31/05/2010

roxbury review






firstly, miles is a master with the camera. there's some more shots over at his photoblog. (as an aside, blake, over on miles' page put your mouse on the close-up shot of me and leave it sitting there until the caption comes up)

secondly, bec was absent from this gig (many thanks to bec for doing all the babysitting that i was supposed to help with so that telafonica could play this gig), while blake and cherry were at pains to remove themselves from the responsibility of writing up the review, so it has fallen to me...

blake commented in the spacia on the way in that it was a rather quiet trip, since bec and eliza are the loud ones (his words, not mine). the roxbury was as red as we remembered and luchi were setting up as we got there. it was their second gig, and the sound guy, who was otherwise great, didn't seem to quite know what to do with a band with so much electronics and no drums! so they took a little while to sort that out, but got there in the end (which also made things relatively easy for us as later the sound guy now had his head around the whole concept!). anna chase set up once they were done and pretty much went straight into her set. she ran her guitar and an accordian through her loopstation, layered over some loops she had prepared at home, and made a really beautiful mix of drones and melodies. i enjoyed it greatly.

we then set up our stuff, though couldn't get the autoharp to register on the mixing desk, so that was a bit unfortunate, but anyway. we started with blending the edges in bec's absence, as blake loves it and bec doesn't. it went rather nicely, with some new additions from cherry's saxophone. the set, on the whole, was quite up and electronic. the rendition of i can hear there's a peace in the dark was the closest to fully satisfying that we have done so far - i think the gradual changes are getting it there and i'm nearly satisfied with it now - it doesn't just rest on it's chorus anymore. i also enjoyed smashing my drum stick on the very last bar of i can't make you love me - so rock and roll. it was a successful set, i thought. it also means there's another permutation of the line-up which we now know will work well!

luchi came on next. i commented to them afterwards that it was very rare that we got to play with a band who are actually doing something in a similar vein to what we do - mixing electronic beats with guitars, fx, melodies and harmonies. i thought they were great and i had a smile on my face for their whole set. they also did an excellent job of filling the room with an audience, for which we are very grateful.

after lugging our gear out through the fancy dress party taking place on the bottom floor, with the assistance of the very friendly older indian gentleman who was the venue's security guard for the evening, we drove off into the west.

30/05/2010

I Can't Make You Love Me



Released as a free download via bandcamp (click to go there). you can download it as mp3, flac, ogg vorbis, aac etc. or stream the entire release here.

<a href="http://telafonica.bandcamp.com/album/i-cant-make-you-love-me-single">I Can't Make You Love Me (Radio Edit) by telafonica</a>

____________________________
released may 19, 2010

The second single for the 'Love On The Second Stair' album. 'I Can't Make You Love Me' is the album's opening track. The edit here abbreviates the introduction but still has all the joyful racket that distorted kalimba, castañelas, floor tom, an Adam and the Ants drum sample, cowbells, phasing synth washes and 4-part vocals provide. 'Scarecrow In The Melon Patch' is the first of the B-sides, and was originally written with the idea of mixing the two great forms of garage - 60s garage rock and 90s garage house. 'Monday Wednesday Friday' is a low-key electronic pulse with bit crushed guitar and monotone/melodic vocal contrasts. 'The Quest For Love Aboard The Belafonte' was the first single from the album. This version was performed live to air on Sydney's FBi Radio in November of 2009. It features melodica, toy squeezebox, typewriter and floor tom - an acoustic version of sorts.

To download the entire release in mp3, flac, ogg vorbis, aac or alac, with artwork included, go here. The bandcamp pop-up menu will ask you to choose your desired format and the price you wish to pay. The release is free, so just type a '0' in for the price. Of course, you can choose to make a small donation to the Telafonica cause if you choose, but that's certainly not a requirement!

A. I Can't Make You Love Me (download)
B1. Scarecrow In The Melon Patch (download)
B2. Monday Wednesday Friday (download)
B3. The Quest For Love Aboard The Belafonte (Live on FBi Radio - Acoustic Version) (download)

27/05/2010

The Gate, May 20th, 2010

Please pardon me for my late review. This past week has been rather busy with our youngest turning seven and the celebrations requiring sufficient preparation to make it a seven-year-old standard of success.
The Gate was a great place to play. Telafonica turned up in two contingents and then discovered that the all-important "Bag of Little Things" was totally and tragically missing. This resulted in some Telafonican girl bonding time for Cherry and me as we battled peak hour traffic between Ryde and Toongabbie to retrieve the bag and save the gig. We felt quite super in our heroic efforts.
I would have liked to stay and soak up the atmosphere at The Gate - I always feel more comfortable playing when I have been a part of the audience first - but Cherry's company and her chocolate chip cookies well and truly made up for it.
What were the male Telafonicans doing while we were gone? I suppose they were doing the peripheral business of "patching" and setting up and sound checking all the not-so-essential instruments - the computer, the keyboard and Blake's guitar.
We arrived back just in time like good superhero girls should, and not a moment too soon. It was fun fun fun to play in Joe and Carly's backyard! We had a great grassy stage that I could dance on without all our music stands swaying in a crazy rhythm, and we had heaps of room!
The audience were very supportive with their cheers and clapping. I think I saw a few of them move during the song, just a little to the left and right. It wasn't really a dance kind of event perhaps but we didn't mind. They may just be the first audience to actually listen to the lyrics!
Blake and AJE came away from it a little unsure about their performance, but I had a ball. I think I am finally learning to be happy to make mistakes and let it go. I make a few. On each song. Besides, perfection is not really a Telafonican ideal.
Adrian and I had to leave pretty soon after we played so I cannot report on Garage Hymnal. Perhaps Cherry and Blake could fill everyone in on that score in a comment.
I can't remember the set list and I am too comfortable on the lounge to go find out at this juncture but I do know that we roughly ordered our songs into a gospel of sorts for this event. We definitely started with "An Invitation" and finished with "I Can Hear There's a Peace in the Dark". Thanks Joe and Carly for having us!

25/05/2010

what to do...

...with our set on saturday night? it will be the first one without bec in quite a while and so will necessarily be fairly different from what we've been doing over the last few months. how far into the deep end should we throw cherry? should we give things like time and distance another airing? it would be good to get some vague ideas so that i can get the tracks prepared to some degree on live before we rehearse.

22/05/2010

may 20th, 2010




Hush, hush my son
Don't rattle the bars
Lay, lay down your head
On the pillow and sleep

Hush, hush my love
Don't, don't fight the sleep
Soon, soon you will rise
And play once more with me

Hush, hush my father
Don't rattle the bars
Lay, lay down your head
On the pillow and slip away

Hush, hush my love
Don't, don't fight the dying
Soon, soon we will rise
And we, we'll be together

10/05/2010

20th on the bridge

tonight from 8pm sydney time, jeff, who runs the 20th project, will be on the bridge - justin zeltzer's show on fbi radio. it's the same show blake and i went on a couple of months back. so jeff will be programming the whole show and will be including the original 20th version of 'but i lose myself' - which used recorders instead of melodicas. i'm sure he'll also discuss the 20th project in some detail, as well as his own music with the desks and other sydney things he likes.

so tune - 94.5fm or http://www.fbiradio.com

09/05/2010

Style Announcement Telafonifolks!

Have decided since Ellie is our firey red and Cherry has now filled the position of spectacular blonde, that I shall take on the mantle of the sultry brunette. Hope that agrees with everyone since the deed is already done.

03/05/2010

telafonica @ deja, may 1, 2010

Deja was another one of those Telafonica adventures where you discover that great cultural experiences can (and most often do) happen in the most unexpected places. We love Marrickville. Where else can you play at midnight for an enthusiastically dancing crowd amidst the comforting smells of bonfire and baking bread? Definitely you cannot find anywhere else an MC with a swiss cheese cape, calling himself Dairy Mouse and quipping on current politics, expertly fending off hecklers and conducting a raffle for babybel cheese and homebrand butter.

It was Cherry's initiation into the band and she passed with supersonic purple colours. The audience loved her. And they told her so. No jealousy implied.
We enjoyed, as always, listening to Alps. Art Rush was..well..interesting. Memorable. The Fuji Collective were big, polished and impressive. Andy Golledge had a nice sound. And we... well we rocked! Well we must have if that means we had fun and and there were people dancing and that they begged us to keep playing at 1am! And the folk from Fuji Collective (who live where we played) and Emma, all of whom organised the gig - were exceptionally great to work with.

We also learned a great deal. Much of it was joyful. Some of it sad. There was one precious soul that didn't seem to have a very high opinion of herself and finished our set unconscious on the floor with an empty vodka bottle in her hand. It has affected me a great deal. I want to give her the hope I have been given but I don't know how.
I do know, though that there were others who were there for the music. Our most cherished meeting was with Colin - a new friend who greeted Adrian with a cup. (for context - colin e-mailed the telafonica e-mail address to find out what the address was. i sent the details and told him to come up and introduce himself if he made it. except, in my haste, i accidently wrote 'cup up' instead of 'come up' - which colin literally did (see photo) - adrian)

One miraculous occurrence was that even after the last piece of equipment was carried past the water heater and into the back of the Spacia and the four Telafonicans had looked longingly into the next door bakery and had taken one more whiff of its aroma; even when we were on the M4 and even in Prospect, Blake was still chatty and wide awake. A Telafonica first!

A surprisingly wonderful evening for which Telafonica are extremely thankful.

And the setlist:
Æowyn And The Absolute Truth
The Tail End Of Winter
Smells Like Rain
The Unravelling Man
This Is The New Thing
Your Hands
I Can Hear There's A Peace In The Dark
I Can't Make You Love Me










02/05/2010

the woes/ the morning after effect of deja

i was still sleeping at home while church was on
my dog isn't happy with me
interesting show though

what's an autoharp? bec, you represent.