February 2008

Elliott BROOD has never been an easy outfit to describe however this debut album release in Australia will serve as an appropriate introduction of the band to audiences’ nationwide. Since forming in late 2002, their sounds have been labeled “death country”, “blackgrass” and even “urban hillbilly”, none of which truly capture the essence or energy of the band.

With Elliott BROOD, the storytelling is paramount and what gets this band under your skin. The band presents tales from the dustier sides of life in dimly lit rooms with half empty bottles. Rhythmic banjo-led stomps and abusive acoustic strumming are married with an old time thump to paint the scene and characters driving the stories.

Mark Sasso’s scratchy vocal delivery seems almost impossible at times ranging from whispered lullabies to nightmarish screams. Ambassador was recorded in an abandoned abattoir and revealed a more diverse side of the band. Rusty distorted guitar sounds and the “suitcase stomp” complimented beautiful and simple storytelling.

The album was nominated for a Juno in Canada in 2006 for “Best Roots/Traditional Album”, and the group won the “Galaxie Rising Star Award” in that same year for best new band in Canada. “The Bridge”, the album’s single reached #2 on CBC’s National Playlist in Canada.

Ambassador’s release prompted an even busier touring schedule, seeing the band cross Canada, the USA and Europe, sharing stages with such diverse acts as Wilco, Blue Rodeo, Broken Social Scene, Do Make Say Think, Corb Lund and countless others. Elliott BROOD has developed a reputation as one of the busiest and most exciting live bands in Canada. Their energetic and raucous live performances have, and continue to captivate audiences everywhere.

Elliott BROOD will be hitting the shores of Australia for the very first time this March. The band will be performing as part of the 2008 East Coast Blues & Roots Festival line up, and will also be stopping in the country long enough to perform a selection of dates along the East Coast of Australia.

www.elliottbrood.ca or www.myspace.com/elliottbrood

March 22nd – Bluesfest: Byron Bay East Coast Blues & Roots Festival www.bluesfest.com.au

March 29th – Lizottes with Dan Mangan, Lot 3 Avoca Dr, Kincumber NSW (tix from the venue: 02 4368 2017 – www.lizottes.com.au)

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Finally, finally, finally! It’s all over and Apple has just sent me my new serial number for Aperture v2.0. This has seriously been a trial, and it has proven to me that Apple is just like all the other computer companies out there in that they do also have problems with their systems from time to time. I’ve been a big big Apple fan and do my best to speak the gospel that is Apple, but now I’m not sure if I will be so quick to sing their praises.

Anyway, here’s the email I just received from Apple….not one single offer of free product, at least it has the serial number in it…err well my version does, not this one however.

 

 

Dear Mathew,

Thank-you for your recent e-mail to the Apple Store.

We understand your frustration over this issue and have checked with our respective department and has managed to request for a replacement serial number for your order.

Your Aperture serial number is XXXXXXXXXXX

We sincerely apologise for the inconvenience caused and assured you that we have taken steps to ensure no recurrence of this unfortunate situation.

We look forward to serving you better in the near future.

If you have any questions, please feel free to contact us for further assistance.

The Apple Store can be contacted by phone Monday to Friday 8am to 6pm (EST) on free phone 133 622 (MAC) (excluding NSW public holidays).

 

Kind Regards,

Wei San

The Apple Store

 

Hopefully that’s this is the last time you’ll hear me complain about Apple.. Despite all this drama I still love them…..specially my iPod Touch..

Now it’s time to get back to all my little projects, I’ll be telling you all about a new one that my partner Cath and I have just about gotten ready to launch some time next week.. Mean while, check out the gallery I’m slowly getting together over at Mathew Packer Photography, hopefully it will fill up a lot quicker now that I’ve got my Aperture back.

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After igniting Australian audiences in 2007 with their machine like grooves and soul crunching tones, Page Hamilton and his band Helmet return down under to bring it like only they can.

And due to overwhelming demand they have recently added a new date to the tour – in Newcastle!

There is no other band like Helmet. Carving their own unique niche through the landscape of heavy music in the 1990’s with albums like Meantime, Betty, Aftertaste and more recently Monochrome, Helmet have inspired an entire generation of axe wielding maniacs to tune the f*** down and rock.

Fresh from touring with Guns ‘n’ Roses, this visit sees Page unleash the latest Helmet lineup featuring cohorts, Dan Beeman, Kyle Stevenson and Jon Fuller in major cities and regional centres across the nation.

Newcastle – Sunday 27th April – Cambridge Hotel

www.moshtix.com.au or 1300gettix

The Rock Shop, Hunter St Newcastle

Beaumont Street Beat, Beaumont St Hamilton

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New arrivals on the blues and roots scene; Chase The Sun have spent no time garnering widespread critical acclaim for their soul-tinged song writing, blues sensibilities and the powerhouse live delivery of guitar star-on-the-rise Jan Rynsaardt. Combining elements of old-school acoustic blues, Stevie Ray Vaughn boogie, hillbilly finger picking and Hendrix flash; three-piece Chase The Sun crank out a new take on a classic sound.

Since forming in late 2006, Chase The Sun have gone hard and got a lot done in a short time, establishing themselves as a must-see live act and making inroads into national touring and festival circuits with “You Gotta Go”, the lead track of their self-titled debut album, gaining momentum on airwaves around the country.

“Sometimes a trio comes along and impresses with their sheer power, dexterity and originality…This is the sort of band you can put anywhere, from beer barn to amphitheatre, and they will win people over… Chase The Sun have put their own stamp on the blues and roots genre and, quite simply, there isn’t a weak moment on their debut release” – Drum Media Nov 07.

Jan (rhymes with Yarn) Rynsaardt has been strumming strings since the age of 7 and was into the heavy guitar sounds of AC/DC and Metallica since the first grade. “I was playing all sorts of stuff through school but when I heard Joe Satriani, that’s when I knew I wanted to be a guitar player” recalls Rynsaardt of his 20-year focus. Satriani lead to Hendrix and Stevie Ray Vaughn who took Rynsaardt back to the blues. “Stevie Ray pushed me in an early direction: back to the blues masters like BB King, Muddy Waters and Johnny Winter”

In Chase The Sun, Jan is joined by Ryan Van Gennip who has held down bass duties for Diana ah Naid, Charlton Hill, Sandrine and iota, and drummer Jon “Howler” Howell; a solid multi genre player who rose to prominence with Leonardo’s Bride, is a founding member of the Lo-Tec Highbrows and in constant high demand for a wide range of projects.

The trio met after an acoustic jam session in Sydney’s west and their chemistry was phenomenal from the outset. Clicking into action immediately, Chase The Sun were a studio at the Blue Mountains (the Robertson Brothers’) to record an album within days of meeting.

And it’s that album that has seen the band go from strength to strength earning the band nominations in every category of this year’s Chain Blues awards. Nominations alone are something but when the band picked up the gongs for best duo/group and best song for “You Gotta Go” their rising star status was confirmed and exceeded.

Their first time through The Wickham Park Hotel in January saw a performance that was, from all reports, sensational and now the best blues group in the country come back to Newcastle again:

Chase The Sun, The Wickham Park Hotel, Thursday 20th March

FREE ENTRY

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2007 was a big year for the Skybombers… and the momentum is continuing in 2008 with the announcement of the band’s first National Tour for the year, covering all along the east coast of Australia with a heap of regional dates in between the capital city shows!

After signing with Albert Music only 12 months ago, releasing their EP ‘Sirens’ in April 07, the band went on to make head way in the US of A, mid year, headlining an outdoor show in the middle of Hollywood for key tastemaker and leading alternative radio station Indie 103.1, where their hit single It Goes Off was on the most played list. The band also played a private industry A&R showcase at The Viper Room and landed international management with Ron Stone at Gold Mountain. And they’re in good company, Stone and Gold Mountain have previously managed Neil Young, Nirvana, Beck, The Beastie Boys, The Breeders and many, many more.

But it didn’t stop there…Skybombers also signed up with respected booking agent The Agency Group for territories outside Australia. TAG represents some of the world’s biggest bands including The Hives, The White Stripes, Pink Floyd, My Chemical Romance as well as local lads Powderfinger and The Cat Empire.

In October 07, the Skybombers, headed back to the US to work on their debut album, with Rick Parker (Black Rebel Motorcycle Club, Von Bondies, Dandy Warhols) due for release in May 2008.

In preparation for the release of the album in May, the band are gearing up to hit the road to ‘road test’ the new tracks plus play some of the old favourites as well.

Influenced by ‘60s garage pop, ‘70s rock and roll, early punk, ‘90s grunge and Britpop like The Kinks, The Clash, You Am I, The Easybeats, Oasis and The Hives, Skybombers are about energy, they’re about melody, they’re about 4 A.M., they’re about being so drunk that you can’t stand still, so your only option is to dance. Most of all, they are about being young. Everyone can relate to that!

Support acts for the shows will be local artists in each of the towns the band is playing, so stay tuned for more details!

Check out The Skybombers at:

Fri 29th Feb – Lucky Country Hotel, with special guests The Deposits

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Last week I mentioned that Apple Computers had just released the very eagerly awaited upgrade to their photo editing and management application Aperture. Being an early adopter I downloaded Aperture 2.0 as soon as I heard about it, and Apple also sent me my trial serial number.

My first impressions of Aperture 2.0 is that Apple has really taken it to the next level and is now ahead of Adobe’s offering Lightroom. I was so impressed with how Aperture 2.0 worked on my Mac Pro, and my MacBook Pro for that matter, that I decided I had to buy it.

When you open Aperture 2.0 you get this startup screen with your trial serial number and the details of your library, you also get this popup with a couple of options allowing you to either continue your trial (assuming it hasn’t expired), buy Aperture 2.0, and Authorize (see screenshot).

I clicked on the buy option on Saturday morning, Safari promptly opened and went to the purchase page where I confirmed my existing Apple / .Mac account information. I then had the option to buy a completely new version of Aperture, or as an existing user I could just buy an upgrade from version 1.5 to 2.0, and then had the further choice of buying a boxed version or just receiving an electronic license version. I chose the upgrade from 1.5 to 2.0, and to receive the electronic licensing as I didn’t require another box and with all the available tutorials on the Apple website I didn’t really need the user manual. From there I had to confirm my credit card details and my delivery address..

Pretty easy process to do, and the transaction seemed to go through quickly and without any problems.

I went and checked my .Mac email address and had the order confirmation was there already (10:51am), I was expecting that the invoice with serial number would arrive soon there after. Waiting, waiting, waiting, nothing. Oh well, must’ve been a hold up in the system somewhere, it is Saturday after all. I went back about my work, editing photos, and figured the serial wasn’t overly important to the photo set I was working on.

Finally at 6:34pm the invoice arrived, no serial number. What the! I logged into .Mac and then into the area where you can check your order process and it shows that I’ve purchased Aperture and that the invoice has been sent, but still no serial number. By this time it was way too late to ring Apple anyway as it was nearly 7pm on a Saturday night, I figured I’d leave it till Monday and that it would be easy enough to sort out.

Monday comes, I call Apple and they have no idea what has happened and are looking into it. After not hearing back from them in what I considered a reasonable amount of time I call again. This time I get passed around from Customer Support to Apple Care to Pro Apps to Customer Support and eventually back to Apple Care, no one can help me but they’ll have someone call me back shortly.

Well this time they did actually get back to me shortly. After outlining my purchase process again to Kevin, I think his name was, I was informed that he would look further into it and get back to me shortly. About an hour or so later I get a call back from Kevin, they’ve recognised the problem and are looking into why I wasn’t issued a serial number and could I email him a copy of my order confirmation and invoice so that he could reference them both. I emailed them to him while I still had him on the phone, he acknowledged the receipt of them.

I was confident that things were now being taken care of and that I would soon have my license. This is now Monday afternoon.

4:30pm Monday afternoon I left work, still no Aperture 2.0 license. Around 5pm Kevin from Apple calls me on my mobile to say sorry and that he hadn’t heard back from the Pro Apps team yet but he would chase them up the following morning. At no stage did Kevin from Apple Computers Australia give me any bad service.

At 10:49am on Tuesday morning Kevin calls me, I’m thinking ‘hells yeah here comes my serial number’. He’s apparently spoken again to Pro Apps in the US and they are generating me a new serial number and they’ll call me sometime in the next COUPLE OF DAYS with the serial number. I complained that I couldn’t fathom how it could possibly take a ‘couple of days’ to generate a serial number. I also told him how disappointed with Apple Computers I was and that this sort of service was absolutely disgraceful. He apologised and said he would get back to me, or try to get someone to contact me later in the day.

It’s now Wednesday, and I still don’t have a serial number for Aperture 2.0, and Kevin has still not called me back.

I emailed customer support again this morning, they replied with a generic ‘we can’t help you any further, you’ll need to contact Pro Apps support on this US phone number’. I replied to that with and told them how disappointed I was that after all of this that they had the gall to suggest that I should spend more money on a product that I have yet to receive by calling their support line in America from Australia. I also told them that I would now be filing a complaint against Apple Computers with the Department of Fair Trading in Australia.

About another minute or two later, just to add insult to injury, I get an automated email from Apple asking me to fill in a survey to do with my recent call to Customer Relations. You can bet I told them what I thought of their service.

As a long time Apple supporter who currently uses a Mac Pro with 2 x 23″ Cinema Displays, a MacBook Pro, an iMac, an iPod Touch and an iPod Nano, on a daily basis this sort of customer service is purely disgraceful and I would find it extremely difficult to continue to recommend their products in the future as I would be afraid of influencing friends and colleagues to buy an Apple Computers product that they might not ever receive….despite being charged for it!

Lift your game Apple Computers.

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Another Lite n Easy week has gone and another couple of kilo’s as well, so the weight loss total so far is 7 kilograms which puts me down to 93kg. The main area I lost weight from this week was my legs and feet, I think I almost lost an entire shoe size or pretty close to it..weird..

The highlights food wise this week were the Chicken Tenders with Chilli Plum Sauce on a bread roll, week A day 4, and then the Chicken and Pasta Bake on day 7. Mmmmmmmm, I can still remember the chicken tenders!

I also tried a couple of different dinners this week, the best being the Baked Chicken with Mushroom Sauce!

Anyway, still happy with how the dieting is going and that I’m still losing weight without having to do a tonne of exercise..

Stay tuned for next week, I’ve got a few new dinners coming and I’m looking forward to the Thai Chicken Cakes we get on Day 2.

Take it easy, Matt

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With the glory days of Mousemoon behind them, two of Newcastle’s hardest working musos are fronting fresh new endeavours. The Duke is exploring his soul in Dukes Of Erlington. Calf is turning a new page with The Book Of Ships. Nick Milligan speaks to both artists about their long marriage to melody

THE RISING TIDE

Although you may see the name ‘Calf’ attached to a number of local musical projects, David Anthony ‘Calf’ Zeeman says he is a serial monogamist at heart. “I can only ever be involved with one project at any given time as a writer. Anything else will usually just involve me being a bit player and adding colours where they are needed. I certainly don’t like to get involved in too many things,” assures the singer.

The idea for Calf’s new band, The Book Of Ships, arrived years ago while he was still committed to playing guitar and singing in The Hauntingly Beautiful Mousemoon. “I found a little book in a second hand bookstore called the ‘Book of Ships’. It’s about the size of a CD cover and has these beautiful illustrations of ships, indicative of certain eras of maritime history. As soon as I saw it I knew it was the artwork concept for an album or project. At that stage though I was thoroughly ensconced in Mousemoon, and thus the project had to wait. Living in the East end of [Newcastle] and at one stage having the ocean baths’ changerooms as my bathroom, lured me to the somewhat eerie, depressive feel of that part of town, where the land ends and you can look out on the lonely freighters,” recalls Calf.

The Book Of Ships utilises Calf’s strengths as a musician. His voice is extremely versatile and as a front man, he’s magnetic. It seems to be a trait that’s common to Mousemoon alumni. The Book Of Ships formed around an album length demo that Calf wrote and recorded, and includes not only Fenton K (ex-Mousemoon), but also Pat Brooke of local atmospheric group Poland, and now of Faults On Film. The five-piece Book Of Ships are one of the most impressive units on the local landscape.

Despite The Book Of Ships’ astonishing live presence, Calf is intent on focusing on the studio. “[We want to record] more so than to play live. We begin pre-production in January for a record we hope to release by mid ‘08. I’m really interested in creating albums as artworks that exist as tangible documents of times and experiences, more so than the fleeting joy of live performance. That said, we do also intend to get touring the eastern seaboard soon,” says Calf.

With a strong passion for music running throughout his family, it was inevitable that Calf would inherit some musical DNA. “My mother’s family was like the von Trapps in The Sound of Music. All thirteen of them played organ and guitar and sang, so I guess I got some of that, but The Seekers didn’t quite cut it for me. It was early morning Rage in the late-80s that did it. I had a Tupperware kit and I played along to Fairground Attraction, Yazz, Yellow, John Farnham, and Icehouse et al. From there I tried to play guitar in high school but failed HSC music. I only got serious when I hit Uni and eventually got into Producing and engineering.

Like most musicians, Calf shares a love-hate relationship with songwriting. “I find writing very hard. It inevitably spews forth a whole bunch of self-loathing and self-contempt and I also find it hard just to switch off from what I may have been doing that day. I’m definitely no Ryan Adams,” says Calf.

Despite the apparent challenge of crafting a song, Calf’s undeniably gifted. One of the group’s current live highlights is the tune ‘Broken Glass In My Mouth’, which Calf reveals to be an overtly political piece. “It is the most political of the tracks in our set,” says Calf. “In a general sense, it is about the every day nature of political corruption as well as complacency, literary escapism, virtual war, hegemony and how acts as small as serving coffee on a serviette are inherently political. I wrote it attempting to (musically) approximate Bright Eyes, but it came out nothing like that and more akin to The Drones’ ‘Jezebel’, I think. I’m really proud of how those lyrics ended up.”

OUT OF THE BAG

“Dukes Of Erlington allows me to pursue the most personal aspects of my songwriting. I like the idea of writing a song and then keeping it no matter what type of music it is. I’ve always written songs since I learned to play guitar, which is years ago now, so I know I don’t have to worry if nobody ‘gets it’. I’ve always been a drummer in bands, so this is the first time I’ve been able to arrange songs the way I’d like them to be,” explains The Duke (pictured bottom left).

Since arriving in Australia from Norway to pursue university studies, Erling Gronhaug has left an indelible mark on Newcastle’s music scene. He quickly received the nickname of ‘The Duke’ and became the drummer for The Hauntingly Beautiful Mousemoon. After this legendary group’s demise, many of its members have not hesitated in launching a number of new projects. For The Duke it has been working with Mojo Juju & The Snake Oil Merchants as a producer and drummer. He is also the frontman for Ergo B Bag, a brash and brightly coloured musical project which started out as a way to pass the time, but has taken him to 2007’s Big Day Out. He’s been invited back to perform at 2008’s Big Day Out. It will only be the band’s tenth live show. The Duke is quick to acknowledge the irony of Ergo B Bag’s success, when it’s the musical project he initially put the least amount of effort into. The group will also get to perform with The Bedroom Philosopher at the 2008 Melbourne Comedy Festival.

While Ergo B Bag & His All Action All Stars may be a rose-coloured musical outlet, Dukes Of Erlington was born out of a dark period in the life of The Duke. As a number of his relationships turned sour, he escaped to a cabin in the forest inland of Byron Bay, where he sat in solitude with no electricity and wrote the collection of songs that would become Dukes Of Erlington’s current set-list. “About a year and a half ago, everything in my life went a weird way. I started pissing off all my friends, because I was in such a bad mood. I stayed in a friend’s house while he was away for four days. There was a generator, but I couldn’t get it started. When it got dark, I only had two candles and it was fucking scary, so I played my guitar a lot,” chuckles The Duke. ”It sounds very romantic, but it was the best songwriting situation I’ve ever been in.”

Once The Duke had written and recorded a selection of his solo material, his friends offered to help him realise the songs in a live environment. His band includes a number of Newcastle’s most talented musicians, including Fenton K, who was a member of Mousemoon and finds time to also perform with The Book Of Ships. The Duke hopes that Dukes Of Erlington will eventually become a more collaborative effort, but at the moment he’s content with being in charge of the songwriting duties.

The Duke moves through patches of writing for Dukes Of Erlington. Although, he confesses that it’s been almost a year since the core of his set-list was written. “My songwriting will stop because I get involved in other acts. I spend a lot of time on the road touring with Mojo Juju and now I’m doing the whole Ergo B Bag thing, as well as The Claff Brothers and The Lovelorn Living Party,” explains The Duke.

The musician admits that performing in so many groups leaves him drained when it comes time to work on new Dukes Of Erlington material. “I use a lame anecdote – when you’re a chef and you cook all day, the last thing you want to do is come home and cook dinner. I don’t write much at the moment. Dukes Of Erlington songs come out when I’m in a downer period and I’m having a shit time,” reveals The Duke, in his Norwegian lilt.

Despite the exhaustion that comes from being in a number of musical groups, The Duke acknowledges that he is someone that needs multiple outlets. “I have a dream of being someone like Beck that can play any style of music. I’ve never managed to turn that into one band yet. I guess the closest I’ve come to being able to do that was with Mousemoon, which was a lot of variety in one band,” says The Duke.

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