Wednesday, April 25, 2007

Musings on a Melody Metropolis

As you may have noticed last week (and already blogged in Aus by Decomposing Trees) The Crayon Fields have received a first class review of 7.8 in Pitchfork for their highly acclaimed release of last year, Animal Bells. For those who aren’t regular visitors to Pitchfork, anything over 7.5 is pretty darn good and given the readership of this highly influential site I would think it will go a long way in helping them secure international distribution of this album. The band just need Geoff to relax a bit more on stage for their live performances to match their studio quality, but I should say that their new drummer is a great new addition, giving the band some bounce and vibe which they seemed to lack a bit previously.

Anyway, even though I think The Crayon Fields are fantastic, and this post probably could stand alone on itself, but it just got me thinking about how many high quality indie pop artists there are from Melbourne just now. And for the sake of clarification I’m not talking 60s pop revivalist bands, like the ever prescent The Basics and Little Red or the acts highlighted in ATR Friday power pop special a couple of weeks ago. Use Belle and Sebastian as your international reference point.

For starters, the quintessential Melbourne band, The Lucksmiths are still around on the scene while their Candle Records contemporaries The Mabels and The Simpletons disbanded long ago. The Lucksmiths have inspired bands and fans alike with poignant and witty lyrics, melodies for all seasons, and joyous live performances.

Another band of this generation who are still alive and kicking but stack up well against the Candle crew are The Steinbecks. These guys also play catchy hook-laden pop songs but are further up the rock end of the spectrum than The Lucksmiths. They're so indie though, they actually played a bike only gig at the Brunswick Velodrome a few weeks back!

In recent times we have also seen several new additions to the scene. Last year Julian Nation released an 18 minute full length gem, We Are All Writers on Swedish label, Book Club Records. The record is full of intimate and quirky pop songs of the lo-fi home recorded variety, and it was well received amongst many in the blogging community, particularly in Europe.

There's also The Motifs, who is the musical project of just one woman - Alexis. The Motifs also do a DIY in your bedroom twee pop thing but her tunes are mostly acoustic and more cute less raw than Nation. Last year a select few (not me unfortunately) got their hands on the first release from The Motifs, a CD-R version on DIY Swedish label, Music is My Girlfriend, which sold out in a matter of days. Her next release a full length record, Away has just been released on a Japanese label, Lost in Found.

Also into DIY indie pop is summer cats, who received a positive track review on Pitchfork recently after releasing a CD-R single on a Miami label, Cloudberry Records last year. They don't have a recording deal yet, but I would expect there would be one just around the corner. If you don't believe me, just check out the sweet infectious goodness of those girl-boy harmonies.

So here's just a selection that all compares well with The Crayon Fields (and, which, in my opinion, is superior than most of what Architecture in Helsinki have done). If there's anything else you would recommend we would love to hear about it!


Upcoming Shows

The Lucksmiths are playing at the East on Saturday May 5. summer cats are one of the supports. The other support is The Zebras - Brisbane's best indie pop group.
The Steinbecks are launching their new album, Far From the Madding Crowd at the Northcote Social Club on Friday May 11.
Julian Nation is supporting The Bedroom Philosopher during his residency at the Wesley Anne on Thursday May 10.
You can catch Geoff, the creative brains behind The Crayon Fields with his side project Sly Hats at the Northcote Social Club this Friday.


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