The WAMis: A Form Guide

On the eve of Perth’s annual WAMi Festival, MATT GILES takes a look at what’s on offer – from day-long industry shindigs to low-key pub shows.

First of all, we should probably get the disclaimer out of the way: I help run Love is My Velocity, an arts and music organisation that is programming a few things for the 2009 WAMi Festival. It would be unfair to both the other events in the festival and other promoters and labels in Perth to use this article to promote our events, so instead I’ll say that under no circumstances should anyone attend any of the following: the launch of the Love is My Velocity Cookbook II, the WAMi Festival edition of the Windows on William shopfront exhibition, and the Bank Notes free recording studio. Just do not go there – and by there I mean, respectively, the Hellenic Centre at 20 Parker Street on May 8, along William Street from May 8-20 and the Old Bank Building at 214 William Street from May 6-8. There, now we can move on.

The WAMi Festival is a huge-ass constellation of Perth music. Over the past few years the organisation that runs it, WAM – which stands for the West Australian Music Industry Association, and yes this does mean it should be called WAMIA – has expanded its banner gig, the Saturday Spectacular. It’s evolved from a two-stage hotel show into a street festival in Northbridge that spans 11 venues and performances by more than 50 bands.

The festival itself takes place over six days before its heads to regional WA for a week. It includes the WAMi Awards, the Too Solid Indigenous Music Awards, the Kiss My Camera music photography exhibition, the WAMi Music Business Conference and a three CD, one DVD compilation. It attracts the same criticisms all things of its nature receive from crabby armchair critics, but it succeeds in focusing unprecedented levels of attention on WA music and in connecting bands to new audiences.

It also succeeds in boggling the mind with the sheer weight of gigs it offers. Below is a form guide that should help you get the most out your WAMi Festival this year.

Day 1: Wednesday, May 6

The main event on the opening day has to be the triple j Live at the Wireless show at the Rosemount Hotel with performances by Karnivool, Sugar Army and Unearthed winners the Novocaines. This is by far the most public event on the WAM program – and it’s free.

Its main competition is no real competition at all, because while the kids will be trying to get into the Rosemount before it reaches capacity, ageing rock fans will be attending the Music Industry Reunion Night at Metro City. Despite its name, it won’t just be a backslap fest. The band line-up at the reunion is one of the best of the festival. Drummer and WAM Hall of Famer James Baker will reunite with his Scientists bandmate Kim Salmon to perform as a two-piece and the Stems and Dave Warner from The Suburbs will also perform, alongside a number of other musicians from WA music’s past.

If neither of those gigs prick your fancy, see homecoming country pop group New Rules for Boats’ singer Sean Pollard performing solo at the Moon Café, or Birthday Party devotee Will Stoker and his Embers at the Hyde Park Hotel.

Day 2: Thursday, May 7

There’s nothing else on this day apart from the WAMi Awards ceremony. There are some decent bands playing, most notably rapper Drapht and grizzled mountain men the Kill Devil Hills, but this is probably for die-hard Perth music fans only.

They’re funny things, the WAMi Awards. There are some weird categories and nomination guidelines that result in such anomalies as a band being nominated for both Best Commercial Pop Act and Best Indie Pop Act, the same bands and people tend to get nominated every year, and it’s normally pretty easy to tell who is going to win. The main honour is being nominated, and that honour is normally reducible to being sufficiently known to the band managers, band members, promoters and journalists who nominate.

But this is what awards shindigs are about, aren’t they? Take the Oscars, for example. Did anybody else actually see Slumdog Millionaire? Who bases a movie around a game show? Or at least, who bases one around a non-fictional game show, one that doesn’t pit criminals against each other in life and death duels that take place on a tropical island? If the Oscars can give a film like that Best Picture, you can’t really fault WAM, who have basically altruistic intentions at heart, for anomalies that arise out of the nomination and voting process.

Ultimately, the awards are meant to provide the recognition that west coast music practitioners would otherwise go without because of their isolation from the Australian music industry. Plus, now that a greater number and variety of Perth bands are coming up and there are more people who count as WA music industry figures, the awards resemble a popularity contest less, serving as better indications of actual quality in Perth. They have as yet been unable to tap into the vast reservoirs of talent that exist in the more DIY circles around town, but then not everyone gets an invite to the house parties where a guy and his friends play 10-minute psych-rock jams around a fire.

Day 3: Friday, May 8

Things pick up again on this day. Most people will be drawn to the Amplifier, partly because people would go see a turd play a dobro there if it meant getting in before the line gets big at midnight, and partly because the Silents and the Harlequin League are playing, and everybody wants their balls on a necklace. If you want to avoid the crush of people and faint smell of vomit that wafts off the bar, you might prefer to see the Preytells twist the ends off a few retro rock sausages at the Norfolk Basement in Fremantle. Or you could stay in and save your strength for …

Day 4: Saturday, May 9

… the Saturday Spectcularrrrrgghhh. With more than 50 bands and 11 venues, it’s impossible to take in completely. So here’s what I think you should do: the day begins around noon with free shows at smaller venues, then a paid show at Metro City, normally the site of Ministries of Sound and flirt parties. Of the free shows, you should check out: The Hayley Beth Love Affliction at the Mustang Bar, because Hayley Beth has an amazing voice (try to hang around for the Ghost Hotel too, they have a decent Augie March-mixed-with-someone-more-country vibe going on); The Lazy Railway at Universal Bar, because they do a really good impersonation of a 1920s black man, except in higher fidelity; and the Autumn Isles, because, after a few years of doing the psych-pop Orange Twin thing too conservatively, they’re finally loosening up and making some exciting stuff. There are more people playing alongside these acts and further shows at further venues, but these guys are the pick of the bunch.

Once you’ve done that crawl over a few mimosas, it’s time to bite the big one and head to Metro City. There are 12 bands playing from 6pm, so even though it’s located in one venue this gig can have the same overwhelming effect as the rest of the Saturday Spectacular. Be selective about the bands you want to see. Playing will be some of the bigger names in Perth music, such as End of Fashion, the Panda Band and Downsyde, but also check out Boys Boys Boys for the irony, Tomas Ford for the insanity, the Novocaines for the strut and Schvendes for the butt-prickling climaxes.

Day 5: Sunday, May 10

After that, things die down a bit and move south of the river. There’s an afternoon gig in Melville starring a few bands from the Metro City show, there’s a debate at the Railway Hotel at which the Kill Devil Hills will again drop some science and in the evening long-serving surrealists Cinema Prague will play at Mojo’s Bar with their fellow scene veterans Red Jezebel. There is a spray of other shows taking place around Fremantle, but as a resident north of the river I’m obliged not to mention them.

Days 6-7: Monday, May 11 and Tuesday, May 12

The Perth Jazz Society and the Perth Blues Club round out the metro WAMi Festival shows at the Charles Hotel. First up is jazz featuring the Johannes Luebbers Quartet and the bluesmen bump in on Tuesday.

And that’s the festival proper. A week later the festival heads regional with a tour spearheaded by blues funk band the Sneaky Weasel Gang, who will be joined by killer soloist Abbe May at the Manjimup Town Hall on May 22.

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