Have you ever wondered what 2001: A Space Odyssey would be like if it wasn’t, you know, long and shit? Well, Adelaide/Melbourne bucket of awesome Bitch Prefect try their best to answer that for you in their new clip for their brand new song, ‘Drifting’. Meandering and handsome, the track is just another of the myriad of reasons to love Bitch Prefect. They are one of the best new-ish Australian bands going around at the moment, at the same calibre of Twerps, Dick Diver and Scott & Charlene’s Wedding. Although ‘Drifting’ is slightly slower (only by a bit) than the usual Bitch Prefect song, and doesn’t exaggerate the slacker aspects like ‘Walk Through the Door’ or ‘Holiday in America’, it still is an absolute gem of a song. I have literally soaked my pants in my sudden anticipation of their second record, ‘Bird Nerds’, out on the 4th of November, on Bedroom Suck. FUCK YEAH!
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Square Moon is a fairly quiet, fairly understated yet emotionally raw collection of paeans to lost time, lost love, sadness, loneliness, heartbreak, heartache, and unrequited obsession. MacManus pours so much of his heart out over the course of these two discs that it’s hard to believe there’s anything left in his cardiac jug. The pianos, acoustic guitars, elegant strings and other bits ‘n’ bobs are tinkled so delicately it’s as if they were recorded by candlelight with a concern for not waking the amiable neighbours. And then there’s the voice. Davey’s blissful, soulfully cracked and battered yearning croak makes Conor Oberst sound like that chump from Maroon 5.

The single was the first Slade single released on Barn Records] Since 1970 to 1976, the band had been on the Polydor Records label.

The track is notable for a performance on the children’s Blue Peter show. The producers didn’t realise the track’s reference to drugs. Complaints rose after their performance which led to the record being banned by the BBC.

In a 1989 interview on Sky by Day, Holder spoke of the song’s lyrics, stating “The song was all about a cocaine dealer in America but it was actually an anti-drug song.

One of the most well-known rock groups from Continental Europe, Denmark’s Savage Rose recorded a wealth of intriguing and eclectic progressive rock in the late ’60s and ’70s. In their early work, one hears faint echoes of the Airplane, Doors, Pink Floyd, and other psychedelic heavyweights combined with classical jazz and Danish-Euro folk elements. Their arrangements rely heavily on an incandescent, watery organ that sounds like nothing so much as psychedelic aquarium music. The most striking aspect of the band’s sound, however, was the vocals of lead singer Annisette. Her childish wispy and sensual phrasing can suddenly break into jarring, almost histrionic wailing, like a Janis Joplin with Yoko Ono-isms, and eerily foreshadows Kate Bush’s style.
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Sometimes I get too drunk,
I feel so goddamned low
I have no place to go, no one to turn to
I think about your loving arms, where I’d like to be
But it’s selfish as can be, and I know it
And if I’m sorry for myself, I’m sorry for you too
‘Cause I’m the same as you, and I’m burning

So I sing for everyone who feels there’s no way out
So maybe if you all shout someone will hear you
Listen to them shout

I won’t say that I love you, ’cause that would be a lie
I can only say I try, and you know it
Love is something more or less than words can hope to say
It’s something day to day in the life we’re living
Lovers come and lovers go but friends are hard to find
Yes I can count all mine on one finger

So I sing for everyone who feels there’s no way out
So maybe if you all shout someone will hear you
Listen to them shout

The distance that’s between us, it just never seems to change
There’s a whole mountain range of misunderstanding

So I sing for everyone who feels there’s no way out
So maybe if you all shout someone will hear you
Listen to them shout

The band was formed in 2001 by Ethan Holtzman and his brother Zac after Ethan was inspired by a trip to Cambodia. As Ethan and Zac were searching for a vocalist to sing in Khmer, lead singer Chhom Nimol was discovered in a nightclub in the Little Phnom Penh area of Long Beach. She was already a well-known karaoke singer in Cambodia, but decided to move to the United States after visiting her sister, and thought it was a good chance to make more money to send to her family back home. Zac is a vocalist and guitarist, formerly with Dieselhed, while Ethan plays the Farfisa organ. Rounding out the band are bassist Senon Williams (who played in Radar Bros until January 2009), drummer Paul Smith, and David Ralicke on brass.

Their self-titled debut album was released in 2003. All lyrics on the earlier albums are sung in Khmer, while the third album introduces some songs in English. Many of the songs are covers of 1960s Cambodian rock tunes by such artists as Sinn Sisamouth, Pan Ron, and Ros Sereysothea, but some are originals, first written in English by the Holtzmans before being translated.

In 2005, the band toured Cambodia during the Bon Om Thook water festival, to critical acclaim. The documentary film Sleepwalking Through the Mekong documents the band’s touring in Phnom Penh and other major Cambodian cities. There, singer Chhom Nimol, whose family included renowned singers from the 1970s onward, reconnected with the Cambodian fanbase, many of whom remembered the heyday of Cambodian rock from that era. The trip was a transforming experience for the rest of the band as they performed with master musicians and recorded new songs along the way, providing the band with new material. The film also reveals aspects of modern Cambodia, as the band crosses a cultural chasm with the same spirit as Cambodia’s original rock pioneers.

Also in 2005, their second album, Escape from Dragon House, was released, containing more original songs. Escape from Dragon House was one of Amazon.com’s Top 100 Editor’s Picks of 2005. It was re-released on limited edition colored vinyl on August 26, 2008.
Dengue Fever at Beautiful Days Festival 2008. Photo: Brian Marks

In June 2008, Real World Records released Venus On Earth in all territories outside of the U.S. and Canada. Peter Gabriel, founder of their new label, said of the deal, “We have Dengue Fever coming out on Real World Records (outside of the USA) – it’s really cool stuff, with the small Cambodian singer and big American guys behind! They’re California based but have taken 60’s Cambodian pop as their main source of inspiration and it’s done with a lot of style. It’s spirited, impassioned stuff.” Venus On Earth was selected as one of the best world music records of 2008 by the iTunes Store.

Dengue Fever has entered into partnerships with a number of charitable organizations to support causes in Cambodia. They are involved with the wildlife and forest conservation organization Wildlife Alliance, and have donated recordings for charity records with the Sweet Relief Fund, a charity that aims to provide financial assistance to musicians dealing with illness, disability, or age-related issues. The group also compiled a collection of Cambodian rock music from the pre-Khmer Rouge era, entitled “Electric Cambodia”, in 2010. All proceeds from this album were dedicated to Cambodian Living Arts.

Dengue Fever were winners of the 8th annual Independent Music Awards for best World Fusion Album.
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Hugo Race Fatalists releases the first single, ‘Ghostwriter’, from the forthcoming Fatalists album We Never Had Control (July 5), a collaborative project between Australian singer songwriter producer Hugo Race (True Spirit, Dirtmusic, Bad Seeds) and the Italian instrumental band Sacri Cuori.

Recorded in Romagna Italy, ‘Ghostwriter’ will be released as a single on May 31st as a download package that includes a cover of the Beastie Boys classic ‘Sabotage’.

Hugo Race describes ‘Ghostwriter’ as “the life story of another individual in exile in a dead end town where folk who lose themselves go to fade away.”

Accompanying the single is a video that was filmed in Catania, Sicily and directed by Corrado Vasquez and Ivan Shok, two young Sicilian film makers, who worked alongside Hugo to come up with the video concept
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Can I just go ahead and declare that Jackson Taylor & The Sinners are officially the funnest band in country music right now? Do I have the unilateral authority to do that? Can we somehow get that certified through oath and affirmation? Because hot damn, if their latest album Crazy Again doesn’t leave you in a good mood, then you’re one hell of a red ass.

Jackson Taylor & The Sinners inhabit this strange niche in the music world; one that sometimes results in the band being overlooked when people are talking about the “best” in any given sphere of country. Their spirit and sound is more akin to the underground, with a punk attitude and sometimes provocative language. But logistically The Sinners are embedded more into the Texas / Red Dirt scene, despite being based now out of Wichita, KS. Over time their ability to cross mindsets, styles, and scenes has left them with no expectations to fulfill, a truly unique sound, and a wide swath of fans that resulted in Crazy Again being the first of their career to chart on Billboard.
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The Sea and Cake is an indie rock band with a jazz influence based in Chicago. The group formed in the mid-1990s from members of The Coctails (Archer Prewitt), Shrimp Boat (Sam Prekop and Eric Claridge), and Tortoise (John McEntire); the group’s name came from a willful reinterpretation (as the result of an accidental miscomprehension) of “The C in Cake”, a song by Gastr del Sol. Starting with 1997’s The Fawn, the group has relied on electronic sound sources, such as drum machines and synthesizers, to color its music, but has retained its distinctive post-jazz combo style. The band has shied away from releasing singles, preferring the album format. Contrary to his multi-instrumentalist role in Tortoise, John McEntire almost exclusively plays drums in The Sea and Cake
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