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Victorian Election 2014 – What’s going on in the Legislative Council?

On the count so far it is looking like the new Labor Government is going to face a wide assortment of parties in the upper house. I want to look at how this has happened. This is based on the count today (day after election) so there is still more counting to go, and this is using Antony Green’s calculator so it is assuming all ticket votes. It is not unknown for the result to differ based on below the line votes (I believe this was a decisive factor in the 2013 Tasmanian Senate election), particularly since Victoria has optional preferencing below the line which makes below the line voting a less arduous task. In particular, these are not my predictions of what the final outcome will be.

The short reason why there are lots of surprising results is above the line voting. It is not preferential voting itself, which is an excellent system and much fairer than first past the post systems, the problem is that above the line votes allow for all of the votes for micro parties to be funneled together in ways that would not happen if people selected their own preferences.

 

Eastern Met (3 Liberal, 1 Labor, 1 Green)

This one is pretty much in line with first preferences, though a first past the post result would give a second Labor rather than Green. Only one micro (for these purposes anyone besides Lib, Lab, Nat, Grn) gets over 2% here, the DLP. The Greens get a big boost when Voluntary Euthanasia get elected, this frees up preferences from Sex, Cyclists and Animal Justice as well, giving Greens a decent lead over Labor for the last spot. It’s actually PUP preferences which put them over a quota, but by this point the Greens lead over Labor is big enough that they still win the last spot regardless of where PUP preferences go.

Eastern Vic (2 Labor, 1 Liberal, 1 National, 1 Shooters & Fishers)

There is a serious preference harvest here with Shooters & Fishers starting on about 2.4%. On a first past the post count the Greens would have the last spot. S&F get it because just about every micro preferences them, this includes all the Christian parties, People Power and PUP but also Sex and Cyclists, which is rather questionable. The cyclist numbers are so small as to have negligible effect, the Sex numbers are much larger, though it isn’t really clear that them preferencing the Greens as they did elsewhere would change the final result anyway, S&F get a lot of votes from the LDP. I’m no fan of Shooters and Fishers but a lot of people in Eastern Vic do like the small right wing/ christian parties, just about a quotas worth. The support for them from PUP was fairly important in making sure they stayed ahead of the LDP who might otherwise win off these preferences. That said, with about above the line voting I think that many of these votes would exhaust and Shooters & Fishers would not get anywhere near a winning position.

North Met (2 Labor, 1 Liberal, 1 Green , 1 Sex)

On First preferences Labor would pick up a third at the expense of Sex. The overall story here is that every small party sends preference to Sex or Family First and almost nothing goes to Labor or Liberal (the Greens primary is so close to a quota that they are out early on after electing Greg Barber), then it basically boils down to whichever of the majors having more excess surplus deciding the winner. So all the micro preferences push Family First and Sex into winning positions, and then the fact that Labor were further over 2 quotas than the Liberals were over 1 means their surplus elects the Sex candidate. Once again, without above the line preferencing neither of the smaller parties would get into that position and Labor would get the extra spot.

North Vic (1 Liberal, 1 Labor, 1 National, 1 Shooters & Fishers, 1 Country Alliance)

On first preferences Labor would get a second and the last would just got to Lib/Nat over Greens. Early in the count the Country Alliance rapidly climb to the top with LDP, FF and DLP preferences. Meanwhile Shooters are kept in there by PUP when they are on the verge of being eliminated. Once again the Shooters are about to be eliminated but this time are saved by Sex and Cyclists, to then be elected by Liberal/National preferences. So their success is absolutely down to preference deals. Finally, Labor preferences then choose Country Alliance over the Greens, I don’t know that much about Country Alliance but I’m sure Labor will find out whether that was a good choice during their term. The outcome had Sex party preferenced differently is harder to tell, they definitely would have stopped Shooters & Fishers but then their big bundle of right wing preferences would most likely elect country alliance and also give the Libs a boost, but chances are that Labor preferences would then elect a Green.

SE Met (2 Labor, 2 Liberal, 1 Green)

There are fair attempts at preference harvests by Sex and Rise Up, but they both run out of micro support. It helps that PUP preferences go to Greens, though even if they went to Rise Up they’d still fall short of a quota, though if PUP went to Sex they would possibly be elected instead of Greens.

South Met (3 Liberal, 1 Labor, 1 Green)

Quite a straightforward one, first 4 spots easily filled, and with only one left it’s just a race between Labor and Liberal who both have plenty of excess surplus to stay on top, no preference harvest really comes together, there’s not enough extra votes left out there.

West Met (2 Labor, 1 Liberal, 1 Green, 1 DLP)

I had thought the DLP success might be partly due to the ballot draw, but actually they are down the bottom, well below the ALP. After the initial quotas are distributed the Greens are in front and get over a quota with Sex, Animal Justice and PUP preferences. Without PUP it’s quite complicated (and depends where PUP preferences go) but the Greens could hang in just short of a quota while the DLP get elected, and then, if Labor is still ahead of Liberals then Liberal preferences would probably put Labor in instead. It is quite possible there would be enough extra votes here and there to see the Greens over a quota before that point anyway.

As for DLP, it’s a classic preference harvest, all the small right wing parties preference them and pretty much nobody preferences Labor or Liberal, when Liberals get eliminated their preferences elect DLP over Labor.

Western Vic (2 Liberal, 2 Labor, 1 Local Jobs)

On first preferences the Greens are favoured over Vote 1 Local Jobs (whoever that is). Vote 1 Local Jobs start with just 1.27% of the vote so if they do get through there will be plenty of commentary. There’s about 2.2 (out of 6) quotas out there with micros so it’s definitely prone to a preference harvest. After the 2 quotas each to Lab/Lib are used up the Greens are way in front for the last spot, but of course there’s a multitude of candidates in there who do not like the Greens. It’s the Country Alliance who save Vote 1 Local Jobs from being eliminated early (meanwhile Labor throw their preferences over to DLP, which previously got them elected in this region). Local jobs are once again in line for exclusion and get saved by Family First. This is the sort of point where above the line votes have such a huge effect, if FF voters chose their own preferences they would probably be spread amongst a number of remaining candidates and Local Jobs would still be eliminated next. That puts them in the big league of the micros with PUP and DLP, who are all still well short of the Greens though. Then the Liberals have a 10,000 vote surplus which puts Local Jobs ahead of the other contenders, and then Sex party preferences make them competitive with the Greens. Then PUP preferences go to the Greens but it is not enough for a quota, so when the DLP are eliminated their preferences and all the Micro right wing ones with them at this stage put local jobs over the Greens. There are some pretty tight elimination points in this count, though it seems possible that if Local Jobs are eliminated the preference harvest may be on for DLP or PUP instead.

 

Wolfpanther vs DJ Cup Of Water

Setlist from the Metro, 2/2/14. Wolfpanther in plain text, Cup of Water in Italics.

New War – Ghostwalking
Native Cats – Mohawk Motif
Sugar Minott – Love Gonna Pack Up
The Congos – Fisherman
Roots Manuva – Highest Grade Dub
Manitoba – Mammals vs Reptiles
Plaid – Coat
Tortoise – Adverse Camber (Autechre remix)
Four Tet – Hands
Tarentel – Tied To A Tree In A Jungle Of Mystery
Rangda – Bull Lore
Cave – Requiem For John Sex
The Verlaines – Death and the Maiden
Sonic Youth – Karen Revisited
Laughing Clowns – Song of Joy
John Fahey – Waltzing Matilda
Peak Twins – Salvation
Old Mate – I Think Of You
Tortoise – Gooseneck
Tortoise – Djed
Pye Corner Audio – November Sequence
Earth – Hung From The Moon
Pearls Before Swine – Did You Dream
The Band – The Weight
Bob Dylan – Tell Me That It Isn’t True
The Zombies – Beechwood Park
DJ Shadow & Cut Chemist – It’s The Real Thing/Milk
Stephen Malkmus & The Jicks – Hopscotch Willie
The Triffids – Hell Of A Summer
Wooden Shjips – Loose Lips
Public Image Ltd. – Albatross
Battles – IPT2
Kode 9 – Xingfu Lu
Yellow Magic Orchestra – Cosmic Surfin’
Penny Penny – Shibandza
Deadbeat – Slow Rot From Rhetoric
Sherwood & Pinch – Music Killer (Dubplate Pressure)
Aphex Twin – Flim
Konx-Om-Pax – Silent Reading
Where Were You At Lunch – Milwaukee
Jaga Jazzist – Animal Chin
Tortoise – The Taut & the Tame
Themselves – Good People Check (Hrvatski remix)
Four Tet – Swimmer
Autechre – Vose In
John Fahey – Dance of the Inhabitants of the Invisible City of Bladensburg
Swans  – God Damn The Sun
Les Coney – The Old Sundowner
The Great Unwashed – Hold Onto the Rail
Pavement – Grave Architecture
The Gist – Love At First Sight

 

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[gigs] Underground Lovers back together

I was really happy to see the Underground Lovers back together just over a year ago, but since then, nothing (though I did get to see many of them at an excellent GB3 gig last year). Good news this week is that they are playing again, still not in Adelaide, it’s two shows supporting Primal Scream in Melbourne, but apparently they are putting out a compilation and doing a national tour. Of course “national” doesn’t always mean Adelaide but I’m hoping for some good news ….
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JANUARY
  • 30th – The Holy Sea at the Wheatsheaf.

FEBRUARY

  • 1st – Sufjan Stevens at the Festival Theatre.
  • 4th – Big Day Out including Iggy & the Stooges, Primal Scream, Grinderman, MIA and LCD Soundsystem
  • 5th – Satan’s Cheerleaders at the Metro.
  • 9th – The Unthanks at the Gov.
  • 11th – Laneway Festival with !!! (Chk Chk Chk) -THE ANTLERS – ARIEL PINK’S HAUNTED GRAFFITI  – BEACH HOUSE  – BEAR IN HEAVEN – BLONDE REDHEAD  – CLOUD CONTROL – CUT COPY  – DEERHUNTER  -  FOALS  -  GOTYE  -  THE HOLIDAYS – HOLY FUCK – JENNY & JOHNNY  -  LES SAVY FAV  – LOCAL NATIVES – MENOMENA – PVT -  RAT vs POSSUM – STORNOWAY – TWO DOOR CINEMA CLUB – VIOLENT SOHO – WARPAINT  -  WORLD’S END PRESS – YEASAYER
  • 12th Format Festival opening night with Woollen Kits, Absolute Boys, Terrible Truths, Fair Maiden.
  • 15th an evening with Nigel Koop at the Format Festival.
  • 24th Cheer Advisory Council at the Format Festival.
  • 25th Super Wild Horses at Format.
  • 26th – Per Purpose, Bitch Prefect at Format.
  • 26th – Monarch, Unearthly Trance, Eagle Twin at Fowlers.

MARCH

  • 5th- Soundwave with Gang of Four, The Melvins and lots more.
  • 6th – Wavves at Rocket Bar.
  • 9th – Darren Hanlon at Jive.
  • 11-14th WOMADelaide, includes Joanna Newsom, Omar Souleyman, The Necks, Wildbirds & Peacedrums, Horace Andy, Don Letts, lots more. Recently added – Os Mutantes.
  • 16th Belle and Sebastian at Her Majesty’s Theatre.
  • 20th Ed Kuepper at the Gov.
  • 26th DOOM at the Gov.

APRIL

  • 4-7th – Paul Kelly‘s A-Z shows at the Space Theatre.

MAY

  • 11th – Kyuss Lives at Fowlers.

On the Stereo

  • Naked on the Vague – Heaps of Nothing LP (Siltbreeze)
  • David S. Ware Quartets – Live in the World 3cd (Thirsty Ear)
  • Fridge – Early Output 1996-1998 cd (Temporary Residence)
  • Four Tet – Ringer cdep (Domino)
  • Slowdive – Catch the Breeze 2cd (Sanctuary)
  • Seefeel – Succour cd (Warp)
  • Oneohtrix Point Never – Returnal cd (Editions Mego)
  • Vex’d – Cloud Seed 2×12″ (Planet Mu)
  • Autechre – Envane 2×12″ (Warp)
  • Public Enemy – Fear of a Black Planet cd (Def Jam)

Marble Hill-Basket Range-Uraidla-Norton Summit

Started with the familiar climb up Montacute Rd but then headed down Lobethal Rd on the picturesque descent to Basket Range, wasn’t quite sure if I’d have the energy to make it back up (but I’ll have to give it a go another time, perhaps after doing the easier ascent up Norton Summit Rd rather than Montecute which seems to just keep climbing forever). This time we returned to Norton Summit via Uraidla and Summertown which wasn’t too difficult, just one long climb on Basket Range Rd. The road where we turned right off Greenhill goes up and down like a roller coaster, quite a ride, with a very steep finish, it’s too short to show up on the elevation map for the whole ride, but if you just map that road it measures it as something like 14% at the steepest point. Thanks to Beetroot for coming along (and setting a tough pace up to Montacute Heights).

[gigs]

Before the local stuff, a bit of general touring news. The Paradise Motel are back together, have a new album and are touring the East Coast around late Sep early Oct. As mentioned in an earlier post Mouse on Mars are touring in late Oct, early Nov. Built to Spill have been announced for the Peats Ridge Festival in late Dec, I expect they’ll probably tour other festivals so not so confident about an Adelaide date. Finally a nice rumour going around is that the Swans could come to Australia next year.

The question that’s really been on my mind (not just lately, it’s been on my mind since about January 11 2009) is this – will All Tomorrow’s Parties festival be coming back to Australia?

AUGUST

  • 11th “local noise, drone, psych, punk, weird sounds” at Pharaoh Gallery.
  • 12th Cheer Advisory Council at the Metro.
  • 12th The Bedroom Philiosopher at Jive.
  • 14th Avant Gardeners, The Big Band, Old Mate at the Metro.
  • 14th Kool Keith at Rocket Bar.
  • 18th “local noise, drone, psych, punk, weird sounds” at Pharaoh Gallery.
  • 19th Humble Bee at the Gov (front bar).
  • 20th Princess One Point Five, We Grow Up, Cheer Advisory Council at the Ed Castle.
  • 21st Grong Grong, Fkn Tutts, Friends at the Metro.
  • 22nd Darren Hanlon at Jive.
  • 22nd Sea Thieves at the Wheatsheaf.
  • 27th Lakes, Bad Habit, Witches at Black Mass, Greeting from SA at the Metro.

SEPTEMBER

  • 3rd – No Through Road at the Jade Monkey.
  • 3rd – Flying Scribble, Fair Maiden, Tall Tall Trees at the Metro.
  • 24th – Starving Weirdos at the Exeter.
  • 25th – Hit The Jackpot, The Ancients, Fake Tan at the Metro.

OCTOBER

  • 1st Zeni Geva at the Rhino Room.
  • 1st Smudge at the Metro.
  • 1st Fire! Santa Rosa, Fire! at the Ed Castle.
  • 8th Sun Araw, Hit the Jackpot, Terrible Truths, Bitch Prefect, Bad Habit at Format.
  • 15th Steering By Stars at the Ed Castle.
  • Ninetynine at the Metro
  • Dead Meadow touring, Adelaide possible.

DECEMBER

  • 4th Stereosonic Festival lineup includes Wiley, Ricardo Villalobos, Jeff Mills, Caspa.

On the Stereo

  • Fabulous Diamonds – Fabulous Diamonds II cd (Chapter)
  • The Pyramid Scheme – Massive Reminders of a Virile King cd (Banished From the Universe)
  • Sun Ra – The Magic City cd (Evidence)
  • Swans – Swans Are Dead 2cd (Young God)
  • Miossec – Baiser cd (Play It Again Sam)
  • Miossec – Boire cd (Play It Again Sam)
  • Built To Spill – Perfect From Now On cd (Warner Bros)
  • Darren Hanlon – Hello Stranger cd (Candle)
  • Moon Wiring Club – An Audience of Art Deco Eyes cd (Gecophonic)
  • The Radiophonic Workshop cd (BBC/Grey Area of Mute)

New Theme

My main motivation for changing theme was that I wasn’t quite happy with way the old one archived posts.  In particular if someone followed a link and got into an old post it didn’t show anywhere what year it was from, so it was potentially a bit confusing. I tend to get hits from people searching for info on gigs, so it’s good if they read a post about someone touring that they know if it’s current or from two years ago.

Changing this probably didn’t require a whole new theme,  but I thought it was a good chance to try something different. I haven’t made any changes to this one, but the default photo  looks better than the old rayon vert photo (even though the aurora and le rayon vert are not the same thing). Not completely sure about fonts, I might try to get bold type (used to highlight names in gig posts) to show up a bit better. If anyone has any suggestions let me know.

[gigs] Yo La Tengo in February, No Ed Kuepper in November

A mix of good & bad news today. The very bad news is that Ed Kuepper’s tour in November has been cancelled due to an injury which means he can’t play guitar for a while. Hopefully to compensate his Adelaide fans he’ll consider bringing the Laughing Clowns here in the new year. At least rather than sitting at home sulking on November 28th I can go out to the Metro to see Batrider & No Through Road.

Fortunately there’s also some good new news today – Yo La Tengo are playing at Fowler’s in Feb. There’s been quite a few other announcements as well e.g. a Dirty Three/ Laughing Clowns Don’t Look Back show, Dinosaur Jr, The Books, Fink, Camera Obscura, and lots of other stuff for various festivals (Syd Festival, Golden Plains, Perth Festival) but no Adelaide dates for any of them.Keep an eye on the Feel Presents site since they promise to reveal info on more Dirty Three/Laughing Clowns shows on November 13th and full Dinosaur Jr tour dates on November 16th.

I got quite excited when scanning through the list of touring artists on Liveguide I saw Earth, but turns out it’s an Australian metal band called Earth and not Dylan Carlson’s band. Very annoying when that happens!

Finally, don’t forget that I’ll be DJing at the Metro this Sunday (8th) from 4-7, come along to here the eclectic sounds of Le Rayon Vert live!

NOVEMBER

  • 5th Matt Banham, Shame Spiral, Michael Beach at the Grace Emily.
  • 6th Bohoeffer at the Ed Castle.
  • 8th Le Rayon Vert DJ set at the Metro
  • 11th Johnny the Kid & Pat Ram at the Grace Emily.
  • 12th Casiotone for the Painfully Alone at Jive.
  • 13th Ned Collette and Laura Jean at the Metro
  • 14th Blackeyed Susans at the Norwood Hotel.
  • 21st Satan’s Cheerleaders, God God Dammit Dammit at Enigma.
  • 24th The Buzzcocks at the Gov.
  • 27th Lightning Bolt with The Grey Daturas and Primitive Calculators at Fowler’s Live.
  • 28th Ed Kuepper and the Kowalski Collective at the Gov Cancelled 🙁
  • 28th Batrider and No Through Road at the Metro.

DECEMBER

  • 3rd Paul Kelly at HQ.
  • 4th The Church at the Gov.
  • 5th The Crayon Fields at the Metro with Hit the Jackpot and Bing Goes to Monaco.
  • 5th Stereosonic at Bonython Park, lineup includes some interesting stuff like Drop the Lime and Hudson Mohawke.
  • 10th Jarvis Cocker at HQ.
  • 18th Sandy Cenin & Paul Champion’s Xmas show at the Metro.
  • 19th (Melbourne) Underground Lovers at the East Brunswick Club.
  • 23rd (Melbourne) Kim Salmon & the Surrealists, No Through Road and lots more at the Low Transit Industries Xmas show at the Corner Hotel.

JANUARY

  • 5th Cat Power at the Gov.
  • 8th Kaki King at Jive.
  • 12th Handsome Family at the Grace Emily.

FEBRUARY

  • 5th Laneway Festival with Echo & The Bunnymen, Eddy Current Suppression Ring and lots more.
  • 19th Yo La Tengo at Fowler’s Live.
  • 27th London Sinfonietta: Pacific Currents at the Adelaide Town Hall.
  • 28th London Sinfonietta: Wind & Glass at the Adelaide Town Hall.

MARCH

  • 5-8th WOMADelaide at Botanic Park with the Skatalites, Calexico, Ravi Shankar and lots more.
  • 6th Wayne Shorter Quartet at the Festival Theatre.
  • 7th The Necks at the Spiegeltent.
  • 7th Pavement at Thebby
  • 24th The Pixies at Thebby (playing Doolittle)

On the Stereo

  • Sunn0))) – Monoliths and Dimensions cd (Southern Lord)
  • Mountains – Choral cd (Thrill Jockey)
  • Times New Viking – Born Again Revisited cd (Matador)
  • MV & EE with Bummer Road – Green Blues cd (Ecstatic Peace!)
  • Tren Brothers – Tren Brothers EP cdep (Drag City)
  • Mouse on Mars – Instrumentals cd (Thrill Jockey)
  • Various – Mary Anne Hobbs: Wild Angels cd (Planet Mu)
  • Various – Warp 20 box set (Warp)
  • Ikonika – Please/Simulacrum 12″ (Hyperdub)
  • Antipop Consortium – Fluorescent Black cd (Ninja Tune)

Links Updated

I’ve done a bit of a clearing out of some dead links, also added a few new ones, in particular I’d like to draw your attention to The Michael Duffy Files (aka Loon Pond) which does a great job of keeping track of some of the strange things written by (mostly conservative) columnists in the Australian press. It’s a bit like an Australian version of Sadly, No! but the posts go into much more depth than the quick take downs of U.S. conservatives there. Some examples:

Also I’d particularly recommend the hilarious spEak You’re bRanes where they take the piss out of comments left on the BBC’s Have Your Say site. As well as the posts, the comments are well worth reading through as well. A couple of favourites:

Blogging to Resume

Things have been a bit quiet here for a while due to computer issues, should be back to normal now. Next time someone tells you that Macs don’t crash, don’t believe them!

Links Updated

I finally got around to updating the links on the sidebar of this blog. I’ve hopefully cleared away the dead links, or links to blogs which are no longer updated (except where I think the archives are worth a link anyway).

I’d like to draw your attention to a few highlights amongst the new arrivals on my blogroll