There aren’t too many bands like Melbourne duo FABULOUS DIAMONDS. Drummer and vocalist NISA VENEROSA talks to MICHAEL PINCOTT about new record Fabulous Diamonds Ii, the art of repetition and why they don’t name any of their songs.

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• Three hard-rocking NSW acts are heading out on the Feel It Cuz Tour!, with Sienna Skies (who recently signed a US management deal) joining The Bride and In Hearts Wake for local shows taking in Snitch (Club 299) on Thursday Sep 9; Expressive Grounds, Gold Coast on Friday Sep 10 and Black Box, Nambour on Saturday Sep 11.
• Brisbane promo types Consume (aka Regurgitator’s management) are running a set of eclectic DJ nights at The Hi-Fi’s Vinyl Bar. Starting Friday Sep 10, DJ’s Honky Kong, Tom Eggert and Ben Salter (The Gin Club) will take care of tunes from 8.30pm. You can be sure it won’t be the usual selection!
• Almost five years after the release of their debut album Beads On A String, Brisbane afro-reggae act Kooii are set to release the follow-up, In This Life. They’re launching it with three special shows, including Friday Sep 10 at The Brewery, Byron Bay (with Fyah Walk), Saturday Sep 11 at Northey Street City Farm, Brisbane (all ages, with Tibet2Timbuktu and Samoko) and Sunday Sep 12 at the Sunshine Coast’s Crystal Waters Community Centre (all ages, with Hayden Hack Infusion, Tibet2Timbuktu and Samoko).
• Sydney indie youngsters Lions At Your Door are touring their new single In A Sea next month, with the sextet headed for The Troubadour on Friday Sep 10. You can check out the new track at www.soundcloud.com/lions-at-your-door/in-a-sea.
• The iconic Ann St Party returns to Valley Fiesta after an absence of three years on Friday Sep 10, running 7pm–10pm with films, exhibitions, fashion and live music happening in shop fronts along the strip. An after-party happens at Club Fiesta (corner of Ann & Ballow Sts), a pop-up bar running Friday to Sunday. 
• Redcliffe act Ephemeris are launching their debut album Cynosure at The Palace Hotel in Woody Point on Friday Sep 10 from 7pm, supported by Last Call, The Snatch and Karla & Shaz. They also have an inner-city launch at The Beetle Bar in Upper Roma St on Sunday Sep 12 from 2pm, supported by bayside mates The Cliffes, The Snatch, Upsize and Hypernovae.
• Melbourne band Ninetynine are launching their new (and seventh!) album Bande Magnetique at The Hangar in Red Hill on Saturday Sep 11 as part of the next Lifted Brow journal launch. Do The Robot, Sunshine State, BigStrongBrute and Ambrose Chapel also appear.
• The Tempo Hotel’s downstairs bar, normally home to The Club House, will be given over to Livin’ Music for a showcase on Sunday Sep 12 from 4pm. The free entry event features Princess Rodeo (single launch), The Moniters, The Faze, Incredible Kicks, Sky Writer, Transvaal Diamond Syndicate and Dead Riot (unplugged), closing out the Valley Fiesta weekend in style. 
• Local pop kids Little Scout are set to record their debut album with Scott Bromiley (John Steel Singers) and Jonathan Boulet in the coming month. They’ll be taking a break to play the Brisbane Festival’s West End Live event on Sunday Sep 19, before a bunch of shows supporting Clare Bowditch and Smudge in October. 
• Locals Mt Augustus are finally on the verge of releasing their debut album, almost five years after they formed. The folk-inspired indie rockers will launch the self-titled record (yes, it’s on vinyl) at The Club House on Saturday Sep 25, supported by Turnpike, Feathers and The Keep On Dancin’s.
• You’ve got until Friday Sep 10 to get a crackling virility hedge growing out of your chin – that’s when The Beards arrive in town. They’ll be inspecting facial growths at Ric’s that night and at The Loft on Saturday Sep 11.
• In a show entitled Night Of The She Wolf, three QUT Bachelor Of Music students celebrate graduation by showcasing at The Zoo on Thursday Sep 23. Dana Gerhman, Ivy May Dillon and Elly Dear will perform supported by The Indigo Kids. Head along to check out some brand new talent.

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With the current return to favour of afrobeat, the son of Fela Kuti (arguably the godfather of the movement) Femi Kuti heads to Brisbane’s Powerhouse on Tuesday Nov 23. Joined by his 14-piece band The Positive Force, tickets for this collision of culture and movement are available from the venue box office.

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We All Want To (pictured) have steadied the ship to write and record their debut self-titled LP, out in October through local label Plus One. The quintet have two shows this week, one at Ric’s on Saturday Sep 4 before joining stablemates The Gin Club, Halfway, The Honey Month, and Roz Papalardo at the Plus One Records Big Sound Showcase on Tuesday Sep 7 at The Troubadour.

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The Troubadour - Fri Aug 27

Local indie youngsters Vasy Mollo warm up for the handful of people who’ve arrived early tonight with catchy tunes in the vein of contemporaries Yves Klein Blue. It’s a small crowd for the Nova Live & Loud winners, but a big step in the right direction for a group trying to shake the ‘high school band’ label.

Sydney’s Step-Panther leap straight from the ‘70s with the Dick Dale-inspired nerdy art punk of their Surf EP. Milwaukee features some delightful gibberish from drummer Julio, while the one-minute gem Surf is over before it should be. Tracks D Minus, Superpowerz and Jimmy are classically punk – there’s Buzzcocks-style vocals, a Jonathon Richman sensibility and Velvet Underground influences aplenty.  The Man, The Myth, The Moses begins with the darkly prophetic spoken word of bassist Jose, drawing influence from The Door’s An American Prayer, before exploding into a psychedelic feedback freakout. Awkward frontman Stevesie sums it up before strolling back to the bar, “We’re a fucking good band and don’t you forget it!”

Equally unassuming in their delivery are fellow Sydneysiders Cabins, on tour to promote their altogether gloomy debut album Bright Victory. The brooding vocals of sinister opening song Hounds draws punters from their couches and it turns out frontman Leroy Bressington is ‘that guy with the cool shirt’ who’s been casually chatting about the place all night. It’s a struggle to catch the words through his thick drawl, but a close listen rewards ears with the bizarre narrative of Mary (“She was young with eyes like diamonds / That must have hurt having eyes like diamonds”). A psychedelic cover of Edwyn Collins’s A Girl Like You fills the room with rain-clouds before Oceanic Blues attempts (and fails) at a switch in mood. With Bressington hunched over for the droning keys of popular single Catcher In The Rye and The Moon, a just-over-half-hour set concludes with haunting unease; a characteristic of Cabins.

MEG COLLIS

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(Glassnote/Liberator)

Friend of The Fray offers up third album

Secondhand Serenade is the musical project of singer-songwriter John Vesely, and fans may have had the opportunity to catch him live in Australia when he was here supporting The Fray in 2009. A singer-songwriter is what Vesely technically is, but the term is a little bit misleading in this case, as Vesely doesn’t sound like traditional singer-songwriters a la Josh Pyke or Bob Evans at all. His cloth is cut from the same factory-faded tight denim as bands such as the aforementioned Fray, and other hard pop-rock bands like Fall Out Boy or All American Rejects. Secondhand Serenade is a fitting but unfortunate name, as it inadvertently does a pretty good job of summing up what’s going on here. Truth is, while Vesely is undoubtedly a talented musician and singer, this album offers nothing new or interesting to the genre at all. Sure, the songs may be an honest expression of the writer’s emotional trauma (as the PR claims), but underneath the super-slick production and multi-tracked vocals it comes across as a lot of misplaced teenage angst (note: he’s not a teenager), perhaps caused by his parents not giving him the keys to the BMW for the weekend. As a result, while this album may give solace to all the middle and upper class white teenagers who think their life is unfair, one is generally left a bit nonplussed, like maybe we’ve heard it all before.

**

CHRIS PICKERING

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