Logo
Prev
search
Print
Rotate
Help
Next
Sample Edition
Contents
All Pages
Past Editions
Create Account
Access Code
Home
'
The Big Issue : Edition 554
Contents
MUSIC 40 #VENDORWEEK 26 JAN–8 FEB 2018 In their early days, Brisbane duo DZ Deathrays played an exhilarating mix of punk and dance, their live shows developing quite the reputation. Fast forward a decade, and the group has moved on from playing house parties to winning ARIAs, and their sound has evolved accordingly. Gone are the driving beats and fuzzy guitars, replaced with a clean production aesthetic and festival-ready vocal hooks. Tracks like ‘Feeling Good, Feeling Great’ and ‘Shred for Summer’ feel destined to become summer soundtracks, and speak to the band’s impressive growth. Yet with this growth DZ Deathrays have lost some of their originality. Bloody Lovely is tight and consistently melodic, yet it also sounds like it could have been composed by any number of other Australian indie rock bands. It’s a difficult fork in the road so many bands face, but in embracing a more mainstream sound, DZ Deathrays have lost a part of what made them so unique in the first place. MATTHEW WOODWARD BLOODY LOVELY DZ DEATHRAYS Mingling the airy vocal layers of guitarist Gabriel Lewis and bassist Lucy Buckeridge, Melbourne trio Lowtide delve deeper into luxurious dream- pop on their second album. Even better, they establish a lasting sense of meditative ambience. But beyond all the effects-dosed serenity, these songs come anchored with chiming hooks and honeyed harmonies. ‘Window’ taps New Order’s brooding grandeur, while the sun-dazed ‘On the Fence’ is one of the straightest pop entries here, evoking REM as much as Slowdive. Equally satisfying are the subtle structural twists, like how the extroverted chorus of ‘Alibi’ dips away unexpectedly or the fragile ballad ‘Fault Lines’ culminates in overlapping vocals. Southern Mind is a masterclass in immersion, alternately droning and soaring. And if not every lyric is crystal clear on first pass, messages begin to coalesce with time, like the mantra-style encouragement to “celebrate yourself” on opener ‘A .C ’. In stark contrast to their band name, Lowtide positively swim with depth. DOUG WALLEN SOUTHERN MIND LOWTI DE LAST YEAR I watched Sir Paul McCartney (who featured on the cover of Ed#550) play a nearly three-hour set covering his vast back- catalogue. The show was mammoth. There were marching bands, fireworks, flames and mass singalongs. But for all the “oohs” and “aahs” that arose during the spectacular sky show that accompanied ‘Live and Let Die’, they had nothing on the visceral impact of the songs themselves. Like so many others, The Beatles were a constant in my life from very young. While I was born decades after they broke up, my sister was a bit of a fanatic. Where most girls her age were covering their walls with pics of Leo and the Spice Girls, her bedroom was a veritable shrine to the Fab Four. Thanks to her, my childhood was subtly soundtracked by John, Ringo, Paul and George. Despite this history, I had totally underestimated the impact hearing those songs live for the first time would have. Sat up in the stands watching (the still charmingly dorky) Paul play the opening strains to ‘Something’ on ukulele, muscle memory kicked in and I was overwhelmed by emotion. It was something I hadn’t felt in such a visceral way in some time. And it was clearly a shared feeling, as people around me smiled wildly at friends and blinked back tears. Such moments can appear hokey or contrived, but this was far from it. It was joyful, uplifting and the perfect antidote to 2017. SARAH SMITH > Music Editor Dream Wife’s fighting spirit is best conveyed by their live favourite ‘F.U.U.’, which closes the band’s self-titled debut album. Packed tight with fiery riffs and the unapologetic menace of its “I’m gonna fuck you up, gonna cut you up” refrain, it’s one hell of a rallying cry. The trio – Icelandic-born lead vocalist Rakel Mjöll, guitarist Alice Go and bassist Bella Podpadec – match their feminist grit with power-pop hooks and propulsive guitars. Dream Wife excels when the band hits the accelerator, like on the biting ‘Act My Age’, which builds to a satisfyingly furious climax. The album’s angriest moments are its best, making songs like ‘Hey Heartbreaker’ and ‘Right Now’ feel slight by comparison. Dream Wife’s punk ethos ensures their debut moves at a swift clip, with no room for indulgence. These songs are built for live shows, and standouts like ‘Fire’ and ‘Kids’ will go down a storm when the band makes their Laneway Festival debut this year. JACK TREGONING DREAM WIFE DREAM WIFE CD DOWNLOAD VINYL WE LOVE YOU, YEAH, YEAH, YEAH. PHOTO BY GETTY
Links
Archive
Edition 553
Edition 555
Navigation
Previous Page
Next Page
