New Signings & Team-Ups: May 31

Image: Amanda Palmer

Lost Highway announces Jason Walker deal

Lost Highway Records/ Universal Music announced a recording deal with Blue Mountains based alt-country troubadour Jason Walker. The guitarist and steel guitar player arrived from New Zealand at 18 and worked with Showpony, Golden Rough, Old Man River, Youth Group and The Older Guys.

His fourth album All-Night Ghost Town will be the first through the label, out on August 12. It was produced by Shane Nicholson at his The Sound Hole studio on the NSW Central Coast, with guests including Jeff McCormack. Steve Fielding and Michael Carpenter who also produced Walker’s earlier records, Sydney based Jules Crighton and alt-country singer Katie Brianna.

Nicholson observes, “Making music with Jason Walker is like dissecting all of my favourite albums and making a collage from the pieces. On top of that, we share a love for Gram Parsons, we have the same dress sense, and we both dance like shit.”

Amanda Palmer at Cooking Vinyl Australia

Amanda Palmer’s next album You Got Me Singing will be released locally through Cooking Vinyl Australia. She recently extended her deal with the parent company in the UK to include Australia and North America. You Got Me Singing is a collection of 12 cover versions from different eras recorded over seven days. Sessions involved her 72-year-old father Jack, a semi-professional choral singer.

Cooking Vinyl also confirmed deals with four new artists: SKYE l ROSS, Area 11, Deap Vally and The King Blues.

Bon Jovi stays with Universal Music Group

The next Bon Jovi album This House Is Not For Sale will still be issued through Universal Music Group. Last year, the band announced it had finished its contract with Mercury Records, with singer Jon Bon Jovi calling it the “end of an era.” But it looks as though the new opus will be through Island, another UMG imprint.

Hells Headbangers thrash Hobbs Angel Of Death

US-based Hells Headbangers signed veteran Australian death-thrash outfit Hobbs Angel Of Death, saying they’ve been fans of the act for decades. Its first album in 21 years, Heaven Bled, is out later this year. The band, lead by Peter Hobbs, is also set for 25 dates through the US from August 22 to September 17.

Hobbs Angel Of Death emerged in the late ‘80s with two demos which quickly found them a global following – Angel of Death and Virgin Metal Invasion From Down Under. Their first album Hobbs Angel Of Death came out in 1988 on Steamhammer, and 1995’s Inheritance, after which the band broke up. The band reunited in 2002 for European tours but aside from Hobbs’ Satan Crusade compilation of the two demos, there has been no new material until now.

Phantastic Ferniture sign management to Heartstop

Sydney band Phantastic Ferniture have assigned management to Heartstop Music, who’ve been building global success for Marlon Williams and Ferniture’s singer Julia Jacklin. The band’s win of 301 Studios’ ’I Am Indie’ competition gave it recording time with producer and engineer Tim Carr as well as mastering, and video prizes that the band will use to complete their debut EP. Meantime it’s released a new single Gap Year, to be followed by July dates in Sydney and Melbourne and a slot on Spunk Records’ July 2 inaugural Spunk Rock! Festival.

Five Finger Death Punch on the rise

New US breakthrough act Five Finger Death Punch signed to BMG-owned Rise Records. When their first album for their new label remains to be seen. The band is currently embroiled in court action brought about by current label Prospect Park. They have one more album to deliver. FFDP have released five albums since forming in 2005. Their most recent, Got Your Six, debuted at #2 in the US.

Cash Savage reaches a milestone

Milestone Records added Cash Savage and The Last Drinks to the roster, releasing Cash’s third album One Of Us on July 1 via Inertia Music. Savage has been performing her brand of muscular country blues since 2009, stamping it with an authenticity with growing vocals and raw storyteller lyrics. She formed The Last Drinks in 2011 and hit the Australian festival circuit, last year touring six European countries, with the Colours of Ostrava Festival and shows in Germany, Austria, Netherlands, Poland and France. The album launches start on July 9 in Darwin, then Adelaide, Sydney and ends August 13 at the Croxton Band Room.

123 Agency inks Pop Cult, Neighbour

Melbourne’s 123 Agency has made two more roster additions.

Queensland band Pop Cult, a triple j feature act, is this year releasing a new single Feels Right and debut EP We Are Golden, and open on Stonefield’s upcoming national run. Aside from producing their own material, the band’s Elliot Heinrich has produced emerging acts as Ayla, Battleships and Tempesst.

Neighbour is former indie band frontman and successful composer Ryan Nebauer. He penned new single Space Camp after peering through a telescope and feeling instantly changed: “From that moment, all my problems were too small to care about and there were bigger questions looming on why we’re here.” He embarks on a NSW and QLD run between June 2 to 16.

Kanye West back at CAA worldwide

Kanye West is back at CAA for worldwide representation after defecting to UTA last March. He will be repped by CAA Managing Partner and Head of Music Rob Light, Darryl Eaton, Emma Banks, Marlene Tsuchii and Jenna Adler. His former longtime agent Cara Lewis left CAA last November and opened her own firm, CL Group, in January.

Flight Facilities release US documentary

Ahead of a sold-out headline gig at Red Bull Music Academy Weekender in Sydney this September with 50-piece Sydney Symphony Orchestra, Flight Facilities’ doco is currently screened on Red Bull TV, A collaboration with De Republica, the 25-mnute Flight Facilities: Across America was shot during the DJ/ producer duo’s Down To Earth tour in the USA in early 2015. It also includes their journey to date, how the inseparable James Lyell and Hugo Gruzman met in Sydney’s Kings Cross and went on to make a debut album that sold gold and was nominated thrice for an ARIA award.

EY, Musitec offer free business consulting

Global professional services firm EY and South Australia’s music industry cluster, Musitec, are jointly providing free business consulting services to Adelaide’s creative industries. Thee will be held on the last Wednesday of every month at the Musitec office in St Paul’s Creative Centre. The sessions will address questions concerning general business advice, company structure to maximise tax benefits, government funding and tax benefits of research development.

Musitec Director David Grice said, “I believe this collaboration with EY will help not only musicians but other Adelaide creative entities to maximise their financial benefits and learn how to run their ventures sustainably. There are numerous tax benefits and government funding resources available to our industry that people just don’t know about, these could really help provide a business with much needed financial support”.

SCA assigned radio rights for Rio Olympics for Triple M

Southern Cross Austereo signed with Seven Network for commercial radio rights for August’s Rio Olympics. Its Triple M network will broadcast selected events from Seven’s coverage. SCA is also setting up a digital radio channel 7 Rio Live to run audio simulcast of events from 5.30am til 1pm AEST each day.

Grant Blackley, CEO of SCA, said, “I’m thrilled that SCA is entering into this partnership with the Seven Network. With the largest radio reach in Australia and a bespoke digital radio channel called ‘7 Rio Live’, all Australians regardless of where they are, will be able to get the best audio coverage of all the action in Rio.”

New website for Hunter, Newcastle, theatre scene

TheatreNewcastle.com.au is a new website set up by husband and wife team Marty Adnum and Rachelle Schmidt Adnum as a one-stop covering the theatre scene in Newcastle and the Hunter region. It lists all local theatre productions and venues, auditions and job vacancies, will be the voice of theatre issues and a directory of all the sector’s 1000 work force. They say the region has 30 theatre venues and 40 companies putting on 70 productions a year.

Farmer & The Owl bring in Bec Sandridge

Wollongong label Farmer & The Owl acquired rights to self-styled “spaghetti disco pop” artist Bec Sandridge. First single You’re A Fucking Joke, about someone she knew in Glasgow, is available online with a 7” version out in July.

Hopeless tells the story

LA’s Hopeless Records, released in Australia by UNFD, has welcomed Canadian pop-rock band Story Untold. Formed in Montreal, it began in the bedroom of singer Janick Thibault, who uploaded his covers of popular alt-rock songs. First release is a self-titled EP. Story Untold have cultivated 250,000 YouTube subscribers, with 30 million views including over 150,000 likes on Facebook.