polaroids of androids

Jun 14, 2008

Gig Review: Super8 Diaries Sydney Launch @ Dirty Shirlows - 08/06/2008

Whoa. What a great day/afternoon of music. Lovely people everywhere. Nobody got shot, the po-leece didn't turn up and arrest folks for having coloured hair and/or tripping off acid AND, most importantly, all of the bands were brilliant.

The first act I caught was When Chimps Attack. Maybe slightly too much confusing banter and in-jokes between songs but the music more than made up for it. It was like being locked inside a Punching Box^TM.

Charge Group were up next and although I rarely get excited for 'gentle' stuff their music really hit the spot. Masterful, precise, gentle strokes. Oh, so gentle. So nice. Oh my. Afternoon eargasms.

We were then treated to a short screening of the documentary that we were all there to 'launch'. If you haven't already got your hands on it then I strongly advise you pick up a copy el pronto. It really does a great job of capturing the local music scene over the past few years.

Castings, after about a three to four hour set-up, unleashing an absolutely thrilling half-hour of music. Very hard to describe. Walls of sound, chaos, instruments everywhere, things coming and going, children being sacrificed. The band were in complete control of the space and a quick glance around the room at this stage uncovered there weren't too many people who weren't completely captured by their performance.

Qua was the real highlight of the day.

His set-up consists of a series of effects knobs, a laptop and a strange blending touchpad instrument. Surprisingly, it's all very interesting to watch even though it's often hard to see how exactly he is at creating such great, expanding soundscapes. Lovely stuff. We strongly recommend you catch him next time he is in town.

Tucker B's are.. well.. the Tucker B's. It probably goes without saying that they pillaged my heart and soul with their greatness. I think the size of the smile on my face during several of the songs was probably a little distracting for the band.

You can catch them tonight at the El Hopetoun with Talons and SPOD.

Ohana closed out the brilliant day with a great forty-ish minute set. Their new material, as we have previously mentioned, sounds fantastic. Our pal, Ivan, recently interviewed them for us, talking to them mostly about their upcoming second album, which is due in a few months time. Seriously, if these guys aren't in your top five local bands by the end of the year we will be really surprised.

Many thanks to Andrew for the better photos above. You know which ones I am talking about.