Tag: reviews

2025 consumption: a look at some stuff I liked

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Right, right. This should’ve been finished before the end of 2025. But between engagements and gastro, it took a bit of a back seat.

YES I KNOW GODDAMNIT.

But now I’m (mostly) back on deck, so here’s your yearly guide to things I perceived. You can check through the previous versions (here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here and here) for some more me-review action.

I think this will be less wordy than the usual variant, but we’ll see how we end up.

Continue reading “2025 consumption: a look at some stuff I liked” →

2024: consumption: a look at some stuff I liked

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It’s the last day of 2024. I am tired, but I am also eleven years deep into screaming into the void about the things I liked during the year, so I’m armed with a vat of tea, a container of lollies and the burning desire to see whether the stuff I consumed throughout the year has a hidden message.

Why do I do this? Your guess is as good as mine. And his. Though he’d be having a Bat-Guess.

This one could be a bit wilder (and woollier?) than preceding iterations, so if you’re feeling like something’s missing, you can check through the previous versions (here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here and here) for some more me-review action.

Or you could log off and go look at some fireworks. I dunno, I’m not your mother.

(Edit: I got too tired before the actual turn of the year and went to bed. This is a New Year’s Day post now, so I assume you are no longer wearing a party hat as you read this, which saddens me slightly. I did a psych! move and this post still appears to have been written in the dying minutes of the year, so it’s still on time, kinda-sorta.)

Continue reading “2024: consumption: a look at some stuff I liked” →

Book reviews: pre-flight five

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We’re about to go overseas for a month, and so I’m hoping that the next post here will be a recap of all the things I get through during fifty-odd hours of flights and however many hours of sitting in gardens.

HOWEVER that means that I need to clear my backlog of books read before I place myself at the tender mercies of security at the international terminal.

Same, except it’s a paperback.

So let’s get to it, because fuck knows I’ve got a lot of pre-trip packing and organisation to get through.

Continue reading “Book reviews: pre-flight five” →

New Howard Stelzer review!

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It’s been a long time between drinks, but I’ve written another review for the fine folks at Cyclic Defrost.

This time, I’m reviewing Howard Stelzer‘s enormous collaborative album, Invariably Falling Forward, Into The Thickets Of Closure. It’s a mouthful, but it’s an absolute triumph.

The album is out through No Rent Records and very much worth your time.

My review can be found here.

Book review: Sirius

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SiriusSirius by John Dunn, Ben Peake and Amiera Piscopo.
My rating: 4 of 5 stars.

This is a brief book, but it’s an important one if you’re familiar with Sydney’s most notable piece of Brutalism, the Sirius building, hunkered in The Rocks just beside the Harbour Bridge.

It’s a building that’s had a contentious history, but is much loved by those who’ve lived there. It’s also a building the government wants torn down, so that 250 luxury apartments can be made because presumably, people who can afford a box in the sky deserve to see the harbour and the city much more than people who might live there because of a social housing program. Continue reading “Book review: Sirius” →

Book review: Outcast, Vol. 4: Under Devil’s Wing

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Outcast, Vol. 4: Under Devil's WingOutcast, Vol. 4: Under Devil’s Wing by Robert Kirkman
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

So we remember what I said about the first volume of this series? And the second? And the third? Again, we can spin it out to the fourth: developing, slowly, with enough subtlety in the presentation to keep me reading.

This trade brings us pretty much up to date: at the time of writing there’s been four additional issues, so we’re still two off another collection. The show based on the property has been and gone, and is seems Kirkman is interested in keeping the slow-burn nature we’ve become accustomed to thus far. But this volume seems to feature more explaining than previous collections, and ramps up the fuck-is-all-the-town-involved? weirdness level.


Continue reading “Book review: Outcast, Vol. 4: Under Devil’s Wing” →

Book review: The Raven

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The RavenThe Raven by Peter Landesman
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

I first read this book not long after it came out. I was still at university, and was still enamoured of study and reading between the lines enough to think that if a text was gnomic enough it must have been super-profound, and if I didn’t get it, it was my fault and not the book’s.

That was then. Now, I can go “eh, fuck that book” with impunity and not feel as if I need to turn in my Lit Nerd decoder ring or something. Continue reading “Book review: The Raven” →

The Fuzz: 100 Demons (2005)

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This is an older review, rescued from the internet ether. I wrote it for a site I was involved with at the time, and I’m prompted to put it online as I’ve just listened to the band’s album and it still holds up OK if you’re keen on the whole garage-rock kinda thing. Excuse the writing: a lot has changed in 12 years – including lead singer Abbe May, who’s now out of the garage and into the spotlight. 

d74a214_4563After two well-received EPs, Perth quintet The Fuzz has upped the volume (and the dirt level) with their debut album, 100 Demons. What results is an album that’s got the sound of hunger nailed. With young bands, this keenness, this eagerness to rock isn’t unusual, but what marks this bunch of noiseniks out is the strength of vocalist Abbe May’s cords. They’re phenomenal, and bring to mind some kind of scientific experiment wherein Bon Scott and Adalita from Magic Dirt are somehow combined to create the Ultimate Rock Throat.

She’s that good. Continue reading “The Fuzz: 100 Demons (2005)” →

PJ Harvey: ICC Sydney Theatre, Jan 22 2017

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I suppose it’s the case that there’s no such thing as a bad PJ Harvey show. But it could be that there’s such a thing as an indifferent one. One that hits the right notes, but doesn’t have the emotional resonance you’d expect.

screen-shot-2017-01-29-at-1-05-11-pm

That was the case this evening. It wasn’t phoned in – not by any measure – but there was something curiously distancing about this evening’s show.  Continue reading “PJ Harvey: ICC Sydney Theatre, Jan 22 2017” →

PJ Harvey, The Tremors @ The Back Room Club, Byron Bay, 25/7/2004

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This review is an example of my older writing. Eventually, I hope to have all my reviews archived here. The writing style is a little different, but then I suppose we’ve all changed in the past decade. (Yes, that means I’m cringing at that use of ‘incendiary’ too.)

Gigs where there’s some difference between bands are always good, and this evening’s show at The Back Room Club was no exception. The difference in this case was that the headliner, PJ Harvey, is the queen of come-close-but-stay-at-arms-length songwriting, at once embracing and spurning, while her support, The Tremors prefer to stay up close and personal; preferably trying to get a hand down your duds in the process. Continue reading “PJ Harvey, The Tremors @ The Back Room Club, Byron Bay, 25/7/2004” →