I had a most unusual realisation the other day.  I realised that I had grown up with British Musical Hall tradition tunes.  Now, being in my late thirties this may seem incongruous with a musical tradition that spanned the late Victorian and early Edwardian eras, a hey-day for absinthe.  But something triggered a long forgotten memory in my mind of spending a good part of the late seventies as a child watching ABC television on Sunday nights I believe, following a long-running BBC show called “The Good Old Days“.

For those post-Gen X, this was a somewhat gloriously hokey romp of a tv show (yea, camp even - Victorian Drag anyone ?) where the entire audience dressed up in period Victorian-Edwardian garb (today we might say old school Steampunk….) and sang along to old show tunes with the performers, often well known comedians and singers of the day, hamming it up on stage reliving the glory days of British vaudeville. Such was its popularity that it ran for 30 years.

That’s what people did before Torrent downloads of Joss Whedon shows and internet porn.

It must be said that with the meteoric Burlesque revival, the revival of Music Hall must surely not be far behind, or have a potential niche in these “new old times”.   And so it is with some delight that I stumbled across the Australian performing duo known as Bygone Error, who are making a mark in the Australian folk scene with their resurrected show tunes and bawdy British humour from these delightfully fruity times past.  Think of a musical ‘Are You Being Served?’ in a snazzy bowler & waistcoat and you’ve hit the vibe.

I think these chaps have potential to go wider than the folk scene - any promoters in the Fringe Festival or neo-burlesque milieu should go give them a listen now.  I can easily see them being an excellent support to the other revived lost vaudevillian arts now back in vogue - and to my mind the musical side has been the one component of these traditions largely overlooked with the exception of specialised cabaret chanteuses such as Meow Meow.  But there is so much more musically from this era, and I am glad for one that this dynamic duo are broadening the re-experience of entertainment history.

Dear friendly Libertines amongst the Melburnian set,

Do you have a frock coat and brocaded shirt just dying for an excuse to come out of the closet?

Maybe an insanely tight corset to die for (not in!) or a pair of flirty French ‘Lolly Bloomers’  that screams for some damn high kicking?

The fine people at Marionette Management Talent Agency are having a launch party on the 24th July 2009 on an Absinthe theme, which is a damn good excuse to get dressed in your finest fabulous Victoriana - with a shot of green of course - and go party with all the beautiful, and most talented people. Only $25 for the waged, and $17 for those undergoing higher learning, it will be held at Chasers, 29 Bray Street, South Yarra, with tickets available from Moshtix.

Through the Marionette’s generosity, we at Absinthe.com.au have managed to secure a free double pass for the most fantastically adorned Absinthe.com.au member from Victoria, who can send us a photo of themselves in their Bohemian finest, with a distinctive piece of viridian plumage in their attire.  If you are a couple, why not submit an entry of both of you together?

This is not a competition of chance, luck or serendipity folks. We want you to dress to impress.  The most impressive outfit will secure the prize to what should be an evening of high glamour.

Send an email with your photo to newlibertines @ absinthe.com.au, including your name, absinthe.com.au login name, address & phone number (of both parties if photo is of a couple).

Competition closes Friday 3 JULY 2009. The winner will be announced Friday 10 JULY 2009.

Terms and Conditions:

1) Participation in the competition includes full acceptance of these terms and conditions. 2) Competition open only to those 18 years and older who are members of absinthe.com.au. 3) Entrant(s) will be required to verify their identity and that submitted photos are of themselves and not of a third party. 4) Winner(s) will permit the publishing of their name (or requested nom-de-plume) and photo on absinthe.com.au. 5) All Entrant(s) will also permit the publishing of their photos in a gallery of the “Best Dressed”  on Absinthe.com.au.  Images will not be used in any other commercial capacity. 6) All photos and personal details will be available to the relevant staff of Absinthe.com.au and the Marionette Management Talent Agency for purposes of judging only. At the completion of the competition all personal details and images will not be retained and will be destroyed, save those of the Winner(s) and selected “Best Dressed” as proof of participation under the above Terms and Conditions. No personal details or images will be shared with any other third parties other than those identified in these Terms and Conditions. 7) Winner(s) will be notified by phone and email.

Die Roten Punkte - Adelaide Fringe, Bosco Theatre, 17 March 2009

Have you ever wanted to think the worst of the White Stripes in a dirty Perez Hilton sort of way?

Now you can get your chance by indulging in the eurotrash high-jinks of Die Roten Punkte (which actually translates as the Red Dots – geddit?!? – and not a homage to John Lydon as you might badly translate if you only know your German from repeats of Hogan’s Heroes or reading subtitles of Inspector Rex).

This show is ultimately about therapy.  Certainly for our brother and sister act, Otto and Astrid, who through the therapeutic powers of drum and power chord written songs come to grips with family tragedy, alcoholism and suppressed incestory tendencies.  But maybe therapy for myself also, causing one to reflect upon ones younger formative musical years?

Our protagonists explore the fringes of straight edge and old school punk, Nick Cave-ish poetic indulgence, EBM/Eurosynthpop and yea verily, Bavarian beer hall songs.  I have to admit a guilty familiarity to the various musical phases one passes in one’s ‘yoof’, and scarily so I seemed to identify with the show with more irony then should probably be permitted.

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Adelaide Fringe Review - CW Stoneking @ The Spiegeltent, 15 March 2009

Society loves a personality that is seemingly bigger than the frame in which it is carried  – individuals with a specifically tailored functional reality that invites a response from peers and public.  They are not necessary fictional, but rather an amplification of select traits of real individuals, and executed such that the character is self-sustaining and independent. They truly have a life of their own.

This is of course nothing new.  Artists and intellectuals have been indulging in literary creations as living breathing expressions of the Self for centuries  - authors such as Giacomo Casanova being an adept at exaggerating his own adventures, and his character being all the richer for it. But how many of them can truly use Casanovas reflective self-epitaph “I have lived”?

The personality under scrutiny tonight is Mr CW Stoneking, the son of noted playwright and poet Billy Marshall Stoneking.  If there are any inherited sins of the father, then it is the ability to tell a tale or two.  His songs are back stories. A musical biography.  Ship wrecks off the coast of West Africa, apprenticeships to Hoodoo root doctors in New Orleans, the life experiences of this Warrnambool warbler are the foundation for his style of Hokum Blues.  While Hokum is an oft used a synonym for fabrication – his voice and style are real, and by extension, CW Stoneking the Bluesman is real.

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Adelaide Fringe Event Review - 7 March 09

Do Tibetans experience death any differently to the rest of us?

Short of dying somewhere on the Asian continent at the hand (or should that be hooves?) of a rabid Yak, it is perhaps somewhat easier to ponder these questions through a profound dance/theatre performance of the key Tibetan work known (perhaps erroneously) in the West as the Tibetan Book of the Dead, more accurately named Bardo Todel - Profound Dharma of Self-liberation through the Intention of the Peaceful and Wrathful Ones.

Our psychopomp in this exploration as part of the Adelaide Fringe is Sun Li Tsuei and her ShangOrientheatre company.  Originally from the provinces of Qing Hai and He Nan in China, she emigrated to Taiwan and studied Tai Chi, Chi Gong and meditation.  In the early 80’s she traveled to Europe and studied mime under the master, Marcel Marceau, and also worked with master of physical theatre, Jacque Lecoq.

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Musicians can come in two particular flavours.

There are recording artists who perform. And performers who also record. The ability to truly entertain can often be more the domain of the latter, and sometimes sadly lacking in the former. Thank god Amanda (Fucking MacKinnon) Palmer is the consummate performer.

But before I degenerate into an overt ramble on her performance last night at the Governer Hindmarsh in Adelaide, I want to pay particular praise - and raise awareness- to her “opening act”, a key member of her touring troupe, the ubiquitous Zoe Keating. One time member of cello-rock ensemble Rasputina, also ex- of psychadelic instrumentalists Tarentel, and accomplished performer in her own right, Ms Keating set the tone and musically dictated the prelude to the evening’s convivialities.

Zoe Keating and her amazing loop’n'thing’o’strings

Wielding a cello and a bank of sampling/looping pedals, she folds layer upon layer of neo-baroque sentimentality, electro-experimentalist sensibility and improvisational inspiration.  Within 10 minutes of her performance I left temporarily to go back to the merchandise desk to buy her album One Cello X 16: Natoma.  I don’t think I have done that before with any artist.

Pour one absinthe, press play on your multi-media interface of choice, and listen. Seriously.

Back to Ms Palmer, freshly resurrected and back out of hell, following her many little deaths at the hands of Neil Gaiman.

The demonically divine Ms Palmer and her cenobite minions

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She’s back.

The chanteuse on the loose, noir pop-cabaret songstress Amanda Palmer, one half of the Dresden Doll duopoly, once again graces our fair shores to promote her new album, Who Killed Amanda Palmer?

With songs full of wit and woe, you get be the forensics expert and pour over her exposed brutalised entrails of emotional…I believe the term she used on JJJ today was…’wangst’. Maybe it was only ‘angst’ she said, but hey, wangst implies some degree of self-loving through self-flagellation.

And who doesn’t enjoy a tad of slap, tickle and self torment?

Already winging her away around the country - if you want to her see her on stage exposing her soul and maybe several other parts, pay close attention to the following dates:

26 & 27th February - The Studio, Sydney Opera House, Sydney

1 March - The Tivoli, Brisvegas

3 March - The Corner, Melbourne

4 March - The Gov, Adelaide

6&7 March - Fly By Night Musicians Club, Perth

10 March - The Studio, Auckland (that’s across the ditch guys…)

12 March - The Bodega Bar, Wellington

14 March - The (geographically confusing) Brisbane Hotel, Hobart (back in Australia but still over a ditch)

Want tickets? Then go you should go here.

If one were quicker off the mark, one might have tried to find out more about the slumber party she hosted in Melbourne….flannelete PJs or satin I wonder? Sigh, time for some wangsting…..

It’s Fringe Festival time in Adelaide again, and we at absinthe.com.au will be on the ground at the Garden of Unearthly Delights and other venues, bringing you some of our reviews and experiences at this month long celebration of underground entertainment.

If you haven’t downloaded the program yet, grab one now and become befuddled by the choice before you.  Not in Adelaide?  Grab a discount fare, jump on a plane and come join the frivolities.

The Opening Night Party kicks off this Friday the 27th February with a free party, parade and concert, with TZU, Fire! Santa Rosa, Fire!, The Levitators and Well Being all on the bill.

Some of the performances that have caught our eye that we will be attending include:

CW Stoneking : bluesman and raconteur, letting loose with his pot’o'jazzy jungle blues, straight outta a smokey boozy speakeasy (one with absinthe of course…)

Imogen Kelly - The Undressing Room : Not just a Queen of Burlesque, but an Artist, darling. Take a peek in her undressing room and give yourself something to confess the following Sunday….

The Kustom Kulture Weekend : Hot rods, quiffs, tatts and zombies. Everything goes better with zombies.

Die Roten Punkte : Ich bin ein Berliner! And you too can be a squishy jam donut just by attending the witty punk-pop performances of Astrid and Otto, everyones favourite eurotrash.

And that’s barely scratching the surface……

If you were that sort of soul, you could very well go out every night for the next 30 days.

If that is you, then we raise a glass of the finest jade in your honour….

Review of “New Music To Fall Asleep To…(Lullabies by Justin Ashworth)”

When new members join the merry band of Absinthe.com.au subscribers, occasionally one observes that the email with which they have subscribed deserves further investigation. It is with no small amount of pleasure that I have discovered that we have a broad church of libertarians under our humble canopy, from visual artists, poets, magicians, distillers, dancers, authors, actors, courtesans, journalists, the odd dominatrix or two, and importantly, musicians.

One such Australian musician, and dedicated absintheur, that I would like to bring to your attention is Melbourne based Justin Ashworth.  I have for many years been a devotee of the dark ambient and experimental soundscape genre, and certainly Australia has had no shortage of exponents of this particular craft over the decades.  The opportunity then to explore new work by a local artist over a glass of absinthe or two is a welcome one indeed.

Being armed with droning loops, acoustic neo-folk attitudes and unpredictable acts of psychadelia, he is actually a hard artist to buttonhole through comparison. A good thing I say. You can hear a track or two from the following reviewed album on Justin’s MySpace page - maybe pour yourself a glass before you click through.

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The Dark Cabaret musical genre continues to grow from strength to strength, and shows itself not to be a passing fad riding on the heels of burlesque, but the genuine discovery of a style and approach to song-writing that balances the historical and contemporary.

One such artist worth investigating as the soundtrack to your next absinthe imbibing is the brooding but sultry Nicki Jaine, who’s commanding voice is seemingly far greater than her diminutive stature.

Mesmerising cover versions of German cabaret songs from the 1940s emerge from within, along with her haunting original material. You would probably be forgiven for picturing in your mind something of a Marlene Deitrich-type with an acoustic guitar. And, in case you needed convincing of her credentials, in this genre through a good back story her musical education arose from individuals such as her grandfather, who reputedly learnt the fiddle from Transylvanian Gypsies.

Any more noir and it would hurt, no?

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