Overseas Hype Watch: Royal Headache, Pond, Jezabels
News posted Wednesday, April 4 2012 at 11:00 AM.
Related: Royal Headache, Jezabels, Pond.
– Sydney’s Royal Headache have cracked Spin’s list of the five best new artists for April. The band, who topped M+N’s Readers Poll with last year’s self-titled debut, were included alongside the likes of Baltimore rock band Roomrunner, London singer Maya Jane Coles, New York rappers Children Of The Night and London sister-duo 2:54. Spin described them as approaching “the hooksmanship of '70s power-pop with sore-throated, sweat-spackled kinetics that's fully in step with their hardcore roots”. Royal Headache will be released in the US in May following a deal with What's Your Rupture.
– UK hype-merchants NME have lavished praise on Perth’s POND. The band have received a staggering, but not entirely unexpected 9/10 for their fourth album Beard, Wives, Denim, which we described as “a sunbaked sprawl that’s part classic-rock homage and part chortling piss-take”. NME described them as a “big bowl of fun”, saying, “If MGMT (with whom Pond have toured) had followed this path and made this album and not Congratulations, they would be the most adored band on the planet.” They also said it was “miles better than” Innerspeaker, the debut album by sister band Tame Impala. Read our interview with drummer Jay Watson, also of Tame Impala, here
– “A record that I loved so much that I immediately commissioned myself to review it for Rolling Stone in America,” so said David Fricke of The Jezabels Prisoner in a wonderful speech delivered at the Australian Music Prize (The AMP) in Sydney last month. That review has finally materialsed, with Fricke – who was sent a copy of the AMP-winning album by his goddaughter – giving it four stars and comparing it to “Björk leading a young U2”. Full review here.
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haha, jezebels not available in poor Australia.
Jezabels: ''song not available - currently not streamable in your region'
Internationalist fucks!
The Jezebels don't care about Oz people.
haha! whoops!
have put in a video instead.
Its like that cultural cringe thing, but on the internet!
The Jezabels embarrassed of their home country.
The Jezabels' home country embarrassed of the Jezabels.
shame!
outrage!
Don't come back you damn jezebels!
should've called yourself after a totally different drones song!
Using rdio players for streams huh.
bad move. 30second samples? signing up?
the only interesting thing here is the Bjork comparison - where's that coming from?
Does a Volcanic Tongue write up rate as hype? Keenan's pretty good at churning out hyperbole (not that I'm disagreeing with these particulars). I wonder which will be more helpful in selling some records?
Scraps
Secret Paradise
Disembraining DM-701
7”
Edition of 250 copies 7” on Joel Stern of Australian weirdos Sky Needle’s new private imprint: great side of femme-fronted DIY keyboard psych from Brisbane’s Laura Hill aka Scraps whose recent LP on Bedroom Suck turned a bunch of heads. Hill sings w/the kinda keen appeal that’ll have you pulling out Barbara Manning’s classic Lately I Keep Scissors LP and the early Azalia Snail sides while the arc of her trails runs through Silicon Teen-style ginchy synth, psychedelic 60s Euro pop and the kinda garage euphorics of your favourite Flying Nun.
Stag
Get Used To It
Disembraining DM-702
7”
Edition of 250 copies 7” on Joel Stern of Australian weirdos Sky Needle’s new private imprint: all-female avant garage pop from Brisbane featuring members of Kitchen’s Floor, Greg Boring and Sky Needle who cross hysterical looped/massed vocals with the kinda crudely rendered rock appeal of Kleenex, The Slits, Titmachine et al. Stag had a great release on Breakdance The Dawn and this single ups their game even further with four tracks of amphetamine female that are as strident in their urge to get-it-across yet as inexplicably affecting as the best of The Raincoats.
David Fricke.
I don't get the Bjork thing at all...Jezabels' music is monotone, unadventurous droning boredom-in-a-box. Very strange that Fricke is into them at all.
on this we agree
female artists can only be compared to other females. it's a golden rule of music journalism.
fricke's taste left the building in about 1985.
@alec m
I've been using the service - pretty good so far. Agreed. The sample streams are annoying.
I love that the Jezebels have a natural antidote - Drive like Jehu.
It was Jehu who drove after Jezebel's son in a chariot and killed him before pushing Jezebel herself out the window and leaving her to be eaten by dogs.
More evil still comes from this dynasty of Baal-worshippers - Jezabel was also Dido's great aunt!
Sunday school FTW!
That said, I'm really glad the Jezebels are doing well :)
That's what I assumed, but didn't want to jump to conclusions based on only hearing that one song. He could have just as easily went with PJ Harvey or Cat Power.
Why? What other rules are part of this thing you call 'music journalism' that I don't know about?
If a band is full of girls, it's called all-girl xxxx (e.g. all-girl punk.) That stands if they have one male member too.
If a band is full of men, then a considered designation will be made as it's obviously much more serious than anything involving women.
A female songwriter may be called a 'songstress' or 'diva,' while a male singer-songwriter will be called a 'singer-songwriter.'
A band fronted by a female will be referred to in terms of her appearance or sensuality at least once....or lack thereof.
Reviews should contain the words ''paean'', ''heady'', ''sprawling'' and ''sophomore'' whenever possible.
You forgot 'seminal'
David Fuck.
How do these rules apply to bands with half female half male then?
You ignore the males in the group to make sure your sexism is heard
how many hermaphrodite bands are there?
so gimmicky
rdio streams really blow.
What ooobo said. No love for soundcloud anymore?
the jezabel's lips really put me off in this.
that said, she looked super hott when they played Falls just gone
Depends what genre and how hot the chicks are.
What if everyone is androgynous in the band? And you can't tell? What if everyone had normal sized lips?
Ummm.. You could be a z-grade manufactured brit-pop band from the late 90s? But I'm not sure.
''...sore-throated, sweat-spackled kinetics that's fully in step with their hardcore roots”.
Fuck this writing. Give me a sweet paying critic gig, Spin, 'cause your current staff suck.