“Instant Coffee” by Dumb Things

Aussie battlers Dumb Things are back with a sweet and dark song about coffee. None of that fancy single origin bean hand ground in a ceramic burr grinder for a pour-over coffee stuff. It’s Dumb Things, so this is “Instant Coffee” with a dollop of existential crisis.

Dunno what it is about this Brisbane, Queensland band but they just have a knack of crafting seemingly simple songs about ordinary everyday things and turning them into heart-stopping pop classics.

The Go-Betweens were also from Brisbane 4 decades ago. Like Dumb Things they crafted clever pop songs from comparatively simple ingredients of a voice and two guitars, bass and drums. But their lyrics often had the gravitas of aspiring novelists.

Dumb Things lyrics, for all their quotidian subject matter, are sometimes just as profound. Except here it is instant coffee which is considered with the same existential intensity as a Go-Betweens relationship break-up, and the process and rituals around drinking instant coffee alone doing some heavy metaphorical lifting in the process. Coffee & Cane (sugar) anyone?

Musically “Instant Coffee” develops and blooms as it goes, displaying an increasing musical confidence and ambition in its structure, arrangement of instruments (check those glorious counterpoint guitar melodies) and the under-stated vocal delivery.

Dumb Things are probably sick of being compared to other bands here. But, if it helps sell you on them, there’s also a little bit of the beguiling simplicity of NZ stalwarts The Bats about Dumb Things approach, and even at times Robert Scott’s magical Bats-offshoot Magick Heads.

Anyway, it’s just another bloody lovely song from them. Looking forward to the new album down the line.

“Head In The Clouds” by Renovator’s Delight

If you love Dumb Things as much as I do you’ll adore Renovator’s Delight, the solo+friends band of Dumb Things guitarist/ vocalist Madeleine Keinonen, who has just released a first album “Bark All Night”. It’s delightfully melodic and jangling guitar pop, and “Head In The Clouds” here could be a long lost Magick Heads song. It’s a beauty. The whole album is.

The phrase “renovator’s delight” is a real estate agent’s euphemism for an old ‘character house’ that has seen better days, requiring re-piling, re-plumbing, new electrics and replacement windows, bathroom kitchen etc. In other words, a money pit. However your commitment of $11 AUD for the digital album or $32 AUD plus postage for the LP of “Bark All Night” is a sound investment. No hard work required here, but many hours of rewarding listening guaranteed.

As with Dumb Things, Renovator’s Delight does the simple stuff exceptionally well. Guitar & bass, drums, Keinonen’s unaffected vocals, and some additional texture from clarinet, violin, and, well, bowed saw of course. As with Dumb Things, Keinonen’s lyrics are observational, slice-of-life stuff, and work with the homespun music and arrangements.

“Bark All Night” seems to display as much of a strong stylistic link to southern New Zealand jangle pop past (Robert Scott and his bands Magick Heads, and The Bats) and present (check the forthcoming album by Jim Nothing if you like your laconic jangling guitar pop served with violin), as there is to the legions of Australian jangling guitar pop icons past and present. Quietly essential.

As bonus content, here’s the video for the opening track “Bucket of Water”:

“Another Door” by The Bats

Our Day 21 song for 31 Days of May Madness, attempting to post a New Zealand track every day of the month of May, is “Another Door” by The Bats:

Thirty eight years on from their inception in Christchurch NZ, combining The Clean bassist-turned-guitarist Robert Scott, with ex-Toy Love bassist Paul Kean, guitarist Kaye Woodward and drummer Malcolm Grant, The Bats still rock that original line-up. “Another Door” is from their 10th album, called “Foothills”.

There’s a comforting and familiar melodic chug and jangle, those vocal harmonies, a certain kind of wistful warm lo-key DIY homeliness, and an atmosphere of subdued psychedelia hovering in the air.

That atmosphere here (and throughout the album) is given weight through the minimalist tone soloing from Kaye Woodward’s lead guitar. Over successive albums Woodward has refined those lead guitar lines into things of Fripp-like esoteric beauty, with their thick overdriven saturation and sustain, and a ghostly waver of tremolo here.

“Gentle People” by Julian Teakle

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Hobart, Tasmania DIY music stalwart Julian Teakle (Native Cats, The Bad Luck Charms) has released a solo album called “New Hobart” packed full of jangling, irascible guitar pop. The second track “Gentle People” stands out with it’s bold psychedelic garage rock guitar tones and pointed take-down of the the “bourgie beige” suburbanites who live “in the bush, but in the city, too straight to go full hippy”.

That lament at soulless development and the toll it takes on those not invited to be part of the “Golden Age” is a re-occurring theme throughout “New Hobart”.

The sparse title track is an arch biting commentary on the gentrification of Hobart. It’s a familiar tale of a once DIY artist-friendly city undergoing change that makes it unaffordable to those who’s contribution is cultural capital rather than the kind of property-based financial capital that drives up the cost of housing: “Can’t afford the rent, don’t worry, we’ve got a famers’ market”.

Throughout the album these tales of the everyday life and the forces at work in society are set in freewheeling jangling guitar pop songs, which carry some trans-Tasman echoes of the spindly charm of early Chills or Bats or Clean songs and recordings, mingling with trans-Bass Strait echoes of the equally spindly charm of early Go-Betweens music (“Bellevue Parade”).

The set of songs on “New Hobart” will appeal to anyone who has enjoyed the surge in new DIY guitar pop in Australia in the last decade. Or to anyone who just loves a wry and well-crafted lyric, a strummed jangling guitar, propulsive bass lines, and clean lead guitar lines lacing their simple melodies through the pattern of a song.

Teakle has also been the driving force behind Rough Skies Records, established to encourage an idea of a scene or music culture in Hobart – “positive parochialism” – for the past decade. The 4 Rough Skies Records “Community” compilations are a great entry point to explore the Hobart scene.

“Electric Sea View” by The Bats

Thirty eight years on from their inception in Christchurch NZ, combining The Clean bassist-turned-guitarist Robert Scott, with ex-Toy Love bassist Paul Kean, guitarist Kaye Woodward and drummer Malcolm Grant, The Bats still rock that original line-up. They’ve just released their 10th album, called “Foothills”. Here’s the closing track, the glorious “Electric Sea View”:

“Electric Sea View” is everything Bats in a song. That familiar melodic chug and jangle, those vocal harmonies, a certain kind of wistful warm homeliness, and an atmosphere of subdued psychedelia hovering in the air.

That atmosphere here (and throughout the album) is largely supplied through the subtle keyboard shadings and minimalist tone soloing from Kaye Woodward’s lead guitar. Over successive albums Woodward has refined those lead guitar lines into things of Fripp-like esoteric beauty, with their thick overdriven saturation and sustain, and tiny bit of tremolo here.

“Foothills” was recorded by the band (bassist Paul Kean) in a house in the foothills of the Southern Alps in the middle of New Zealand’s South Island. As Robert Scott explains: “Many carloads arrived at the house, full of amps guitars and recording gear, we set up camp and soon made it feel like home; coloured lights, a log fire, and home cooked meals in the kitchen. We worked fast, and within a few days had all the basic backing tracks done, live together in one room, the way we like to do it – it’s all about ‘the feel’ for songs like ours.”

“Lights are Low” by Robert Scott

Our day 22 song for New Zealand Music Month 2020 is “Lights are Low” from Dunedin, New Zealand music legend (and artist) Robert Scott.

“Lights are Low” is the opening track from Scott’s brilliant 2014 album “The Green House” and features Hollie Fullbrook (Tiny Ruins) on co-lead vocals. Fullbrook sings on 5 of the songs on the album, which stands as the high point of Scott’s solo catalogue.

Robert Scott should require no introduction. But just in case… (deep breath) … he has been bassist and one of the songwriters and vocalists in The Clean for almost 40 years, plus he’s also been guitarist, songwriter & vocalist in his own band The Bats, first formed just after the early 80’s reign of The Clean, and still going strong with the same line-up today. Oh yeah, and let’s not forget his other bands, like the glorious Magick Heads (1991-1997), or his covers band The Moreporks (playing Buzzcocks, Joy Division, Stooges etc. Bats-style for weddings, birthdays etc.). So calling him ‘prolific’ seems like an understatement.

Scott is also an artist and, together with partner Dallas Henley, runs and art shop/ exhibition space in Port Chalmers near Dunedin called Pea Sea Art. As well as art supplies, there’s also a collection of local vinyl and CD releases available for sale there, including some of Scott’s own releases.

 

“Bear Hunt” by Minisnap

Somehow missed this gem of a single “Bear Hunt” from Minisnap from 2012 with an accompanying video filmed around the ruins of earthquake damaged Christchurch.

Minisnap are an offshoot from The Bats. Basically Minisnap are The Bats (Kaye Woodward & Paul Kean and drummer Malcolm Grant) without Robert Scott, with Woodward taking the lead vocals (and songwriting) as she has done on the occasional song by The Bats over the years.

Fourth Minisnap member is guitarist Marcus Winstanley, however on this single they are joined by John White (of Mëstar, The Blueness, and the first line-up of The Prophet Hens) on layered guitars and backing/ harmony vocal. It all adds up to a perfect kind of fuzz’n’jangle popcraft with a bit of feedback shoegaze style guitar layered beneath it all. Fantastic.

Also fantastic is the full range of releases by Minisnap and The Bats available in digital format via The Bats and Associates bandcamp site which is well worth some detailed archeological excavation if you are either unfamiliar with the bands or wish to add to your collection of sublime jangling NZ guitar pop.

“Pull My Arm” by Flowers

Don’t know how many bands in the history of forever have been called Flowers but I’ll bet there’s been a few. Possibly not quite as many as the number of bands playing indie-pop strictly following the C86 Purity Laws* of unadorned guitar, bass, drums and vocals.

But this Flowers and this song “Pull My Arm” pretty much grab you by the scruff of your neck and demand your undivided attention.

“Pull My Arm” features a clarion call of a lead vocal so effective at cutting through and grabbing attention Flowers could warn shipping away from a dangerous reef in dense fog.

Rachel Kennedy is the owner of that wonderful voice. Her bandmates are Sam Ayres (Guitar) and Jordan Hockley (Drums).

The minimalism and strum’n’churn of the guitars does invoke the likes of The Wedding Present or Heavenly perhaps. But on the quieter tracks it’s actually NZ’s The Bats who come to mind in the guitar and even some of the melodies. These are all fine touchstones for any band happy to fly the ‘indie-pop’ flag – as Flowers clearly are.

But it’s rare to find a voice as assertively confident whilst still retaining the unaffected purity of tone required classic for indie-pop. Adding to the fun and the fury, the guitar here also packs a bit more of a power when the buzz-saw fuzz/ distortion is engaged, transforming it into something altogether heavier at times.

There’s plenty of variety and texture from the relatively limited ingredients making up Flowers’ sound. Indie-pop this may be, but on steroids and capable of heavy lifting when it matters.

Flowers have a new album “Everybody’s Dying to meet You” out this month on Fortuna POP! in the UK and Kanine Records in the US.

If you wish to go on an archival dig you’ll find an early EP and some demos on Flowers’ Bandcamp page.

[* I made up ‘The C86 Purity Laws’… they don’t exist. It was just a throwaway hook-line for effect to get your attention. Relax.]

“North By North” by The Bats

Not much time spent searching out new music so far this year as work has been busy and the weather great down here for a change… so, in lieu of something new, here’s a classic song by The Bats called “North By North” performed live at Sammys in Dunedin in 2009.

The Bats - North by North (Live 2009) from Fishrider Records on Vimeo.

Here's the original recording and video for the song - the single from their 1987 album "Daddy's Highway" which was re-issued last year.


‘Whispering or Singing’ by Boomgates

Day 7 of the unofficial Australian Music Month takes us back to Bedroom Suck Records for Boomgates ‘Whispering or Singing’ from their ‘Double Natural’ album.

Boomgates draw together people from a variety of great Australian underground bands – Eddy Current Suppression Ring’s Brendan Huntley, Twerps Rick Milovanovic and Dick Diver’s Steph Hughes. They’ve also done a split 7″ with The Bats recently.

The album is a great rough thrash of guitars bass & drums part Velvet Underground, part The Clean, and part Feelies staccato-strum. The voices alternate between braying ‘strine (I mean that in a good way) and Steph’s more melodic singing. The contrast between the two is perfect here.

The album packs a naturalistic punch – a clean and real recording, with stories and laconic voices reflecting unpolished suburban Australia (Melbourne in the case of Boomgates), and echoes of early Paul Kelly as much as beloved Australian storytellers The Go-Betweens.

Boomgates – Whispering or Singing from Powers of Ten on Vimeo.