REGURGITATOR

After dipping toes in the bubbling grease of contemporary dance for Rockshow in Nov 2009 they dropped the strainer in the chip fryer, frittered away on some new years festival appearances along with a few shows in the past few months. Back in their classic 3 piece mode, after approaching Rockshow in this guise, and with Seja embarking on her own solo career they recently played some stand out performances (including Seja’s last keyboard stand with them) at the Brisbane Powerhouse 10th birthday… and sold out shows in Sydney and Melbourne. Back on the fries… they saturate the wrapper with new recordings, new tourings and a new soundtrack to cult classic Akira.

With Quan and Ben relocating to new home town Melbourne early this year they activated some fresh studio spaces in their recently acquired dwellings and started work on their first new material since the Love and Paranoia sessions in Rio de Janeiro in 2007. Quan has set up a recording blog here and see them use it… the tracks are currently being mixed by Casey Rice after some additional recording at Head Gap.. and will be released through digital outlets and physical forms in September.

On August 8 as part of the Graphic animation conference at the Sydney Opera House Regurgitator have been commissioned to produce a live score to the ground breaking Japanese anime film AKIRA.

Comic books, illustration, animation, music, multimedia and other new ways of telling stories have not only changed the face of our popular culture, they now define it. Graphic novels and comic art are now a leading source of inspiration for films, television, clothing, designers, musicians and artists the world over. GRAPHIC celebrates this brave new world in a weekend of specially commissioned productions – with musical responses to graphic art & stories, workshops, panels, a film program, a games exhibition and an animation competition. Highlight events include the Anime classic Akira with a live rescore by Regurgitator; Shaun Tan’s The Arrival live scored by Ben Walsh and the Orkestra of the Underground; and the big one – Neil Gaiman in the Concert Hall reading a new unpublished work, with specially commissioned live score by FourPlay and projected illustrations by legendary graphic artist Eddie Campbell.

Akira with live score by Regurgitator Akira is the benchmark film by which all other anime are judged, spawning countless imitators and defining many of the themes, concerns and style of the genre. Set in 2019 in post-World War Three Neo-Tokyo, this animated classic introduced the western world to adult-oriented Japanese animation and has been lauded worldwide as the movie that “started it all”. Akira started life as Katsuhiro Otomo’s epic 2,000+ page manga (Japanese comic book), before being adapted into an animated film in 1988. The film will be shown in the original Japanese language version with English subtitles and rescored live by Regurgitator. As Australia’s most renowned and successful experimental art-rockers, Regurgitator have achieved triple-platinum status – an astonishing feat for such an uncompromising band – who never shy away from the unusual, the untried, or indeed any genre that attracts their creative sensibility.
Tickets available from the Sydney Opera House.

And now following this… Regurgitator embark on the most intensive headline tour since the 6 week long 2007 Amor e Paranoia tour with New Pants from China and I Heart Hiroshima… or the 2008 tour with guiding lights DEVO. For this latest slush in hot fat Regurgitator has invited new sensations from Melbourne RAT VS POSSUM and Brisbane’s bursting with joy LANEOUS & THE FAMILY YAH along for the fries. Plus for a special one-off show… DJ KRUSH from Japan will be joining Regurgitator for a double headliner in Brisbane on SEPT 18 at The Tivoli
Tickets on sale in the coming days… from JULY 20 or thereabouts.

Faster Louder presents
REGURGITATOR
plus RAT VS POSSUM (expect WA shows)
and LANEOUS & THE FAMILY YAH (except TAS & WA shows)
with co-headliner DJ KRUSH from Japan (Brisbane show only)

WED 15 SEPT Hobart REPUBLIC BAR
plus RAT VS POSSUM
Tickets from Ruffcut Records – 6234 8600, Moshtix and The Republic Bar – 6234 6954, and regurgitator.oztix.com.au

THUR 16 SEPT Adelaide THE GOV
plus RAT VS POSSUM and LANEOUS & THE FAMILY YAH
Tickets from www.moshtix.com.au (ph 1300 438 849) & Moshtix outlets, www.venuetix.com.au (ph 08 8225 8888) & Venue*Tix outlets & at the venue 11am-9pm Mon-Sat, and regurgitator.oztix.com.au

FRI 17 SEPT Melbourne THE HI-FI
plus RAT VS POSSUM and LANEOUS & THE FAMILY YAH
Tickets online from www.thehifi.com.au Phone Tix 1300THEHIFI (1300 843 4434) & Polyester Records – Fitzroy & City, and regurgitator.oztix.com.au

SAT 18 SEPT Brisbane THE TIVOLI
with DJ KRUSH (from Japan) plus LANEOUS & THE FAMILY YAH and RAT VS POSSUM
Tickets from Ticketek 132 849, www.ticketek.com.au, Rocking Horse Records (07) 3229 5360 and regurgitator.oztix.com.au Doors at 7.00pm

SUN 19 SEPT Byron GREAT NORTHERN
plus RAT VS POSSUM and LANEOUS & THE FAMILY YAH
Tickets from venue, www.oztix.com.au (ph 1300 762 545), oztix outlets, and regurgitator.oztix.com.au

WED 22 SEPT Katoomba HOTEL GEARIN
plus RAT VS POSSUM
Tickets from www.oztix.com.au (ph 1300 762 545), www.moshtix.com.au (ph 1300 438 849), the venue, all Oztix & Moshtix outlets, and regurgitator.oztix.com.au

THUR 23 SEPT Canberra THE MARAM
plus RAT VS POSSUM and LANEOUS & THE FAMILY YAH
Tickets from  www.moshtix.com.au (ph 1300 438 849), Moshtix outlets, and regurgitator.oztix.com.au

FRI 24 SEPT Wgong UNI BAR
plus RAT VS POSSUM and LANEOUS & THE FAMILY YAH
Tickets from Redback Music, the venue, Oztix, www.bigtix.com.au, and regurgitator.oztix.com.au

SAT 25 SEPT Sydney MANNING BAR
plus RAT VS POSSUM and LANEOUS & THE FAMILY YAH
Tickets: www.manningbar.com (ph 1300 762 545), www.moshtix.com.au (ph 1300 438 849), the venue, all Oztix & Moshtix outlets, and regurgitator.oztix.com.au
An official selection of Sydney Fringe 2010

SUN 26 SEPT Karratha WA WALKINGTON THEATRE
Ph: (08) 9159 6859 for ticketing.

MON 27 SEPT Perth AMPLIFIER BAR
plus BOYS BOYS BOYS! and NAIK
Tickets from Bocs, Moshtix, 78’s, Mills, and regurgitator.oztix.com.au

www.regurgitator.net
www.myspace.com/regurgitators
RECORDING BLOG: http://consume.com.au/regurgitator

RAT VS POSSUM
…play experimental pop music. Layered and looped, billion-part harmonies, tom-heavy percussion, drum samplers, jangly guitars, casio keyboards and loop pedal. They released their debut ‘Daughter of Sunshine’ in April through Sensory Projects. A collection of psychedelic, faux-tribal pop songs written for the Summer, recorded during the Winter of 2009.‘Daughter of Sunshine’ is an album of multi-coloured ecstatical indulgences, chiming guitars, Cash Converters’ keyboards and a bandwidth of beats that documents the band’s first year of music making; capturing their evolution from a glitter-obsessed two-piece, playing to handfuls of barely-amused friends in living rooms,  to the current five-piece, drum-heavy incarnation of the band packing venues ll over the place amid performances with Passion Pit, Jonathan Boulet and the like…
“…joyously experimental, infectious and unique.”- Tom Hawking, Inpress
“Rat Vs Possum seized the stage quite unlike any act we’ve seen at the seasonal Triple R showcases and offered themselves up as one of the acts to catch in 2010.”– Sam McDougall, Triple R
“This is one tribe I am more than happy to be cannibalised by.”Wilfred Brandt, TwoThousand
“…absolutely inspired neo-tribal bliss and shambolic, shouty freak outs.”- Lawson Fletcher, Mess and Noise
“Dan Kelly wished he was 21 and living on acid and baked beans again at the Rat Vs Possum gig.”- Dan Kelly’s rad facebook status
www.myspace.com/ratvspossum

LANEOUS & THE FAMILY YAH
Laneous & The Family Yah make Grunty Indie Soul and Croon Punk for your earholes. Together with the all singing, all dancing Bird Fire Choir, Laneous navigates his band through abstract hip hop, punk and old soul. Alternatively cheerful, smooth and demented he cuts through the Family Yah’s at times fiercely syncopated, occasionally bombast and otherwise wobbly grooves with his trademark falsetto croon and charming hip hop murmurs. Bubblin’ up out of the artisan hot bed that is Brisbane’s West End, L&TFY are amongst the hardest working on the East Coast Touring Circuit. Their 2009 Debut LP “St Ill Regal” pushed the band onto the National stage with Triple J spinning Searing Life on High Rotation, a QSong Award and FBI rotation for Bubblegum, a triple j Unearthed ‘Parklife’ Win and critical acclaim around the country. This saw L&TFY spend the best part of a year on the road. Still though they found time to record and release 3 Limited Edition EPs – all now sold out and ascended to the vaults. Having finely tuned a high energy and dynamic live show the old fashioned way – through grueling trips up and down the coast, crashing on floors and fighting for DJ duties in the tour bus, their Sophomore Album “Found Things” is Laneous & The Family Yah at their most direct – a fight between the animal and the evolved, an uncompromised and highly joyous offering of soul, punk and hip hop. It’s release in September 2010 (through Bird Fire Records) cements L&TFY as amongst one of the most prolific acts in Australia.
www.myspace.com/lachlaneous

DJ KRUSH
Known as one of the first hip-hop artists in Japan, DJ Krush (Hideaki Ishi) is a globally renowned producer, remixer and DJ. DJ Krush constantly expands his field – working on film soundtracks, television dramas and commercials, as well as live sessions with other musicians. In 1991, Krush’s remix TVO was a hit in the London club scene. He released his debut self-titled album in 1994 (Shadow Records), and since then has released eight solo records, including releases in Japan, Europe and the Unites States, and numerous singles, remixes and collaborations. With his music ranging from hip-hop to techno and acid jazz, some critics have labelled Krush the ‘Godfather of trip-hop’, referring to the multi-layered psychedelic element of his music.www.sus81.jp/djkrush

The Opera Theatre: Sunday 8th of August
AKIRA THE FILM… LIVE SCORE BY REGURGITATOR.

Akira was the benchmark film by which all other Anime followed. Set in a post World War Three Neo- Tokyo in 2019 this animated classic introduced the western world to Japanese animation and has been lauded worldwide as the movie that “started it all”. The dvd has sold over 41,000 copies in Australia alone.

Regurgitator; Australia’s most renowned experimental art rockers are creating a new live score to play live, alongside Akira. Regurgitator have gone triple platinum in Australia an astonishing feat for a band never to compromise or shy away from the unusual, the untried, or any genre that infects their creative sensibility.

GRAPHIC: AKIRA with live score by Regurgitator
Comic books, illustration, animation, music, multimedia and other new ways of telling stories have not only changed the face of our popular culture, they now define it. Graphic novels and comic art are now a leading source of inspiration for films, television, clothing, designers, musicians and artists the world over. GRAPHIC celebrates this brave new world in a weekend of specially commissioned productions – with musical responses to graphic art & stories, workshops, panels, a film festival, a games exhibition and an animation competition.

“Hyperviolent. Apocalyptic. Kinetic. Lurid. Akira is the definitive anime classic.” – Empire magazine

Akira is the benchmark film by which all other Anime are judged, spawning countless imitators and defining many of the themes, concerns and style of the genre. Set in 2019 in post-World War Three Neo-Tokyo, this animated classic introduced the western world to adult-oriented Japanese animation and has been lauded worldwide as the movie that “started it all”. The DVD has sold over 41,000 copies in Australia alone. It started life as Katsuhiro Otomo’s epic 2,000+ page manga (Japanese comic book), before being adapted into an animated film in 1988.

The film will be shown in the original Japanese language version with English subtitles.

Regurgitator are Australia’s most renowned and successful experimental art-rockers, who have created a stunning new score to play live alongside Akira. Regurgitator have achieved triple-platinum status in Australia – an astonishing feat for such an uncompromising band – who never shy away from the unusual, the untried, or indeed any genre that attracts their creative sensibility.

Rated M15+- High Level Violence

Akira Trailer http://www.nipponcinema.com/trailers/akira-trailer/

See the rest of the GRAPHIC program here http://www.sydneyoperahouse.com/about/program_graphic.aspx

Learn how to be part of the GRAPHIC animation competition here http://www.graphic.sydneyoperahouse.com/

Venue: Opera Theatre
Dates: 8 August
Duration: 2 hours and 15 minutes with no interval

Book Online Now!




Most bands are too afraid to step up to the bat. They are scared that life is going to
throw them different kinds of curve balls. But for more than fifteen years, Trans Am
has fearlessly stepped up, taken their swings and thrown a few curve balls of their own.
Few bands can say they’ve toured the Canadian mountains with TOOL, and fewer still
can they played their first tour opening for Tortoise. Trans Am a-la 2010 is a band of
veterans unafraid to contradict themselves, confident in their identity even as
confounding as that identity has been for their fans over the years.

Thing is a wreckage of sorts.
The project was originally commissioned as a sci-fi, horror adaptation of Romeo and Juliet. When funding for that project fell apart, Trans Am forged on with their own album. To capture the feeling of exhaustion and paranoia demanded by Thing, Trans Am remained at their recording studio until the early morning, occasionally exiting to run up and down the hills of San Francisco. All vocals were recorded during recovery from these sessions. Thing features songs written entirely by the individual band members, as well as more collaborative efforts. Tracks were composed and/or recorded in Pescara, Italy; Portland, Oregon; Leon, France; San Francisco, California; Somewhere over the Pacific Ocean; London, England; Death Valley, California. The three members of the band currently reside in Portland, San Francisco and Washington, DC. For half of the tracks on Thing, Trans Am utilized a recording/composition strategy known as “Zombification.” Once a song was recorded, each of the band members (as well as anybody else in the studio at the time) would record multiple additional tracks without any reference to the previous ones. The song then forgot itself – and was almost unlistenable. After cellaring the un-dead music for up to a year, Trans Am would begin to peel back the layers of the song, usually arriving at something completely different.Thing was recorded between May 2008 and November of 2009, but the ongoing economic crisis did not affect the album’s lavish production budget.

Thing represents a further attempt by the band to further remove themselves not just from various indie-rock labels, but music itself. One of Thing’s requirements was that each track contain a completely non-musical element, preferably something with a sonic signature that was not even necessarily a sound.

With such history behind them, eight albums and last year’s live double LP and DVD What
Day is it Tonight?, Trans Am’s record speaks for itself. This new album does not
attempt to redefine the band’s image or return to any previous form, but
simply to speak for itself, a single palpable, particular… Thing…
TRANS AM’s THING out now on VALVE/MGM.

I heart hiroshima

Developments…

While Susie is currently on expedition in New York enroute eventually to Berlin… and now making a visit to SXSW this coming week… Paul Rankin completed a second video for the track RIVER. It was shot before Susie’s disembarkation and their great going-away-show at Brisbane Powerhouse in late Jan where they play both albums in their near completedness. Paul has pieced together another spirited visual interpretation drawing forth the pagan in a dark river forest. Online now and desecrating television shortly.

YOU TUBE
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qj5DWymkTW8

VIMEO
http://www.vimeo.com/9896206

Other news…

THE RIP will be released in Europe on Cargo Germany in June.
The album is now available in other territories online… and discussion is underway for a US album release.

Shakeytown was picked up for US TV show The Deep End…
As well as new Brisbane film JUCY http://if.com.au/2010/03/09/article/Odins-Eye-acquires-Jucy/TWSPDCCQWJ.html

More news when it happens…

THE RIP out now on Valve.
www.ihearthiroshim.com
www.myspace.com/ihearthiroshima

It is with undeniable pleasure Valve makes available in Australia the latest album by New Zealand’s Mint Chicks. With no uncertainty I can honestly say THE MINT CHICKS are my all-time favourite New Zealand band… and I have to say that is a big call given my love for KING LOSER, THE TALL DWARFS, THE CHILLS, BAILTER SPACE and even early SPLIT ENZ among others. Out of the static comes new album SCREENS = sheer f**king brilliance!

THE MINT CHICKS …a Bio (of sorts)
The first Mint Chicks bio distributed was for F**k The Golden Youth, the jaw-droppingly astonishing debut album the band served up in 2004. It served none of the usual bio purposes at all. Instead, it seemed to be a slightly-crazed communiqué from a fringe group with indeterminate goals, containing the kind of muddled leaps and erratic proclamations familiar from scribbled notes reproduced in books about cults or serial killers. Perhaps that’s exactly what the source of the bio was, transposed and presented with a Flying Nun letterhead as some sort of odd representation of whoever it was opposing the Golden Youth of the album’s title. Maybe it was some kind of attempt to articulate the ragged pop melodies and hyper-kinetic energy that the album was characterized by, which is something particularly hard to convey without actually hearing it. Possibly, it was something to do with having the word “f**k” in an album title, usually the domain of committed politico-types. Really, who has any idea what it meant — but most agree that the album is one of the finest debut releases in New Zealand’s musical history, one that will be discovered and rediscovered for many years to come. Still, it is quite conceivable that a rather different piece of paper could have been sent out, stating only three things. “Written by the Nielson Brothers and performed by The Mint Chicks”; “This record is our idea of fun pop music”; and “Everything on this album is EXACTLY the way you hear it”. That’s it in a nutshell, and in fact would be entirely suitable for any release in the consistently-engrossing Mint Chicks catalogue, from the initial excitement of the EPs Octagon Octagon Octagon and Anti Tiger, their handful of 7” singles, the multi-award winning Crazy? Yes! Dumb? No’ right up to (and including) their brand new album, Screens. And as much as we could concentrate on The Mint Chicks’ past accomplishments and deserved success, Screens takes us somewhere else entirely. When the first hints of what The Mint Chicks were recording in their new home-base of Portland, Oregon, started creeping out — tunes like ‘Enemies’, ‘Life Will Get Better Some Day’ and ‘What A Way’ — it was immediately apparent that The Mint Chicks had taken another inadvertent creative leap, one that they are probably too focussed or too modest to realize. When pressed, Ruban Nielson mentioned that he had figured out that they were making “troublegum” music — technicolour, vibrant pop with welcoming melodic thrills and an emotive heart, yet nonetheless containing aspects and themes which could be considered either antisocial, keenly-intelligent, or real, depending on your perspective. It’s the kind of inclusive music that’s made to be enjoyed, yet doesn’t underestimate an audience’s intelligence or short-change anybody by tempering creativity with commercial compromises. The Mint Chicks have already proven it works beyond any vague pop cultural theorising: Crazy? Yes! Dumb? No! — grand-slam winner of five 2007 New Zealand Music Awards, and an additional six bNet awards — is certainly troublegum by any other name. And now Screens — even brighter, more stimulating, further in and way farther out, tightly-packed with multiple bubblegum hooks. Or should that be “barbs”? Take the first single ‘I Can’t Stop Being Foolish’, a song which may be about being punished for your true nature, and a kid thinking about his dad being sent to jail and pondering his own future, knowing that he’s inherited all of his father’s vices. Musically though – a candy party! Then there’s the aforementioned ‘Life Will Get Better Some Day’, impressive enough as a bNet hit late last year, but in it’s final Screens glory with the calm vocodered plea nestled amidst some mightily-ringing percussive clangs, it’s the difference between a hand-stencilled sign and glorious neon, or the spectral and the Spectoral. Now, an existential crisis takes on the characteristics of a great spiritual truth, further highlighting the acceptance of isolation expressed by the song’s narrator and transforming loneliness into a uniting sense of jubilation. In fact, all of Screens is exuberantly-constructed and arranged. Produced by The Nielson Brothers and Jacob Portrait, it necessitated mixing in four different studios to exactly capture the elusive sounds swirling about the Mint Chicks imaginations and make them tangible. Work took place in The Dandy Warhols’ Odditorium studio; two other Portland studios with proven track records — Audible Alchemy (Modest Mouse) and Supernatural (The Shins); and the Orewa studio of award-winning producer Chris Nielson. If anything, the refining of The Mint Chicks’ sound is entirely in keeping with the escalating might of the
Nielson/Nielson songwriting force. Having never been distracted by external trends or flavour-of-the-moment sounds, Kody and Ruban Nielson have only ever had to keep up with each other; and in the nine years since their collaboration began, the pair have been driven to develop one of the most distinct and original styles in New Zealand post-everything popular music. With their third album Screens, the full picture created by The Mint Chicks is now becoming recognisable. Never lacking in ambition or foresight, it’s nothing less than the sound of a band creating their own future.
THE MINT CHICKS:
KODY NIELSON
RUBAN NIELSON
PAUL ROPER

That’s not to say it doesn’t sound like The Mint Chicks, because there’s definitely only one band on earth (specific location irrelevant) who could have made this, but it has the energy and pure new sound of a band spewing out a lifetime’s worth of ideas into their first album. (Groove Guide)

Screens’ is the sound of a band swallowed by video game playing, Guitar Hero waving robots. At all times sounding like everything and nothing before them, it’s another bold statement that will have fans rejoicing. (NZ Musician)

Screens is addictive and deliciously obnoxious. (NZ Herald)

SCREENS by MINT CHICKS out now through Valve/MGM in Australia!
Features HOT ON YOUR HEELS, I CAN’T STOP BEING FOOLISH, RED WHITE OR BLUE, and SWEET JANINE!

ALBUM REVIEWS
The Mint Chicks – Screens – Reviewer: Duncan Greive Issue: April 2009
Following the unparallelled artistic and commercial success of Crazy?Yes!Dumb?No! in 2006, The Mint Chicks made a series of moves which might have made no sense to outsiders, but mirrored perfectly the internal logic of their machine. Firstly, when you’ve finally cracked the local market, won a boatload of Tuis and gotten mainstream radio play with your bizarro pop, surely it behooves you to retrench and pay back some of that faith? Instead they booked tickets to Portland, capital of the indie rock universe maybe, but around 11,000 kilometres away from the place which had finally, after five years, figured out how to love the prickly young men. And when the chemistry of your band is paramount, the strange impulses audible in your music now making perfect sense, speaking in unison for maybe the first time, surely then it’s incumbent upon you to keep that unit together? So parting company with (and not replacing) bassist Michael Logie, often the only guy who looked like he was actively enjoying the process, almost takes you back to square one. Which, it turns it out, is probably exactly where they want to be. Screens sounds like a brand new band making their first record. That’s not to say it doesn’t sound like The Mint Chicks, because there’s definitely only one band on earth (specific location irrelevant) who could have made this, but it has the energy and pure new sound of a band spewing out a lifetime’s worth of ideas into their first album. Which, it barely needs pointing out, is a very good thing. The album opens with Red, White Or Blue, a song which functions as something of a national anthem for their newly colonised territory, celestial harmonies floating over a thin but fierce noise-pop bed. It has that Beach Boys thread running though it, a band I’ve heard The Mint Chicks call out on more than one occasion, but sounds like Brian Wilson grew up on the shores of Three Mile Island rather than California. As a primer for the album, it’s perfect, and one of the best sounds they’ve ever made. That bleeds into 2010, one of the earliest songs from the three-piece era, with a piece of Mussorgsky’s Pictures At An Exhibition jacked for a staccato melody before dissolving into a bashfully romantic pop lyric, highlighted by some spectacularly free guitar playing from Ruban Nielson, which nonetheless fails to detract from the wistful love song at its core. The 7” version from over a year ago was rougher and lacked the finesse present here, a predominantly production-based riddle which they’ve largely solved. Where C?Y!D?N! sounded like a technicolour explosion, Screens is more a riot of pastels, and at first this is somewhat disorienting, even disappointing, to those expecting a repeat of the immediate thrills of its predecessor. But it’s a time thing. Give yours and Screens reveals its secrets, in some ways as an album purer and less manic than the one that came before it. That wistful tone found on 2010 is repeated throughout; Don’t Sell Your Brain Out could be 1910 Fruitgum Company with its bubblegum vocal line, though the music is far too clanky. In some ways this is Kody Nielson’s album, he actually sings more than ever and often provides the hooks via his keyboard playing, allowing Roper and Ruban to go deeper into their robot pop, safe in the knowledge they’re always tethered to the melody by Kody’s expansive mood. Singles like What A Way and Life Will Get Better Some Day provide a welcome respite from a mid-tempo which would otherwise see the songs congeal, the latter’s treated vocal as affecting as anything they’ve ever conjured. There’s nothing so shocking as the title track of C?Y!D?N!, and I hope that doesn’t affect the commercial impact of the album, but in Life Will… they’ve found a song which might even outdo it for emotional impact. It closes out on a calmly reflective note, the end of an album not nearly so surprising as the predecessor to which it will inevitably be compared, but one that shows they’ve survived and thrived through their self-imposed trials, and retained the intense magnetism which drew us here in the first place. Screens won’t shock you from your apathy, but given time it proves again that the three-piece Mint Chicks remain the country’s benchmark for evolution and ambition, and have delivered their second truly great album.

THE MINT CHICKS: Screens By Shaun Chait (NZ Musician)
The Mint Chicks compelling second album ‘Crazy? Yes! Dumb? No!’ certainly got people raving, cementing their status as one of the most interesting, relevant and even genius bands coming out of this country. The now three-piece have since literally moved out and set themselves up in Portland, Oregon, where this follow up has had its tortured genesis. ‘Screens’ is the sound of a band swallowed by video game playing, Guitar Hero waving robots. At all times sounding like everything and nothing before them, it’s another bold statement that will have fans rejoicing. I’m not going to even go into comparisons – suffice to say this is kooky, indie, electric, electronic, synthy, pop rock and dance album with plenty of colours. ‘Screens’ is vocoder and keys heavy – I would love to hear a companion album mixed in reverse, with the drums and guitars turned up, but as it is their producer/mixer mate Jacob Portrait did what even the Nielson brothers hadn’t anticipated, making the less standard stuff the central focus. Clocking in at a sharp 30 minutes it’s short enough for the whole album to be a highlight, however I’ll nominate Sweet Janine, What A Way and Telephone. It’s bound to have everyone raving.

Mint Chicks – Screens Scott Kara Rating: * * * * (NZ Herald)
There has always been more than a dash of arsenic laced through the Mint Chicks’ sherbet-flavoured pop. And it may not seem like it at first but the Portland-based Auckland trio have upped the dose of poison on their third album, Screens. It’s a record of extremes, with the throwaway catchiness of I Can’t Stop Being Foolish and Don’t Sell Your Brain Out, Baby off set by the warped and mangled stylings of What A Way and Enemies. And in between there’s the Clean on P jaunt of the title track.Yet songwriting brothers Kody and Ruban Nielson manage to make the album coast along on a pure pop rock plane (something they call “troublegum”). And it’s all underlined by the Nielsons’ devilish and wry sentiment, with deadpan stories – this time round often told through fruity vocal processors – about being caged up, haunted by demons, and having a noose around your neck. At around 30 minutes it’s over pretty quickly, and because it includes almost intentionally disposable gems like I Can’t Stop Being Foolish, it doesn’t have the substance of 2006’s Crazy?Yes!Dumb?No!, which makes you wonder whether it has the same durability as that classic Kiwi album. One friend said he’s listened to it so much in the car he sometimes feels like throwing it out of the window. Then again, it’s near impossible not to enjoy the agitating delights of Enemies and Life Will Get Better Some Day – the last and best tracks – with hand-wringing and gold teeth-flashing glee. Screens is addictive and deliciously obnoxious.

QUAN’s new solo album The Amateur is steadily growing great responses… see the great review from Time Off.

The new website up and growing with a free promo download track ARE YOU THE BEAT I’M LOOKING FOR?
www.quantheamateur.com 

Quan is a short extract from a love letter, an Amateur (from the latin ‘Amator’-'Lover’, from Amare ‘to love’) ineptly following the natural course of things since forever. 

Apparently a photon that begins it’s life in the centre of the sun spends on average about 10 and a half million light years zigzaging to and fro as it slowly works it’s way to the surface, a distance that if traveled in a straight line would take a mere 2.5 seconds. It then takes a further 8.5 minutes to reach the earth. 

Furthermore our Sun Converts Five Million tones of Mass (about the equivalent of a million elephants) into pure energy every second.

These factoids remind me of two things: 1. The virtue of patience and 2. That the immolation of a human heart pales in comparison to that of a Star’s. (Or is it the other way round?) 

Is this a foundation for Hip Hop? Yes. 

Quan Yeomans from Regurgitator finally delivers his 4 year labour of love on again off again requiem to those heady amateur days. Recorded in Sydney, London, Hong Kong, flight lounges, bus stops, doorways… and now making as many music videos as he can. Features The One, Gimme Gimme, And this is what she said…, Year of the Jerk and more. Touring in 2009.
Is this the beat you been looking for?

QUAN THE AMATEUR out now on Valve/MGM. For interviews, images and more contact brian@rishrecords.com or consume1@ozemail.com.au www.quantheamateur.com