Kim Salmon (pictured), underground Australian rock living legend formerly of The Scientists, currently of Precious Jules, is available to give guitar lessons. If you can get to Melbourne for a lesson he’s charging $50 per hour as well as giving $30 per half-hour tutorials to beginners. All you have to do is find him on Facebook or Twitter, where he’s @mrkimsalmon.

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BYRON NAMENYI, singer with hardcore band THIRD STRIKE, talks about ending the band on a high and thanking those who have supported them over the last five years.

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Tony Bennett has received renewed admiration following his latest collaborative duets album, Duets II. The 85-year old crooner plays Brisbane’s Convention Centre on Saturday Apr 7. Tickets are on sale Wednesday Feb 1 from Ticketek.

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Morning Of The Earth – the original film and music – celebrates 40 years with an east coast concert tour, calling into QPAC on Friday Jan 27 and the Gold Coast Arts Centre on Saturday Jan 28. Featuring Brian Cadd, guitarist Tim Gaze (Tamam Shud), and special guests Mike Rudd (Spectrum), Lior and Gyan, tickets range from $79.

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Photo: Charlyn Cameron

If the rumours are true and the Big Day Out is on its last legs, no one has told today’s crowd. Enthusiasm for the festival is high in the Gold Coast Parklands, and everyone seems more relaxed because lines for everything aren’t as long, and the D-barrier’s not as claustrophobic as years past.

With guitarist Lindsay McDougall wearing a fluoro pink headband and gaudy boardshorts, Frenzal Rhomb are taking the piss at the Orange Stage before they play their first song. In between cracks about Kanye West’s barber and how tough Parkway Drive are, the band play their oeuvre of 20-second joke songs like Caps Lock and Beaded Curtains Parts 2 and 3. What other band could get paid to play a festival and spend most of their set ridiculing it?

Outside on a glaringly hot day, in relatively close proximity to beaches, Unearthed winners Dune Rats come alive. With the sun behind them on the Hot Produce Stage, the two-piece (a three-piece today with the help of Last Dinosaurs’ Sean Caskey) ride the wave of their ironically bubblegum surf rock. With a catalogue of songs dedicated to reefer, Xbox and slacking off, the fuzzed out slacker rock outfit sound like Dinosaur Jr. cross-pollinated with The Beach Boys.

A suspicious plume of smoke rolls out of the green stage as Best Coast win over a loosely filled tent with their set of nostalgic odes to love, cats and weed. The lovely Bethany Cosentino & Co. keep the crowd entertained with new material, but tracks Crazy For You and Boyfriend from the band’s debut album are the real highlights; all involved swaying their way throughout a perfectly chilled mid-afternoon set.

What’s the proportion of Boiler Room attendees here to see Odd Future Wolf Gang Kill Them All perform or to flip out? The flip out-hopers will go home disappointed, as the dozen strong hip hop collective are captivatingly aggressive, just this side of chaos. Yonkers is a highlight of fuzzy beats and growls from Tyler, The Creator, but the aftermath is a sharp decrease in crowd numbers, off to graze on another patch of grass.

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(kscope/Shock)

Sprawling double album from modern prog hero

Porcupine Tree frontman Steve Wilson has been a major figurehead in the last few years’ renewed fascination with progressive rock. While this hasn’t culminated in prog becoming anything resembling fashionable, the simple fact remains that the genre enjoys probably its biggest audience since its ‘70s heyday. Wilson is one of the smarter modern prog artists, in that he respects the classic artists of the era (Floyd, Crimson etc) but doesn’t let them infiltrate his own music too heavily. His new album Grace For Drowning is perhaps his most blatant recognition of prog past, right down to its double-disc format. He still avoids the record sounding like a facsimile of the early 1970s by incorporating (as he often does) elements of modern electronica into the sound. But at the same time, the guest-heavy line-up conspires to make this the most retro Wilson recording yet. The likes of Jordan Rudess (Dream Theater), Steve Hackett (Genesis) and Pat Mastoletto (King Crimson) keep things in a decidedly old-school prog direction, but Wilson is too much of an adventurer to stick to one style of music. Throwing in choral chants, Ayler/Coleman-esque free jazz and even some drone/doom elements, it’s an expansive, intense work. There is a lot to take in and its determinedly epic structure makes it less engaging than his last solo record (the messy but fascinating Insurgentes). But it’s still unreservedly recommended for Wilson aficionados or indeed anyone who’s been seduced by the new wave of prog.

***½

MATT THROWER

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