Tuesday, June 05, 2007

The Brown Couch

Gertrude’s Brown Couch has been hosting some great acts of late. Black Pony Express were there a couple of months ago, and in the last three weeks punters at this relatively new venue would have also heard tunes from top acts such as Ollie Mann, Owls of the Swamp, Julian Nation as well as Sly Hats.

This Thursday Gertrude's is hosting the Melbourne debut of Macaca Mulatta,

After reading the above sentence you may be thinking ‘Who the fuck are Macaca Mulatta?’ Well, I’d probably be doing the same until I discovered a juicy bit of info last night. Macaca Mulatta is actually the band of Chris Chinchilla, ex songwriter and guitarist of UK band Art Brut. For anyone that doesn’t know, Art Brut released one of the most critically acclaimed album of 2005, Bang Bang Rock ‘n Roll. Everyone seemed to love it. The Village Voice Pazz ‘N Jop poll which compiles the opinions of a huge number of critics (795 in ’05) put it at 23, while that other hip institution that I refer to far too often – Pitchfork - gave it 8.9 and had it at no. 3 in their best of list.

Last year Chris Chinchilla left Art Brut (citing personal reasons) and formed Macaca Mulatta back in England. This year Chris has made his way to Melbourne, has since developed his knowledge of the local scene, and is now playing with a different lineup under the same name. Thursday night is their first local gig.

While I haven’t heard the Art Brut record, it sounds like Chris is doing a similar thing with Macaca Mulatta to what he did with Art Brut - fun slightly bratty Brit Invasion punk with some angular guitars, but perhaps not as forceful rhythmically as Art Brut and sounding more like Billy Bragg. But check out the myspace tracks. They sound pretty decent. Given it is their first gig on Thursday I wouldn’t be expecting too much from them, but they’ll probably be a band to watch over the coming months. Especially on the local scene, where arty punk acts are few and far between (as far as I can tell). The Pommy accent sounds pretty fresh too amidst our many American accented guitar rock groups.

But it’s not only these guys who you can catch at Gertrude’s – the other acts might be pretty decent also. I especially liked what I heard from the myspace of of Readers’ Wives. They seem to be a mix of post-punk and post-rock sounds. There's a dark twangy bass and some hostile and urgent guitar work. Reasonably dense too from what is apparently a three piece .

My third favourite but by no means a dud is Perth band Burgers of Beef who are over here for a long weekend . They seem to be doing a slightly wacky Weezerish indie pop thing but a bit cleaner and with some female vocals to boot. These guys are also supporting The Fauves at their 1000th gig celebrations on Friday night, and have a headline gig at the Rob Roy on Sunday with Fred Astereo and Emma Heeney.

So all in all, Thursday is shaping up to be a good one. I’m afraid I can’t be there so have one for me. Doors at 8. Only $6 entry.

0 Comments:

Post a Comment

<< Home

Contact

Out There

Bloggin' Melbourne

Melbourne Radio

Melbourne Venues

Other Stuff in Melbs

Local Labels

Local Record Shops

Local Tours

Bloggin' Oz

Sites Oz

Bloggin' the Globe

Sites Worldly

Previously

Across the Rooftops 2006