The handy thing about working at a music magazine as an intern is that they give me loads of free tickets to gigs, and with a little bit of English eyelash-batting and name-dropping, I can sweet talk myself into pretty much any gig, tickets or not. And, luckily for Harry, I allowed to take a +1.
On Thursday night we headed to Oxford Art Factory to go and see Foxes as Chris, the editor, had put my name on the door for me. She's sort of a new kid on the block and is actually English from Southampton, unbelievably, and had come over to tour Australia before trying to break America. I didn't think I knew much of her music, but turns out she's sampled by loads of DJs as she has that perfect garage/house kinda voice they all love and I recognised loads of her songs. OAF is a really cool, simple, but very famous venue on Oxford Street and the crowd there that night were really chilled and because it's not very big, it was really intimate. So intimate, in fact, that I could have sworn she was giving Harry the eyes over the heads of everyone as she sang, the little minx.
She gave a really good set and her voice was amazing, and it was so nice to hear such a familiar accent! Only annoying thing about her is her obsessive hair flicking, which is kinda cute at first but then just gets really annoying she she's got a full on mane and it kinda gets in the way.... never mind, she was still good.
We stayed for her full set but headed home when she finished as Harry had to sleep and I had work the next day. If any of you guys want to check her out then she's coming back to do a UK tour soon.
After our fun and free night out on Thursday, a friend asked if I was going to the Astral People night at Basement where Shigeto and Phaeleh were playing, and it sparked a little idea. Tickets were $40, which is a leeeeeetle pricey, and so I tried my luck and emailed Astral People and told them I wanted to run a review on their gig for The Brag magazine and would they fancy sticking me on the door with a +1? Half an hour later, Harry and I had free tickets. BOOM.
The gig was on Saturday night and I scuttled home after work, had a quick change, and then we headed back into the city. Basement is in a slightly bizarre place as it's right down in Circular Quay in the hub of the CBD and is literally just the basement of a huge skyscraper. It's a cool venue though as it's basically like an underground pub and the stage is only slightly raised, making it feel like some kind of open-mic gig, apart from the fact that it's world renowned DJs...
Shigeto did his set first and I really enjoyed watching him and how versatile he is as a producer. He's also an awesome percussionist and did loads of live sampling which was amazing to watch. After a short break, Phaeleh began his set and continued on for a good two hours. He's really different live compared to his recorded stuff, as his music is mainly quite ambient and people expect him to be super chilled out, but he's not. It was amazing to be stood so close to him, I literally was 2m from him, just watching everything he was doing. Very different from seeing him at Outlook/Glastonbury!
It was so nice to finally find a really good venue which was host to amazing underground nights, bringing in some of mine and Harry's favourite musicians. I kinda feel that Sydney is lacking a bit with it's music scene not really amounting to much, but Astral People are an absolute blessing and I'm sure we'll be heading to many more of their nights. Fingers crossed I'll be able to work my magic and get free tickets again....!
B
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