“We were in a band last year, and there were lots of ideas that nobody understood or agreed on,” he explains of his history with brother Luke. The band was actually an earlier incarnation of Quiet The Few, “but we figured we'd keep the name because Luke had come up with it,” Ryan says with a laugh. Now, he says, they write and perform really well together. “We grew up listening to the same music, and I guess you'd have to say we're on the same wavelength. It's really uncanny how in sync our ideas are sometimes.”

After the dissolution of the band, “We didn't know what to do! We didn't have anyone to play with, so we sat in the garage and wrote this record.” The record in question is their EP, North, written and recorded at Abercorn Studios. “It was amazing. It was brilliant,” Ryan says of the recording experience. “Luke's a big fan of Deloris [who recorded their epic Ten Lives at Abercorn Studios], so we found the studio through them.” The studio is situated on a farm owned by the parents of Hugh Counsell, the studio's engineer, “so there was an endless supply of scones and tea: it was very welcoming, and beautiful being out in the Dandenongs.”

Hugh, the brothers were excited to learn, has recorded with artists such as, oh, some guy you might remember named Elliot Smith. “We didn't know that at first!” Ryan exclaims. “We'd actually gone to him and said we were looking for a sound like From A Basement On A Hill [Smith's final record, released posthumously]. So that was one of the stories he brought out one night at Sing Sing.”

Sing Sing? Oh, yes, Sing Sing. Did I forget to mention that? The band also tracked drums at the iconic Melbourne studio, since there wasn't really the space at Abercorn Studios.

Coming up with dollars is always a battle for unsigned bands, but Quiet The Few did it in increments. “We knew this was something we wanted to do, since around this time last year,” Ryan says. “So we cut back on drinking, all that stuff.” (It may not sound like much, but by Arcady's conservative estimate, cutting out a six pack each week would save each brother between 700 and 1,100 dollars, depending on how expensive their tastes are.)

After the recording was finished, the brothers found themselves a bassist. The brothers and Hugh had taken turns laying down bass parts for the EP. “We went out one night to a gig a friend had put on. We were chatting to him early in the night about the band, and he'd also asked a friend from work. This friend told him that he'd been playing bass, and was looking for someone to play with. But still, it took this friend a few hours to figure out that since we were looking for a bassist and Chris was looking for a band, he should probably introduce us!”

For the moment, the band are hoping to secure distribution for the EP, but are content just playing shows around the traps and selling it at gigs. “We went through a lull earlier in the year: there weren't many places to play. But now, people are putting on a lot of nights, and what's really great is the variety. Limp, which is for experimental punk bands, Us Vs Them, which is pretty post-rock, and then nights like Click Click, for indie groups like us.” Just what we like to hear at Arcady: a top-quality indie band finding its feet.

LIAM CASEY

Friend them on myspace, motherfuckers!

Upon the release of the band's new album Good Arrows, I wanted to ask how the band creates their music with such a diverse array of contributers, as well as enquire about the feat of simply getting that number of people together in one place. Sam describes their unstructured process as being something which just "comes about whenever we have the time to get together." For the new album, Sam says, "We didn't have necessarily a set idea. I think it was much more of a band record. Everybody in the band was involved with it being open to who thought which songs were working and which songs weren't, so it's more like a group of people that are actually playing together..

Their past work has been quite experiment in nature, where obscure samples are used along with objects to create new sounds, but Sam suggests that this album contains a few more "pop melodies, a bit less experimental in a way, but then it's still got that experimental thing in other places". In terms of what instruments/objects are used on this album I was told that "Mike and Martin had found some sea shells to use, and also some bear's toenails but I'm not sure if that is actually true," he laughs. "[But we also] use things that are like filed recordings, that Mike's chopped up digitally, to become beats and things, but originally they are just like a fire burning or people having a conversation."

The tour for the new record brings them to Australia early in the new year. Apart from scaring him off a little with my comment about the intense hot weather expected, he says that the band is "really excited about coming anyway".

CAROLINE MCCURDY

'Good Arrows' is out now on Pod through Inertia. Tunng will be performing at the Sydney Festival from 13th-15th January, and at Melbourne's Northcote Social Club on 16th January.

Back in 2004 was where the Pyramid Rock Festival began with 4000 people turning out to see headline act Regurgitator at Philip Island. Angus Cameron believed that the area "was in desperate need of extra entertainment". After plans for the festival to go ahead the year before were interrupted by a "disenchanted local lady", the festival now "works closely with Bass Coast Shire to achieve a harmonious night for all across the coast".

The line-up this year includes such international acts as: The Black Keys, Spank Rock, The Matches and Buck 65 , plus some special Australian acts like Wolf & Cub, Howling Bells, The Audreys, Josh Pyke, You Am I, The Cat Empire and more. Angus told me he thinks this year has "the best line up yet. We're looking for diversity and plenty of depth in the line-up. The artists are all incredible performers which we hope will result in amazing experiences for the patrons on the day."

With the festival selling out in record time this year, I wanted to ask Angus what he thought was the reason behind this apparent "festival boom" the country is experiencing. He believes the Pyramid festival receives "return patronage, explaining that "Many of our [patrons] keep coming back with more mates, so long as they are into the line-up."

Those lucky enough to have scored tickets to this year's festival are in for an excellently improved event. Angus tells me that as the festival is still relatively young, their experiences so far have allowed them to do some "fine tuning and focusing on delivering the best possible experience on the day". Despite past problems, like the great traffic jam in 2005, he says those issues are "a thing of the past", and that they have "surveyed patrons of the past - we know what they want, and what they want they shall receive."

Essentials such as "shade, toilets, showers" plus "all the creature comforts" will be more readily available. Also they are presenting "plenty of eye candy, this year in the way of decorations and markets" to add to the atmosphere that Angus believes will be "encompassing many moods. At times it's sure to be electric as favourite acts take the stage. Plenty of chilling during the days, deck chairs and rugs out on the grass. [Although] moments of raucousness will no doubt be evident."

The Australian music scene has really boomed over the course of the year with more attention being paid to local acts rather than international bands. With big crowds turning out for lesser known Aussie acts is certainly a sign that theway we feel about our national music is changing. Angus believes the surge in support comes from the "music being promoted really well now days. The quality of our own acts is world class and the Australian public is loving it. It's not necessarily about waiting around for the big internationals to come out before you go to a show. Australian artists have so much to offer - it's fantastic times for the Australian music scene."

Over the course of summer, there are quite a few rad festivals to choose from. I asked Angus what makes the Pyramid Rock Festival a winner this year. He answered that "Nearly 100% of the patrons camp at the event. Many thousands of personalities camping together make for a really unique experience. The location is breathtaking and carries a strong spirit and atmosphere of its own. It's certainly a completely unique experience. Music, music and more live music!"

CAROLINE MCCURDY

It's the kind of story that makes publicists' and journalists' jobs so much easier. Girl records album at home with father. Girl distributes copies of album in packaging decorated by hand with lace and ribbon. Album gets into ears of influential people. Album is released worldwide, and girl is unwittingly flung into the world of professional music.

“I thought it would be great to release the record, but I had no idea how or when it could happen,” Alela Diane explains. “I recorded it because I had written some songs. I'm amazed that it has taken me all over and that so many folks have heard it!”

Alela recorded her debut, The Pirate's Gospel , in her father's home studio in 2004. The resulting collection of songs is charming. With no pretension or seeming desire to make these songs public, Alela sings and plays for the pure joy of it. There's a little pain, of course (there always is in music, isn't there?): Alela first picked up the guitar when she was nineteen, and began writing songs as an outlet for emotions stirred up by her parents' divorce.

I wonder whether it was at all awkward to take these emotionally honest songs to her family. Not at all, Alela says. “I am very comfortable with my family, so it felt very natural to share the songs with those close to me. Both of my parents were amazed that I was able to reflect upon what had happened through songs instead of holding all that sadness inside.”

Her decision to drop her surname for her music career certainly wasn't motivated by any ill will towards her parents. “I think it's prettier,” she says simply of her middle name. “My last name, Menig, doesn't have much of a ring to it.”

Alela was brought up in Nevada City, California (not Nevada City, Nevada, as I'd mistakenly suggested), and it was there that her music caught the ear of psychedelic folkstress Joanna Newsom, another of Nevada City's notable daughters. Having played with Newsom and Vashti Bunyan, the original “freak folk” poster girl, I wonder if Alela feels lumped in with the apparent “new folk” movement (think Devendra Banhart et al). “It's hard to say,” she muses. “I definitely don't feel to be a part of the ‘supposed community', but there could be one. I think that mostly there is a bunch of people playing folksy acoustic music right now, and it is easy for journalists to clump it together.”

Alela's style isn't modelled on anybody in particular. “I just use the voice I got from my mum and do what I can on the guitar,” she says. “My dad showed me a few chords when I was young, and I have taken about five guitar lessons in my life. Mostly I just stumble around on the instrument and see what I can find.”

She found taking her songs on the road to be a challenge, but one she seems to be enjoying. “Touring has mostly been good. It is challenging to get used to the rhythm of the road, away from the routines and the stillness of home. I love to see new places and observe how folks all over live their lives. I also love to go home.”

Hopefully, her travels will bring her to Australia at some point soon. “There is talk of coming over to support this record in the [American] spring. I will be over, I am just not certain when!” By that time, we may have Alela's second album in our hot little hands. Although The Pirate's Gospel was released worldwide just a few short months ago, Alela has nearly finished her second album. “It's different, and has more instrumentation,” she says. “I am feeling good about where it is headed…you'll see!”

Liam Casey

Rapidly rising Sydney quintet Bridezilla have been stuck in a whirlwind of late; with tens of interviews to do, videos to shoot, ceaseless practice sessions and preparation for their debut self-titled EP release, all after taking a four month break to focus on Year 12, and well-- damn .  When I caught up with lead guitarist Pia May one early spring afternoon the biggest of her worries was a wasp trapped inside the room she was in.

What are you all doing at the moment?
We've been pretty busy of late, doing press and getting ready for our EP launch. Daisy (Tulley, violinist) and I just finished Year 12 and  we've just been having a lot of band practice. It's been kinda hectic with HSC and everything, and we've had a four month break from the band so launching right back into it has been a bit... odd.

I can imagine! Right, how did you all meet?
Me and Holiday (Sidewinder , vocalist and rhythm guitarist) have been friends basically since we were babies - family friends and all that - and the rest of us grew up around the same area in our early teenage years. We all started playing together around 2004-2005, just jamming at people's houses and then we decided to form a band later on. We don't really have a "line-up" per se, we're just a group of friends and they (guitar, saxophone, keyboard, violin and drums) were just the instruments we happened to play. There was no conscious decision to include instruments or members and we really just fell together.

So you play lead guitar, right?
Well, we don't have a bassist so I play chords and a bit of lead guitar at times but I usually try to compensate for our lack of bass. It's still good but it's-- interesting . We're never serious but we've kind of entertained the thought of having a bass player but there's no way we'd want six people in the band [laughs].

It's safe to say your influences are a lot wider-ranging than the typical Joy Division , The Smiths and Nirvarna cited by most artists. Do you have any particular influences as a band?
We've never sat down as a band and gone "Hey, I like this, let's do something like that", but the music we listen to? It's so different, we all listen to all different stuff. Josh (Bush, drummer) listens to only Australian music, like Silverchair , Holi is into, like, Pavement and Bob Dylan , which I listen to as well; Millie ( Hall , saxophonist and keyboardist) is into jazz and classical music. Daisy, I don't know, listens to more-- corny kinds of music? Folky guitary stuff, you know? So I suppose our tastes are ecclectic which can infiltrate into the music.

So how do you feel about the increasing media exposure you have gotten of late?
I'm-- I'm not too sure. It's definitely a positive thing, it's not something to be afraid of, unless people are asking you to change your music, which no one is, and there's really no pressure. It's a different aspect to the music, but you have to do it. We did our first video promo a month or so ago and we decided to shoot with a friend, deciding that was easier, but because of HSC and being on a break from music at the time, it was hard to get together and shoot someting, so it's just all us, individually in our rooms, playing. It felt really weird, having this guy in my face while I was playing in my room.

I also don't like interviews that are filmed, they're just really awkward. We did one for Pedestrian and it was so bizarre watching it back, watching yourself say the most stupid things. It was horrible. When we all watch it now, we just cringe.

You've been starting to gig around more, do you enjoy playing the live shows?
Yeah, we haven't done anything in a while, our last gig was in June--

--the whole four month break thing?
Yeah, that whole HSC thing [laughs]. It feels like it was so long ago and doing HSC is kind of like being in a black hole, so you kinda come out and your all "whoa". So basically, we're just waiting for the EP launch and then we're off to Melbourne for the Architecture in Helsinki tour. We've never gigged outside of Sydney so it's our first interstate trip; we've been trying to figure out accommodation and all that as well. We're staying at my grandparents house in Adelaide so that should be interesting again. We're doing Laneway Festival as well which means more going on planes; aeroplane food . I doubt we're going to get any on whatever cheapo airline we're traveling but whatever.

So what else is set for the year ahead?
Well we got a bunch of press out of the way last week so basically, just chilling until our shows. We also have an awards night to attend because we got nominated for the Qantas SOYA (Spirit of Youth Awards) along with Young + Restless and Mercy Arms which is kind of awkward seeing as I go out with the drummer (Julian Sudek) from Mercy Arms. I actually had a dream last night, I'm staying over at his house at the moment and I had a dream where they won and I woke up and was all I guess it's all over, we didn't win, you know, but then was all wait, it was only a dream! I told him and now, ha, there's this whole competative air floating around*. I also want to go to art school next year. I have interviews coming up and I need to arrange my folio. One of my interviews is actually on the day we fly out for Adelaide so that's a problem. Painting is my major passion--

--were you the one that painted the EP cover then?
No, that was some guy, some weird guy Holiday managed to find on the internet that does these kitchy baroque-style still lifes. These weird images of pomegranates and rotting pumpkins, that sort of deal. She just emailed him and yeah. We were originally going to pay him but he said no, just spend the money on as many roses as you can for yourselves.

Uh, yeah.

Bridezilla's debut self-titled EP is out on Ivy League now.

*Young + Restless actually ended up winning the SOYA Award. Damn.

JOSH EARL

Kellie Sutherland sings and plays an assortment of instruments for orchestral art-pop collective Architecture In Helsinki. The band have a new album called Places Like This, and are embarking on their third national tour this year in support of it. Although the band has always had a quirky and lively sound, the album finds them at an unprecedentedly energetic level, with more electronic dabbling than previous albums. Was this a conscious decision?

“No, not really,” says Sutherland, sounding a little bemused. “I guess that came down to the mixing of the album. All the instruments on the album are what we play live. When we recorded the album at the end of last year, we had just finished one month of touring [with Clap Your Hands Say Yeah], and wanted to capture the songs live. We put down about 70 percent of the record in about six days, so it was definitely like our live sound on the record. But I guess the electronic instrumentation at the forefront as a creative choice by us as producers.”

The band set up camp for recording in New York, where the group's principal songwriter, Cameron Bird, is currently based. Before meeting up in America, the band had worked on material together through the internet, a method of collaboration that is becoming increasingly common. “Each of us had our own home recording set-up,” Sutherland explains. “At first, it was a huge challenge because we hadn't written any music when we weren't all in the same room together, but it soon found its way into a new way of working pretty easily. It meant that I went home and downloaded all the stuff that Cameron was sending and set it up in a ProTools session for myself, and then I'd start writing all my parts over the top. And if it wasn't working, it was only up to me to decide that. And if I thought it was the bomb, I'd send it off to everyone else and more often than not it was included. It just sort of freed up a lot of stuff and everybody was able to work individually and yet collectively. I don't know that I'd jump at the chance to do it again, but it really worked for us. The self-empowerment was a pretty awesome feeling.”

Although the band is now a six-piece after the departure of Isobel Knowles and Tara Shackell last year, it's still a large number of people to work with. Is it ever difficult to make decisions and keep everybody happy? “It never really feels like there's more than one conversation going on,” Sutherland says. “We were all there during the recording process. We were separate when we were writing the demos, but when we were rehearsing the songs and really tightening up the arrangements, we were all there together. It feels like we're all on the same page anyway. When it comes down to it, we usually agree.”

In the interim between 2005's much-lauded In Case We Die and Places Like This , the band released We Died, They Remixed , a compilation of remixes that received mixed reviews. “After not putting anything out for a while and having all these remixes that people had made for us, we thought we'd do a whole album,” says Sutherland. “Cameron took on the project and chose all these people that he thought would do a good remix. Eventually, it came together. It was something that I wasn't sure about, but then when I heard it, I was really happy with it. I really like the chance to work with other people as well the people that I work with in the band. It's really amazing to hear the songs that you know so well turned into something new by people that you respect. You get to understand more about production and more about making music by just listening to other people and what they've done to your songs.” And her favourite? “The 33hz remix of IT'5! I've heard that song so many times because we play it live all the time. People really like that song, but it seems like a song that has been around for years and years. So when I heard somebody do a remix of it, it was so refreshing to hear the song in a new way.”

Liam Casey

The number of reputable media outlets who have attributed the funky orchestral pop of albums Boardface and Like Drawing Blood to Goyte rather than Gotye is astounding, and I won't embarrass them by naming them here. All that matters is that you know the difference.

Gotye is the nom de guerre of Melbourne-based Wally De Backer. (Wally is short for Walter, which is the English version of Gautier, which is Belgian-born De Backer's original name, and Gotye is a phonetic spelling of Gautier. So there you have it.) De Backer recently walked away with the ARIA Award for Best Male Artist. “I don't really buy into the hype, the glitz and the glamour,” he says. “So things like going to the ARIAs I find a bit weird, a bit strange." Nevertheless, attending the ceremony meant “an amazing weekend and a chance to play in a stadium, so that was very cool. And, I suppose, [I got] a nice, warm, fuzzy feeling that folks in the industry have some genuine respect for what I'm doing musically and independently on the business side of things with my Gotye stuff.”

De Backer's legion of devoted fans will object, but there are objections grumbling through the music industry about the award. Although De Backer drums in The Basics, he is not a musician per se. ““Most of the musical or instrumental elements of what I do as Gotye are sampled,” he explains. “It's actually a process of collecting records, MP3s, CDs, sometimes even VHS.” De Backer describes himself as a “vinyl vulture”: “taking really old, weird stuff that nobody knows or cares about any more [and] manipulating pre-existing bits of sound.” Although his vocals and some instruments are recorded live, De Backer says he will still go and tweak these sounds, estimating that around 90% of the material on last year's Like Drawing Blood was extensively processed.

I wasn't surprised to learn that one of De Backer's strongest influences is Kate Bush, a pioneer of production and melodramatic pop. “When I was a young boy, I was holidaying with my parents. I must have been about seven, and there was a teenage girl in this caravan park that I hung out with. She played me Pater Gabriel and Kate Bush for the first time, and it must have made an impression: I never grew up listening to them, but I kind of rediscovered Kate Bush and Peter Gabriel around age twenty.

"There was this element of nostalgia and rediscovery. I just got so into this music, especially the Hounds Of Love album. I'd just come home from work and fall asleep listening to it, pick apart all the amazing things she was doing, production-wise, the way she experimented with her voice and different instruments. Now, I put on records like Hounds Of Love and The Dreaming , especially, and feel very inadequate as a producer.”

Bush is an artist renowned for her almost hermitic existence: she hasn't performed live in decades, and her most recent album, 2005's Aerial , came after a twelve-year silence. Gotye was a similarly studio-only project. Despite playing live with his other band The Basics, De Backer had only played a handful of shows with his Gotye material. Earlier this year, however, he put together an ambitious mini-orchestra and took it on the road. How difficult was it, I wonder, to make the transition from recording artist to performing artist? "On a scale of one to ten – with ten being the most difficult – it was definitely a ten,” he says with an almost mirthless laugh. “It was lots of fun, and a great experience, but also extremely difficult, and often frustrating. I'm extremely tired, and I don't really see and endpoint to this kind of hard work. To put it simply, I promised myself I wanted to do this music live, and there are still parts of me that go, ‘I wish I hadn't done that, because I probably would have written another record by now'. But instead, I might not make a record for another couple of years because I've made the decision to play [my music] live. But if I didn't try to make this stuff happen live, quite a lot of opportunities like playing at the ARIAs and building my audience, aren't really viable.”

And now that this audience is growing, can they expect new material any time soon? “No,” he says without hesitation. “That's the downside to all these amazing opportunities, if there is one. I've been so busy between Gotye and The Basics that there's been nary a second to really have a life, let alone write new music.”

Ah well, you can't blame me for asking.

LIAM CASEY

It's Thanksgiving in America, and Tegan and Sara Quin have spent the day at a soup kitchen. No, they're not musicians struggling on the breadline: they volunteered their services for the day to feed the hungry and homeless of Boston, Massachussets. “There were these funny old ladies, and there were nine of us. They put us to work, washing pots and whatever, and I could tell they were relieved that they didn't have to do it. It's good for us: we've been on tour since June, so I haven't washed a dish in four months. It was good practice,” Sara says with a laugh.

As any touring artist will tell you, a long time on the road takes its toll. So I ask Sara what she prefers: recording or touring. She pauses. “I see my life in three sectors,” she begins. “I love being a performer; I love touring and playing live. That comes with a lot of strange things: being on television, and doing interviews. That's really a funny part of our job. I love being in the studio, I love writing music, and getting creative. Not just with music, but with everything: visual arts, album artwork, t-shirt design and backdrops. When you're mapping out your tour and what your record campaign is going to be like, I love that stuff. I love the business, I love the do-it-yourself attitude that we all have. The other part of my life is normal: I belong to a book club, I like to cook, I like to write songs and hang out with my family and go bowling. I see all of those different sectors, and there are pros and cons to all of them. I don't know what I like the best; I just like that I have the opportunity to do all three at different times of my life. If I only had to do one of those things, I might get sick of it, but I like that in my life, I can be doing one or all of those things. So I like all of them!”

With so much creative energy, I wonder (aloud, of course) whether Tegan and Sara have considered pursuing careers outside of their creative partnership. Sara has, after all, recently released a collaborative single, We're So Past This, with Canadian band The Reason. “I heard Tegan say once, and I totally agree, that she can put some of her extraneous energy into other projects, but the truth is, this is a full-time job and it's difficult to really put your time and energy into something else,” she says. “We're young and we're prolific, but I don't know that we can put all of our energy into Tegan & Sara forever and feel completely fulfilled. So I think, for sure, at some point [we would do that]. Tegan has other side projects, and I've always thought about other careers I'd like to try at some point in my lifetime. I think we both want to have families. I think that at some point, the energy that we put into Tegan & Sara will wane a little bit. But right now, we both fixate a lot on it. We really want this to be successful. We get a lot of enjoyment out of playing this music and touring with one another. For right now, it makes us really happy.”

This open-ended attitude to their career is reflected in their songwriting processes, Sara says. Each girl will write and record their own demos (Sara recorded hers in the closet of her Montreal home). “Tegan and I have never been competitive or protective of what we do. As long as we give each other the space to write the song, I think that we're happy to sign off on it and say, ‘Okay, now you put your ideas down on it'. We're able to give another perspective, and in some way, we've always been each other's producers. We've always been able to say with an unbiased perspective, ‘This song is great, but you really need a bridge' or ‘I hate these lyrics, change these lyrics'. We don't get very spastic about it.”

Liam Casey

Have you ever been afraid? I have. I was waiting for a telephone call from Amanda Palmer, who you may know as the pianist, singer and songwriter from The Dresden Dolls. I know that she's articulate, intelligent and prone to mood swings. She's going to eat me alive, I think. It seems her hunger for human flesh has been satisfied for the moment, however, as Palmer chats openly (although she sounds rather tired) from her home in Boston, Massachusetts about her upcoming solo tour and record. Her Australian tour predates the release of her album – an unusual way to do things, I suggest.

“That hadn't occurred to me!” she says. “I never really think about it in those terms. As far as I'm concerned, I have fans and I have time and I want to travel.” Though the album – titled Who Killed Amanda Palmer? – is definitely coming. Initially, Palmer simply wanted to release ballads that hadn't made it onto The Dresden Dolls' records. “Of course, nothing went as expected and the record took on a life of its own as soon as Ben got involved,” she explains. Ben? you may wonder. Who is this Ben? Ben Folds is the answer, a name I certainly never expected to see on a list of people Amanda Palmer would collaborate with. “It's been incredibly enlightening and really educational and, for the most part, tonnes of fun, because Ben is the most hilarious guy. He captured it incredibly well, and I found it incredibly easy to trust him, to do what he saw fit. Which is very unlike me: I'm traditionally a control freak, but handing my baby over to Ben Folds was easy.”

The baby in question, Palmer explains, “is like apples and oranges [when compared] with The Dresden Dolls: what we do works because it's minimal. In the case of these songs, it works as well, but in a different way. It's much more expansive, musically, and there's a lot of orchestration. It's just a bigger, richer, fuller sound.”

Palmer is quick to explain, with a melodramatic laugh, that she “didn't do this solo record to escape the shackles of The Dresden Dolls.” As well as working on his own projects, Palmer says that Brian Viglione, her co-conspirator in The Dresden Dolls, has “been really supportive, but also really honest in his feedback. He's been a really helpful voice in the production of my record because nobody understands my music quite like Brian does: nobody has had the intimacy with it that he's had. I think we were both really terrified that we would go the way of other bands on hiatus, or that we would really burn ourselves out. Luckily, that hasn't happened: we've got a really strong partnership that I treasure and cherish.”

As well as her own material, Palmer has been playing a lot of covers on tour – from Radiohead's Creep to St Vincent's Marry Me , along with much older and more obscure material. “I find myself picking out songs on the piano just because I want to and, to me, playing covers is the most fun part of being a musician. As someone who generally performs my own stuff, there's a lot of baggage. You can feel a wonderful sense of relief when you play somebody else's beautifully written song.

Like Tori Amos before her, Palmer has managed to reinvent the role of the piano in contemporary music with nothing more than rudimentary music-reading skills. “I think I have a moderate wiring problem,” she says. “I can't touch type. Even though I type incredibly fast, I can only type if I'm looking at the actual letters. In much the same way, I can improvise on the piano and play by ear very proficiently, but only if I'm looking at my hands. Part of the difficulty for me in sight-reading is just having to look from the page to my hands to the page to my hands: I can't actually make the connection between my fingers and the notes on the page. Even putting time in it, I never really got above a second grade reading level. I do genuinely wish that I could have a more loving relationship with the piano: sit down with a glass of wine and play some Chopin or Bach, just because I felt like it, but maybe in another lifetime.”

LIAM CASEY

Victoria, is the town to be exact. In Canada's British Columbia province with a population of 78,000 supported an eclectic music scene, too small to segregate into genre distinctions. "We'd be an indie rock band playing with a death metal band and then a folk singer-songwriter." And  having a wide range of musical influences and intermingling within the scene has definitely had an effect on Hot Hot Heat's music. Forming around 1999, the quartet, with original singer Matthew Marnik , initially played what has been described as hardcore-influenced 'guitarless synthesizer-led math-rock' (wow, can someone spare me a handful of tissues after that wank ?), which can be heard on their compilation Scenes One through Thirteen . Yet finding that approach to making music more constrictive than first thought, their style evolved to what is found on 2002 debut album Make Up The Breakdown , aided by a line-up change, Bays taking up vocal duties as well as to manning the keyboard and the addition of Dante DeCaro on guitar.

Since then, the band has recorded 2005 sophomore effort Elevator , lost DeCaro to Montreal band Wolf Parade , gained a member; San Franciscan Luke Paquin, toured Elevator and have now come to round to recording and releasing Happiness LTD . "So much of making a record is dependent on the interrelationships you have in the band, put four musicians in a room, no matter how talented, and you can't produce music with meaning without that connection. The thing with having Luke in the band is that we're like a gang now, much tighter than we were when we were kids. Luke joined right after we finished recording Elevator and we had two years of hanging out, touring and getting to know each other. We recorded a lot for this album, but ended up choosing the songs that meant the most to all of us."

A surprising inclusion on the album is the song 5 Times Out of 100 , which featured on pre- Make Up The Breakdown EP, Knock Knock Knock . Having the chance to record with producer Eric Valentine of Songs For The Deaf fame,yet having no material ready, the band decided to lay the track down, a second time around. "It's such a fun song to play live but no one seems to know it and it ends up being more of a bummer than anything. So recording it with Eric gave us the chance to kill two birds with one stone. And the version on the EP is the shitty version we recorded ourselves and that song really deserves a chance."

The recording process of Happiness LTD was vastly different to that of the previous albums, some having being written on tour and recorded on laptops, much being re-written in several different studios with after a change in direction, the album originally intended to be the representation of a live show, a more cinematic approach was adopted and many songs dropped as a result. Trying to capture the raw energy of the performance gave way to increased musical experimentation. "We recorded our song, Out of Heart and began adding theramins and getting our friends to sing on it and the next thing you know, we have an orchestra. Once you get a taste of experimenting and how fun it is, we just went through the whole album and kept on adding more and more. We just had fun surprising each other with what we could do."

This contrasts greatly to the way Elevator was written and recorded, the band working in the seclusion provided by a converted barn, in a lake town north of Victoria, cutting repeated demos, then heading off to Los Angeles for sessions with producer Dave Sardy. "I don't care where you record a song, it's not important, but where you write a song really effects you" Bays muses when asked the difference in writing and recording on-the-go and in seclusion. "I don't like being to comfortable. At one point, while recording I got rid of most of possessions, moved into some hole in the wall and pushed everyone away from me, intentionally kinda screwed my life up because I think if I'm too comfortable, I'm not inspired. And there's this kinda of comfort that with self-sabotage, the only way to make yourself feel better is to be creative."

The tour bus is another outlet to which the four express their creativity, living there on an almost constant basis, they're, uh, often resourceful. When we caught up in the week preceding Halloween, the bus covered in chains, skulls, giant spiders, hanging skeletons and a fog machine. In the bus. "You walk into the bus and there's fog everywhere.  We also got our hands on some realistic looking pellet guns for when we were crossing the border (from Canada into the USA) for-- I don't even know why, but we get to the border and the customs officer was screaming at us saying she was going to arrest all us. We spent about an hour trying to talk our way out of getting arrested." 
Dustin (Hawthorne , bassist) is always the one getting in trouble, getting kicked out of hotels that kind of stuff. Someone, I guess, threw a milk crate at him on the street and knocked him out. He somehow stumbled back to his bunk and there was this trail of blood leading right up (to his bunk). There was blood everywhere. Anyway Paul (Hawley, drummer) thought it would be amusing to well, firstly check he was okay, but then-- we had this stack of Mojo magazines and he ripped each page out of the magazine, crumpled it up and filled the bunk up with them. Uh, yeah.

Our crew are all fun people, no one is really a bummer, and there's always a sense of adventure."

Responses to the album have been largely favourable, surprisingly given the panning Elevator was given, critics considering it a poor effort compared to the gem that was Make Up The Breakdown . "I've always thought that Elevator would make more sense to everyone once the third record came out, once people had established what was going on. With Make Up , we wanted it to be this punk rock, new-wave thing; with Elevator we wanted this big OTT pop album, but I also knew that we didn't want to do that again," Bays then going on to describe how this record is kind of the opposite, Elevator having been really dry, and what you see is what you get, whereas this one is more uh, wet, more mysterious.

The album process, not often spoken of was actually captured in one hundred hours of footage, cut and packaged with the album on DVD. Rather than being a glorified account of events, it shows the fighting, the complications of trying to work with four different people's ideas on the same piece of work and man, at any one time, at least one person looked as if they wanted to cut a bitch. Like Paquin mentions to Bays early on in the film, "this is just going to show you for the fucking ruthless dictator you are". For a band who hate shooting promo videos ("I don't see what it has to do with being a band at all and think it's one of the most stupid ways to try and promote a song or an album. But hey.") why release such a frank account to the public?  
"It's just such a bizarre thing to do. Originally it was our friends' idea, asking if they could do the whole fly-on-the-wall thing and they shot all this footage in the studio, the whole time and we didn't think too much of it. Then they edited it in their spare time and showed it to us. I totally hated it because they had made it totally flattering and out that we were really funny guys, that we all got on really well together and that making an album was a breeze, but it wasn't like that at all. So I took the footage and I edited myself to show all the fighting and so people could see the flaws. There's something really intimate about how it all turned out in the end. The other guys in the band thought it showed to much but I was the one saying let's do it, let's just do it and see what happens. A lot of people hide behind this air of mystery, this bullshit cool that was okay in the sixties, seventies, eighties but it's not real. And you see people put on this rockstar persona for interviews and whilst some of that rock and roll stuff goes on sometimes, it's mainly just this fake bullshit."

NATASHA THEOHAROUS

Upon first listen, this album, with it's pop-rock sensibilities, leaves you feeling, well, empty. Bang, boom, that's it. However on subsequent listens to Great Vengeance and Furious Fire, the full, snaking funk melodies begin to wash over you and in no time you're left bobbing your head back and forth - as if your neck is composed entirely of rubber - the way only bassists do. With the influences of dirty blues, soul, glam and raw acid rock all evident throughout the album's ten tracks, the Bath quintet's sound transports you to some bizarre blaxploitation flick. Album opener "That Kind Of Man", arguably the finest track, hits you front right and center, lead singer Swaby 's Curtis Mayfield - esque falsetto floating over that rhythm. Next track "Coleen" takes us down a notch, the rest of the album following this sine wave path of high and low right through to laid-back soulful closer "Who Needs Sunshine". Highlights on the way include "Don't You Know" and "Girl", the latter unleashing a surprisingly fitting spoken word rap over a sixties garage beat.

Great Vengeance and Furious Fire, both a grower and a shower. Who would have thunk it?

NATASHA THEOHAROUS

When I say this record is quaint, I mean it with every positive connotation the word can carry. Alela Diane's debut, The Pirate's Gospel, is a gorgeously uncomplicated affair. Recorded in her father's home studio, the production and delivery are heartfelt and simple. With very little ornamentation, Alela sings her circling songs on the guitar with a few vocal loops and handclaps. Oh, and backing vocals from friends and primary school age cousins. There's a haunting quality to Alela's voice, like a more subdued Joanna Newsom (her most easily identifiable contemporary). She brings a quietly epic quality to songs such as "Pieces Of String" and "Clickety Clack", which find metanarratives for human existence in everyday domesticity, which are offset nicely by the brief sweetness of "Something's Gone Awry".

It probably won't be the most bone-shaking album you hear this year, but it's refreshing to hear an album that is so honest, straightforward and unadorned. It's the kind of album that stoners, hippies, artists, yuppies and nannas around the world can agree to love.

LIAM CASEY

23 is the second EP from Perth four-piece The Silents. Their music is a little like the Kooks but at the same time a bit more reminiscent of Epicure. They've got some pleasant sounds on this recording, as "Window" demonstrates. Although parts of the EP fall somewhat flat, the band is expected to release an album soon through Ivy League records, and this might be what's needed to really demonstrate the quality of their music. A bit more variety on the album would perhaps improve things. No doubt they have some pretty cool moments where you can get a future glimpse as to what they might grow into.

Their "garage-psychedelic", that also encompasses some rock influences, is mostly a nice mixture jarring guitars and "swinging" drums. Although they band has a tendency to provide a smooth travelling collection of songs, this perhaps borders on causing some distraction through similarities in riffs and beats.

After such a success and constant air-play with the track "Nightcrawl" on Triple J, from their previous EP "Flicker and Flames", hopefully this one can match in popularity and attention.

Caroline McCrudy

As incredible as Mum's previous albums have been, this one takes the almighty cake. It's an incredibly beautiful record, accompanied by some amazing illustrations included in the artwork. The atmosphere this record provides is a very uplifting one, and while the songs are less experimental than on previous albums, they are no less enjoyable for the fact.

The samples used remind me of what might your favourite objects you keep in a drawer or your special jewelry that's kept in a precious box would sound like if they suddenly came to life and began joyfully dancing around with each other. In the more quiet parts of the album, the background sounds are reminiscent of what you hear on those nights trying to go to sleep when everything is silent, but there are still tiny little noises that can be heard.

The different instruments that are used on the album like: harmonics, violins, accordions and some electronic elements are all intertwined to create some very intriguing soundscapes.

Tracks like, "Blessed Brambles" and "They Made Frogs Smoke Til' They Exploded" are highlights on the record, but the vocals by the twin sisters Gyoa and Kristin Anna Valtysdottir in "School Song Misfortunate" are so great and childlike. This is definitely one of those "I'm listening to this album and nothing else for the whole week" kind of deals.

Caroline McCurdy

It would be too easy for me to review this album by simply saying “Ripe – like a big pile of shit” and also, it wouldn't necessarily be true. After the success of Ben Lee's last album the time was perfect for him to capitalise on this new audience with his unique brand of indie-pop. Unfortunately (for Ben Lee at least) this album won't do that mainly because it isn't that great, it also isn't terrible, it's just a bit like fairy-floss, sweet, light but, in the end, nothing really.   

Ben Lee knows how to write a good song, Evan Dando can testify to that, but what makes his songs connect is when they feel like there's an intimacy between the song and the listener. The irony is that while so many of the songs here deal with the subject of intimacy they feel cold and disconnected, especially the track ‘Sex Without Love' which starts off sounding like Bon Jovi, and like Bon Jovi it's not very good (read awful).

The best song on here is the title track Ripe, another song from this album about letting go and falling in love, and it may not be a coincidence that the reason that it is the best song is that it is also the song with the least amount of musicians with just Ben on acoustic guitar joined by Mark Goldenberg on electric. It's simple and it works, but alas, it's already too late as when this song finishes so does the album and, as the listener, you're left wanting something a bit more substantial.

JOSH EARL

After tackling beautiful Balkan bleakness on Gulag Orkestar just a year ago, Beirut turns his hand to romantic Parisian pop. The trademarks of his debut are still here – his baritone, oddly epic in its monotone, the droning and often playful accordion – but the arrangements are handled with a lighter hand, and given little French flourishes of euphonium and glockenspiel. The regal sweep of Nantes and Cliquot are highlights, as is the surprisingly upbeat In The Mauseoleum.

It's a rather majestic affair, expanding the sound of Gulag Orkestar rather than radically altering it, and this is what often rings false. You see, Beirut is also known as Zach Condon, an American teenager who began composing his mournful songs after a trip to Eastern Europe. There is something almost insulting about a Western teenager appropriating these musical traditions he has little knowledge of, mustering nostalgia for a time and place he has never known. Nevertheless, The Flying Club Cup is an impressive piece of work, despite the cultural colonisation. Oh, and did I mention that Owen Pallett, who you may know as Final Fantasy, arranged the strings?

Liam Casey

Folk punk. Two tone ska. Current wave British indie rock. Labeling the self-titled debut album by Southampton lads, SixNationState , as any of the above would be fitting yet still, inadequate.

Unlike most current wave British indie rock - probably their most accurate descriptor - SixNationState incorporate more into their music then the typical Libs/Strokes/anythingreleasedinthepastfiveyears mix that most young bands exploding right about now seem to hold sacred (yes, I'm looking at you, The Wombats .) And as a consequence, they actually generate that raw blinding excitement that bands like The Libertines , The Strokes , The Coral and more recently, Larrikin Love brought to their early releases. And that, is much more important than a catchy yet transient hook and Single of the Week in the NME (still fucking looking at you, The Wombats.)

To pick a standout track on this album is a task in itself, with the songs fitting together and flowing naturally, yet all different in their approaches; the production and way of handling the songs, maintaining congruence throughout.

Production on this album maintains their raw, manic vivacity without losing that edge, which unfortunately is too common an occurrence in production in recent times, the music losing several of its facets on the mixing board.

Basically what I'm saying is, if you had the choice to buy either this or The Wombats' A Guide To Love, Loss And Desperation, put the disc by those overrated bastards down and buy this. It has a shelf life of more than three months and your ears and wallet will thank you for it.

(Seriously though, what kind of name is The Wombats? I just, I don't even know...)

NATASHA THEOHAROUS

For the past year there has been little to impress on the Sydney scene. Band after band regurgitate the same rubbish that leaves you looking for love. In the midst of all things mediocre is born a band that is actually worth the hype: Bridezilla.

The elevator to the Oriental Room of the aptly chosen Mandarin Club was adorned with faux red roses; a clever coordination with their gig poster and a suggestion that there was indeed something to be excited about.

Bridezilla launched their debut EP while executing a subtle kind of confidence. They know they are worthy of all the attention, but aren't big-headed about it in the slightest. Bridezilla have been playing gigs quite regularly over the past year. It's seen them mature greatly and thankfully suggests more good things are to come.

Naturally, all the tracks on the EP were showcased, with the recent single “Brown Paper Bag” penultimate and the airwave favourite “St. Francine” left for last. Throughout the entirety of the set Bridezilla exuberate through the close connection between them, exemplified through their mutual support when sound and technical difficulties arose. Love your friends, love Bridezilla.

ADELA AMANOWICZ

Culminated at the height of the British indie explosion of the early 2000s, Art Brut fit snugly amongst the barrage of neo-post-punk and garage revival as the band to whom you could giggle and dance at the same time. Saturated with a razor-sharp wit, which saw them make a mockery of everything from their own personal misfortunes [“Rusted Guns Of Milan”] to the very indie scene they were a part of [“Formed A Band”], the Bournemouth quintet stirred the British music press as one of the UK's most unique bands. But that was then. Playing to a moderately busy Corner Hotel, what becomes clear is that now, as dance and grunge have made their defiant returns, Australian crowds have changed and Art Brut have missed the boat. Had this gig occurred a year ago, perhaps it would have garnered the response it deserved, because lacklustre Art Brut certainly were not.

Led by the infinitely charming Eddie Argos, whose onstage swagger had the crowd chanting “Art Brut! Top Of The Pops!” like football hooligans, the band performed an entirely improvised set, relying on audience requests to dictate their setlist, a sure-fire of sing-alongs from debut LP Bang Bang Rock N' Roll , laced with singles from the sophomore It's A Bit Complicated . Singing praise for both Melbourne and the Meredith Music Festival at which they played the weekend prior, it seems Art Brut's charm is not lost with the gathering of anglophiles here tonight. Yet as a brilliant delivery of “Good Weekend” brings their capital set to a close, their only misfortune lies in their inability to pull a larger crowd within an increasingly segregated indie scene.

Aleena Glentis

Fire! Sparks! Eyeliner! Oh my! My Chemical Romance's first full-scale Australian tour had it all. I was worried that the band would get lost in the cavernous Sydney Entertainment Centre, but like other artists I've seen perform there – David Bowie, with a glittering runway, and Scissor Sisters, with enormous breasts projected on stage – they proved themselves more than capable of pushing their performance to the very back rows.

The band opened with This Is How I Disappear , a menacing and lonely song that set the scene for the set (as did the enormous backdrop of hungry wolves). The set list drew primarily from last year's The Black Parade , dipped occasionally into their breakthrough album Three Cheers For Sweet Revenge , and completely ignored their debut record I Brought You My Bullets, You Brought Me Your Love . (With good reason, might I add.) Every song, however, was greeted with cheers of emo joy (which marred the slower moments, like the heart-shatteringly tragic Cancer ). Frontman Gerard Way's voice was sufficient, but hardly extraordinary: he could carry a tune on stage, but he held himself close to the nasal end of his range. The band were incredibly tight, too, even with a couple of the full-time members temporarily MIA.

A couple of horrified parents quickly escorted their children from the arena when Way simulated masturbation on stage and employed a string of expletives that could only be described as “shocking” (or perhaps “gratuitous”). But really, what do you expect when you take your twelve-year-old to see a band called My Chemical Romance? The band slowed things down with a surprising acoustic rendition of b-side Desert Song , before launching into the anthemic Famous Last Words, a perfect sing-along end to the set.

Unless you're a fifteen-year-old girl (and there's nothing wrong with that), you can't take My Chemical Romance completely seriously. There's a knowing edge of high-camp irony and melodrama to their performance, and the best way to enjoy it is to lose yourself in it: scream the lyrics you know, wave your arms when you're told to and hold your friends' hands as you jump up and down to your favourite songs. That's how I did it, and it was awesome.

Liam Casey