sunset. Opening proceedings were PUMBA, playing only their second ever show. Not that you would…

Papa vs Pretty have been smashing live music venues around the country with their exceptional performances since 2006. Despite the fact that they’ve been knuckling down on recording with few live appearances if any recently, they’ve managed to come out of their cave to launch their new single ‘My Life Is Yours’ from their forthcoming second…

It’s not always easy to make electronic music an enjoyable live experience. Once you get to the stage of Daft Punk, you can make up for a robotic stage presence with the greatest pyramid of production you’ve ever seen. If you’re Flume, you get away with it just because the music is so, ridiculously fucking…

Between these two loud live acts, Oxford Art seemed such a tight space on Saturday night. Loud in their sound but also with a high performance energy that seemed almost too intense to watch from the bar. Brisbane band Millions kicked off the show, keeping fairly quiet in between songs but gathering a big crowd….

How many rock stars can you say you know? How many rock stars do you think really tell you the truth? I can think of one: Amanda Palmer. Now I am not claiming that me and Ms Palmer hang out at the pub, nor that I have read her diary – but when I listen…

Amanda Palmer has an intensity that colours her musical career as much as it does the relationship with her fans. We love it. Standing outside the Enmore Theatre, it was clear we’d been touched by it too: the floor length black coats, shirts from last tour, lacy corsets, and various piercings earn us weird looks…

High expectations come with buying a ticket to a live DJ set. Unlike a live band, they can’t often interrupt the music to speak to the crowd or ask for an encore. But that’s how Alison Wonderland has gathered a band of followers – with a live show that interweaves top songs of the moment…

Having only become an Anberlin fan in the past year thanks to the recommendation of a close friend, I wasn’t sure what to expect from their live show. Yes, they made rock music, but how would the energy transfer to the stage? However, with such a strong line up, it wasn’t hard for my friend…

For Tonight Alive, the past two years have been dedicated to the promotion of their debut album — an effort that has been a huge success. But their recent show at The Hi Fi marked the last show in that era. With the release of their second album awaiting them the next day, our Aussie…

British singer-songwriter Tom Odell is the talk of the UK music scene. After two EPs and nominations with BBC Sound of 2013 award and winning the Brit Awards Critics Choice, Sydney was treated to an intimate showcase ahead of his performances at Falls Festival over New Years.

On a day when a “Fuck Abbott” t-shirt was causing controversy in the music industry thanks to The Preatures’ Isabella Pitway – who won the Vanda and Young Songwriting competition, accompanied a slew of other amazing female singer/songwriters, including the wonderful Thelma Plum – it felt appropriate to be at a rock show with three…

Giraffage a.k.a. Charlie Yin took to the stage, still and unassuming, until he began playing and grooving along to his own music. He is no macbook act – working the board in real time and constructing his own soundscape. Donned in black t-shirt and gold chain, he suggests an illusion of simplicity, while dipping into…

Logan (Hugh Jackman) is back in a decidedly darker take on the iconic X-Men character, marking Jackman’s sixth appearance as the steel-clawed “mutant”. The film takes place primarily in Japan and sees Logan reconnect with a man he saved during WWII, Yashida. The plot from there, for the most part, focuses on Logan protecting Mariko…

Wax Witches is the solo project of Alex Wall, one half of garage poppers Bleeding Knees Club. It’s got a similar sound to BKC but with even grittier guitar work and bratty lyrics. Wax Witches has an online stream of weird and wacky mash-ups linked to pop culture and 90s high life but in the…

Femme Locale’s momentum has been increasing at a rapid rate. Not only have there been three showcases in the last four months, but the crowds and artists have both been getting bigger. The most recent touchdown was at The Camelot Lounge, featuring the talent of Rachael Zella and the Blackbirds, Inês and Brotherfunk. As an…

“Thanks for having me back.” Oh, James. You are so welcome. I wasn’t exactly sure what to expect from a James Blake show. I’d mistakenly relegated his second album Overgrown to my personal list of atmospheric background music. That’s not to say I didn’t think he was a stunning vocalist and his hypnotic, electronic soul…

Winter festivals are far from an easy exercise to put yourself through, especially ones that run multi-days. When you think about it, it’s quite remarkable Splendour in the Grass has become the popular event it has, line-ups irrespective. I guess people are just gluttons for punishment. I feel this way after every Splendour. So what…

The sun was out as more than 17,500 punters descended on North Byron Parklands, the permanent Splendour in the Grass site for the first time, for a day headlined by past festival favourites Mumford and Sons. Situated about 20 minutes north of Byron Bay, this is the site the Splendour organisers bought to be the…

Hot off the heels of the release of her fourth record, Once I Was An Eagle, Laura Marling has returned to Australia to play Splendour in the Grass and a series of sold out concerts around the country as part of the Heavenly Sounds “tour of churches and cathedrals”. Tonight was her second performance of…

On Friday and Saturday afternoons, as part of the King Street Wharf Festival in Sydney, the restaurants that live on the wharf took part in a two day event called “On The Wharf”. It was a chance to enjoy tasting plates from restaurants like The Malaya (soon to celebrate their fiftieth birthday!), Kobe Jones, Georges…

It’s always a pleasure to go out for a night of soulful, (mostly) acoustic music when it seems that many are swamped by the electronic. Never mind the knowledge that attending a sideshow (this one for Splendour In The Grass) means that you get up close and personal to the act with the time and…

With horror films these days, it’s difficult to avoid either the “torture-porn” sort of films – Saw, Hostel etc. – or the “found footage” stylings of the surprisingly never-ending Paramormal Activity series. But for those who hold the genre close to their heart, it’s hard not to look back to films like The Excorcist or…

There are many words one could use to describe an artist as compelling as Kirin J Callinan. The terms ‘controversial’ and ‘confronting’ seem to get thrown around a lot and after watching his show at Jive on Friday night I’m going to go with chameleon. Last time I saw Callinan he was playing to a…

Pop rock connoisseurs Lime Cordiale took over The Standard Friday night for the launch of their single ‘Bullshit Aside’ off pending EP Falling up the Stairs. The Sydney based quartet led by brothers Oli and Louis Leimbach are gaining some well-deserved attention, with their latest release picked up by the good folks over at Triple J. They’ve put out an…

Held in a Chain Factory on Friday night, Converse brought their national run of “GET LOUD” shows to Brisbane, featuring explosive performances from The Laurels, The Murlocs and Tiny Migrants. Here are a few photos from the night and if you’re in Auckland on the 18th of July you can heads along to the last…

Little larrikin Lawrence Greenwood AKA Whitley has been MIA from the Australian music scene for a while on an indefinite hiatus. For those not familiar with Whitley he was basically Australia’s answer to Scott Walker or Nick Drake, a troubadour with impeccably crafted heartachingly sweet songs. His hiatus resulted in a lot of travelling to some intriguing…

Michel Gondry has always been one of my favourite directors. His ability to take dreamlike concepts and turn them into something visually tangible has always been his strength, and a unifying quality between all his productions – be they feature length, short or music video format. Though perhaps we won’t consider The Green Hornet in…