X-Ray Words - The Prehistorics (self-released)

Aussie-based perenial European tourists The Prehistorics return with their sixth album. three years in the making and starting just after their last release "Racket du Jour" (2001). The core of the recording band for the last few records, Brendan Sequira (songwriter, vocals, guitar), and Michael Carpenter (drums, production, and plenty more things this time around), enlisted some great guitar players to help out along the way.

It's exactly what you'd expect from a Prehistorics album:  great playing and production, and just that little bit better than the previous offering.

Deep Heat – Rockafella (Tuff Cuff Records)

We’ve all heard about the “difficult” second album, but this takes some beating.

A quarter century spans the debut and the follow-up for Wollongong’s Rockafella. To be fair, a band breaking up will do that. evrery time..

The good news is that the lay-off hasn’t done them any harm, and if you're a vinyl junkie, you'll be stoked that their return to the record racks is in the form of a meaty, thick 180gm slab that's been cut to make a big noise. 

Bright Lights & Dead Beats – DISGRACELand (self released)

It’s hard to translate a live band to tape/hard drive, but DISGRACE Land have given it a damned good shot on their sophomore CD “Bright Lights & Dead Beats”. In doing so, they’ve also wound the clock back to Sydney circa 1986 when the city resonated with the sounds of the garage and the swamp in equally large measures.

“Bright Lights…” is a major sonic advance on “A Beginners Guide to DISGRACEland” and that’s largely down to engineer, mixer and masterer John Cobbin, but the band gave him the songs and performances to make it fly.

It’s a no-frills recording but the energy is palpable on songs like the surging “Sweet Salvation”, brooding opener “Border Town” and the urgent and lean “Better Call Saul”. Granted, you don’t get frontman Carl Musker jumping on top of your stereo to preach at you in person but listening to the CD is the next best thing.

Rosewood – Kevin K and The Bowery Kats (Vicious Kitten)

Around these parts, a new Kevin K album feels just like an old pair of slippers. The sound is lived in, equal parts Johnny Thunders, Stones and the New York Dolls, and the lyrical themes (usually loss, drugs and swimming against the tide) sit just right. Familiarity does not breed contempt. 

Some folks say Kevin K is in the thrall of Thunders and there’s an awful lot of JT in his guitar squall and vocal drawl. That being the case, admiration stops just short of mimicry. The more enlightened think he’s giving a nod to (as opposed to being on the nod with) an enigmatic influence.

 Jails, Death & Institutions – Van Ruin (Crankinhaus Records)

This five-song CD EP is the new project for Sydneysider Phil Van Rooyen, also of Chickenstones and late of Sonic Garage, Circus Chaplins and Panadolls, and for those with short attention spans, in two words it’s: “compellingly great”.

Phil’s on vocals and guitar and is joined by producer Al Creed (New Christs, Panadolls and a million others) on bass and additional guitar, and Stu Wilson (Aberration, New Christs, Lime Spiders, Chris Masuak’s Dog Soldier) on drums. If those credentials strike a chord with you, you’ll take to “Jails, Death & Institutions” like a long-term inmate to a remand hearing.

Interloper - Ed Clayton-Jones (Golden Robot Records)

The past is a mystic portal. You know? Maybe not so much if you're under 24 years; but, if you survive long enough, you draw on the past more than the present, simply because 1) there's a lot more of it, 2) there's a lot you missed the first time, 3) you're finally beginning to put the pieces of your youth together and 4) your thirties and forties will just have to remain unexamined.

Not all of us ponder our beginnings, but we should, because it's how we got here. And some of that getting here was pure luck as much as anything. Anyone who thinks that they were predestined or that their life was written by god ... sorry, chum, you think you're way more important than you actually are. Remember that last roast lamb? Could've grown up and had a happy life, but guess what..?