Liam 'Snowy' Halliwell has been one of Melbourne’s busiest musicians over the past decade. He’s written and played on more songs and in more bands in Melbourne, than anyone would care to write or read, however his new project SB (Snowy Band) might be his finest and most sincere work to date.
 
Self-produced and self-recorded, 'Audio Commentary'  is a work that Halliwell laboured over and sees his craft refined to its absolute finest. Perfectly matching the heartbreakingly sincere lyrical content, with beautifully crafted, spacious instrumental arrangements and ethereal vocal interplay, ‘Audio Commentary’  is an emotive record that’s entirely captivating.
 
To pull the project together, Halliwell enlisted the help of friends Emma Russack, Nat Pavlovic (Dianas) & Dylan Young (Way Dynamic), each of whom bring a complimentary piece to the band, both recorded and live.
 
Release: March 27th, 2020, Spunk Records/Osborne Again
Words: Brain Drain

Powerful Melbourne rock trio Cable Ties have released their widely anticipated second LP, Far Enough.


Capturing the attention of a slew of acclaimed press, Far Enough features all the critical elements of Cable Ties’ sound - colossal walls of ‘70s hard rock and pithy proto-punk are coupled with a pulsing rhythm section, anxious guitar, defiant songwriting, earth-trembling vocals and unwavering intensity. 


According to guitarist and singer Jenny McKechnie, Far Enough revolves around the philosophy of hope, with album tracks drawing from the central theme of finding hope in dark moments. 


“Hope is a really important theme on the album,” says Jenny. “In the past, I thought I could change things. I thought if I pointed out how messed up everything is, then people would see a clear path to fixing these problems. By the time I started writing this album, I had lost this hope. But it’s about the importance of getting hope back, even when you can see no logical reason to have it."


Release: Poison City Records/Merge Records, March 27th, 2020
Words: Slow Clap

More Than Just Ghosts is the new album from The Dead Maggies. Tasmania’s wildest folk-punk, cow-punk, colonial cos-playing, gang vocalist story tellers are back with a powerful new release demonstrating their unique sound. More Than Just Ghosts brings 200 year old stories of rebellion, resistance and death back to life, remembers the Port Arthur massacre, and looks to the future, Australia’s closest neighbours Indonesia, and the past. 

The album was recorded, mixed and mastered across 5,566 km of land and sea. It’s 2020 and a DIY folk-punk band from Tasmania can now access the tools of a global industry. The recording was a bi-national effort - first demoed in Bass Studios, Bandung, West Java (Indonesia) before being sent to Hobart, Tasmania and then back to Bandung again. Fitting then that the first songs from The Dead Maggies to step away from Tasmania, step to Indonesia and their friends lives there. And for the first time the Maggies have included traditional songs, weaving ancient folk stories in amongst their modern folk punk, exposing the links between the past and present of their music and lyrics. Fans of their early work won’t be disappointed though, the core of the album is still the swashbuckling adventures of bush pirates and convict rebels, in some cases following directly on from stories included in their widely acclaimed 2015 album Well Hanged.
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Release: April 3rd, 2020, Folk 'Til Ya Punk Records
Words: Folk 'Til Ya Punk

While Porridge Radio have self-released numerous demos and a garden-shed-recorded album (2016’s Rice, Pasta and Other Fillers) on Memorials of Distinction, Every Bad is a culmination of what has been in the band’s head for some time; the record they have been waiting for the means to record.

2019 saw the band propelled from a word-of-mouth gem of Brighton’s DIY scene to one of the country’s most exciting upcoming bands. Birthed from open mic nights around the seaside town, lead singer Dana Margolin initially performed bedroom-recorded songs to rooms of polite, unassuming audiences who stared at her quietly while she screamed in their faces.  She soon decided to form a band through which to channel her new love of performing and songwriting – and be noisier while she was at it – so Porridge Radio was born.
 
Every Bad arrives full of grand, sweeping ambition – with vocals so urgent that it often feels like it is moved by compulsion rather than choice, with all the rawness of early Karen O, and influences as disparate as Charli XCX and The Cranberries.
 
Speaking of the emotional drive behind the record, Margolin explains “A lot of it was figuring out how I want to exist in relation to others, and how to process my own feelings, how to be vulnerable, how to show people how I feel. I struggle with being vulnerable and being open, so that’s something I do through songs.”
 
And thank goodness she does. Though these songs are deeply personal explorations, expressed via a weird, beautiful musical language all Porridge Radio’s own, they extend a hand to every listener who has felt conflicted, held two feelings in their hearts at once, or flailed around the depths of their own choices and relationships. For those of us who know how that feels, Every Bad is a funny, profound little comfort.

Release: March 13th, 2020, Secretly Canadian/Inertia
​Words: Secretly Canadian