Some of our Demo Of The Weekers have gone onto bigger and better things. No chart-toppers yet but we're sure it won't be long. Here's a rundown of some of them...
The Drones (dotw 6/11/01) are now $25,000 wealthier after winning the AMP prize for 2005 for their album Wait Long By The River And The Bodies Of Your Enemies Will Float By. They are heading overseas on a UK tour starting with the All Tomorrow's Parties festival in May with Mudhoney, The Yeah Yeah Yeahs and Devendra Banhart before hitting the road on their own club dates across the UK and Europe. Here's what Sophie said about them back in '01: "The Drones are a girl (bass, vocals) and three males (drums/guitars/vocals) from Melbourne. They've been playing together for about a year, or maybe two years by now. 'Swamp blues', distorted guitars, general thudding impression, idiot-savant garbled vocals. Their music is dark, smoky, smelly, sticky-carpeted..."
Diana Cormie (dotw May '04) made it into the top 20 for the 2006 Toyota Starmaker at the Tamworth Country Music Festival this year. A damn fine country-pop singer who deserves to make it to the very top!
The Savages (dotw 14/11/01) had a five track cd released by Half A Cow in September '02 called Long Live You. Hailing from Fagersta in Sweden, Daniel, Fredrik, Mats, Magnus and Magnus rocked our world. Check 'em out!
The Rectifiers (dotw 13/12/01) have continued on their own path of mysterious electro-country rock. And it's a small world when Rectifier Paul Rigby joins Half A Cow's Nic Dalton & the Gloomchasers on the banjo in '05.
The Sound Platform (dotw 4/3/02) may or may not have broken up but mainman Darren Smallman has been putting out loads of cds (by both local and overseas artists) on his Low Transit Industries label, which keeps going from strength to strength. One of our favourite albums EVER is the Finishing School's Destination Girl.
Sarah Sarah (dotw 9/12/02) broke up but spawned not one, but two pop bands. Zac and Kate formed the Wellingtons who released an EP through Reverberation and the other Kate has recently put out the Janes Vs World cd through Popboomerang.
Treetops (dotw28/10/02). Ah, the Treetops. A constant favourite around the HAC office. Here's what we wrote: "Ben, Jordan and Emmett, three-quarters of Melbourne band Treetops, have been playing together for a few years (possibly since high school?), with guitarist-turned-drummer, Leif, joining last year, replacing the Roland DR202 that can be heard on this demo." They went on to release three fantastic EPS (on Cavalier and Slanted), then they lost Emmett , Leif switched to guitar then left, went through a squadron of drummers, got dropped from the Slanted label and are still chipping away at the elusive debut album. Let's hope it all works out for them - a very talented band! Meanwhile, Ben and Emmett have reunited in a new band called The Brutals.
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