Books Editor. An admirer of songs and reader of books. Simon has a PhD in English and Comparative Literature. All errant apostrophes are his own.
Falling Through Clouds is the new production from Perth theatre company – The Last Great Hunt. Personally I’d argue that that sentence alone should be enough to make you want to go and watch this work. But then of course you might not know who they are yet. If you don’t Falling Through Clouds will…
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Letters Home is the latest theatrical work from Joe Lui. If you’ve been to a theatre production in Perth over the last few years, it’s likely you will have seen Lui’s name and face in a programme somewhere having worked as a director, writer and designer on a number of productions, including with his own…
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The Distance from Here is the latest production from Perth theatre company Endless Theatre Company. Written by American director, screenwriter and playwright Neil LaBute, the play is a dark and at times brutal look at life on the fringes of suburbia, a tale populated by disenchanted youth and their extended families. Though set in suburban…
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Patrick James’ Broken Lines EP tour hit the West Coast on Saturday night with a show at the Fly By Night in Fremantle. Despite the miserable weather a sizeable crowd turned out for James’ return to the Fly, this time playing the main stage. Opening the evenings proceedings were Central Coast duo Winterbourne, playing their…
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Just before he headed out on a national tour, we caught up with Singer-Songwriter Patrick James for a quick chat about his new EP Broken Lines, touring with Boy & Bear and his plans for the rest of the year. Congratulations on the release of Broken Lines. I’ve had a couple of listens to it…
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White Rabbit, Red Rabbit, the final instalment in Perth Theatre Company’s 2014 season, is not your average night at the theatre. Written by Iranian playwright Nassim Soleimanpour, White Rabbit, Red Rabbit is more akin to performance art than traditional theatre. Each night a different unsuspecting performer takes up the challenge of acting out Soleimanpour’s script,…
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Recently we caught up with Norwegian quintet Highasakite over email to find out a little bit more about the band, and their new album Silent Treatment. The band are due to hit our shores next month for a quick-stop tour, with two shows in Sydney and Melbourne; though the band have hinted they may be…
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On Wednesday night Perth’s His Majesty’s Theatre stage was transformed into the ornate halls of the Vatican for the opening night of The Last Confession, presented here for the first time in Australia, with venerated British actor David Suchet (Poirot to so many) making his Australian stage debut as Cardinal Benelli. Set in 1978, The…
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Friday night saw Ben Howard finally make it across west for a sold out show at Perth’s Astor Theatre, kicking off a run of dates that sees Howard also take to the stage at Splendour in the Grass. Yet this was a show, as Howard revealed, that came ever so close to being cancelled, with…
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We all have our slight addictions, many of them relatively benign like coffee. For others like the protagonists of Eight Gigabytes of Hardcore Pornography, the most recent production in Perth Theatre Company’s 2014 season, they are more extreme and not without their consequences – whether it be his addiction to hardcore pornography on the Internet…
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Local singer-songwriter Riley Pearce spent the majority of the first half of this year in America on exchange. Saturday night saw Pearce and his band play their first headlining show since his return to Australia and Perth. Those of you who follow Pearce on Facebook are no doubt already be aware that his time overseas…
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Saturday night saw Fremantle’s Mojos play host to the third and final Little Bastard show of their album launch tour through Western Australia with a large rowdy crowd braving the stormy winter weather for an evening of good times and good music. Kick-starting it all was, the brilliantly named, Aborted Tortoise. It’s pretty safe to…
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Perth locals Runner played their second and final launch show for their debut album Cloud Kingdom in the intimate confines of the Astor Lounge on Friday night. Opening the show was the as ever ethereal Rabbit Island, performing as a duo, with Jake Webb on guitar duties alongside Amber Fresh. Whilst there were a few…
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Kim Churchill’s national tour made it to Fremantle on Thursday night, with a packed out mid-week show at Mojos, the second of three shows in Western Australia. Impressively and a little surprisingly roughly 80-90% of the crowd were already milling about outside the venue before the doors had even been opened, guaranteeing a great atmosphere…
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RabbitHead is the latest production from Little y Theatre Co and Whatshesaid. Directed by Ian Sinclair RabbitHead is a darkly absurd Australian comedy and performative response to Barbara Baynton’s gothic novel The Chosen Vessel. It’s a strange work – full of oddities and quirks, and even now, a day or so later, I’m still not…
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The paranormal has long captured the interests of writers, directors and actors alike. You can even go into bookshops and find whole shelves devoted to the genre. Werewolf Priest!: The Lamentable Ballad of Father Hank Grimby, the latest production from writer, director and producer Levon J Polinelli both continues this burgeoning genre, and successfully parodies…
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Wish is the latest production from Perth Theatre Company, and the first in its new season. Adapted by Actor and Director Humphrey Bower from the Peter Goldsworthy novel of the same name, Wish is a charming yet challenging piece of theatre, which will perhaps leave a few unsuspecting patrons unsettled and uncomfortable. Wish is the…
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Elephents, the latest brainchild from writer Jeffrey Jay Fowler, has all the hallmarks of a good soap opera; love triangles, dramatic deaths and even the odd elephant or two. It’s sort of like Neighbours or Home and Away, you know, if either were set in a dystopian world plagued by power cuts and where going…
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Sunday saw the West Coast Blues and Roots Festival return to Fremantle for its 11th year. Though back to its now customary one day format and with a smaller line-up than in recent years, the festival still managed to draw a none-too-shabby 15,000 people through the gates. Blues and Roots has always been a reasonably…
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Martin Carthy is rightly considered by many to be one of the most influential figures within the British music landscape, and continues to be a leading figure in the English folk tradition; having recently been awarded the Lifetime Achievement at the 2014 BBC Folk Awards. Carthy has released over 40 albums throughout the course of…
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Ahead of his appearance at Byron Bay Bluesfest in April and a short promotional tour we caught up with award-winning and Mercury Prize nominated English Folk musician Seth Lakeman to have a chat about his latest album Word of Mouth, his experiences touring Australia, and his involvement in the award-winning collaborative project The Full English….
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We caught up with singer-songwriter Simone Felice ahead of the March 14th release of his new album Strangers to find out a bit more about the new record, his thoughts on the state of radio, the Americana revival and more. Hi, how are you? Hi Simon, it’s nice to hear from you. Yeah, it’s great…
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Ernest Ellis released his highly-anticipated new record, Cold Desire last week. We caught up with him to have a chat and find out more about the new album; how it all came about; and whether or not we’ll see him out on the road around the country in the coming months. What was the inspiration…
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It’s been a rollercoaster year for Sharon Jones, the corrections officer turned soul queen. Her fifth album with the imitable Dap Kings, Give the People What They Want was shelved and touring halted so Jones could turn her attention to battling and ultimately beating cancer which threatened to bring her fairy-tale career to a halt….
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Having just released the single “(Lady) Roll Back The Years”, we caught up with Stephen Kelly – lead vocalist and guitarist of Dublin band Raglans – to get to know them a little bit better, and look ahead to their debut album – due out later this month. Head to the end of the interview…
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Ahead of his show at the Perth Festival, we caught up with Icelandic composer and musician Ólafur Arnalds to discuss his latest album, 2013’s For Now I Am Winter and get a glimpse into his creative process. How are you, how’s the jet lag? Not too bad, my head feels a little bit foggy, but…
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Thursday night saw Icelandic composer Ólafur Arnalds brave the warm Perth weather and make his Perth Festival debut at the festival gardens, treating the attentive and patient crowd to a selection of songs from his latest album For Now I Am Winter and more. Sydney composer Sophie Hutchings opened proceedings with a brief, but lovely…
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A Midsummer Night’s Dream is up there as one of Shakespeare’s most oft performed plays. There have been countless as adaptations and reinterpretations over the years, but I’d imagine there are few as wonderfully strange and eclectic as Russian director Dmitry Krymov’s interpretation A Midsummer Night’s Dream (As You Like It). As clichéd as it…
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Heroes and tyrants, Gods and Mortals, and ancient armies all clashed on stage on Sunday night. All of them brought to vivid life by one man, actor and co-writer Denis O’Hare, for the Australian premiere of the An Iliad. A captivating and engaging adaptation and reinterpretation of Homer’s Iliad by US collective Homer’s Coat, that…
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Laneway Festival returned to Western Australia for the 5th year on Saturday, moving from its home in the Cultural Precinct, to the leafy surrounds of Fremantle’s Esplanade park. In a period of uncertainty for festival organisers Laneway seems to be going from strength to strength consistently selling out across the country, even in Perth! But…
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