Australia: DMB, Crowded House Top Blusfest Lineup; Live Nation & Hertz; More

Dave Matthews Band, Crowded House, and Patti Smith And Her Band make their return to the 31st Bluesfest Byron Bay, April 9-13, announced among the first 20 artists unveiled.

 “This will be Dave Matthews Band’s third visit to Bluesfest and if the two earlier visits are anything to go by … it’s going to be more of the same … a tent full of happy, dancing Bluesfesters, magical and unmissable,” festival director Peter Noble remarked. Crowded House’s return is an exclusive and Smith’s appearance in 2017 won that year’s Helpmann for best international contemporary concert.

While George Benson and Brandi Carlile are first-timers, others to have graced the Tyagarah Tea Tree Farm stages before include The Cat Empire, John Butler, Morcheeba, Buffy St. Marie, John Mayall, Xavier Rudd, John Prine, Jenny Lewis, Frank Turner, The Marcus King Band, Walter Trout, Christone ‘Kingfish’ Ingram, Greensky Bluegrass, Larkin Poe and last year’s discovery The War & Treaty.

Live Nation and Ticketmaster Australasia entered a multi-year deal with Hertz to be its car rental partner across Australia and New Zealand. Aside from inter-brand deals for customers, LN will further use Hertz vehicles for artists and crews on their tours – over 1,000 live events in both countries a year, according to LN Australia CEO Roger Field. He added, “We’re looking forward to helping Hertz provide their valued customers with access to Live Nation’s growing entertainment portfolio of music, family and comedy tours, and events.”

Coordinated by export body Sounds Australia, 30 Australian acts will showcase next month, in Nashville at Americanafest, and Hamburg at Reeperbahn Festival. Among numerous performance and networking events will be the organisation’s signature Aussie BBQ where free music is mixed with Aussie food and wines.

Six play the Americanafest bill –  including Jordie Lane, Falls and Little Georgia – while more showcases are at The Bluebird Cafe (Sept. 10), A Taste Of Australia (Sept. 12 at InDo) and the Aussie BBQ at The 5 Spot Sept. 14, with 12 acts plugging in midday to 7 p.m.

With Reeperbahn Festival selecting Australia as its focus country for this year, 17 acts head to Germany. The Aussie BBQ in Berlin Sept. 16 is at Fluxbau, Pfuelstraße 5 with a five-act bill headlined by power trio You Am I. The Hamburg BBQ, at Molotow, Nobistor 14, features 16, including The Rubens, RVG, Olympia, Pierce Bros, Press Club, Delta Riggs, Winterbourne and DZ Deathrays.

New Zealand electro-producer LOUD (Sebastian Kereti) is asking his social media followers if he should take legal action over the unauthorized use of his “Thoughts” in a video at the July 23 student group Turning Point USA rally in Washington DC, to herald President Trump’s arrival onstage. New Zealand newspaper Herald On Sunday was told by record label Lowly Palace the video was likely compiled by Trump’s campaign team. LOUD said the track generated 13 million YouTube views before the rally and earns “several thousand dollars in royalties each month” from synch use. “I’m not a fan of [Trump] … I would much prefer Obama to use it,” the 22-year old said, although he is “not really into politics.”

Brian Ritchie, bassist of U.S. punk folk trio Violent Femmes and curator of Tasmania’s award winning Mona Foma festival, experimental jazz trio The Necks and genre-defying Zephyr Quartet received excellence awards at the August 19 Art Music Award, at the Great Hall of University of Sydney. 

Ritchie, now a naturalized Australian after moving to Tasmania in 2007, created an adventurous bill that included musicians and performers from outside the mainstream, “females in general and specifically from cultural backgrounds which usually suppress their voices,” refugees, those working with obsolete technology and) people “with unusual psychological profiles.”  Mona Foma helped transform the Tasmanian isle from a cultural and tourism backwater to one that draws younger cashed-up and adventurous mainlanders.

The Necks were the first band to receive a distinguished services award. Formed in 1987, Chris Abrahams (piano), Lloyd Swanton (bass) and Tony Buck (drums) have, the awards said, “developed an original sound and an unconventional approach to long-form, minimal improvisation.” Zephyr Quartet, a string ensemble with an enviable wide range of collaborators, was recognized for its 2018 program “which defied genre, style and expectation, as well as their fearless championing of Australian work over 20 years.”

An investigation by news site 10 Daily found that people from as far afield as Nigeria and Canada are posing as grandparents who’ve lost a loved one on Facebook and scamming hundreds of Australian concert-goers. Over a four-week period, Sydney events affected included those at the Hordern Pavilion, Enmore Theatre and Factory Theatre and from acts including Foals, Boy & Bear and Thelma Plum. Even tickets to a high profile charity game between musicians and media to raise money for a music program to help the down-and-out, and which features high profile entertainment, were considered fair game. They ask consumers to send money via PayPal, and then send a screenshot of confirmation.