Brisbane: great bands, free samplers

I've said it over and over again on this blog, but Brisbane has one of the best live band scenes in Australia, maybe even the world. And it's really pretty at night:

No matter what kind of music you're into, there's a handful (or more) of people making it in Brisbane. Most of them aren't that well known; but for every Regurgitator and Custard we get a band like SixFtHick, who've been playing just as long, put out as much good music and are chronically underappreciated. But that's not stopping them, they still keep making music and playing shows.

And shows is really what Brisbane is all about. I'm constantly surprised that when I head to a local show how the crowds can be bigger than a lot of international touring bands I've seen. How these bands from Brisbane end up being more well known in other places (like the Saints and the Go-Betweens anyone?) but still call Brisbane home.

This love of the Brisbane musical scene and local bands is obviously not just shown by me, as two free music samplers have been released highlighting some of the best bands Brisbane has to offer.

The first is Sounds Like Brisbane. A mix for more of the hipster side of Brisbane. It has everything: hip-hop, indie, electronica, mathrock, punk, folk, even old school rock and roll... everything that appeals to the hipster in you and me. It also does a great job of showing how diverse Brisbane's musical side really is.

You can get it for free right here.

It features some of Brisbane's best bands; Texas Tea, Regurgitator, I Heart Hiroshima and the Medics to name a few. But the highlight to me would be the instrumental mathrock magic that is Mr Maps. I've heard this name bandied around Brisbane and the internet for the better part of 6 months now, but I've not been motivated to listen to them. Luckily they have a track on this compilation and now I'm hooked.

The second free sampler appeals to the 50% of me that isn't hipster: it's punk and hardcore. Brisbane's punk and hardcore scene is second to none. I'm going to shows almost weekly in this scene, and that's just a small fraction of it.

You can get the link, and a nice little blurb, from this Swedish Hardcore blog (now there's a blog post I've been writing slowly for the past year or so: Swedish music (particularly hardcore)).

I've seen 90% of those bands live, most more than once. With most of them I've yet to hear recordings of their music. So this was an excellent chance to listen to them in a more quiet setting than the multitude of venues I've experienced them all in the past. The mix was put together by a dude in Fires of Waco, who's band really stands out as a highlight of this mix (and their album came out last week too, get on it). There's even some classic Brisbane hardcore on the mix, in the form of Dick Nasty, who've been playing together since before I first moved to Brisbane as a pre-pubescent.

These two samplers are really just the tip of the iceberg. I can think of so many other bands that should be included in this. And it just makes me proud, as a music fan, to be living in such a great city.