Australian music! Tours! NOW!

San Cisco

They're going around plugging their Awkward EP again. Here's a song from it and it's not hard to see how their indie-pop is slowly taking over the airwaves and becoming ear worms stuck in your head for days.

May 10, Elsewhere, Gold Coast

May 11, The Zoo

Dappled Cities 

This one is courtesy of Darcy, probably their biggest fan. First off, they have a new song in anticipation of a new album very soon. Check it out:

They'll be playing this and hopefully a whole lot of new songs as well at Oh Hello on May 24.

The Medics

The best band to come out of North Queensland? Probably (I don't know many). In the past I've gotten them confused with the Dutch band of the same name. But not for this post. No. The Dutch Medics do zany rock, the North Queensland Medics make some beautiful indie-pop. Which they'll show case for you on April 21 at the Zoo. Get some free MP3s of them from here: http://www.triplejunearthed.com/themedics

Massive update

It's been such a long time since I've done this, but because I've fallen behind, I think it's time I updated my blog in one huge hit. So here's all the tours and news I've been saving over the last 2 weeks to blog about.

Coal Chamber are playing Soundwave 2012
Yes, one of those first nu-metal bands that got me into heavy music are reforming and coming out our way for Soundwave next year! I'm actually quite excited to see them...

Other bands confirmed for Soundwave next year include: Trivium, CKY, Shadows Fall, Devin Townsend, Gojira, The Used, Hellyeah, Dillinger Escape Plan, Dashboard Confessional, Hole, Machine Head, Hatebreed, Kvelertak, Mastodon, Zebrahead and Saves the Day (including a second set of them playing Weezer songs). Wow. Already looking to be a big festival.

Foxy Shazam 
One of my favourite bands from Soundwave this year have pulled out of the Harvest Festival to focus on the UK.

Vasco Era
Noisy indie rockers the Vasco Era are heading out for an Australian tour, playing the Coolangatta Hotel on October 29 and the Zoo October 30.

Vanilla Ice
He's too legit to quit and as such he will be playing Jupiter's Casino, on the Gold Coast. November 13.

Opeth
The Swedish progressive-death-metal-rock band will be playing the Tivoli on December 15. Expect lots of long hair, black shirts, and extended solos to fast drumming.

Clap Your Hands Say Yeah
These indie-rockers are coming out for the Harvest festival, but have also decided to play an intimate sideshow at the Zoo on November 20.

Free Triple J concert
Triple J, to celebrate the launch of their new digital radio station playing "unearthed" Australian music, are having free shows Australia wide on October 5. Ours will be at the Arena, featuring Bleeding Knees Club, Emma Louise and The Medics. Doors are at 7pm, it's free, but it's first in best dressed.

Valley Fiesta
Free music will be invading the streets of Fortitude Valley on October 7 and 8 with two stages playing great music. For FREE! You can catch Hungry Kids of Hungary, Kidney Thieves, Laneous and the Family Yah and much more. Head here to find out.

Hipster Watch: Bigsound 2011

Hipsters love finding bands no one knows, yet are still good to listen to. Bigsound is Brisbane's answer to the South by Southwest festival. For a few days, the Valley is overrun by music everywhere you look. There's live music, there's workshops, there's speeches and it's basically everything you need to be in the music industry in one place. It sounds like the perfect place for a hipster to get the inside knowledge.

The best part for the average punters like you and me, apart from occasionally seeing a famous guest speaker, is the live music event. One ticket, for $55, gets you 80+ bands across multiple venues over 2 days. And the best part is, being a music convention, it's going to be the best of the up and coming bands in our country fighting for attention. No matter what, we, the punters, win. Check out the band list so far:

The Getaway Plan
Horrorshow
Calling All Cars
Emma Louise
Eagle & the Worm
Busby Marou
Trial Kennedy
Evil Eddie
Last Dinosaurs
Adalita
Big Scary
The Adults (feat. Shihad's Jon Toogood) (NZ)
The Sheepdogs (Canada)
Jonathan Boulet
DZ Deathrays
Bleeding Knees Club
Ball Park Music
The Medics
Avalanche City (NZ)
Stonefield
Jinja Safari
Owl Eyes
Boy In a Box
Damn Dogs (Feat. Chris & Mark from Jet)

Okay, granted, the Getaway Plan has been around as long as I've been going to gigs in Brisbane (if we forget when they broke up) but the rest is some of the best of Australia's new music. DZ Deathrays, The Medics, Calling All Cars, Jonathon Boulet, Ball Park Music and Trial Kennedy are getting me excited. I don't even know half of the bands there, but I'm sure it's going to be awesome.

If you want to find great new music before everyone else jumps on the bandwagon, head to this. Not to mention, it's great bloody value. It's happening September 7-9 at various venues around the Valley.

What can I do? The river's overrun. We're swimming in a flood, you know

All of my flood related blog titles are songs from my soon to be "Flood - the Mixtape". It's actually hard to find songs about flooding and I haven't had much time, but it will happen hopefully. Even just to live in my car.

As you can see from above, the water line on my apartment was barely head height. I got truly lucky. All I lost was the stuff in my garage: a drum kit, old golf clubs, some furniture, a fridge, a keg and random other things. Mere metres down my street was different. Poor souls. You can see my pictures on my Flickr, including a huge boat found in a park down my street.

But now, flood related music news!

Big Day Out released a release releasing the fact that they are still open for business. And they're donating $20k to the flood efforts. Honestly, I forgot that BDO is like a week away, I still have to sort out my transport/accomodation/etc. Obviously I had thought of other things this week.

The cancelled Mos Def/Talib Kweli show at the Tivoli has now been moved to January 26. EDIT: Now at the HiFi. Existing tickets will be honored.

The Beautiful Girls show at the HiFi tonight has now been moved to March 18.

As I mentioned yesterday, Burst City was hit by the flood water. Last night's Danish punk show was cancelled, but tonight's show with Blank Realm and Feathers will be going ahead.

Woodland is still open, with the Health/Death Set/DZ gig in full force tonight.

I would encourage anyone going to gigs to use public transport where possible please. It's free right now, and after being stuck in traffic for 5 hours last night trying to get to and from my place to clean, it's kind of annoying. You're not helping the flood people by being on the roads unless you have to.

And now the big one: Flood Bank, a benefit for flood victims, will be held at the Old Museum on February 3. Some of the best local indie bands will be playing, including:

Violent Soho
Ball Park Music
Inland Sea
The Medics
Bang Bang Boss Kelly
The Baby Seal Club
Blonde On Blonde
Grand Atlantic
Texas Tea

Tickets are $30 and go on sale this week from Oztix. The event is 18+ and licensed. Get in quick, it should be great and will help people much worse off than me.

If you're under 18 and want to help buy listening to music, an all-ages show will be announced in the next few days.

Good luck my fellow Brisbane music-fans that were affected by the flood.

Big Sound and Valley Fiesta collide!

Those of us that live and gig in Brisbane truly understand how we can be seen as the live music capital of Australia. The music scene here is just so large and diverse, yet still as close as a family. Q Music run a yearly music conference called Big Sound as a celebration of this aspect of our wonderful city.

It's a coming together of the business, the arts and the music side of everything. As they say in the above trailer, it's our attempt to replicate a South by Southwest style festival and conference in the streets of Fortitude Valley, where there's so many live music venues in such a small area. This year there will be all sorts of managers, musicians, producers and more sharing their experience and knowledge, and helping out the local scene.

And the best part is, a shit tonne of concerts in association with it.

On the Wednesday and Thursday (8th and 9th of September) over 60 bands will be playing across 6 stages in the Valley, including 2 outdoor stages. Get comfortable, here's the list (I've bolded the notables to me):

CHILDREN COLLIDE
THE VASCO ERA
BOY & BEAR
THE GIN CLUB
THE JOHN STEEL SINGERS
PARADES (one of my new random favourite bands)
ERNEST ELLIS
THE HUNGRY KIDS OF HUNGARY
BRIDEZILLA
THE JEZABELS
BONJAH
THE WILSON PICKERS
LAST DINOSAURS
HALFWAY
THE CHECKS (NZ)
THE HOLIDAYS
STIFF GINS
GEORGIA FAIR
FIRE! SANTA ROSA FIRE!
PERRY KEYES
DUBMARINE
THE CAIROS
THE MELODICS
BALL PARK MUSIC
ARTISAN GUNS (NZ)
YOUNG REVELRY
RICHARD IN YOUR MIND
EAGLE & THE WORM
O YE DENVER BIRDS
THE NAKED AND FAMOUS (NZ)
THE OPTIMEN
PIKELET
THE MEDICS
GUINEAFOWL
MY FICTION
THE TRANSIENTS
BIG SCARY
DISCO NAP
THE DELTA RIGGS
DANIEL LEE KENDALL
26
DEEP SEA ARCADE
JINJA SAFARI
METALS
KYU
THE HONEY MONTH
LOVE CONNECTION
MELODRAMAS (UK)
KIMBRA
EDGE OF COLOUR
RUBY FROST (NZ)
CITY RIOTS
THE FOREIGN OBJECTS
KNIVES AT NOON (NZ)

And that's just the first announcement. Granted, it's a lot of indie, but it's mainly local. Just showing how good our music scene really is. Tickets are only $46 for the full two days, which is a steal for the amount of music you will get to see.

The second all this finishes, we get to start the music all over again! The weekend starting the 10th of September is when the Valley Fiesta starts. 3 days of music all throughout the Valley, most of it free. In years past there's been great bands, I remember in the first few weeks of living in Brisbane they had the Resin Dogs play the Sunday Afternoon. The mix of a few beers and free music in the mall made me actually happy to be living in this great city of ours. The line up is yet to be announced, but they generally manage to pull out some good bands, even a few international ones. A few years ago they even had the Silversun Pickups play for free.

Big Sound
Big Sound Tickets
Valley Fiesta