Womadelaide HIghlights – Saturday

Wow, Tanya Tagaq! No idea there was going to be something so out there at Womad, definitely the highlight of the day and one of the most distinctive performances I’ve seen anywhere.

Here she is with Rebecca Foon (A Silver Mt Zion)

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For Womad she’s doing a continuous (presumably improvised or at least largely so) performance accompanied by violin and electronics. She plays again tonight and does a workshop on Monday. It’s much more like something I’d expect at an experimental music festival rather than Womad – well done to them for being so adventurous.

Yesterday I also enjoyed the Workshop with Omar Souleyman and Rizan, the harp playing of Marshall McGuire, the entertaining French/Nigerian singer Asa and a repeat performance from Wildbirds & Peacedrums.

 

 

Womaidelaide highlights – Friday night

Quick post on Womad so far. Easily the highlight was Omar Souleyman. The crowd was a bit slow to get going, while there were clearly qutie a few fans there (who like me would be familiar with him through his releases on the Sublime Frequencies label), there were also plenty who didn’t really seem to know what to expect – i.e. full-on, over the top dance music. After a while everyone got the idea, those not up for dancing moved back and all the enthusiatic people were left at the front and there was a fantastic atmosphere … really fun music. I’ll have to keep this short since I’ll have to go to see him do a workshop shortly.

Runner up for me was Dereb the Ambassador – quality Ethiopian Jazz (in the style of lots of stuff on the Ethiopiques compilations). The band are from Sydney, but lead by Dereb from Ethiopia. Really great stuff but why the hell were people sitting down?

Also can recommend  Natalie Natiembé and Wildbirds & Peacedrums.

[gigs]

This weekend is WOMAD, the weather forecast looks perfect for it. My picks are

  • Joanna Newsom on Sunday night. Absolutely my top gig of last year was seeing her in Melbourne, it’s great that she’s finally visiting Adelaide.
  • Omar Souleyman – hearing good things about his interstate shows. Plays tomorrow night only.
  • The Necks on Sunday and Monday nights. I see the Necks whenever I can but I’ve missed their last couple of Adelaide shows (I think last time they clashed with Womad, and the time before I was heading back from ATP where I’d just seen them play), so I’m very keen to catch both sets.

Should be lots of other great stuff as well.

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In the following week there’s another couple of big shows, on Wednesday it’s Belle & Sebastian at Her Majesty’s, with my DJ set at the Metro beforehand.

Next Sunday Ed Kuepper & Mark Dawson play at the Gov. Always keen to see Ed, but also very excited to see those two team up again after a break of more than 10 years. Quite a few of the first gigs I ever went to were Ed & Mark.

June will be a good time to visit Melbourne with the Melbourne International Jazz Festival being held later than usual (which suits me rather well). They’ve got a fantastic lineup including Charlamagne Palestine & Tony Conrad, The Sun Ra Arkestra, Sonny Rollins and Faust. I’ve never been able to go it before due to timing, really looking forward to it this time. In particular Overground looks absolutely amazing.

 

MARCH

  • 11-14th WOMADelaide, includes Joanna Newsom, Omar Souleyman, The Necks, Wildbirds & Peacedrums, Horace Andy, Os Mutantes, Don Letts, lots more.
  • 16th Belle and Sebastian at Her Majesty’s Theatre. Before (and maybe after) the show DJ Wolfpanther plays indie pop at the Metro.
  • 20th Ed Kuepper at the Gov.
  • 26th DOOM at the Gov.
  • 27th DJ Wolfpanther plays an all Warp Records set at the Metro.

APRIL

  • 4-7th – Paul Kelly‘s A-Z shows at the Space Theatre.
  • 8th – Collarbones, Steering By Stars, Panoptique Electrical at the Metro.
  • 15th – Eat Skull, Slug Guts at Format.
  • 28th – Rites Wild EP launch at Format
  • 30th – Cheer Advisory Council album launch at Jive.

MAY

  • 4th – Herbie Hancock at Her Majesty’s Theatre.
  • 11th – Kyuss Lives at Fowlers.
  • 16th – Gary Numan and Severed Heads at HQ.

JULY

  • 1st Van Dyke Parks and Kinky Friedman at the Gov.

On the Stereo

  • Dave Burrell – Momentum cd (High Two)
  • John Coltrane – Live in Seattle 2cd (Impulse)
  • Albert Ayler – Nuits de la Fondation Maeght 1970 cd (Water)
  • Volcano the Bear – Classic Erasmus Fusion 2cd (Beta-lactam Ring)
  • Swans – Public Castration is a Good Idea cd (Thirsty Ear)
  • The Focus Group – We Are All Pan’s People cd (Ghost Box)
  • Moon Wiring Club – A Spare Tabby at the Cat’s Wedding LP (Gecophonic)
  • Moon Wiring Club – A Spare Tabby at the Cat’s Wedding cd (Gecophonic)
  • Emeralds – Does It Look Like I’m Here cd (Editions Mego)
  • Belle & Sebastian – Lazy Line Painter Jane EP (Jeepster)

2011 Adelaide Cinémathèque

The Cinémathèque program for the first half of the year is out, as usual lots of great stuff. If you’re not familiar with it, the Cinémathèque is a film society screening films on Monday & Thursday nights at the Mercury Cinema, usually grouped into themed programs. You can’t buy individual tickets, you can buy a pass for 4 films, 16 films, or an annual pass which lets you get into everything (this is because technically they only have rights to screen films for members). I usually get an annual membership, it’s a great chance to see old favourites on the big screen, as well as catching up on those classics I never got around to seeing before and being exposed to fantastic obscurities that I’d never even heard of.

The program so far looks great, here’s some highlights for me

  • Alain Resnais! Last Year at Marienbad is one of my favourite films ever, even though I saw it not too long ago after buying the dvd I can’t miss a chance to see it on the big screen, I’ve never seen it in the cinema before. Look forward to the other films in the Resnais program as well (I’ve seen Hiroshama Mon Amour but it was quite a long time ago, haven’t seen Je T’aime, Je T’aime).
  • They haven’t had Woody Allen for a while so good to see some of his films there. Most of them I’ve already got on dvd and know well, but I never get sick of Annie Hall so I’ll probably go see it, and it’s hard to miss Manhattan just to see the opening on the big screen.
  • Brazil – I’ve only ever seen half of this, the video I was watching went bad halfway through so I’ll be keen to see this.
  • 1970’s Conspiracy Films – great theme! The only one I’ve seen is The Parallax View, so I’ll be keen to check out the others.
  • Rainer Werner Fassbinder – never seen any of his films, interested to check them out.
  • Bill Murray – nice selection, it’s a hell of a long time since I’ve seen Ghostbusters (have seen it on the big screen before, remember watching it at the Roxy in Parramatta when it first came out).

It all starts with Five Easy Pieces on March 28th.

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[gigs]

MARCH

  • 5th – Collarbones are supporting Guineafowl at the Ed Castle.
  • 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. Before (and maybe after) the show DJ Wolfpanther plays indie pop at the Metro.
  • 20th Ed Kuepper at the Gov.
  • 26th DOOM at the Gov.
  • 27th DJ Wolfpanther plays an all Warp Records set at the Metro.

APRIL

  • 4-7th – Paul Kelly‘s A-Z shows at the Space Theatre.
  • 15th – Eat Skull, Slug Guts at Format.
  • 28th – Rites Wild EP launch at Format
  • 30th – Cheer Advisory Council album launch at Jive.

MAY

  • 4th – Herbie Hancock at Her Majesty’s Theatre.
  • 11th – Kyuss Lives at Fowlers.
  • 16th – Gary Numan and Severed Heads at HQ.

JULY

  • 1st Van Dyke Parks and Kinky Friedman at the Gov.

On the Stereo

  • Wildbirds & Peacedrums – Rivers 2cdep (Leaf)
  • The Sounds of Siam: Leftfield Luk Thung, Jazz and Malam from Thailand 1964-1975 cd (Soundway)
  • Fela Kuti & Africa 70 – Zombie cd (Knitting Factory)
  • Otomo Yoshihide’s New Jazz Quintet – Live in Lisbon cd (Clean Feed)
  • The Engines – s/t cd (Okkadisk)
  • William Parker Organ Quartet – Uncle Joe’s Spirit House cd (Centering)
  • Alps – Alps of New South Wails LP (Past Futures)
  • Bitch Prefect – Marylin Munroe/Holiday in America 7″ (R.I.P. Society)
  • Like Leaves – s/t cd
  • Ainslie Wills – Somebody for Everyone cdep

Support Format

In recent weeks a typical Adelaide question is “been to any Fringe stuff?” and my typical answer has been “no, spending all my time at Format”. The Format Festival this year was excellent, so I’d like to say thanks to all of the Format Collective people for all the hard work they put into it, and to encourage people to join me in donating to help them going for the rest of year as the venue is still there outside of festival time and puts on all sort of events (some of the best gigs in town, art exhibitions, zine store, egg eating …)

My highlights of the festival:
– opening night, absolutely amazing sets by Terrible Truths and Fair Maiden in particular. These bands need to put out albums. And play more gigs.
– An Evening For Home For the Def – I got interviewed in front of an audience by Nigel Koop. How the hell did that happen? And even more strangely I played a live music set that was not a disaster. Some people even liked it. Meanwhile upstairs my soon-to-be housemate built a snow globe so big you could walk into it. I’m still terribly confused by the whole evening, but in a good way.
– Nobody turned up to see Alps, Fkn Tutts, Sarah Chadwick and Bare Grillz because it was raining. I don’t care because I was there and they were all awesome, and the Alps LP I bought (Alps of New South Wails) is great.
– Sunday picnic – nice relaxed arvo gig with Aluka and Soursop.
– Format Festival of Song part 3 with Ainslie Wills and Cheer Advisory Council, wonderful evening of guitar pop.
– Hipster Gateaux: yet another great gig, Melbourne’s Super Wild Horses and new locals Deep Feelings were both great.
– Closing Party … I didn’t want it to end and I don’t think anyone else did either judging by the fact that it was will into the early hours of Sunday morning and people were sticking around even though the bar had closed some time earlier. Yet another top lineup, locals Like Leaves have played some great sets lately (in fact it was the second time that week I’d seen them), but it was a nice change to see them in such an intimate venue. The highlight of the night however was Collarbones. I really love all of the garage rock type stuff that we get from most interstate touring bands lately, but it was a nice change to have something completely different in the form of the glitch pop of Collarbones, who I knew previously from a show in Sydney last year. Lots of fun.
– And then there was the handball. For two weeks it became normal to be playing handball in Peel St at 1 in the morning, a game I haven’t played regularly in about 20 years. It was great getting the touring bands into it (e.g. the guys from Bare Grillz took to it enthusiastically), as well as many bemused passers-by. By the final night the standard was very high, we even had an official adjudicator (the security guy, who only learnt the rules at the opening night party), in the end the official competition didn’t take place but I reckon Hugh Langlands-Bell was clearly the unofficial winner.

There’s more stuff coming up at format including gigs by Siltbreeze label band Eat Skull and a launch by Rites Wild both in April, so join me in supporting them through Pozible (link below) to help them keep going.