That whole “music used to sound better when I was younger” theory

MARCH (11-16)

Screaming Match – $40

Sometimes, people ask me if I get starstruck – bearing in mind the stellar quality of people I meet. Yes. Yes, I do.

Someone has already described this Brisbane trio as being… damn it. I really don’t want to bring in parallels. I’m back in the pool room in an Islington pub, hiding from the members of Galaxie 500 because I don’t want to tarnish the varnish. I’m trembling like a leaf backstage at the ICA, about to introduce Daniel Johnston on stage. I’m Wayne and whatever the hell that other guy was called, on my knees in front of J Mascis in 1987, “We are not worthy”. Bands like this make me feel my age, leave me floundering and scarred. So good, so natural.

Dial – On Game

This new album, this new album that this song is taken from, is called Western Front. (I had a song called ‘Western Front’ once also: before UT entered my life and altered my entire perception of what music could be.) It’s bruised. It’s beautiful. It’ll scrape and scour away at your very soul if you even give it a quarter of a fucking chance. LISTEN to the music. Listen to it.

Nicki Minaj – Stupid Hoe

I played this song to my Sex And Drugs And Rock And Roll class in Caboolture, and it sure attracted some extreme (negative) reactions. “This is shit,” was the common consensus… all except me and this one girl sitting at the back who the previous week had revealed herself to be a Royal Headache fan and was sitting there with her jaw dropping, like me. It was the first time she’d heard it too. “I’m going to be buying the album tomorrow,” she said. More hardcore than Throbbing Gristle, more extreme than most ‘extreme’ punk hardcore and metal hardcore I’ve heard, and… wait. The video to ‘Stupid Hoe’ has been watched by 71 million people? What the fuck is going on? The alternative and underground is getting seriously left behind by this wanton and determined deconstruction of sound happening within the ‘mainstream’.

Blank Realm – Cleaning Up My Mess

Go Easy is a radical jukebox. Alan Vega, wearing pink vinyl pants and an asteroid belt, swings his pelvis into our solar system looking through his aviators for the mad sounds he vibed on when the Voyager Golden Record hit his star  bearing such tunes as ‘The First Tools’, ‘Brandenburg Concertos’, an hour of the brainwaves of a woman meditating on violence and love, and ‘Johnny B. Goode’.  It shot straight to number one there because they didn’t realise it was a compilation, their species having no hang-ups about bands needing a narrow sonic identity. When Al passes Saturn he picks up a thought that Sun Ra left floating, directing him to Brisbane, Earth. (Ben Green)

The Drones – Why Write A Letter That You’ll Never Send

Regret and defiance and wit will only get you so far. As will the melancholy blues, baby.

Blanche Blanche Blanche – Rich Man

Creney has updated his Facebook status even as I type: “Hey E. P4K gave it a 7.0 yesterday. Said it sounded like Devo. Or Ariel Pink. To quote you, ‘Bangs wept.'” Probably P4K were irritated by the fact it was ladeeez on stage having fun. (Dudes on stage having fun? Sure. But the ladeeez still have something to prove, right?) Jerk-offs. Worth a 7.1 at least.

Dick Diver – Water Damage

Openness is one of the strengths of this album. It’s less of a single journey than their stunning debut New Start Again and most sadly it’s missing the extended instrumental flights, but the benefit of this series of short trips is that we see more places and people. The first album, with songs largely written by guitarists Ru Edwards and Al McKay, apart from the two separate (but important) contributions by Steph Hughes and Al Montfort, came close to establishing a Dick Diver sound: delicate, Television-gone-rural twin guitars and an overall sepia tint. Calendar Days, by contrast, sounds like a confident band flexing and stretching its collective muscles, playing with different colours because it can. (Ben Green)

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by Everett True

My name is Everett True. I am a music critic. This is what I do. I criticise music. The clue is in my job description – music critic. I do not consider myself a journalist, as I do not research or report hard news. I do not consider myself a commentator as I believe that everyone should be a participant. I criticise people and in return I am not surprised if other people criticise me. It is part of the whole deal of being in the public arena. I am Everett True. Believe in me and I have power like a God. Quit believing in me and I no longer exist.