Electric Guest interview

Vinisha Mulani has a chat with Matthew Compton of the bangin’ and soon to be tourin’ Electric Guest:

So here's the history lesson on Electric Guest. The band is made up essentially of two guys, Asa and Matthew. Asa’s brother is Jorma, of Lonely Island (Dick in a Box, anyone?). Jorma is friends with Danger Mouse. Danger Mouse is a magical producer who has worked with the likes of the Black Keys, Beck, Gnarls Barkley and The Shins. He heard them, he liked them, they moved in, they hung out, they recorded.

So tell us a bit about your debut album, Mondo. Having Danger Mouse as a producer must be exciting.
Yeah, I mean it kind of happened a while ago. Before Asa moved to L.A. he was living in Brooklyn, and his brother Jorma is friends with Brian (Danger Mouse's real name). One day his brother played [our music] on the phone, and Brian liked it. We moved to LA, Asa took Brian’s room and Brian had made a studio in the basement, so we started recording there.

We worked for years on the album, we both kinda had our things, and we worked on things together, then we got a bit more serious about it. It wasn’t real until we were mixing the album and Brian said ‘You guys gotta put your band together’.

Tory and Todd Dahlhoff play with us live. Todd’s amazing. He just moved to LA with his brother- we rehearsed for a year before we started playing together.

I read that you cite some of your influences as 60’s era French pop and Indie Rock. Anything you’re listening to right now in particular?
Yeah, it definitely influences my bass. I listen to everything, but I really like Michel Colombier, who is a composer. And there’s another guy, Francois de Roubeaix - he’s one of my favourites. He does mainly films scores, and he actually records by himself, writes the scores himself, he does everything.

So you’re the drummer live, how about when you’re recording? 
Yeah, live I do drums. While recording I do a few of the bass parts, a few of the guitar parts, just kind of whatever.

So you’re a bit of a Francois yourself? 
(laughs) You could say that. Or trying to be, anyway.

What did you do before Electric Guest? 
I’ve been touring for 10 years, or something like that. I played in a band called Cursive for a while. I played in a lot of rock hardcore bands, but I didn’t really enjoy it. I always wanted to play in a band with more like electric bass lines, more like this one.

Do you and Asa write together? How are your styles similar and different?
Yeah, I mean a lot of the ideas we have to make a good song are the same. We worked on Mondo together for years. We come from different places, from different backgrounds. He’s more into hip-hop and I’m more into indie rock but we love that. We both agree on what works about music, and we both like the same things about songs – we both like the same pulse about the song. We agree on what works and we find a common ground between the two styles.

You’ve been touring for a while now – and still have a lot of touring to go, with a lot of fun festivals coming up. Where are you looking forward to going? 
I’m the most excited about Australia (the band is playing Splendour in the Grass this year).

Good answer. 
No, really! Because I’ve never been. I’ve been talking about it all summer long. I was really hoping to go, I’ve heard really good things about it, and I heard Splendour in the Grass is a great festival.

One of the guys that plays in the band with us has been before, and I’m really looking forward to it. Someone told me that people in Southern California and people from Australia have the same attitude, same way of life.

Finally, what’s a dream collaboration for you? Who would you love to work with one day?
Blonde Redhead. They’re one of my favourite bands.

You can check out Electric Guest's tour dates over at their Facebook page.

Interview by Vinisha Mulani.

The Human Rights Arts and Film Festival Australia

The fifth Australian Human Rights Arts and Film Festival (HRAFF) opened in Melbourne this week. Vinisha Mulani tells us more: 

What started as a group of friends brainstorming in a share-house kitchen six years ago, is now a national film festival in its fifth year, based at the Australian Centre for the Moving Image, has Margaret Pomeranz as a festival patron, includes a music festival, art exhibition, forums and the President of the Maldives doing a live Q&A.

But that's not the sole summary of its success - despite its escalation from the kitchen table to ACMI, the success and soul of the Human Rights Arts and Film Festival lies in its content and intent. As inspiring as the festival's establishment and growth, are its films.

From Wrinkles, a Spanish comical animation about Alzheimer's, to Buffalo Girls, about girls in a Muay Thai child boxing tournament, the films range in topics but are all consistent in how you feel when you leave the cinema. HRAFF films can catapult even the most cynical suit-clad individual into a state of inspiration to change the world for the better. (Just a heads up, Australian Volunteers International and Intrepid Travel - there may be an unexplained exponential increase of people lining up in front of your offices over the next month). The Island President is also a program highlight; an inspiring documentary about the president of the Maldives' and how he tackles his small nation's slow extinction in the face of climate change.

Whatever incredible film you choose to watch at HRAFF, you will have something to gain - whether it be inspiration to do something great, raising your awareness in something you had no idea about, or a window into the life of an individual on the other side of the world.

HRAFF's dates around Australia:
Melbourne 15 – 27 May
Canberra 28 – 30 May
Adelaide 29 May – 1 June
Sydney 29 May – 1 June
Brisbane 5 – 8 June
Alice Springs 8 – 10 June
Byron Bay 12 – 15 June
Perth 14 – 16 June

For more detail on the program in general and to purchase tickets: http://hraff.org.au/
Words by Vinisha Mulani

Chips Laffer and Single Twin at The Toff, Melbourne

Having interviewed Single Twin last week, Jess O'Callaghan took in his gig on Sunday and found a familiar-looking support act. Photos by Vinisha Mulani:

The entire evening was bewildering. Brilliant, but bewildering. Let’s begin with the support act, Chips Laffer. It became quite clear from the moment he sat at the keyboard and opened his mouth that this was Jae Laffer, lead singer of The Panics. A quick Google that day had told us Chips Laffer was definitely not a person, and if he was, he had never performed anywhere before.

‘Chips’ whittled out lovely tunes on the guitar and a dodgy keyboard whose keys kept sticking with heat (he held it up as proof. Apparently, real person or not, Chips Laffer has pride) before grinning at the slowly filling band room. “Here’s a song I play with my band. It’s called Cruel Guards.”

The whole act gave the illusion that you’d somehow found a time machine. For one, gigs at The Toff always make you feel like you’ve found a time machine. It’s all red velvet curtains, fancy wine and candlelight. Two, I was relaxed, and not battling a crowd of festival maniacs to see Jae Laffer play. I wasn’t being hoisted on shoulders and pushed through stubborn bodies to get closer to the music. I was sitting in a tiny band room listening to him play haunting solo versions of what are usually pretty overwhelming songs and chuckle at his own misleading moniker.

Halfway through the set he stopped again, and welcomed the newcomers.
Chips: I’m Chips Laffer...
Heckler: Chips?!
Chips: Chips. Shut up. I’m from a band called Chips Laffer and the Panics. This is our most famous song and I play it even when I don’t need to play it. I don’t know why.

He played Don’t Fight It. He played originals. He played Bob Dylan covers. It was fantastic.

Single Twin was no less perplexing, but not because of his name. I’d long since untangled that web of pseudonyms. Single Twin is Marcus Teague. Marcus Teague was once the front man for Deloris. Marcus Teague is the name of Single Twin’s first album. Single Twin is not the name of the album. Got it. Not perplexing.

The intro to every song was deadpan, with Marcus staring unblinkingly at the audience. They began almost convincing, "This song is about catching a centipede bus through the backwaters of Santa Monica..." and escalated into the absurd: "This one’s about ordering pizza in World War II. And bombs are dropping all around you, and you’ve realised that you’re going to die... but you just want your last meal to be pizza." Ok, so they were all absurd.

He played a song that went for all of forty seconds which was about being called in for dinner and running back to the house. When it stopped abruptly he grinned at the audience. “A song can be as long as you want it to be.” Then the band came on stage; four beautiful moustachioed hipster men with an eclectic collection of instruments. I was sold. Marcus is obviously clever as well as a talented musician. He knows what live music is meant to do and what an album is meant to do, and he makes it happen. Marcus Teague the album was very different to a Single Twin show, although most of the songs were the same. The album feels almost as though the music is whispering to you, telling you a secret. The live show was crisp, and the sound was big, quite precise in its execution but never to the point of being polished, or trite.

There was a song dedicated to how sexy banjos are (complete with a banjo being all sexy), back-up whistling and men harmonising. This means I can’t be held accountable for anything written in this review. Men harmonising turn me to jelly.

Regardless of how great the band were (and they were great), Teague’s lyrics stand up all by themselves. Each one tells a story, and, contrary to what his intros suggest, none of them seem to be about energy drink. They remind me of trying to explain a dream you’ve had first thing in the morning. Every time you listen to one of these songs you hear something in there that hasn’t hit you before. Like the familiarity of the "packet mix of corn and cream," in Fish in New Leaves, or the ache of "in my mind you are beside me and singing," in My Silken Tooth.

So, on the whole, it was a bewildering but spectacular evening. I’d like to thank whoever had the thought to arrange the tables close to the stage like a 1920s nightclub so there was no pressure to stand and do the awkward quiet-music-shuffle on a Sunday night. The whole gig was like a giant, satisfying exhale at the end of a very long week. An exhale that involved white wine, secret identities and male harmonising. The best kind.

Review by Jess O'Callaghan. Photos by Vinisha Mulani.

Melbourne's Laneway Festival 2012: a photographer's perspective

Bobbysix snapper Vinisha Mulani talks us through her experience in the photography pit at Melbourne's Laneway Festival:

St Jerome's Laneway Festival, Melbourne - also known as The Hipsters' Annual Mass Migration to Footscray. The banks of the Maribyrnong River and the Footscray Community Arts Centre were bouncing with sunshine, tattoos and on-trend attendees. A gem of a venue, the Footscray Community Arts Centre had incredible views of the river, lush grassy knolls and even a few graffitti-clad laneways to boot. I had managed to wangle a photopass - despite my camera being approximately two metres shorter than the other photographers' and naked of accessories. Hanging out at the photo pit felt a little bit like a first day at a new school and your skirt being too long. Or not having a Tamagochi.

After getting over my camera's inferiority complex (the festival had everything short of portable counselling sessions - Melbourne's beloved BeatBox Kitchen & Taco Truck both made an appearance), I became a Photography Warrior. Despite being ill-equipped of extra weapons, before I knew it I was dodging and weaving through various jutting lenses and camera bags in the photo pit, shooting (get it?) subjects I've never seen that close before, and did not even bang into anyone's equipment (cough). 

Together, my camera and I developed girl-crushes on the amazing array of strong female performers inclusive of Anna Calvi and the incredible Maddie Follin of The Cults. My view of the audience also changed. Usually in festivals I'm on a constant tip-toe, drowning in a sea of the lucky tall - but from the photo-pit a new perspective emerged. (See image below of two girls crushing on Jonti with ukelele- giggling, hand over mouth, wide-eyed, head tilt). 

Highlights of the festival: Starting the day with Husky, a blue sky and a view of the river - the musical equivalent of having a massage on the beach. Being close to Active Child's harpistry. No long queues. The aforementioned girl crushes. An ice cream break (it was hot). Surviving the photo pit.

Words and pictures by Vinisha Mulani. Check back later in the week for Heidi Pett's full review of Sydney Laneway 2012.