“Searching For Charlie Owen”
Charlie Owen
Cam Butler
Pete Ross and the Sapphire
Django Bar, Marrickville
Friday 16 August 2024
WORDS: Edwin Garland
PHOTOS: The Barman

The Camelot Lounge and its smaller cousin Django Bar, really are the most unheralded venues in Sydney’s inner-west. They’re in a great location, directly opposite Sydenham Railway Station, with Django holding about 120 people and the other about 200.

There has been a lot of love and attention to detail put into the fit-out with all sorts of antiques and obscure paintings on hand. Food and bar prices are reasonable, the sound is immaculate and there’s loads of atmosphere and vibe.  In a time when it’s a struggle for venues to keep themselves alive, big kudos to the owners.

Grace Cummings and Band
Metro Social Club, Sydney
Saturday, August 3 2024
Photos: Sandra Kingston

Grace Cummings is a once-in-generation Australian artist.

It is two years since I first caught her at the Great Club in Marrickville in Sydney’s inner-west, with less than a hundred others on a cold Thursday night.

It was a show by a remarkable artist with swagger and brutally heart wrenching songs that left us in awe.

Accompanied by a band with attitude, she took her vocals from a whisper to paint-stripping level, leaving the hairs on your arms standing up.   

Her remarkable album “Storm Queen” has been on my turntable regularly since, but her records don’t fully capture the live experience.

_{The Fadeaways at The Crowbar the night before. Shona Ross photo.}

The Fadeaways (JP)
+ Jupiter 5
+ Dirtbag
MoshPit Bar, St Peters, NSW, Australia
Sunday, July 14 2024

Sometime in the 1970s, American garage rock started to become in vogue among a hip crew that lived in a few households of each other in the inner city of Sydney.  It was an area that was home to Deniz Tek, a medical student from Michigan, Rob Younger and John Needham among others.  Their reference point was the ”Nuggets” compilation, put together by Lenny Kaye from the Patti Smith Group.

In Australia, the album’s availability coincided with us taking a  fresh look at our home-grown ‘60s bands, many of them also purveyors of perfect three- minute slaps of attitude and beat that were recorded with amps about to blow and guitars that could be purchased for 20 pounds.

The Purple Hearts, Missing Links and The Creatures were the more obvious names to drop. The more obscure a single you could talk about, the cooler you were, and the actual items became the Holy Grail, to be played while you read your imported copy of Creem magazine.

_{Barney "Boogie" Williams on keys and Danny Hadley on guitar and vocals.}

The Animals and Friends
The Gov, Adelaide
May 28 2024

Expectations are a bugger of a thing.

We don't know we have them until we find ourselves hung-up by our own preconceived ideas.

Take Chain. The blues band. They're gritty, muscular, and utterly themselves. 

Yes, I've been watching a few recent live things on YouTube, prompted by a Melbourne chum who went to see them a week or so ago. He was blown away.

THE BEASTS
JP SHILO
The Metro Theatre, Sydney
Friday 5 April 2 2024

Was a time when Australia was seemingly the envy of the underground music world. A wave of Oz bands had grown up in relative splendid isolation, in an environment with a currency based on paying your dues via live work.

The bands absorbed many external influences but parsed them through local filters and delivered something unique.There were few barriers between the players and the punters (in some cases they were interchangeable) and their existences revolved around extended weekends and pushing things to the max.

That’s why gigs like tonight need to be cherished. They come along only once in a while. They recall a different time, and give hope that some kids will pick up on what’s being dished up and want to go and do the same. You call it nostalgia; I call it therapeutic.

FULL FLOWER MOON BAND 
SUNFRUITS
(and VILLE VALO)  
Metro Social Club, Sydney
Saturday 16 March, 2024
Photos by DIGBY FROG

Brisbane's Full Flower Moon Band is one of the best, and most inventive bands in Australia; simply put they’ll lift the hairs on your arm. Bold statement, but true. The reasons why will be clear if you read on.

It’s a Saturday night. It’s raining, I am standing at the bus top, irritated and looking at the timetable. Damn, the bus is late again and I’m going to miss the connecting ferry.  Fuck privatisation. It has turned the local bus service to shit.

Approaching is a cool rock ‘n’ roll couple who look about my age, one of them wearing a Chimers T-shirt (a rarity in my part of the world.)

We strike up a conversation about the appalling bus service as they have walked from another stop after giving up waiting for a bus that will never arrive.