Who's Who at Big Day Out 2008: Rage Against The Machine

This is Rage Against the Machine.

This is also rage against the machine.

That's all I needed to say.

Rage Against The Machine - Down Rodeo (from Evil Empire)

Who's Who at Big Day Out 2008: Silverchair

Dear Daniel,

Growing up is a bitch. I know you know that. You've battled with depression, anorexia, arthritis, divorce, earth, wind and fire. You've joined the burgeoning numbers of those who yearn to enter into the realm of the unaged. You miss your bolster.

But you know what? I have your salvation. A few weeks ago, I received an an email that said "ETERNAL ELIXIR OF YOUTH!" It came from a Mr Zamundo Mgaberesbe from Congo, who said that he would post me his mystical potion, brewed in the deepest recesses of Congo's jungles. All I needed to do was deposit $20,000 in his bank account. So, Danny boy, I thought of you, sold my sister, and put the required dough in his account. And true to his word, Mr Mgaberesbe sent over a package a week later containing that a hallowed vial.

So here's the deal: At Big Day Out, just play 'Tomorrow'. Or 'Israel's Son'. Or 'Pure Massacre', or anything from Frogstomp that made my pube-free ass sit up and believe I was immortal. Screw maturity, and the shitpile that is Young Modern, and do the right thing. Do it, and the vial is yours.

C'mon, do it.

Do it.

Please.

Yours youthfully,
Pantsy

Silverchair - Tomorrow (from Frogstomp)

Who's Who at Big Day Out 2008: Enter Shikari

According to Wikipedia, 'shikari' means 'hunter' in Persian, Hindi, Nepali, Urdu and Punjabi. Which suggests that with a band name like Enter Shikari, these Brit synthcore chaps are positioning those searing songs of shriektronica against a bushy jungle backdrop, inviting us to conjure up images of some khaki-donning heroic dude scouring through mosquito-infested Borneo in search of that vicious creature that is terorrising those peaceloving villagers at night.

Ok, so let's put it to the test then:

(Puts on headphones. Plays 'OK, Time For Plan B'. Four minutes and 54 seconds later, song ends. Puts down headphones. Picks up pet Malayan Tapir. Brings her to Babyland, buys her a fuchsia bib, and a pair of pleated socks. Reads The Complete Adventures of Curious George to her. Puts her to bed.)

They're right. Totally rawks man.

Enter Shikari - OK, Time For Plan B (from Take To The Skies)

Who's Who at Big Day Out 2008: Augie March

You know what's the best part about discovering a new band? It isn't the surge of satisfaction you get afterwards when they go big. It isn't the snarky finger-pointing you get to do when someone tells you "Have you heard of...?" It isn't even the incomparable burst of excitement that envelopes your toenails when you discover they're playing at a festival that you're attending.

Nah, the best part about discovering a new band is the flock of seagulls that fly over your head the moment you do. What, you mean that's never happened to you before? Poor thing. The precise moment I first heard Augie March—it was one sunny Aussie afternoon, when Triple J blasted 'Men Who Follow Spring The Planet 'Round'—at least 24 seagulls burst through the clouds and perched themselves on the ledge of a nearby pier. Granted, I was at the beach, and my mates were feeding chicken to another flock of gulls nearby (yeah, those bipeds are freakin' cannibals). And plus, I vaguely recall another flock shooting by when 'We Built This City' came on. And another bunch when some John Tesh number popped up. And another when this 4-year-old blew his clarinet...

Details, lads, details. God is in the canvas.

Augie March - The Honey Mouth (from Moo, You Bloody Choir)

Big Day Out 2008: Final lineup announced

So Big Day Out completes its lineup announcements with a city-specific bunch of local acts. On paper, there should be something for everyone, but evidently some papers are thicker than others. True to form, Sydney has the chubby 260mg sheet, with Dappled Cities, Bridezilla and Belles Will Ring. Melbourne can yippee over Love Of Diagrams, Auckland has Shocking Pinks, Perth seems decently placated with old fogies The Stems, and Gold Coast can at least wiggle a lil' with Dead Letter circus. And Adelaide? Umm... City Riots? Oh oh, the wine is killer up north! And olive groves down south are the bomb! And those cherry orchards out in the hills!

Bah.

AUCKLAND:
Missing Teeth, Shocking Pinks, MU, Dick Magik Johnson, The Exiles, The Electric Confectionaries, Battle Circus, Surf City, False Start, The Kingsland Vinyl Appreciation Society, The Lookie Loos, Kerretta, All Left Out, Pig Out and Solstate

GOLD COAST:
Brothablack, Tucker, Behind Crimson Eyes, Afro Dizzi Act, Lynchmada, Dead Letter Circus, Iron On, Yves Klien Blue, The Kindness of Strangers, Black Market Rhythm Co, Johnny G, Roger That, Mia Carla, Bark At the Moon, Segue, Nick Galea, Pony Loaf, Grass Roots Street Orchestra, Rhythm Colission Sound, The Gin Club plus triple j unearthed winner

SYDNEY:
Brothablack, Tucker, Behind Crimson Eyes, Dappled Cities, Eddy Current Suppression Ring, The Tongue, Hard-Ons, Expatriate, Bridezilla, Mercy Arms, Belles Will Ring, Funktrust, Mark Walton Fretless, Poxymusic, Grafton Primary, John Ferris, Soft Tigers, Stick Figures, Ben Morris, Kobra Kai, Aston Shuffle plus triple j unearthed winner

MELBOURNE:
Brothablack, Tucker, Behind Crimson Eyes, Dappled Cities, Eddy Current Suppression Ring, Pegz, Children Collide, Love of Diagrams, Game Boy Game Girl, Mammal, J-Nett, Muph & Plutonic, T-Rek, Galvatrons, Spacey Space DJ, Mountains In the Sky, Miso, DJ Sunshine plus triple j unearthed winner

ADELAIDE:
Brothablack, Tucker, Behind Crimson Eyes, Vents, King Daddy, City Riots, New Season Black, Soft White Machine, The Johnwoodsband, Delta, MPK, Leader Cheetah, The Swiss, Lady Strabgelove, Master Celebrator, Forner Child Stars, Skeletons plus triple j unearthed winner

PERTH:
The Stems, The Dirty Secrets, Dyscord, Sex Panther, The Harlequin League, Will Stoker and the Embers, Captains of King, The Watts, The Takers, J.Nitrous, DJ Sardi, Petrosex plus triple j unearthed winner

Dappled Cities - Colour Coding (from Granddance)
Bridezilla - St Francine (from Bridezilla EP)
Belles Will Ring - The Coldest Heart (from Mood Patterns)
Love Of Diagrams - Pace Or The Patience (from Mosaic)
Shocking Pinks - End Of The World (from Shocking Pinks)
Dead Letter Circus - Disconnect & Apply (from Dead Letter Circus EP)
City Riots - My Favourite T-Shirt (from City Riots EP)

Who's who at Big Day Out 2008: Midnight Juggernauts

Right now, Melbourne's electropop act Midnight Juggernauts have just about everything under control. Their electropop sound will churn up the sweat cloud at BDO's dance tent. Their post-BDO tour will send nationwide sales of synths up by 4382%. And Vincent will land himself a spot on Neighbours, as Delta Goodrem's amnesiac half-brother.

So there's only one thing left for them to do then: get rid of the "s" at the back of their name. How dare anyone imagine that Juggernauts can exist in the plural form! Do these chaps know anything about Juggernauts? Everyone knows that Juggernauts never come in twos! Sharing is the antithesis of Juggernauts' very existence! Juggernauts always bash bozos alone, never together. Hey, what the heck? My last five sentences had "s" at the end of Juggernauts! Oh no, now my last six sentences about Juggernauts has "s"! OH NO, SEVEN! AAAA...

It's Friday. Gimme a break.

Midnight Juggernauts - Dystopia (from Dystopia)

Who's Who at Big Day Out 2008: Dizzee Rascal

I am convinced that British rappers have zero ability when it comes to picking a name. I mean, they've got the bump and grime down pat, and the consonant-dropping flow that will always garner critical drool on all ends of the Atlantic, Pacific, Arctic, Indian, Caspian and Mordorific. But c'mon: The Streets? Plan B?? Sway???

So, in the name of altruism, I have decided to assist Dylan Mills by redeeming his alter ego Dizzee Rascal, thus provide him with a far zippier moniker to match those Mercury-nomming rhymes and dimes that he can't help dropping. The goal: to present the ultimate bitch of a name to him, right before he takes the stage at Big Day Out. The side goal: to be invited to his after-party, where the hunnies and the... heck, what happens there is none of your business.

Anyways, to aid me in my World Vision-like endeavour, I have enlisted the help of Rap Star Name, Hiphop-Rapture and My Rap Name—flawlessly crafted rap name generators destined to produce a result that will send the bling to the ceiling. The ho to the down low. The jammers to the slammers.

The results, pronto!

Rap Star Name:


Hiphop-Rapture:


My Rap Name:


Shit. 'K fine, forget it. Dizzee, you got two months.

Dizzee Rascal - U Can't Tell Me Nuffin' (from Maths + English)

Who's who at Big Day Out 2008: Faker

Ok, so in Faker's 11 years of existence, it has rotated through 23 different band members, and has come across sounding like a chuckaway hybrid from some cloning exercise involving Alex Kapronos and Kele Okereke, with a couple of cells pinched from Gavin Rossdale's cheekbone to complete frontman Nathan Hudson's mug. And yes, their debut Addicted Romantic's cover was a piss-bad rendition of Gavin DeGraw post-barroom brawl.

Still, there is enough here to be festival worthy. Which means it's all good. So how does one marry the "Where have I heard this before" bitch with the "My festival ass will shake to anything remotely punk" stud? With a good ol' fashioned Moroccan garden wedding, that's how. Make sure it comes complete with 16 flower girls and 24 ringbearers, and involves plenty of monkey-shaped lanterns. And if that doesn't ensure an slug-free procession, at least the reception is still redeemable with generous helpings of camel kurma and cuscus.

Faker - Enough (from Addicted Romantic)

Who's Who at Big Day Out 2008: Cut Off Your Hands

Post-2005, any band starting with the letter "C", and with the words "Your" and "Hands" in their moniker, are begging to be sacrificed on the altar of unfair comparisons and impending lawsuits. But New Zealand dance punkers Cut Off Your Hands aren't simply saying yeah on the back of hype-fueled abandon, yet. They've done the hard yakka over the past few months, going cross-Tasman and from one end of the Atlantic to the other, all for the sole purpose of preening the global hipsterati to their Kiwified version of Franz Ferdinand.

Big Day Out is set for a cracker of a set by a deserving bunch of globetrotters, then. Of course, they've hardly clocked up the frequent flyer miles I have. Like on Saturday, I flew to Kazakhstan for 324 rounds of golf, then headed south to Santiago, Chile, for my routine eggs and toast breakfast. Then I felt like buying a Pashmina shawl for my pet earthworms (named Frank, Dave and Spragelidecious, respectively), so I hopped on the first flight out to Kashmir, India. Singapore Airlines should start painting their planes yellow, in my honour. Seriously.

Cut Off Your Hands - Still Fond (from Shaky Hands EP)

Who's Who at Big Day Out 2008: Sarah Blasko

Here's a confession: I'm an absolute sucker for doll-faced female singer-songwriters. Not really flash on the Tristan Prettyman-type bombshells, or the Alice Cooper lookalikes. But you could deck Rosie Thomas in a pink pomegranate suit, or uncover a scandal involving Regina Spektor and a mid-morning romp with three Greek preachers at The Jungles of Zamondo Music Fest, and chances are I'll still lap up the music like a nobbyless noodlehead.

So Aussie senorita Sarah Blasko, hear me now: I give in. Even if you dump the gushy electronica and go Missy Higgins pop, I'd give in. Even if you reconnected with your French roots and sprouted armpit hair, I'd give in. Even if you demanded that all genuine connoisseurs eat three bitter gourds before downloading one of your songs...

Ok, maybe I'm not that big a sucker. I'll just feed them to my pet armadillo. Her name is Caroline, by the way. Yes, DNA testing and 21 vets have all insisted that it is male, and its got biceps the size of a Mazda 929 and a nine-foot long schlong. But science sucks; favouratism rules.

Sarah Blasko - I Could Never Belong To You (from What the Sea Wants, the Sea Will Have)

Who's Who at Big Day Out: Billy Bragg

Hail ye raging old man of British folk.

From collaborating with American alt-country heroes Wilco to pushing the boundaries of British folk with his para-political rants, Bragg has been making good ol folk music for a decent 30-years now. And he really doesn't look like he's going to be stopping for tea anytime soon.

In many ways, the man's a punk legend. Just that he does it with an acoustic guitar.

But then again, that's pretty much a loose definition. It's like saying chicken is actually beef only with feathers. Or Godzilla is actually Ultraman but only with kick-ass nuclear breath. Or football is really like tennis only with bigger balls. Or Ryan Adams is actually Bryan Adams, just 100 years younger.

Billy Bragg - Walk Away Renee (from Must I Paint You a Picture? The Essential Billy Bragg)

More Big Day Out Rumors

Imagine with me. You've got a huge-ass cannon.

How big? Excellent question private. One big enough to send a hole the size of a Chinese wedding dinner table through Godzilla. In case you're wondering 'what in tarnations', that's pretty damn big.

And after you've got a cannon that's that big, you decide, 'Hey, why don't I add one a ten-grenade per-launch grenade launcher? I mean, just for the bloody heck of it. And while I'm at it, why not detach those plasma cannons off an X-Wing fighter and strap in on to the side of said cannon, you know, just to make it prettier?'

If you have no idea how/what I am talking now has anything to do with said Australian/NZ fest that's adorning the headline of this article then my friend, you need to eat more coriander, or run laps or you know, read more books.

Arcade Fire? Bjork? Rage? This could just be the beginning. Please, please Santa. Just this once. I promise I won't make fun of jocks anymore. Then again forget that promise, but please please grant me this wish.

Want to know who the rest of the rumored bunch are? Go here

The Smashing Pumpkins - Starz (from Zeitgeist)
The Polyphonic Spree - Running Away (from The Fragile Army)
Interpol - Next Exit (from Antics)
Manic Street Preachers (feat. Nina Persson) - Your Alone is Not Enough (from Send Away the Tigers)

Big Day Out 2008: first lineup announcement

Dear Mr Branson,

How's Sudan? I heard they got great camel meat. Apparently if you grill it over a spit, and eat it with some of their corn (which I heard is pretty killer too), it's almost as tender as Kobe beef. Serious.

Anyways, you're a busy man, so I'll get straight to the point. You see, there's this music festival coming along in January. It's called Big Day Out. Now, usually it's really only two-thirds loyal to its name. Like, it's 100,000-people big, and it lasts the whole day in various Australian and New Zealand cities. But the lineup for the last couple of years hasn't really been all that out. Oh, it had White Stripes, Franz Ferdinand, The Killers, My Chemical Romance, Muse, Magic Numbers—decent-sized names, sure, but nothing truly historical. Nothing out.

But then there's Big Day Out 2008. And Mr Branson, this year, it's OUT. You see, there's a band called Rage Against The Machine that will be playing their first ever gigs outside America ever since their reunion this year. That's history. Then there's this other band called Arcade Fire, who have revived my passion to bash motorcycle helmets. That's history too.

And you know all about history right? So you'll totally feel me when I say that those two bands, plus Bjork, Battles, LCD Soundsystem, Grinspoon, Hilltop Hoods, Sarah Blasko, Billy Bragg, Paul Kelly, Dizzie Rascal and so on and so forth (and that's just the first announcement, with rumours of Smashing Pumpkins and Queens Of The Stone Age also coming)—all of them are making history.

But what's history made if there's no one to share it with? Which is where we, the Pirates of the Bargain Bin, together with a few supportive chums, come in. You help the needy, and we need to go to Big Day Out. And since you recently just gave some Dutch greeny company €500,000, we figure that just 1% of that would be more than enough. Just to pay for our flight and ticket. We're willing to eat each other to skimp in the food department. And we reckon kangaroo pouches can fit at least our bottom halves during bedtime.

What's our worthwhile cause, you ask? Well, we've always thought of ourselves as freedom fighters. Pro-democracy revolutionaries. Anti-slavery battlers. World peace. No hunger. Death to malaria. Life to polar bears. Eternity for...

Dude, give us the money, and I'll paint my car red and tattoo 'I love Virgin' on my ass.

Sincerely,
Pirates of the Bargain Bin

Link: www.bigdayout.com

Rage Against The Machine - How I Could Just Kill A Man (from Renegades)
Bjork - Vertebrae By Vertebrae (from Volta)
Arcade Fire - Windowsill (from Neon Bible)
LCD Soundsystem - Get Innocuous! (from Sound of Silver)
Grinspoon - What You Got (from Alibis and Other Lies)
Hilltop Hoods - The Nosebleed Section (from Calling)
Sarah Blasko - Always Worth It (from The Overture & The Underscore)
Paul Kelly - You're Learning (from Foggy Highway)
Dizzie Rascal - Wanna Be (from Maths & English)
Battles - Race: Out (from Mirrored)
Billy Bragg - A New England (from Life's a Riot with Spy Vs Spy)