We listen to a lot of music here at Tone Deaf HQ, and we’re the first to admit we’re perhaps a little biased towards sounds of the Australian variety. We do make the best music in the world, after all.
In honouring our favourite Aussies, we’ve once again compiled a list of the most outstanding local releases you should be listening to right now – whether they’re smaller indies acts or big-name essentials, these are the newest Australian records you should be adding to your ‘must-listen’ list. Let’s get started.
Client Liaison – Client Liaison EP (Remote Control)
Client Liaison might look like oversized suits-wearing time travellers from the late 80s early 90s, but beneath their larger-than-life vintage exteriors lies a palpable touch of sincerity that filters through every delightfully stylised pore of their ambitious audio-visual project.
Up until the release of this debut self-titled EP, the Client Liaison experience had been limited to a string of eye-catching, ear-worming singles and their infamously theatrical live shows.
Last year’s glistening single ‘Feeling’, which returns on this short-player, is a perfectly-written pop song with heart-pulling chords that strike you as hard as they did upon that first listen. But the rest of the track-listing proves that this initial stroke of synth-pop genius was no fluke – these Melbourne mavericks are the real deal.
From the pulsating disco synths on ‘Feed The Rhythm’ to the Olympics Opening Ceremony-sized roar of ‘Feeling’ followup ‘Queen’, Client Liaison have sculpted a distinct and defined vision that is unwavering and undeniably addictive in their highly-anticipated debut release.
Time-transcending and stuffed with feeling, the Client Liaison experience is really like no other. Get immersed. (Dylan McCarthy)
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Laxe – Laxe EP (Independent)
Under his monicker Laxe, Sydney bedroom producer Brogan Galceran dabbles in hip hop-informed experimental electronica reminiscent of his fellow internet-age contemporaries like XXYYXX, UV Boi and Basenji.
Laxe’s self-titled EP oscillates between chill joints such as EP opener ‘What I’ll Be’ to sweaty boiler room club cuts like ‘One’, with Galceran showing he can flex some seriously versatile production skills that can mould into into different styles without ever feeling out of place.
Using warped vocals, trap-inspired 808s and off-kilter samples – like what appear to be microwave beeps and clangs of kitchen utensils on the aptly-titled ‘Microwav’ – Laxe shows a level of ingenuity and creativity that suggest he’ll be a name to look out for in months to come.
This is an EP oozing with raw talent – get onboard with Laxe before you get left behind. (DM)
Chips Calipso – I Walked Outside And Felt The Sun (Independent)
“With so many pop-centric bedroom producers delving into electronica, it is refreshing to hear a new project that is composed entirely with ‘conventional’ instruments. Melbourne’s Chips Calipso (David Cameron) has cleverly distorted, effected, and layered vocals, guitar, bass, and drums… and it works,” so said our writer about Chip Calipso’s new tune ‘The Pines 2009’.
The Melbourne multi-instrumentalist makes kaleidoscopic, psychedelic-stained surf pop perfect for a soundtrack to a lazy Sunday afternoon. It’s the kind of jangled, distortion-heavy bedroom rock that makes you want to forget about all your commitments and head down to the beach with a group of close mates.
As your writer put it neatly, “Chips Calipso’s mantra is, ‘I don’t mind.'” – it’s a laid-back approach that’s impossible not to get lost in. I Walked Outside And Felt The Sun is a swirling daydream of youth, and its motto of escapism is hard not to fall into. (DM)
The Ninjas – The Ninjas EP (Independent)
Brisbane heavy-hitting indie rockers The Ninjas have put out their debut self-titled EP, a five-track released jammed with their amped-up, electric rock & roll.
The quartet have spent the last couple of years polishing their craft supporting The Cribs on a recent tour and making a name for themselves with their jolting live shows. The Ninjas always had threatening potential, and now it looks like they have officially arrived.
The band recorded the EP with revered producer Magoo (Powderfinger, Regurgiator, The Jungle Giants) at his personal studio. As shown with their latest single and one of the EP’s highlight moments, ‘Never Had Much Time’, which boasts the Britpop sneer of lead vocalist Josh Stewart with shredding guitars, slick production and heavy riffing, The Ninja’s enormous, stadium-ready sound is prepped to send them to the next level.
If you’re in need of a new rock and roll record, these guys have you covered. (DM)
Richard In Your Mind – Ponderosa (Rice Is Nice)
Ponderosa is the fifth studio record from Sydney’s Richard In Your Mind, lead by frontman Richard Cartwright, Ponderosa continues the band’s Strawberry Fields era Beatles-esque, psych pop we’ve come to know and love from the five piece.
Created over a period of two years, Ponderosa sees the band at theirmost musically meticulous and bizzare yet. Tracks like ‘Four Leaf Clover Salad’ with its swirling sitar intro display another level of sophistication from this usually guitar pop band, Richard In Your mind do Beatles better than the Beatles. Though very nostalgic, the hooky songwriting on Ponderosa keeps one foot firmly in the present.
Like the lead single ‘Hammered’ which our writer called a “sugar-sweet number laden with sunny pop-hooks and simple lyrics that instantly burn into your conscious. It’s the kind of jam to start your day with and trust us once you do, you’ll catch yourself humming the words “me and my baby get hammered in the day time” for hours on end…and then you will want to go throw a few back with your pals, it’s just that damn good” the rest of the whole record is damn good, the perfect soundtrack to draw in the upcoming summer months. (LD)
Magic Hands – Let Me Hold You While You Fail (Finger Wave Records)
It sounds like the perfect setting for an indie rom-com flick; during the cold European winter of 2011, two Australians met in a tiny smoke filled bar in Germany. One of them was Alex Badham of Melbourne’s eclectic band folk pop Aleks And The Ramps, the other musician, illustrator, and all round creative talent.
Then over 12 months the duo wrote and recorded an album between a cement basement in inner-city Melbourne, a Berlin apartment and a coastal holiday house in rural Victoria.
The result of which is Let Me Hold You While You Fail (OMG even the album title sounds like an indie rom-com film) a collection of 10 almost unclassifiable eclectic electronic pop songs each more delicate and dreamy than the last.
Out September 5th via Melbourne label Finger Wave Records Let Me Hold You While You Fail fuses modern electronic pop beats withan obvious baroque chamber pop influences. Listening to Let Me Hold You While You Fail we’re definitely glad the duo made an album not a film as it’s one of the most stunning local releases we’ve heard of late. (LD)
