WOMAD

Augie March

From Australia

It's never easy to pinpoint exactly where Augie March are coming from, but it's abundantly clear where they're not. They're a band apart from the nowhere music that's everywhere and maybe a century or two removed from the desperate bang and chatter of the vapid pop/rock zeitgeist.

See, in a world gone mad with window-dressing, Augie March actually make stuff. Their albums are leather bound volumes on a shelf groaning with tatty magazines. They're the old family roast joint across the street from the plastic strip mall takeaway. And singer-songwriter Glenn Richards is a real live poet with a six-stringed loom. The guy doesn't even dance.

'Poems used to be called songs,' he says, by way of describing his general motivation. 'I'm very keen on the idea of bringing that full circle. I love the way words can move together and I guess I find music a natural vehicle for that.'

Moo, You Bloody Choir is Augie March's third album. It may be that you're still swimming in the prismatic wordplay and intriguing sonic details of their ecstatically acclaimed Sunset Studies (2000) and Strange Bird (2002) albums, but neither disposability nor immediate transparency are high among this Melbourne band's strengths. So sue them. Or lend an ear.

Moo, You Bloody Choir was recorded in Melbourne, San Francisco and the band's own Second World studio in Nagambie in country Victoria. It was variously produced by Australian studio legend Paul McKercher, by Captain Beefheart/PJ Harvey alumnus Eric Drew Feldman, and by Augie March, and was mixed by Mark Howard (Time Out Of Mind - Bob Dylan).

Its inspiration spanned from St Kilda ('Clockwork') to Hobart ('Mt. Wellington Reverie'), but possibly not during the millennium you're standing in, and not in any way that an expensive video shoot will render obvious.

'I guess I could be guilty of being anachronistic with the kinda themes of some of these songs,' Glenn admits, 'but a general idea is to tie a notion of the historical to the contemporary: 'Why do we have this society that we have right now?' That idea interests me somehow.

'As usual there's nothing you can directly glean,' he says with an almost apologetic laugh, 'because I'm not a very literal songwriter. I'm just hoping that imagery will suffice.' The album's climactic, string-woven epic, Clockwork, perhaps puts that another way:

'O but I didn't write this song with a machine, And I don't know how to stop it from its accidental purpose.'

If that kind of imagery doesn't suffice, well, there's always those nonsense bars with their nowhere music...

Press Quotes:

"Augie March are not made for these times. They're like a beautiful old bottle of wine in a world of alco-pops. In a debased pop culture of reality TV and vapid celebrity, the bands antique romanticism is more than an anomaly. It's unfashionably quaint, unadvisedly literate and just too clever to skate on the surface…They're one of Australia's finest bands. Front man Glenn Richards is a songwriter of rare quality, and Augie March's music - quaint, archaic and melancholy - is brilliant." - Sydney Morning Herald

"Richards is in fine, strong voice, sounding confident and purposeful. Backing vocals (by choirboy - voiced drummer Dave Williams, guitarist Adam Donovan and bassist Edmond Ammendola) were smooth and rich as velvet. With keyboard player Kiernan Box, the band masterfully executed their new songs Just Passing Through and Cold Acre, along with 2003's rollicking Train and mournful Blackbird…The set ended as it began, Richards playing acoustic guitar accompanied only by Box on keyboard. First the bittersweet Bottle Baby, finally There Is No Such Place; both songs that held the silent audience transfixed with their poise and poetry, exquisite longing and beautiful melodies. To be savoured" - The Age

"Richard's is an incredible vocalist…it's only when you see them in a live setting that you can truly appreciate the musical expertise of each of the five Augie boys…they were predictably brilliant." - Beat Magazine

More info: www.augie-march.com