Surf ‘n’ Western music with the incomparable Mikelangelo & The Tin Star

Described elsewhere as “ sounding like a spaghetti western blended with a Beach Boys sex party”, Mikelangelo and his band The Tin Star performed a very entertaining set at a well attended in store performance at Basement Discs at lunchtime today.

I have had the pleasure of seeing Mikelangelo previously with his other band The Black Sea Gentlemen when they played an in store in 2005, so was delighted to see him scheduled this time round.

Mikelangelo has a larger than life on stage persona. He’s extremely funny for one, and a snappy dresser (dig the jacket!) for another. And his music is lively and enthusiastically played – western surfing music indeed, reminiscent of 50s bands The Atlantics and The Shadows given a Balkan twist. The first tune played (an instrumental) was called Balkan Beach Party, then Mikelangelo got confessional with a song about his conception and birth pulling no punches in the lyrics, which were quite explicit.

The Tin Star are a four piece band and generally include female singer Saint Claire who was not present today, suffering ill health. So today was just the boys, including Fiete Geier on lead guitar, Gareth Hill on bass and Pete Olsen on drums.

Check them out on My Space and also visit Mikelangelo’s blog Secrets of A Gentleman for fashion tips.

Tex Perkins & The Dark Horses

I haven’t written about music for a while, in fact I’ve neglected to mention the last few Basement in store performances, which were as usual excellent and starred Nick Charles on one instance and Tracy McNeil on the other.

Today however was a special occasion where acclaimed Australian rocker, Tex Perkins with his band The Dark Horses were showcasing songs from their latest self-titled CD at a lunchtime in-store at Basement Discs. It was well attended – quite a crowd was there to hear a fabulous half hour or so of music. I was not sure what to expect, having never really followed Tex Perkins’ musical career, which has included fronting iconic bands The Cruel Sea and The Beasts of Bourbon.

I was pleasantly surprised. The music was warm and soulful and full of rock n roll goodness. Tex has a great rock voice, somewhat ragged and gravelly but powerful, and the Dark Horses provided solid backing in the guitar and percussion, not to mention keyboard departments. Somehow all six of them managed to squeeze on to the tiny Basement stage.

It was worth braving the chancy Melbourne weather to attend.

But wait, there’s more…

Whilst I was waiting for the tram home outside the GPO, I was fortunate enough to hear a very talented young singer, performing close by. Named David Shaw, he must have been all of 15 years old, but he could sing like an angel.


He had one of those beautiful, powerful emotive voices – it reminded me of Patty Griffin –and used it to great effect. I was enormously impressed. Remember the name David Shaw, I’m sure he’ll be a star one day.

Mechanique – a haunting post apocalypse tale by Genevieve Valentine

Some months ago I ordered a book as a gift for a friend from Small Beer Press, a small independent publisher in the USA. As usual, when the book arrived, they had included in the package an assortment of oddments, like A Working Writer’s Daily Planner , an ARC (advanced readers copy) of a novel called The Liminal People, several promotional postcards  and an attractive  bookmark, masquerading as a ticket to the Cirque  Mechanique, which intrigued and charmed me. There is a web address –www.circus-tresaulti.com- on the ticket, but somehow I kept forgetting to investigate it.

Last week, I read Jeff Vandermeer’s short reviews of recommended science fiction & fantasy books for summer reading on the New York Times web site.  One of the books on his list was Mechanique -A Tale of the Circus Tresaulti whereupon I realised what the bookmark was all about and set about acquiring a copy of the novel.

One of the best things about having a Kindle is that one doesn’t have to wait for books that are unavailable in Australia to arrive from overseas. In some cases this can take up to three weeks. Sure, it’s pleasant to anticipate a package, but then again why wait.

One of the postcards contained in the Small Beer Press package was promoting Weightless Books, an indie press ebook store. So there I surfed and found Valentine’s Mechanique for the princely sum of $4.99. In a trice I had it downloaded and loaded onto my Kindle. It’s also available on Amazon (UK and com).

So was it worth it? Well, for $4.99 you couldn’t really complain if the book was not up to expectation, but Mechanique turned out to be a real gem, a keeper. I’m tempted to buy a hard copy of it for my book collection.

I finished reading the book this morning, emerging as if from a dream, having been thoroughly immersed and seduced by Genevieve Valentine’s tale of an unusual circus troupe travelling through a world devastated by war .

The circus performers are mechanical in the sense that they have been enhanced with metal, wire , cogs and gears, but retain a fragile humanity.  They can die, but they can also be reincarnated and they refer to themselves as having the bones.  What having the bones means is gradually revealed over the course of the novel. To keep up appearances those artists who are unmodified wear metal gloves and shoes or in the case of Little George,  walk around in brass legs.  They are manufactured, so to speak,  by the female circus ringmaster  Boss, though that is not her real name. Boss is somehow magically gifted in the art of raising the dead and mending her broken creations.

Of all Boss’s creations , it is the flying man that haunts the novel. The original flying man, Alec, is only present in the story as a memory, a powerful memory at that. He fell, and the repercussions of his fall are a poignant thread throughout the book.

Mechanique is certainly a strange and wondrous novel, but is very well written and  strongly character based. Despite their obvious mechanical enhancements each character possesses a psychological depth that causes the reader to willingly suspend disbelief. The novel proceeds as the circus moves, from place to place and from one character’s point of view to another. It reminded me somewhat of Angela Carter’s Infernal Desire Machines of Doctor Hoffman – it has that same feel of exotic location.

It’s a melancholy novel, quite heartbreaking. As I said before it’s a gem and a delightful discovery for me of a new writer I had not previously come across. 

Too Cool For Cats

Winter has come early to Melbourne this year. freezing cold from the middle of May. By the time winter is officially here we will be quite inured to it – sort of.

I snapped the above photo of the cats this afternoon, both curled up on the bed – in rare close proximity, though not touching.

Lizzie in the foreground looks much bigger than Willy, but truth to tell there’s not much between them in height. In weight, Lizzie is a featherweight, whereas Willy, who looks slim and slight, actually weighs a ton. He’s a solid muscular cat, hence the deceptive heaviness.

As Melbourne has been plagued with rats and mice over the past few months, Willy has been catching one or more a day. Unfortunately, he brings them inside to play with, and more often than not they escape and disappear under the furniture. Lizzie has totally lost interest in prey these days, so doesn’t even bother staking them out, a pastime she took very seriously in her younger days, so there are unknown numbers of rodents lurking somewhere in the house, unless they’ve escaped through the walls as we can’t hear any scuttling.

My attitude has become ‘out of sight out of mind’, as I can’t be bothered fretting about it.

However the thought of another three months or so of winter is kind of depressing, but a good excuse to curl up with the cats and read.

David Mitchell – Superstar Writer at the Athenaeum

I don’t suppose you can generally call a writer a superstar, but the huge turn out at the Athenaeum Theatre last night for noted literary light David Mitchell, gave the impression that wordsmiths can warrant such status.

David Mitchell himself admitted that he envied musicians, who can obtain an instant response from their audience as to the acceptability of their musical offerings, being out there in the glare of the spotlight a lot of the time, whereas writers, having a solitary occupation, rarely receive such feedback . He did mention though that he enjoyed touring and meeting his readers face to face.

He came across as charming, funny and unaffected; he has an appealing and attractive personality that was friendly and cheerful to all those who queued for his signature.

As these sort of events go, not that I’ve been to many, it was interesting and engaging throughout. It started with David Mitchell reading from his latest novel The Thousand Autumns of Jacob De Zoet, then Melbourne Writers Festival Program Manager, Jenny Niven posed several questions about his writing process. He spoke at length about his methods of research and the problems inherent in writing an historical novel. All very interesting and wittily expressed by the guest of honour.

After a few audience questions, it was a matter of getting in line for the signing. It was a long queue, but David Mitchell seemed indefatigable. I only took my copy of Thousand Autumns, and was pleased to have it signed, though others seemed to have brought along his entire opus.


David Mitchell has been widely praised for his writing, and I have no arguments with that, as I recall my delight when I first discovered his books when Cloud Atlas was published. I was entranced by the novel and awestruck by Mitchell’s clever sleight of hand prose. At my time of life it was thrilling to discover a writer of Mitchell’s calibre as such beguiling writers are all too infrequent.

The Black Caviar phenomenon continues in Queensland

Black Caviar is aiming for her 13th win in succession and 6th Group One in the BTC Cup at Doomben race track on Saturday (today) . Queensland Racing is expecting record crowds to attend, matching or even overtaking the turnout back in the 1970s for Queensland racing hero Gunsynd aka The Goondawindi Grey.

The weather on Saturday in Brisbane is expected to be fine and sunny, so the track should be good. Certainly better than the present weather here in Melbourne where winter has struck with a vengeance. Oh to be in sunny Queensland!

A field of eight will contest the BTC Cup, a weight for age competition over 1200 metres. The field includes Hay List who proved his superiority to the majority of sprinters excepting Black Caviar, recently demolishing a classy field in the All Aged Stakes with an effortless 3.5 length win. Black Caviar and Hay List have met on three occasions, and the mare has won all three, so I can’t see Hay List getting the better of her in this.

The remainder of the field will no doubt have to fight for third spot. Old troopers Black Piranha and Snipers Bullet who haven’t raced since December 2010, resume in this race. They both have form on the track, but they’ll probably be pipped by super consistent mare Melito or one of the other younger contenders.

It’ll be a must watch race for racing fans all over Australia simply because of super star Black Caviar, but alas it won’t be free to air TV. I’m contemplating going to the nearest TAB to witness the event, depending on the weather.

Speaking of stars of the turf, the 2010 Australian Spring Carnival hero, So You Think, had his first start for his new trainer Aiden O’Brien in a 2000 metre race at the Curragh in Ireland. Though not pitted against the top echelon of middle distance runners, So You Think won the race by 10 lengths, displaying his obvious class and impressing all and sundry. He’ll be contesting harder races in June, so here’s hoping he continues his winning ways.

This post was written mid week, but as Blogger has been down I haven’t been able to post it until today.

Rumble, Shake & Tumble with the Wagons

I just love watching the Wagons band perform live, and had an opportunity today to see them at an in store at Basement Discs. Their new album Rumble, Shake & Tumble, was released today and a large audience was at Basement Discs to celebrate the launch.

As a live band Wagons are dynamic, rambunctious and riveting. Led by the very funny and charismatic Henry Wagons, they gave us a taste of the new record to the tune of four or five songs. Very tasty it was too, full of country rock goodness, and included a great tribute song to Willie Nelson.

Henry was in fine form spruiking the new record for all his worth, and I’m certain many CDs were sold, particularly after he called for pug puppy Gordon to join him on stage. How could you love the guy and not buy his record!

Check them out on My Space and try and get to a live performance during their extensive tour supporting the new album. They won’t be back in Melbourne until mid July when they’ll be doing an extravaganza at the Forum Theatre.