Last night I had the pleasure of talking to Beijing-based photojournalist Matthew Niederhauser, who is talking at Sound Kapital this Friday at Carriageworks!

He’s been covering the Chinese indie scene for some time now, and had a lot of really fascinating things to say about it.

Check out the interview above, and don’t forget to enter on our Facebook page to win tickets to the Sound Kapital show (entries close today! Weds 1 Feb, 5pm).

Hi all,

There’s a bunch of podcasts that still need to be edited (hopefully this long weekend), but I thought i’d go ahead and put tonight’s Neil Finn interview up, as there’s people asking for it!

This was such a blast. Without wanting to get too sentimental, I’d joked about one day having Neil on the show, as if that was the ultimate aspiration for a show where I talk to antipodean singer-songwriters. And I’m still not sure that there’s anywhere bigger to go from here, but luckily there’s exciting music all over Australia to tackle. Oh, and I wouldn’t mind Robert Forster, too ;)

Big thanks to Neil for taking the time out to chat! Make sure you head along to his new band Pajama Club’s show at Oxford Art Factory on Monday 13 June, and download their new single here. It’s a cracker.

There’s lots of great music coming soon to the site too - tonight’s interview with Pat of The Falling Joys, as well as live sets and interviews from Jack Ladder, Mike Noga, Moth Larf and Naked On The Vague are forthcoming. Yay!

I remember my first gig after turning eighteen. It was Mudhoney at the Metro, and I was flying solo. Pre-gig I ended up in conversation with an older punter, who told me that I simply had to check out a Sydney group called Crow.

Five years on, the group has reformed, and there’s a fantastic sounding record nearing release. So I was very excited to have Peter and John Fenton in the studio, two brothers who make up half of Crow. They chatted at length about reforming, recording and touring, and treated us to a live, acoustic rendition of “The Whole World Turns”.

I’ve kept Peter’s wonderful intro to the song on this post, and the whole interview + song is up on the Podcast. Make sure you head along to see them this Friday at Notes in Newtown!

Circle Pit have been around for some time now, but lately they’ve been on a roll - releasing a great debut album, playing some big shows, and ruffling a few feathers along the way. So I was pretty stoked to have them in the studio to play a few stripped back numbers, as well as chat about what they’ve been up to lately.

Tonight they played:

• Infinity
• Another Trick
• Beginning And The End

As with all of Radiant’s sets so far, it’s available for free - just click the Podcast button up top.

And check out their album launch this Wednesday at Oxford Art Factory with Lost Animal, Dead Farmers and Bed Wettin’ Bad Boys!

Jamie Hutchings is one of Sydney’s most awesome songwriters, and he’s consistently been there since the mid-90s. He’s fronted Bluebottle Kiss for many years, and last year released a solo album called His Imaginary Choir that found a brighter, more joyous sound.

I was very excited to have Jamie in the studio to chat about his past and future projects. He also played a short set that featured two new songs, a track from his last record and a Bluebottle Kiss song. The set was:

• Make Me No Sense
• Smoky Dawson
• White Rider
• New Vagabond

In hindsight, I think the vocals are a little low on this one. My bad. Tremendous set though, and Jamie was great to talk to. The full set is up on the podcast, where they’ll all be from now on. Check it out!

This week, I had the pleasure of interviewing Shaun Hemsley. Under the name Tenzenmen he’s run a label, a distribution, organised tours, operated a venue, and entered many other pursuits to promote music from Australia and Asia.

This interview went way longer than usual, and there’s good reason for that - Shaun’s knowledge of these scenes makes for a fascinating listen, and there was so much to talk about. He also played us some selections from his record label, and was kind enough to allow us to podcast the whole shebang.

The tracklist for this episode is:

• Nikko - Wedding Song
• Scul Hazzards - Slaughtered Pigs
• (interview) 
• Zoo - Manekin Bermesin
• Muscle Snog - Cat
• (interview)
• White - Boswitha Strunk

 Have a listen, and check his work out at tenzenmen.com.

Last night The Maple Trail (aka Aidan Roberts) came into the studio and played a tremendous live-to-air set. He’s a really interesting performer to watch live, refusing to relinquish the rich texture of his albums in a solo environment, and he succeeds with violin bows, shakers and loops. The result is at once intimate and expansive, with Aidan creating little worlds of sound for his folk songs to inhabit.

He performed four songs and chatted about his records so far, recording solo, and plans for the future. Setlist is as follows:

• Barking Dog and Swallow
• Rabbit
• (interview)
• Kodiak
• Telescope

As usual, the whole thing is available to download here. Enjoy!

Godswounds turned up to the FBi studio with more equipment than I’ve ever seen… an electric drumkit, keys, bass, acoustic guitar, a couple of amps, laptops, and a sax quartet to boot. Suffice to say, what resulted was unlike anything I’ve had in the studio, and probably won’t be repeated.

The band took us through four of their videogame-inspired instrumentals, and between tracks I had a very interesting chat with ringleader Lachlan about the Taiwanese music scene, videogame music and the somewhat mythical Chinese genre of “Pigfishing”.

Their set was:

• Lin Niang Kaho
• Boton Loves Femion
• Pro Boner
• Rubbernecker 

Then, after a short break, they introduced a completely separate band - a sax quartet called Besom - to perform their track Car Eater. An unexpected twist, and a whole lot of fun.

The whole thing is well worth a listen, and you can find it here.

The Preachers released their debut EP on Monday, and celebrated by cramming into the FBi studios for a stripped back performance on Radiant.

Led by Gideon Bensen and Isabella Manfredi, they pull together influences from alt-country, blues and folk to great effect. Their Radiant performance saw a slight retreat from their rowdier live sets, in favour of a good old fashioned (mostly) acoustic jam.

Their full set and interview is available to download here, and includes the songs:

• Be Alright
• Fictional Lover
• Boxing With Shadows
• Young

The Preachers’ EP is out now digitally on Bandcamp and will be available on CD very soon. And you can catch them performing live and loud at Spectrum on Wednesday April 28.

I was delighted to have Quaoub in the studio this week for the first of many performances on Radiant. Joined by Sonia Z of Psychonanny & The Babyshakers, he chatted about his music and influences, and played a handful of his songs live on air.

You can download the full set here, and preview a track above.

His set was:

• Oblivion
• Chronical
• Athlete
• Evil Is Old Bread
• Choppingboard 

Despite a few mishaps (amp troubles pre-set, and a rendition of Chronical that didn’t go quite to plan) he played a terrific set, so check it out!

Last week, I had the pleasure of inviting taper extraordinaire Morris Coffey into the studio. Morris runs the blog Sydney Live, in which he posts a bunch of (mostly) Sydney gigs that he’s gone to armed with some mics and a recorder.

We chatted about taping, the Sydney music scene, blogging, and played a bunch of his favourite recordings. It was a great episode, so give it a listen and give his blog a visit.

Embedded in this post is a preview of the interview, but it’s low quality and only the first part. The whole shebang is longer and better quality, and you can find it here.

Recordings included in this interview are:

• Naked on the Vague - These Days
• Dick Diver - On The Bank
• Intentions - Abdicate
• Royal Headache - Two Kinds Of Love (slight glitch, sorry!)
• Ghosts of Television - Topsoil
• To The North - Luster