With a strong focus on the Australian music scene, Australian Guitar is a rich source of information on playing techniques, styles, the wide range of instruments available and all the technology that guitarists have to consider in the 21st Century.
A VIDEO INTERVIEW WITH PETER WALKER Peter Walker was a founding member of progressive hard rock band Bakery. After six years on the road, Walker migrated to the studio world via Charles Fisher and Trafalgar Studios, where he often worked with people he knew from his touring days. He engineered and produced numerous albums through the ‘70s and ‘80s, covering a wide range of music from rock, pop and country, all the way to film soundtracks and the like. These were heady days, with large budgets and long sessions. Walker was also a resident session guitarist, playing on many tracks and advertising jingles. Much of that work was uncredited, as his specialty was replacing existing parts – or beefing them up – for albums by well-known bands. His work can…
For its 16th consecutive year, the BIGSOUND music conference and festival dropped on Brisbane like a flock of seagulls on abandoned chips. Between countless catch-ups, parties and free burritos, we spent three full September days and nights traversing the city in search of all the best industry insight. From the daytime keynotes, we learned a lot about how our local music industry is evolving – in short, it pays to go with your own flow, shove cynical types to the side and embrace change rather than fear it – but come nightfall, we stripped off our blazers and slipped on our mosh shorts, stocked up on pints (an exciting new discovery for this sheltered New South Welshman) and hit the pits with youthful conviction. With a lineup notching over 150…
It’s 11 o’clock on a Friday morning when Australian Guitar gets a hold of Kim Churchill. Weight Falls – the Novocastrian folk-rocker’s long-awaited fourth album – has only been out for a few months, but Churchill is already keen to brew hype for LP5. “I’m parked in my van outside a recording studio,” he tells us, “Waiting for the producer to kind of awkwardly come out and ask why I’m here two hours early.” Though it’s unlikely we’ll see new material surface anytime soon, Churchill is overflowing with new ideas. It’s crucial, he stresses, that those ideas hit tape before he dives headfirst into the touring cycle for Weight Falls. “I reckon when you release an album and tour it, you become quite… ‘Stoic’ isn’t the right word… Maybe ‘solid’,”…
At a total runtime just grazing 24 minutes, the breakthrough record from Perth shredders Cursed Earth comes and goes in a violent haze of riff and roar. Front to back as an 11-track album, Cycles Of Grief does its job destructively well – it’s loud, it’s livid, and it injects you with an inescapable lust to crack a skull or two in the pit. But it’s when the record is split and soaked in as two distinct ‘volumes’ – the viciously reckless Growth and straight-up bloodcurdling Decay – that it takes on a new life and the unique elements of both halves truly shine. According to resident axe-annihilator Kieran Molloy, the insidious duality of Cycles Of Grief exists to build a larger narrative of contrasting perspectives, both of which make…
To say the return of Cloud Control was eagerly awaited would be one hell of an understatement: sans a few one-off shows to show they still existed, the Blue Mountains indie staples had spent three years in hibernation before announcing ZONE, during which time they lost founding bassist Jeremy Kelshaw and returned home from their short stint as a UK-based outfit. Against all odds, the now-trio’s comeback was met with as much fan adoration as they’d indulged in before slipping away. “I’ve always had the feeling that we’re one of those bands where when people get into us, they stick around,” says frontman Alister Wright, shrugging off any doubts that LP3 may have fallen on deaf ears. Producing the album themselves, Wright and co. took their sweet, sweet time piecing…
Philly soul will never go away. Nor should it. There’s something uplifting, energising and downright sexy about the style that makes it remain relevant to the human experience, generations after the genre first found its voice. Son Little released his self-titled debut in 2015, and since then, his music has taken him around the world and given him plenty to write about and filter through the lens of his chosen genre – or rather, the genre that chose him. New Magic is a diverse and fresh record that still manages to feel familiar and haunting, even when it’s making you shake your butt. And the album has a very strong connection to Australia. “I came to Australia in late November last year,” Little says. “If you had asked me then,…
