a review of the ep over at The Silent Ballet...

some epics from our show with tarcutta at the east...

big thanks to the very generous razzledog

signal hill all the way from los angeles last night at irene's warehouse in brunswick..

check out their website here

margins at the old on saturday night..

Patrick Emery from Beat Magazine has also had a listen to the new one...

The recent spate of outrageously hot weather demonstrated yet again that society remains perversely fascinated with the changing vagaries of the weather. In fact, observing the weather must be the oldest past time - that is, in the moments between procreative amusement.

Radiant City are not - by public report at least - weather watchers or otherwise fascinated by the clouds, sun and wind. Yet within the band's music exists and intensity that's ordinarily associated with climatic events. Like the Dirty Three and Silver Ray (such comparisons are indefensibly obvious, but necessary nonetheless) Radiant City's instrumental sound broods, breathes and explodes with brilliant regularity.

Terminal Drift is Radiant City's latest release, a four song EP that packs an infinitely greater punch than its quantitative brevity would superficially suggest. The opening track, Urban Drill, barrels into action with a tumultuous drum beat that could simulate either a roll of thunder, or (as the title suggests) the brutally loud soundtrack to urban living, careful guitar licks fighting battle against feedback in a quest for aural supremacy. He Fell After His First Flight is a darker journey, a few choice melodies loitering in the background looking for a beat to embrace and a moment to seize. Auto Centro suggests a Krautrock dystopia, or maybe an obscure interpretation of the dysfunctional financial state of the contemporary global car industry as it strives for survival in an environmentally conscious world.

Finally there's Man Versus Mathematician, an intriguing debate to contemplate - the quest to reduce nature to a set of neat equations and binary concepts shows no signs of abating - and the methodical sounds and rhythms of the song itself suggest that it's less a fight, and more a constructive dialect that can benefit all parties.

Terminal the album certainly is not; if it drifts, it's doing so with attitude and precision. And it's infinitely more exciting than weather watching.

thanks again to everyone who came out for the show, and a huge thank you to slight of build & margins for taking the trip with us. twas a cracker of an evening.. now it's onto the album, we start recording in a couple of weeks :)

here's some pics.. (by dazza, our man at the front)

adam mills over at mess & noise has given the new one a listen:

Radiant City’s last transmission, 2007’s limited Judith EP, was a big step forward from the Melbourne duo’s self-titled debut (itself highly impressive). It showed an increased clarity of purpose and less reliance on Andrew McLaughlin and Brad Marshall’s direct influences. The four tracks that make up Terminal Drift are the next logical steps along that continuum.

Recorded, once again, in the comfort of McLaughlin’s lounge room, Terminal Drift benefits from a prevalence of warmth. Everything here sounds huge, bathed in natural reverb and free of the horrors of compression. Without a doubt, Radiant City are now louder and noisier than they ever have been. They’re also more focused, showing a refined sense of economy on the EP’s opening one-two punch. The strident ‘Urban Drill’ is an exercise in perpetual motion, building from practically nothing towards an explosive finale in just over three minutes. It’s followed by the spidery ‘He Fell After His First Flight’, which offers a tightly-wound take on the traditional tension/release dynamics associated with instrumental rock.

‘Auto Centro’ is a foray into pulsating electronic textures, combining flickering tones and subliminal hums with heavily processed drums and guitars. Sprawling closer ‘Man Versus Mathematician’ takes a more circuitous route than its predecessors. McLaughlin slowly constructs an impenetrable wall of noise over Marshall’s deceptively simple drumming, closing out the disc with an almost deafening crescendo.

Call it post-rock if you will, but Radiant City are leagues ahead of the hordes of dullards currently swooning under that ugly tag. And Terminal Drift is ample proof.

at the seed factory..

nao working on the final master of the new ep while i work on the artwork..