Sun 12 Apr – Big Bad Voodoo Daddy, Frankie Wants Out

The ultimate swing band just hit Melbourne! Big Bad Voodoo Daddy came and dazzled us with an 8-piece line-up that projected a massive wall of sound my ears are still whining from. Every single player there was a master of their art and showed it off… regularly…

Karl Hunter on saxophone with his signature sound on the Go Daddy-O intro, the amazing Joshua Levy on piano, Kurt Sodegren with his pounding toms, Dirk Shumaker with his spinning bass, Andy Rowley with his barking baritone, Tony and Glen and their…

Sharon Jones and the Dap-Kings visited Melbourne shortly after the Falls Festival to give those of unlucky enough to either to get to Falls or get lost in the attempt a chance to hear them live.

And hear them we did. Absolutely brilliant original music, a funky soul sound straight out of the 70s, and a live stage presence bigger than the room courtesy of Miss Jones got the crowd moving and responding wildly.

I loved the way she interacted with the crowd, asking people up on stage and dancing with the guys and girls, including them in the song…

Sun 30 Mar – Maroon 5, OneRepublic, Brandi Carlile, Ry Cuming

Despite the other two bands, Maroon 5 and OneRepublic, not being my cup of tea exactly (though when the first Maroon 5 CD came out I remember I really liked one song) - I decided I would go to this gig purely to see Brandi Carlile on her first performance in Melbourne.

I missed her signing though! After she finished playing she said she's be signing stuff after the performance but I thought she meant after the entire concert, not after that slot… I have a t-shirt from the…

Got to go see The Melodics live on Friday night in Melbourne! Excellent show, with some great players.

It was a five-piece band with a bass player, drummer, saxophonist, pianist, and vocalist, with a guest rapper/singer.

The music styles ranged from hip-hop to reggae to funk and each were handled expertly. The sax player especially had some real talent and improvised through a great deal of the set, as did the pianist and bass player. I may be wrong but I'm pretty sure there was also a fair bit of free-form rap in there. The lead was pretty good, reminded…

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hBLm747tyn0

Grrr, if only I could play like that…

Queen
Bohemian Rhapsody
Mnozil Brass

Tue 1 May – Dave Matthews Band, Xavier Rudd

Opening first with Xavier Rudd, who is an *extremely* accomplished musician, the gig got off to a great start with some very sedate moshers swaying to his beat. I've never seen him live before though I've often heard how good he is, but I wasn't quite prepared for his awesome ability to keep track of several different musical threads in real time (i.e. bass drum, didge, and guitar).

He played through a lot of the old favourites as well as some of the songs from his new album, which, shockingly,…

If you want to hear the music we played at the nationals go here: http://nfomation.com/archives/459.

Plus, you can hear me clearly in the fourth piece at about 5:40 and and 13:29…. :D

Doesn't sound that impressive as it would if you were there, but anyway.

Also, I'm going to see DMB soon! More here later.

The Reel Big Fish came and rocked Melbourne tonight! Along with guests Guttermouth and Bagster, they played at the Billboard, a nightclub in Little Burke.

- Bagster was OK - a few problems with intonation and since I'm a trombone player, the guy on trombone was under heavy criticism for being a little poor with his technique. Balance overall was pretty poor, and the songs sounded all the same with very little differentiation…

- Guttermouth was tons better, but again mostly a blast-fest with a noisy feel overall, though sometimes you could hear enough rhythm to groove to.

Finally the…

I think this is a reasonable score…

Last.fm-Mainstream-O-Meter result

• 1 - Paul Simon: 112,510 listeners
• 2 - Dave Matthews Band: 186,754 listeners
• 3 - The Beatles: 599,618 listeners
• 4 - Led Zeppelin: 415,870 listeners
• 5 - Reel Big Fish: 118,132 listeners
• 6 - Pearl Jam: 291,568 listeners
• 7 - Ben Harper: 145,102 listeners
• 8 - Thirsty Merc: 4,028 listeners
• 9 - Rammstein: 292,575 listeners
• 10 - Brandi Carlile: 11,870 listeners
• 11 - Aretha Franklin: 131,215 listeners
• 12 - Red Hot Chili Peppers: 609,411 listeners
• 13 - Jamie Cullum: 89,920 listeners
• 14 - "Weird Al" Yankovic: 120,135 listeners
• 15 - Stevie…

I actually signed up here ages ago, but didn't actually do anything with it until today… too much to explain.

Anyway, I like to think of myself not so much as a musical snob as someone who enjoys music that not many people these days seem to (apart from the great people on this site). Bjork, Dave Matthews Band, Paul Simon, the Daly Wilson Big Band, the Beatles, they're all good. Sadly, most people near where I live would seem to like nothing more than to listen to the crap on the local radio station (though we DO have Triple…