First chance to hear how a string septet, fifty piece choir and a world champion beatboxer mix up modern music

Seven of the most talented string musicians on the London scene have joined forces to produce Fuze: a unique string septet which performs in collaboration with World Champion Beatboxer Wan Dan and fifty piece Bermondsey choir ‘The Heard’ to produce a prodigious new sound mixing contemporary edge with classical excellence.

The core all girl seven-piece, signed to Warner Music Entertainment, consists of classically trained musicians from the UK and Australia, with Cat Parker (violin), Willow Stahlut (violin), Marianne Haynes (violin), Polly Wiltshire (viola), Chantal Leverton (viola), Rhian Porter (cello) and Lizzie May (cello).

The group brings together experience spanning the realms of classical to jazz and pop, with members performing from Birmingham to Bahrain, in venues ranging from the Symphony Hall to the Big Chill, and with a variety of artists from Zero 7 to Elton John!

Together with artist and producer Jim McWilliam, who has arranged for the likes of Pavarotti to Jeff Beck, Fuze has taken a variety of contemporary pop, rock and dance classics from revered artists including Radiohead, Bjork, Lamb and Massive Attack, and reworked them instrumentally to find the most beautiful way of representing the piece.

They have also created original material which shows off the scope of their sound – from punchy rhythms led by Wan Dan to dreamy, cinematic soundscapes from the strings to a cappella harmonies from The Heard.

This ambitious new line-up will play by themselves and in conjunction with high profile artists at a series of festivals and events this summer.

Catch Fuze first at their inaugural showcase at ULU on 12th May. Doors are from 7.30 pm.

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From CMU “A new tribute album to influential Brisbane indie rockers The Go-Betweens has been announced, and it’s set to feature contributions from Australian artists such as Dan Kelly, Sarah Blasko and Glenn Richards. ‘Write Your Adventures Down’ will get an Australian release via SonyBMG imprint The Red Label in June - no word yet on a UK release.

As I’m sure you all remember, because you’re all very old, the duo of Robert Forster and Grant McLennan’s main period of activity ran from 1977 to 1989 and was adored by critics, but didn’t impact hugely on the public. They reunited in 2000 and won an ARIA award for their final album ‘Oceans Apart‘, released in 2005. McLennan, as previously reported, died last year from a heart attack.”

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Kylie Minogue is to guest as a Cyberwoman in the next series of Dr Who, according to the News Of The World. A BBC insider is quoted as saying: “Kylie jumped at the chance to be in the show and is really looking forward to acting again”.

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On the morning of the 13th of February 2007 the Band “Borne” had no idea what was about to take place. The boys were excited about their album “Loss of Signal” being made available all over the world and thought a large audience might be exposed to their music. But everyone was overwhelmed by the amazing worldwide response. The guys have always valued the online community and appreciated the level playing field provided by the MySpace and YouTube revolution.

On the 23rd of Febuary Loss of Signal was sitting in the top 20 on the Amercian Billboard Digital charts (billboard) as well as being catapulted into the TOP 50 in Japan and New Zealand, the TOP 20 in the UK and Canada, and the TOP 10 in the USA, Australia and France on iTunes. With the single getting airplay on stations in the USA like Indy 103.1 and securing deals with advertisers and films in the USA, the word on Borne is certainly starting to circulate with powerful decision makers.

After a recent news article in which the giant EMI clamed to have lost millions of physical sales due to downloads and the recent Grammy awarded to Australian band Wolfmother, Michael Stangel, A+R for Borne’s Indy Label Jellyfish said “It’s a nice place to be right now. The phone has not stopped ringing and the offers are coming in at a rapid pace. There is talk of the band having one of its singles on the soundtrack for a major Hollywood blockbuster sequel, but I can’t say anymore right now.”

With the success of the two previous EPs, “BORNE EP” and “Souls on Satellite”, Borne is set for another busy year touring, with talk of a European tour in May and a possible trip to the USA in 2007 to promote “Loss of Signal”.

Borne’s Loss Of Signal has managed impressive download positions on itunes for the week ending 18th Feb, 2007 are as follows…

France: # 5 Overall Top Albums
USA: # 10 Overall Top Albums
Australia: # 6 Overall Top Albums
Canada: # 12 Overall Top Albums
UK: # 13 Overall Top Albums

Hear for yourself below!

Audio Stream: “The Guide” - Real Media / Windows Media
5 song sampler: Get it here!

bornemusic.com
myspace.com/borneaustralia

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The ‘no’ in ‘No Pussy Blues’ is not a prohibitive one, but, rather, one describing a certain, painful paucity in the narrator’s life. Try as he might - and he goes to great lengths - this guy just can’t get laid. From the first snippets of sound - a typewriter typing out ‘No Pussy Blues,’ - to the dying scream of electric guitars in the fade out, the listener’s focus remains on the characteristically bookish and disaffected vocals of Nick Cave as he describes his many and varied attempts to score with a pretty fan. Tension builds subtly in his practiced voice until howling guitars join in and transform his monotone to a scream which, in turn, subsumes the crisp hi-hat drum pattern and the hammering bass line of the verse to create a Mike Patton-esque squall of pent up noise and frustration. Not getting any is rarely so exciting or entertaining.
[BH/CMU]

Release Date: 19 February 2006
Label: EMI/Mute

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Those Avalanches have written on their website all of the following words about their long awaited new album (trendy music types, by the way, don’t have much time for capital letters or apostrophes, or so it seems):

“happy new year yall. we’ve made a heap of mixes and stuff available while we finish the record. they wont give you a hint of the new albums magical sound unfortunately, but they will keep you pilgrims well nourished until the next harvest. its a really thrilling time for us right now as this record comes together, its so fuckin party you will die, much more hip hop than you might expect, and while there is still no accurate estimated time of arrival, were sure you’re gonna love it when it arrives. much of last year was spent cutting up the spoken word/instructional records we need to tell the albums musical story, and we have some 40 odd songs we’re narrowing down and finishing. so its real, it exists, and you know we wouldn’t be serving anything up unless it was gonna give you that same special feeling that since has. funnily enough its ended up sounding like the next logical step to since, we just had to go around in a big circle to get back to where we belong. and one day when you least expect it you’ll wake up and the sample fairy will have left it under your pillow. so big up to clint for all his work in making the downloads available for everyone to enjoy, and have a great oh seven”.

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NME.com reports that Emily Eavis has said “It’s just not going to happen”. Kylie Minogue, previously thought to be headlining the closing day of the festival, is not set to play Glastonbury 2007 according to Emily Eavis.

“(Kylie)’s got a lot of touring up her sleeve and I think if she was going to do Glastonbury, she’d rework her show and I don’t think it’s going to be possible in that time frame. It’s just not going to happen,” explained Emily. Eavis also told BBC 6 Music that the returning festival would not be “dominated by headliners”.

“We’ve got really good stuff coming in. But there’s not going to be dominating headliners. We’ve got such a good wealth of stuff coming in through.

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Kylie Minogue will make her comeback to the UK stage following her much reported fight against breast cancer with a one off show at the Wembley Arena on 31 December. The show will kick off at 8pm and run until after midnight, with the venue open until 1pm. And if you’re worried about being stranded in North London with no way home, the good news is the tube will be offering free services until 4.30am on News Year Day.

Confirming the show, Kylie told reporters yesterday: “I’ve been to some great New Year’s parties over the years and I can’t wait to host what will be the biggest party of all”.

Tickets for the Kylie show are £65 and go on sale tomorrow.

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Rolf Harris has apologised for the racist language used in his 1960 hit song ‘Tie Me Kangaroo Down, Sport’. Speaking in an interview to be aired on Radio Scotland on 10 Dec, Harris talked of his regret at having used the term “abo” to refer to Australian Aborigines in the track.

The words of the song, as you may not be aware, if you’ve never really examined the lyrics in great detail, depict the demise of an Australian stockman, who, on his deathbed, is telling friends to take care of his affairs - exhorting them to “keep me cockatoo cool”, “take me koala back”, and “mind me platypus duck”. The offending line is “let me abos go loose”.

The song was written in 1957 when aboriginal rights in Australia were virtually non existent. At that point they weren’t even guaranteed a vote. After the song became popular, a re-recorded version replaced the references to “abos” with “emus”. Harris said in the interview: “At the time, I was 27 or something when I wrote that. But since 1960, I have never sung that verse.”

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On 5 February 2007 Domino continue their Triffids reissue programme with the release of two very contrasting, seminal albums, ‘In The Pines’ and ‘Calenture’. Both albums have been remastered and will be released with additional music in an expanded format as limited edition CDs. They follow the 2006 reissue of the band’s ‘Born Sandy Devotional’ album, which, voted ‘Reissue of the Month’ in Uncut magazine, signaled the start of a rolling campaign that will see all The Triffids’ albums reissued, and will culminate in a Best of and Rarities set. A hradback book written by Bleddyn Butcher adout David McComb and The Triffids will also be published during this period.

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