tex don and charlie

_{Penny with her Japanese band the Silver Bells at her "Tokyo" album launch at Melbourne Museum. Pic by Gary Hallenan}

Album: “What Would I Know”, Brian Henry Hooper (Bang! Records)
This posthumous album release is startling in its beauty, rawness and poignancy. Songs about romantic and filial love and songs about death are delivered in Brian’s signature kicking against the pricks style.

Mick Harvey's production appears to form a bridge between the states of life and death. This leaves the listener unsure whether our bard has in fact crossed the River Styx to Hades; while the instruments, like bellows, breathe life into a raging fire. Are they all bellowing from the Underworld or are their feet still firmly planted in the land of the living?

Like Orpheus, the musician, poet and prophet (armed with an electric golden lyre and a distortion pedal) performing in front of Hades, God of the Underworld (clad in a black leather jacket), in the hope of retrieving his ill-fated bride Eurydice, Brian Henry Hooper sings songs to make gods weep.

Legendary Australian guitarist Charlie Owen is playing select solo shows in Canberra and New South Wales in October that will reflect on his career of amazing collaborations. 

His band history includes Beasts of Bourbon, the New Christs,  Tex ,Don & Charlie, Tendrils and Working Class Ringos, and he’s collaborated with Paul Kelly, Chrissie Amphlett and Louis Tillett.

His show “Searching for Charlie Owen” involves him playing and talking his way through his own back pages and shows why he’s regarded as one of our greatest guitarists.

Charlie will be joined on the bill at Smiths Alternative in Canberra on October 28 by special guest Penny Ikinger, the former Wet Taxis member and a solo artist in her own right.  Tickets are here.

And the show at MoshPit Bar in St Peters, Sydney, on Saturday, October 29 will also involve a support bracket from Penny Ikinger, again in solo mode. The line-up will be opened by MD Horne and Matt Allison. 

Tickets numbers for Sydney are capped and are available here.