Wednesday 12th March
Sometimes people look to us for information and then get disappointed because they thought someone said ‘ThreeThousand is my source' and actually that person said ‘ThreeThousand is on the sauce'. Which points to an uncomfortable truth. This week though, we have some scoops for you that are not the ice-digging variety. There's a new version of an old magazine, a mini-apocalypse at The Carlton, the guy who makes those T-shirts you haven't been able to find anywhere, and a new gallery without a real name. Why are we so on it? Because we are saving it up for the weekend.
ThreeThousand 146 - straight to the sauce
Cover image by Raphael Kilpatrick. If you would like to submit a cover image, that would be rad. Email photo@threethousand.com.au.
Chip Kidd's new book
Hear Now
Ambiguous Horse shop
Almighty Dustward Nation
iBand
Sagmeister germy type
Tiny cameras
Tin&Ed's listen and found links
Shit Town re-opening
The Leila Texts
Desiree Palmen
Romance
Tell us what's cool
cool@threethousand.com.au
This bitch kid's book
Neverland
Harness racing
Bruce Almighty
Slap bands
Germs
Adam Ant
Sigfried & Roy Masters of the Impossible
Shit
The heelless heels
Palm reading
Ho pants
Tell us what's fool
fool@threethousand.com.au
un Magazine
What:
un Magazine
Where:
The magazine at all good art galleries
The Launch at The Tote, 71 Johnson St, Collingwood
When:
Magazine out now
Launch Thurs March 13, doors 6pm
How much:
Magazine free
Launch $5
It seems it's a real challenge to write about art without getting high on your own cultural superiority. But the writers of un Magazine have always avoided this, with smart but accessible commentary on Melbourne's art scene. It doesn't matter if your artistic education hasn't progressed much since Art Attack, because un has turned art writing on its head.
To celebrate their foray into the pimped-out second volume of un, a big relaunch is happening down at the Tote this Thursday. They've invited artists including Nathan Gray, Dylan Martorell and Helen Johnson to ‘remix' the original poster (designed by the king of posters, Warren Taylor of The Narrows) and you can buy these on the door if you want to support a second print run of this issue.
Regardless, for a measly $5 you get your very own copy of the new issue, plus the sights and sounds of Tap Queen, Van Newton and Bullshit Rare.
Format: Magazine
Genre: Art/Design
Keywords: Art, Un Magazine, The Tote
max design ‘n' shit
What:
max design ‘n' shit
Where:
Contact Max if you have a wall, sleeve or canvas you would like filled.
Where else:
T-shirts can be found at Monk House Design, 102 Lygon St East Brunswick and Currency Clothing, 246 Brunswick Street Fitzroy.
MySpace:
here
How much:
T-shirts around $66 and other services are negotiable
Max was tracing lines on paper at Pushka one afternoon. Tim the owner kept passing him, leering over curiously. Max was outlining the figures of dogs, bears, birds and matching their heads up with the bodies of men in dashing outfits.
These characters have come to life in unexpected places in Melbourne. You can spot them nattering away in The Alderman toilets. They are proudly printed on t-shirts and wandering up the sleeves of a few. Tim at Pushka is one of these. Having fallen in love with the curious personalities of Max's pen, he requested a dog-boy find home on the inside of his upper arm.
We can't tell you that Max is a cutthroat businessman out there to make a buck. He humbly brings characters to life and lets them wander off to find homes for themselves. You can find them on t-shirts, walls, and other people's flesh. And if you would like one for a pet, call him.
Location: Online
Price: $10 - $100
Product Type: Design
Before The Devil Knows You're Dead
What:
Before The Devil Knows You're Dead
When:
Out March 20
Where:
Cinema Nova
Dendy Kino
Watch the trailer:
Here
Win:
We have 10 double passes to give away! To enter, email win@threethousand.com.au with the subject line ‘mid-to-late career nudity'
Sidney Lumet's Serpico, Dog Day Afternoon, and Network are three of the highlights of 1970s cinema. His output since has ranged from genuinely interesting to instantly forgettable - remaking Cassavetes? Not for the faint hearted - and now, at 83 years old, his latest is Before The Devil Knows You're Dead.
An old-fashioned male melodrama disguised as a one of those twisty crime thrillers that clogged cinemas all through the ‘90s, Before The Devil... is mostly a showcase for its scenery-chewing actors. Albert Finney is never less than awesome. Philip Seymour Hoffman amps up his sleazy - and mumbly - charms. And Ethan Hawke is completely believable when he's this pathetic. (A well-deserved karmic backlash for being so awful to Winona in Reality Bites, perhaps?)
The film's obsession with fathers and sons doesn't leave much room for women, but Marisa Tomei's performance is an absolute scene-stealer - and that's not only due to her sudden embrace of mid-to-late-career nudity.
Disappointingly, though, these big, actorly moments don't add up like they should. Before The Devil... wears its dramatic mechanisms too close to the surface. You end up feeling more for the performances behind these men than you do for the men themselves.
Format: Cinema
Genre: Thriller
Keywords: Sidney Lumet
World's End
What:
World's End
Where:
The Carlton Hotel Gallery, Lvl 2, 193 Bourke St, Melbourne
When:
Launching TONIGHT! Wed March 12, 6-8pm
Exhibition runs until April 5
How much:
Free!
Image:
Benet Spencer, House 1, (detail) 2007
In On the Beach, Gregory Peck and Ava Gardner fall tragically in love as they wait for the nuclear fallout that has already wiped out the Northern hemisphere to blow its way down here. Nearly fifty years later that same melancholy vibe of atmospheric doom pervades World's End, an exhibition of thirteen Melbourne and UK artists who aren't here for a good time, or even for a long time - they're here for the End Times.
Dissolute dystopias, pessimistic prophesising and messianic maudlin mysticisms - you get the idea, now get to the Carlton Hotel and get a beer. Seek comfort in all this humanly warmth and camaraderie, this chatter and hearty cheer. Enjoy it while you can. Look at the art, but not too closely. Study, for example, the intricacies of Lisa Young's mdf-board sculpture and consider its graceful lines. But do not be reminded of Holbein's anamorphic death's-head, or, worse, the fearful symmetry of your own skull - your own personal reminder of the unfunny joke that ultimately awaits us all at World's End. Drink up, there's a sport!
Gallery Type: Project Space
Location: CBD
Medium: Mixed
Keywords: The Carlton Hotel
Landlakes, ii
What:
Landlakes
Who:
ii
On:
Feral Media / Fuse
Where:
Title / Feral Media shop
MySpace:
Here
Links:
ii on Who the Bloody Hell Are They? / Interview on 2SER / Dizzydonor / Landlakes album MySpace
Concentrated listening duo, ii, are Melbourne's best bliss pop-improv act. Their sound pushes the limits of known recording and performance technique - engaged absolutely with the task of pushing forward - but selflessly, in a spirit of auditory-psychic love. Debut album, Landlakes, launched last week at The Toff in mesmerising style, is a variegated masterpiece covered in ears that - like the inward-attuned, thoughtful protagonist of some changing state-of-being drama - slow-turns as a kaleidoscope through chains of contrasting sound-thought.
Opener ‘We Ate Everything' says all in its title, unconsciously describing Landlakes' surveilling-reinvention of whole schools of close-listening music. Starting off with a free played/processed drumming spat, the track inexorably draws guitar, keyboard and field-recordings through Fennesz -sounding shimmer treatments towards a huge, closing granulated basstone. ‘___ Service', ‘Moementks' and ‘Memory Lust' graft Pajo's heart to Parmegiani's brain, while ‘Oho', ‘Tropes' and ‘Clamshell' are simmering blue movies coupling Tortoise with Vladislav Delay.
Like a tapering, colour encephalograph of changing sonic resolve, Landlakes is the tech-patched, pre-cognitive sound of tomorrow's indie.
Genre: Electronic
Release: Album
Mixed Business
What:
Mixed Business
Where:
486 Queens Pde, Clifton Hill
When:
Tues-Sat 7.30am-5pm, Sun 8am-5pm
Contact:
9486 1606
Mixed Business is both a café and a convalescent home. You wander in feeling a bit fragile, even wary of spending a hungover Saturday morning in a fledgling café.
But fear not - you are soon taken under the care of a remarkable waitress who somehow combines Greek yiayia, old-school English nurse and hospitality hottie into one soothing package. You can almost hear her tutting, "You've gone and got yourself wasted, haven't you. Hmm? The sun's too bright and your tongue feels like an anchovy? We'll see to this."
And see to it they do, with their impressive repertoire of medicaments: coffee, poached eggs with fancy sides, fruit toast with ricotta, gingerbread and lamingtons. And all in the middle of Clifton Hill - formerly the last remaining caffeine dry zone between the CBD and Northcote.
If you're still feeling a bit below par, you can retire to their garden (complete with flowers, chirping birds and a lemon tree) to continue your convalescence. We don't recommend they branch into obstetrics or epidemiology, but they're doing a great job with rehab.
Location: North East
Venue Type: Cafe
Keywords: Cafe, Clifton Hill
Gallery above Glitzern
What:
House of Baulch exhibition at the gallery above Glitzern, sometimes referred to as Von Haus Gallery
Where:
Upstairs at Glitzern, 1a Crossley St, Melbourne
When:
Current show on until this Friday, 12-5pm
Contact:
9663 7921
There's been talk, oh yes there has. And now it's open. The gallery above Glitzern in Crossley Street. It's actually in the apartment that once belonged to anal-retentive Australian landscape artist and teacher of Frederick McCubbin, Eugene von Guerard. It is a bit spooky and fadedly opulent, which is the perfect setting for an exhibition by Kathryn Baulch, of Melbourne's cult jewellery label House of Baulch.
You'll recognise the style of the pieces from downstairs at Glitzern; it's all about dark, shiny, geometric deco theatrics. There are one-off wearable pieces, but there is also a giant chandelier-style bauble necklace hanging from the ceiling that would suit the dark whimsy of any frou-frou relative of the BFG. Drop by before it ends this Saturday!
Location: CBD
Product Type: Accessories
Keywords: Accessories, Gallery, Glitzern
Yamaha Felt Hammer
What:
Yamaha Felt Hammer
Where:
The Toff in Town, Lvl 2, Curtin House, 252 Swanston St, Melbourne
When:
March 12 - 24
How much:
Depends on show, go to The Toff site for ticket info.
Image:
We were going to run a picture of a piano, but this one of Sophie Brous is so Streisand-bling-tastic that we went with it.
Win:
We have a double pass to the Muscles piano show on Saturday night! To enter, email win@threethousand.com.au with the subject line ‘chubby '70s concert halls suck'
Sound the call. Haters of chubby ‘70s concert halls and ‘shhh' jazz clubs can breath a sigh of relief when Yamaha Felt Hammer opens tonight. Felt Hammer is the first of long line of tri-annual ‘mini festivals' where a Yamaha C1 Grand Piano comes to the Toff In Town to host some of our best-loved local* and international tinklers in our favourite intimate inner-city bar hang.
It brings together a superhot line-up including Muscles in acoustic mode (gasp), New Buffalo, Melbourne's most wanted (and Felt Hammer founder) Sophie Brous with piano god Paul Grabowsky, electroacoustician Cor Fuhler (Holland) with Oren Ambarchi, celtic popstar Rachel Unthank (UK), Japanese pop heros Lullatone, an evening of Anthony Pateras (including an amazing new duo with Agents of Abhorrance's Max Kohane), James Rushford playing Morton Feldman, Jane Badler with Sir, and an opening night party show boasting members of every local band that we could care to see live, including Art of Fighting, Architecture In Helsinki, Macromantics, Little Red, Ned Collette, Sly Hats, Guy Blackman, Ground Components and Lucksmiths, Hot Little Hands and Three Thousand.* Set up a bed in the Toff stairwell, there's no need to leave for the next 12 days.
*Penny is playing tonight and if you want to see someone do something they haven't tried since 1996, while surrounded by actually talented people and wearing a hat made of sequins, then you should buy a ticket.
Ambience: Other
Location: Urban
Keywords: The Toff in Town
Shit Town re-opening
What:
Shit Town re-opening party
When:
TONIGHT! Wed March 12, doors 9.45pm - late
Where:
Next to St Jeromes, Caledonian Lane, through the silver door.
How Much:
Free
Description:
It's dirty, it's got a scandalous name and we were devastated when the closed recently. But it's back on tonight, and there's no mistaking it's still Shit Town. There might be inadequate lighting/ventilation, but who cares when we've got Rice-Cream and Liz, plus Jona and Zeshan for some musical accompaniment. With the constant talk of shutting down there’s a sense of urgency to the place. So get down there before it disappears again and you're all dressed up with nowhere to go.
Keywords: Shit Town
múm
What:
múm
Where:
Northcote Social Club, 301 High Street, Northcote and The Corner, 57 Swan Street, Richmond
When:
Sun, Mar 16, doors 8pm
Mon, Mar 17, doors 8pm
How much:
$40 + bf
Description:
Fetch an accordian, glockenspiel, Wurlitzer, some strings and a couple of laptops. Put them in front of a few Icelandic musical geniuses and there you have múm. This Sunday and Monday múm will fill Melbourne venues with sounds devastating, beautiful and heavy enough you’ll feel the glitches thump in your stomach. We hope this write up will find you before the shows sell out.
Keywords: mum, The Corner, Northcote Social Club
Is Not Magazine party
What:
Is Not Magazine party - So You Think You Can Party
Where:
Roxanne, Lvl 3, 2 Coverlid Place, Melbourne
When:
Fri March 14, doors open 9pm
How much:
$10 at the door
Description:
Is Not Magazine have not had a party since the over-‘60s tap dance troupe extravaganza last year. That is why this one will be awesome. Except for their Sydney launch where everyone dressed bad and that garage sale in 2005, they've never done anything half-assed. Theme: So You Think You Can Party? Why, yes, we do. The incredible Peacocks are headlining. Manchild, MAFIA, Steezy on decks. Marawa hula hooping under a bra-bomb detonation at midnight. And the usual dance routines from various amusing non-professionals. Go! It's a fundraiser for a magazine with no ads. Not one.
Keywords: Is Not Magazine, Roxanne
Tic Toc Tokyo EP launch
What:
Tic Toc Tokyo (EP Launch) with Plug in City and Bachelor of Arts
Where:
Northcote Social Club, 301 High St, Northcote
When:
Sat Mar 15, doors 8.30pm
How Much:
$10 at the door
Win:
We have a double pass to giveaway. For your chance to win email win@threethousand.com.au with subject line "I want to go to a place somewhere in the future."
Description:
Tic Toc Tokyo, will release the EP we’ve been knocking on the lead singer’s door for. We've even threatened to confiscate their instruments until they delivered the CD personally. Then we realised they might need their guitars to record and so withdrew such threats. So, Artefacts has arrived and they’re throwing a party to celebrate. The live show at the Northcote will be contorted and sharp, filled with anxious melodies and rain dance rhythms (there will be a slim chance of rain). But don’t leave home without your dancing shoes as TTT will take you to a place somewhere in the future, influenced by their no-wave and post punk learnings. With Plug In City and Bachelor of Arts paving the way, clear the schedule and make your way north.
Keywords: Tic Toc Tokyo, Plug in City, Bachelor of Arts, Northcote Social Club
Donkey Gold
What:
Inside this Donkey is a Raging Sea of Molten Gold
Where:
Cobra Bar, upstairs at The Tote, 71 Johnson St, Collingwood
When:
Sat Mar 15, doors 8.30pm
How Much:
$7 at the door
Description:
We don't know about you, but it seems there aren't enough donkey-themed events in Melbourne these days. Too long they have been hiding in the shadow of horses, which have an entire racing carnival devoted to their worship! Well it's about time that the donkey took the spotlight. So, get excited about the Cobra this weekend, which is hosting a party with the tagline: “Inside This Donkey is a Raging Sea of Molten Gold”. Intrigued? May even a little afraid? You should be, because we have been promised 'asonorous sounds' from animal lovers such as Cougar Flashy, The Hondas, Your Animal, Plague Doctor, Dj Richie 1250 and Patinka Cha Cha. There will even be a special appearance from the Donkey Gold Choir, setting their number 1 hit single "I.T.D.I.A.R.S.O.M.G" free into the wild. Piñatas optional.
March Warehouse Show
What:
March Warehouse Show
Where:
38 Stafford Street, Abbotsford
When:
Sat Mar 15, 3pm - 1am
How much:
Probably free but they might have an ice-cream container welcoming your coin at the door.
Description:
Mask-making, drinking and a murder of bands including Drumheller, Smokin' Hot Bitch, Surf Surf Surf, GAY, Ouch! My Face! and The Females. The guys who are throwing this party want no Corey Dellaney neighbour complaints or fluoro-clad kids jazzed up on bourbon. So get in early because they will have to turn the rowdy away at some point. So awesome. So respectful.
Keywords: Warehouse party, Ouch! My Face!
From the people who brought you the thrill of real, live birds at a gallery opening comes the Jacky Winter Emporium. Australia's unrealest illustration agency is setting its artists free with this dandy new internet based retail concern. Here you can purchase original work and prints from some 27 represented artists, from Dylan Martorell's intricate and dignified creatures to Andrea Innocent's Japanese folk freakouts and Niels Oeltjen's delicate and lovely bird people, plus much, much more! The Emporium has secured the services of master printer Brian Gikes to lovingly make the limited-edition giclee prints somewhere in the Victorian bush. Go on, get your mitts on some artwork while the getting's good and you can still afford it. We have an A5 mounted Oslo Davis print (of your choice, within reason) to give away, to enter, just answer the following question...
This week's question:
Live birds...
a) suck
b) have no lips
c) were at the Jacky Winter gallery launch
d) are quieter than the dead 'uns
To be in the running send your answer AND postal address to win@threethousand.com.au, winners will be notified by email.
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