Deadbeat Summer

I took my first official gig photos at the beginning of this week for FasterLouder.com.au. Part of a series of gigs held under the Happy Mondays' moniker at Curtin House's summer-favourite Rooftop Bar, the gig was moved downstairs to The Toff in Town, resulting in better sound but harder photography conditions!

Neon Indian, a Texan band Wikipedia labels as 'psychedelic indie dance' were headlining in their last show as part of the Mind Control - Psychic Chasms Posessed tour with upcoming Sydney band Kyu supporting and as I'd been keen to see Neon Indian anyway, I was pretty excited when offered the chance to take photos of the gig.

The photos are live on FasterLouder.com.au...

...and if you're keen to have a listen:

Neon Indian's album Mind Control - Psychic Chasms Posessed:
  Neon Indian - Mind Ctrl: Psychic Chasms Possessed by Popfrenzy

Meredith mania

As promised, here are some more photos from the 20th anniversary of the Meredith Music Festival. After a dramatic start to the weekend (tonsillitis and a car crash to name just a couple of issues), these photos were taken during the Saturday afternoon, which was one of my favourite parts of the festival. El Guincho's set was a highlight of that afternoon, which also happened to be the sunniest part of an otherwise cold, wet and windy weekend. 

 El Guincho - Bombay by Ragged Words

Merrydeath

The nickname 'Merrydeath', which refers to the Meredith Music Festival, is an apt one. The festival takes place over a weekend in December each year on a farm in country Victoria. It includes three days of camping and music for most of that time, day and night, except for a couple short hours of 'silence wedge' around dawn each morning. Having gone into the festival already run down thanks to a bout of tonsillitis I was glad I had the foresight to take today off work.

Some of these photos were taken in Echuca on Friday morning and the rest were taken at the festival on the weekend. These photos are just for starters as I'm waiting to get my other camera back from a friend.

On a musical note, El Guincho was the highlight for me. His tunes are so upbeat! I missed Neil Finn's entire set due to looking after my sick sister but apparently, and not surprisingly, he was incredible. I overheard a couple of girls in the toilet queue saying he was so good they cried.

 

Some girls have all the luck

So apparently this isn't photoshopped. How is that at all fair? Beautiful shots by Akiss Paraskevopoulos on Fashionising though - more here.

Siesta

Apologies for the lack of posting recently - I've been on holidays. Potentially there's some exciting stuff in the works though so more content coming soon, I promise. 

Meanwhile, I'm obsessed with this song. You should be too. 

The Naked And Famous - Girls Like You from The Naked And Famous on Vimeo.

Ring a Ring o' Roses

My ring collection has become a bit of an obsession. The newest addition is the silver square ring to the right in the photo below, bought while visiting the Camberwell Market yesterday.

The lady selling it (not to mention a bunch of other amazing rings - it was a good thing I only had a small amount of cash on me because I could easily have walked away with six or seven) told me they'd been sourced from a small town in Morocco. She also said they had spiritual qualities and though I like to take anything like that with a healthy amount of cynicism, it's a nice story. She told me one lady had purchased several rings from her and returned to the market not long after to report the rings had helped her find a boyfriend. Interesting theory!

One of my other favourites is the wolf ring I got from the Melbourne Design Market a few months ago.

Excuse the make-up in this shot - it's Monday and I was bored.

Wilfred Jackal and The Shake Up at Miss Libertines' Purple Sneakers

One of my favourite Melbourne bands at the moment is Wilfred Jackal, having discovered them by accident one night at the Espy a few months ago. Last night they supported Sydney's The Shake Up at Miss Libertines' weekly Purple Sneakers indie night and I managed to convince my friend to come along with me to see them again. This was difficult because my history of introducing her to clubs is not great -- the mania that is After Dark Social Club at Roxanne Parlour isn't for everyone. 

True to form Wilfred Jackal gave a great performance. The lead singer's voice is incredible and their songs are infectiously catchy. There's a certain smugness from getting to see them in such intimate gigs when they're clearly on the rise. Check 'em out here. 

We hung around to check out The Shake Up and though we'd never heard of them we were both pretty impressed by their punk Clash-meets-Buzzcocks sound (listen here). 

I'd been to Miss Libertines a couple of times before but it was better than I remembered. The venue is classy while being unpretentious and the music was like the best of everything on my iTunes remixed. Happy hour lasts until 10pm too!

Pics:

Wilfred Jackal

The Shake Up

Purple Sneakers at Miss Libertines