Every so often, men involved in the music scene who see themselves as believers in social justice get a bee in their bonnet about the oversupply of Y chromosomes in their local music scene.
Where are all the chicks? Why aren’t there more female band members, music writers, roadies, or sound techs? In an issue of the sorely-missed hardcore magazine Death Before Dishonour, editor Lochlan Watt wondered,
In a male dominated music scene, where there exists a number of females screaming for equality and to have their intentions and passions recognised as being genuine, there seems to be a lack of them actually getting into it and getting involved beyond simply going to shows and getting tattoos.
Here’s the thing - a lot of females just aren’t interested in getting involved, and the ones who are interested are too busy creating opportunities for themselves to have the time to whinge about equality. Sure, it’s important to have female “voices” and “perspectives” on the “music scene”, but the last time I checked, equality doesn’t mean giving a shitty sound engineer work just because she is female.
I’d like to leave you with this photo taken by John Hatfield.
In a group of dudes at a hardcore gig, only my friend Big Will (front and centre in the navy shirt and green shorts) is actually “getting into it”. The rest of of them are standing there with their beers, arms crossed. I don’t know if the surplus of dicks is the biggest problem here.
After a fortnight of nasty surprises, I was thrilled to learn I’d been chosen as one of five residents to work on their creative practice at the State Library of Queensland’s new centre for digital culture, The Edge.
I told Facebook and didn’t get the cavalcade of congratulations I’d hoped for; probably because as one friend succinctly put it, “I couldn’t work out what the fuck The Edge actually is and what you would be doing at it.” I think I also confused some Rockhamptonites - The Edge is the flashest apartment building in Rocky, also located on the river bank. Big Will is the night receptionist. I digress.
Basically, The Edge is giving me a stipend and access to their shiny new facilities (iMacs, recording studios and an espresso machine are just some of the facilities relevant to my needs) in 
exchange for me creating awesome stuff and helping out the other residents. Their facilities will also be bookable by the general public and there will be plenty of conferences, workshops, lectures, performances and panels on interesting things being held there. I’m incredibly grateful for the opportunity and hope like hell I can make my project AWESOME.
“Stop fishing and tell us about your project!” I hear you grumble. COOL YA JETS, MATE. Here it is.
A FASTER HORSE - A fortnightly podcast profiling young people with careers your guidance counselor wouldn’t have heard of.
When asked whether he sought the opinions of his customers, father of the automobile Henry Ford replied, “If I’d asked my customers what they wanted, they would have asked for a faster horse.”
Similarly, many young people’s views on future possibilities in both life and career are shaped by their limited life experience and the viewpoints of those around them.
“A Faster Horse” will profile young people doing crazy things that they never set out to do – from touring in an ABBA tribute band in South Africa to droving cattle across Australia. It will be available fortnightly from the iTunes store and through The Edge website with accompanying multimedia material.
I think the best thing about the internet (and something that has remained mostly unexplored by mainstream media thus far) is the ability to choose which medium would tell the story best. If a combo of text and sound would do it, then great. If a story would be more engaging as a vodcast, I’d like to give that a go. Anyway, we’ll see. There will definitely be 12 audio podcasts being distributed fortnightly from mid-March and a heap of multimedia stuff on the accompanying website. Keep an eye on the A Faster Horse twitter for updates.
The Edge has their grand opening tonight (Feb 26th)! If you’re in Brissie you should come along from 5pm. It’s a really neat space, DZ are playing and there might be free t-shirts.
This is Big Will, me and Reece just before we went to Mastodon. The height difference is 100% to scale, and let’s just say nobody gives me a hard time when I’m hanging around these two.
Photos are up of some of the bands I saw at Who The Hell.
“Twelve minutes of pure injury,” is how my best friend describes a set by her boyfriend’s band Downpour, the best (and only) hardcore band in Rockhampton. They’re launching their demo tonight and we’re here with forty others to drink impossibly cheap booze and show our support for “the scene”.
Tonight, “the scene” is located at The Cave Bar, a small room at the back of a dodgy pub in the town’s CBD, proudly advertising itself as a real pub due to its lack of gaming machines. At any rate, it is one of the few places in town with original live music.
In proper D.I.Y. style, the demo was recorded mostly live by a friend, then burnt onto stenciled CD-Rs and housed in paper slip cases, meticulously put together by the band’s guitarist. Half the band work as orderlies at the base hospital, folding linen and cleaning up bodily fluids. The bass player works at Target and the drummer works for the railways.
“You know,” my friend continues, “sometimes I think that fuckheads turn up to these shows just to punch the fuck out of people.”
She’s probably right. Maybe it’s the steamy weather, maybe it’s the town’s obvious class divides, but Rockhampton is an incredibly violent place. The latent anger bubbles to the surface in boozy punch ups, football games and road accidents, yet music seems to be the least socially acceptable outlet for testosterone-fuelled rage.
Downpour start their set and the crowd is a seething mass of swinging punches and pile-ons. Mic leads are broken, glasses are lost and smaller dudes are steamrolled. The less adventurous punters climb onto the bar rail for safety and a clearer view as the seven-foot-tall singer fights his way into the audience, shoving his equally gigantic and mega-drunk mate Big Will away as he gets up in his face.
“Somebody take Big Will down!” he shouts, grinning from ear to ear. “The man is a menace and needs to be stopped!”
They blast into the next song and the crowd clambers up and onto Big Will, forcing him to the ground. This is the sort of violence and aggression where nobody gets hurt, the sort of violence that is fun and constructive. It’s the same stuff that drives career women to the gym, jocks to the playing field and puppies to shred the valuables of their owners.
As soon as the band finishes playing, one of the gig’s organisers grabs the mic.
“OI! Some cunts have snuck in here without paying! It’s only five bucks you stingy fucks, fucking pay up and support the scene or otherwise gigs like this won’t keep happening.”
He turns off the mic and puts an iPod on through the PA, leaving band and punters alike scratching their heads. Money? Nah. Nobody’s in this for the money.
For more Downpour, here’s their MySpace and a video of their song “BWS”.
Live photos by Luke Wonnocott, all others by me.
