Beastman & Nanami Cowdroy team up with Smirnoff to design limited edition packs

Isn't it nice when friends team up? Bobbysix's old mate Beastman (Brad Eastman) has joined forces with our buddies at Smirnoff to design one of two limited edition Smirnoff No. 21 packs.

To celebrate his and fellow Australian artist Nanami Cowdroy's designs, for one week only Smirnoff Australia is opening an interactive gallery in Sydney’s hipster haven, Surry Hills. Inspired by the theme of creating something visually stunning from a blank canvas, the Smirnoff Start Pure Gallery will house a one-of-a-kind art installation that allows visitors to help create a piece of artwork that will contribute to the design for a third, and final, Limited Edition pack – only five of which will be created.

The gallery will be open to the public from Friday 2nd until Thursday 8th March, 10am – 5pm daily, and will also allow visitors to see the large scale versions of the pack designs by Beastman and Nanami, as well as exclusive artwork from both artists.

Commenting on his exclusive pack design Beastman said, “I tried to push the theme 'start pure' through the design – conceptually you start with nothing and you add life and you add years of hard work, and then you become something. Creating little stories that mean something to me, that’s what I love that about being an artist. I love that I can trigger people’s thoughts and trigger people’s emotions.” Remarking on her design, Nanami said, "I found the Smirnoff concept of 'purity' to be ideal, as I'm accustomed to starting with a blank canvas, which I find is always exciting and enticing. I was inspired by the unique twisting design of the Smirnoff Limited Edition pack - which sparked the idea of a playful octopus, its tentacles coiling around and embracing the bottle within.”

Visitors to the gallery will be able to view both artists’ designs first hand, as well as produce their very own of pieces of art using the paper chromatography process - a method for testing the purity of compounds and identifying substances. Once produced, each individual artwork will be stored in a display case on the gallery walls, contributing to the overall artwork, which will evolve over the duration of the gallery opening period. Following their visit to the Smirnoff Limited Edition Gallery, participants will be able to visit the Smirnoff Australia Facebook page  and tag their piece of art. The wall of art created by the gallery visitors will be captured and printed as a third Limited Edition bottle pack, and the five copies will be offered as prizes in competitions (deets to be announced).

The Smirnoff Start Pure Gallery will be located at 374 Crown St, Surry Hills, Sydney and will be open to the public from Friday 2nd until Thursday 8th March 2012 – 10am-5pm daily. Admission is free. 


The limited edition Smirnoff No. 21 packs designed by Beastman and Nanami Cowdroy will be available to purchase from Coles, Woolworths and local liquor retailers for a limited period. Drink responsibly, fools.

Changing Lanes 2011

Last year's inaugural Changing Lanes felt like a proper festival. Which is kinda weird because there were no tents, no fields and not a naked wasted hippy anywhere in sight. Instead, there was a street, a stage and a pub. Doesn't sound much like a festival, you may think. But that's where you'd be wrong, Changing Lanes 2010 was an incredible festival experience. A labour of love for its founders (they had to bend over backwards to convince the local council to give them the green light) the Sydney-based, one-day event was made up of brilliant Aussie bands, DJs, food stalls, artists, and had simply the most organic, home-grown feel to it. In 2011, the festival moved to a new venue. Goodbye grungy Newtown, hello hipster haven Surry Hills. A bigger event, a new location, more punters, would Changing Lanes 2011 retain its charm?

Thankfully, the if-it-ain't-broke-don't-fix-it rule was strictly adhered to. Sure, everything was a little magnified this time round, but this was still the same Changing Lanes that we swooned over last year.

As the sun beat down relentlessly, Sydney's best new band, Cameras (above) were a lunchtime treat, even though a 1.30pm slot wasn't really ideal. While their atmospheric sound is best suited to playing in the dark, they still gave one of the performances - if not the performance - of the day. We've gushed plenty about Cameras on these pages over the past couple of years (and, trust us, there is more to follow when their debut album drops next month) so we won't rave for too long this time. Suffice to say, they won't be playing this early at festivals for long.



Elsewhere, DJs on the FBi stage belted out some crowd faves and The Gaelic hosted a bunch more acts, such as the divine Lanie Lane and the brilliant and bizarre 'country surf' of Mikelangelo and the Tin Star. As we have often seen at Brighton's Great Escape, the problem with having a festival that utilises indoor venues is that, once they're full, they're full. So there were eternal lines snaking from the three clubs/bars that hosted stages. Simply, it's the nature of such a beast. If you weren't organised and didn't arrive early to whatever you wanted to see, you probably missed out. No point grumbling about it. Besides, the quality on the main stage was so high that there was always an outstanding option to fall back on. Like Aussie legend Gareth Lilliard (below) of The Drones, who played a devilishly downbeat acoustic set, introducing each song with a funny-as-fuck preamble.

Just like last year though, the music was only half of what was going down at Changing Lanes. For instance, after the street artists had done their thing with spray cans, there were fashion installations to enjoy, most notably from the ever-interesting Jesse Willesee (check out the pics below). There were also market stalls from the likes of Dear Pluto and, of course, no festival would be complete without a spinach and cheese gozleme. And the band(s) played on too. Bleeding Knees Club started a little on the ropey side, but by the end of their set, their perky indie pop had even the most sun-drunk of punters dancing.

As night continued to fall, Devonshire Street grew more atmospheric. While Gay Paris and The Snowdroppers did their thing in The Gaelic, Papa Versus Pretty rocked the life out of the main stage, before headliners PVT (below) ended proceedings. As always seems to be the case with PVT, their instrumental offerings were comfortably their strongest and most visceral. That is what we fell in love with them for in the first place, after all.

And once PVT had ripped the crowd apart with their shuddering math rock, that was it. Another year done, and another big thumbs up from Bobbysix.com. Will the festival move on again next year, or has it found its home? Time will tell, but one thing is for sure, it has laid some pretty amazing foundations over these past two years.

Changing Lanes first release sold out. Second round of artists added

Sydney's most organic, charming festival, Changing Lanes, is back on the 17th of September for its second consecutive year, taking over the lower end of Devonshire St, its surrounding laneways and venues to raise funds for FBi Radio. MAPS Entertainment and FBi Radio are transforming that part of Surry HIlls into a cultural wonderland featuring a melting pot of music, street art, fashion, photography and food. So awesome is the festival and so cheap are the tickets, that the first release has already sold out in a heartbeat, so, if you wanna be there, you'd best get your act together and grab one from the second release before they all go too. Check out www.changinglanesfestival.com for more ticketing details.

Changing Lanes made its debut in Newtown last year and was an overwhelming success. The event combined music, art and fashion and included acts such as Tame Impala and Itch-e & Scratch-e, resulting in tickets selling out in only a week. Festival Director, Danae Goiser said “We are pretty blown away by the creative concepts some of the artists have come up with for this year’s event. It’s an inspiring time to be involved in Sydney’s creative communities and we’re so proud to be able to provide a platform for artists to showcase their talents.”

This year will see the likes of PVT, The Vasco Era, Gareth Liddiard, The Snowdroppers, Papa Vs Pretty,  Bleeding Knees and Megastick Fanfare joined by heaps of other acts. And a second announcement of artists includes Big Scary, Canyons DJs, Domeyko / Gonzalez and, most excitingly of all, Cameras. Visit www.changinglanesfestival.com for the full line up.

Buy your tickets today. If you don't take our advice then don't come crying to us when you miss out.

Dear Pluto's Grand Opening night - Photos.

The kids who brought you the Hibernian House Vintage and Retro sales launched a brand new space recently. Tucked away in Sydney's Surry Hills, Dear Pluto presents similarly awesome sales - only now they are EVERY WEEKEND rather than monthly - while also offering up other amazing events such as movie nights, markets, swap parties and album launches. BobbySix.com was on hand to take some snaps of those cool enough to have found their way to the grand opening.

You can, and should, join Dear Pluto's facebook page.

Laura Imbruglia residency at The Excelsior

LAURA IMBRUGLIA
SARAH KELLY
The Excelsior, Surry Hills
04/08/10

August sees a Laura Imbruglia residency at The Excelsior in Sydney’s Surry Hills, with every Wednesday offering up a different theme. The opening night of this run was entitled ‘Solo Laura’ and will be followed by Country Laura, Band Laura and, lastly and maybe most intriguingly, Karaoke Laura.

While the last-minute cancellation of support act, the wonderful Camilla Hill, through illness, was a disappointment, her shoes were ably filled by Sarah Kelly from redsunband. Perched onstage with a guitar, Kelly’s nuanced voice was spellbinding. At times delicate, sometimes with a strained beauty, her textured vocal filled the room and added to an already intimate atmosphere.

Battling through foldback problems and admitting to being a little nervous, Laura Imbruglia put on a typically unpretentious and charming show. Armed with an acoustic guitar, she rattled off tracks from her two long-players. Thanks to her knack of penning superb lyrics, a set from Imbruglia is a collection of well-rounded tales that offer a spectrum of ideas and emotions. One minute she sings about the misery of dating an older man, the next she is yearning for unobtainable love. In Home Sweet Home she talks about being curmudgeonly beyond her years, while in My Dream of a Magical Washing Machine she asks, “What did I drink last night? What did I smoke last night? It messed with my head.” Oldie-but-really-goodie It’s Getting Worse remains a delightfully sweet love song, while You’re a Parasitic Germ lands at the other end of the scale.

The next three weeks seem set to demonstrate that, as well as having many sides to her storytelling ability, Laura Imbruglia can mix it up musically. If you appreciate a fine combination of wit and melancholy, if you are a country fan, a rocker, or just want to get up on stage and belt out some Meatloaf, you should head along to one of these Wednesday night shows and support one of Sydney’s most intelligent songwriters.

Details of the residency here.