Music
The Age
Friday March 26, 2010
Eddy Current Suppression Ring Two years ago, the band's name sounded freaky and wrong - like a secret most people were too far away to hear - but it's a measure of its unprecedented success that Melbourne's Eddy Current Suppression Ring (above), a very punk band in every way except the way they sound, are now edging so close to the mainstream they can almost touch it. This may be against its wishes. The band won the Australian Music Prize last year, snaring $30,000. This year it released its third album, Rush To Relax, seemingly recorded in six hours, an endearingly flawed masterpiece of short, sharp punk-pop shocks, long, strange jams and total high energy that never flags: and surely it's this energy that wins it so many fans? The energy and the fun and the tightly controlled fury? April 16, The Palace, St Kilda, see lovepolice.com.au/ecsrStereophonicsLike Muse - who is close in so many ways; the glamour, the ambition, the cinematics, the symphonics - Welsh band Stereophonics (below) has found a captive audience in Australia, where a solid live band with no nonsense about it is appreciated greatly. This is its fourth tour. Seventh album Keep Calm and Carry On came out just before Christmas. Seven albums? That suggests nothing but self-confidence and massive belief and I reckon that accounts for most of its appeal: a serious rock band (with a sexed-up lead singer, Kelly Jones) that will not be diverted from its predetermined path. April 15, Palace Theatre, city, see ticketmaster.com.auJustin Townes Earle Steve Earle, the Texan country-rock godfather, he was a bad boy, right? Indignant protest songs and unparalleled anger and a wayward life fuelled by serious drugs. This is a man who behaved so badly he was able to, basically, appear as himself in The Wire as a down-and-out junkie loser. Brilliant songs, though. Now his son is up: Justin Townes Earle (below), who tells interviewers he was using drugs when he was 12 and kicked them for a straighter life before most people have graduated to proper grown-up bicycles. Album Midnight at the Movies came out late last year. He's real, that's for sure. A real roots singer. With stuff to say. April 16, the Corner Hotel, Richmond, see cornerhotel.comJamfestWhen you have a show sponsored and produced by Channel Ten's tweeny Video Hits program, you know a certain amount about it before it even happens, and shows like this might fly beneath the radar of many, yet Jamfest is where the kids are at. It bills itself as an "urban pop music festival" and on the bill are two ciphers of modern pop culture, both disposable, both momentary, both about fakery and make-believe and both almost certainly billionaires. That'd be Akon, the R&B heart-throb, and Kelly Rowland (left) the five-time Grammy winner from Destiny's Child. There are others, and a phat DJ hanging it all together, but those are the names at the heart of it. April 14, Royal Melbourne Showgrounds, see thejamfest.comDJ FalconFinally, if you're one of those can't stop/won't stop party people for whom the idea of staying at home on a Sunday night because it's, well, Sunday night, is just too much of an odd idea because there are parties out there happening and DJs and house music and girls and boys and noise and sweat and lights ... and if you are scared that if you don't go out you might miss the best night of your life even if you had multiple best-nights-of-your-lifes already - then this one's for you. He's French. He has a beard. He's linked closely with Daft Punk. He plays records that all sound the same. His name is DJ Falcon (above) and you should be scared. April 25, the Prince, St Kilda. See princebandroom.com.auOur pick Dan SultanWho is the man making a million ladies' hearts across Melbourne go all aflutter? Dan Sultan, a dapper young singer with an Irish father and an Aboriginal mother. He's in the film Bran Nue Dae (2009), and he's a member of the Black Arm Band, the Aboriginal collective of musicians that also includes Paul Kelly and Shane Howard. He's handsome, there's no doubt. His shows are electric and a large part of his appeal is that he's unashamedly retro, a skinny-suited man fronting a big band playing '50s rock 'n' roll and '60s Memphis soul. He is destined to be huge so catch a small show while it is still possible. April 16, the Prince, St Kilda, see princebandroom.com.au
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