ICONIC AUSTRALIAN BAND MOTOR ACE ANNOUNCE NATIONAL ‘FIVE STAR LAUNDRY 20TH ANNIVERSARY TOUR’ FOR 2022 FIVE STAR LAUNDRY 20TH ANNIVERSARY EDITION VINYL
After selling out the national tour that saw their return to the stage in 2018, beloved Aussie band Motor Ace are back to celebrate twenty years of Five Star Laundry – the landmark album that catapulted them on to the global music scene, today announcing a 20th Anniversary re-issue set for release November 5, alongside a Five Star Laundry 20th Anniversary tour for 2022. The tour will kick off at Freo Social on June 10, before hitting Badlands (Perth), The Triffid (Brisbane), The Factory Theatre (Sydney), The Cambridge Hotel (Newcastle) and The Gov (Adelaide), before finishing up with a hometown show at 170 Russell in Melbourne on June 24.
Tickets go on sale at www.livenation.com.au at 1pm local time Friday October 8, with a Live Nation 48 hour presale live at 12pm local time Wednesday October 6.
The Five Star Laundry 20th Anniversary Edition will be available as a limited edition red 2LP vinyl and a 22-track expanded digital edition which includes bonus tracks from their Live At The Chapel performance in 2003. PRE-ORDER HERE.
“Five Star Laundry, when it’s said and done, is Motor Ace,” explains the band’s frontman Patrick Robertson. “As you’d expect from a bunch of twenty year olds, perhaps it lacks a little sophistication here and there. But for me, Five Star Laundry truly captures on record, the ‘all-in’ energy and the desperation of four guys trying to make a mark. It was our first record and we didn’t take it for granted, we knew it may be our one and only opportunity. The first record has an advantage over the others – songs are written over a longer period of time and can be fine tuned at live shows. But also, the songs are free from the burden of expectation. And this is true of the excitement and naive energy of this record. We poured everything into it without distraction or second guessing ourselves. I think this is the main reason it has stood the test of time and resonates strongest with fans of the band.”
Thrilled to be honouring the milestone, Robertson says, “For us, it’s a privilege to be able to play these songs to a willing audience after twenty long years since the release of the album, and we can’t wait to finally reunite with you all after a hard couple of years.”
With a rich musical history spanning over twenty years, Motor Ace’s debut album Five Star Laundry went gold within the first month of going on sale in Australia. After that massive feat, the band spent many months on the road touring and making music, with massive supports slots alongside Foo Fighters, Oasis and Blink-182. You couldn’t turn on the radio without coming across Motor Ace; and as sold out shows became the norm, their tracks became a mainstay on the ARIA charts. Their timely sophomore album Shoot This was released in 2002 to abundant critical acclaim. It spawned lead single Carry On that held the coveted #1 most played song on Australian airwaves for 8 weeks in a row, and Shoot This, debuting at #1 on the charts and achieving gold sales on release.
Motor Ace is Patrick Robertson (vocals, guitar), Dave Ong (guitar), Damo Costin (drums) and Matt Balfe (bass).
Five Star Laundry 20th Anniversary edition is set for release November 5 and available to preorder now.
Tickets to the Five Star Laundry 20th Anniversary tour go on sale from www.livenation.com.au on Friday October 8 at 1pm local time.
MOTOR ACE – FIVE STAR LAUNDRY 20TH ANNIVERSARY TOUR
Tickets available from www.livenation.com.au
FRI 10 JUN | FREO SOCIAL | FREMANTLE, WA | 18+
SAT 11 JUN | BADLANDS | PERTH, WA | 18+
THU 16 JUN | THE TRIFFID | BRISBANE, QLD | 18+
FRI 17 JUN | THE FACTORY THEATRE | SYDNEY, NSW | 18+
SAT 18 JUN | THE CAMBRIDGE HOTEL | NEWCASTLE, NSW | 18+
THU 23 JUN | THE GOV | ADELAIDE, SA | 18+
FRI 24 JUN | 170 RUSSELL | MELBOURNE, VIC | 18+
RÜFÜS DU SOL ANNOUNCE FOURTH STUDIO ALBUM ‘SURRENDER’ SET FOR OCTOBER 22 RELEASE + SHARE NEW SINGLE ‘ON MY KNEES’ OUT NOW ON ROSE AVENUE AND REPRISE/WARNER RECORDS
Grammy-nominated live-electronic trio RÜFÜS DU SOL have today announced their fourth full length album, Surrender set to land on October 22, and shared a third taste of the album with new single On My Knees, out today on Rose Avenue and Reprise / Warner Records.
Surrender sees RÜFÜS DU SOL stridently building their own world; an album written on their own terms. The band’s electronic roots offer a proud point of separation from other stadium-selling live artists, even as they write songs and play to crowds that break the traditional glass ceiling for dance acts.
On My Knees is a brooding insight into RÜFÜS DU SOL’s darker tendencies, toying with honest emotions and aching lyricism, demonstrating what makes them so unique in the electronic space. While previous single Alive gave a glimmer of hope, and Next To Me a yearning for love and romance, On My Knees has an anguished sense about it, playing into the powerful title of Surrender. The band reference the industrial sounds and sonics of Trent Reznor and Nine Inch Nails, coupled with the lyrical intensity on which their career has been built.
Tyrone Linqvist hauntingly sings “If you could see me now, I’d probably let you down… Looks like I’m on my knees again, feels like the walls are closing in.”
“For this song we had a lot of fun writing something that was darker, driving and a little more edgy,” explains James Hunt. “It’s definitely one of the most banging tracks on the record – we referenced some of our favourite club music for the drum programming and had fun envisioning the time when we could finally play this live. It had an amazing reaction at our Red Rocks shows last month which was really special for us.”
RÜFÜS DU SOL is a band synonymous with tension, they came together through the push and pull of the dancefloor, have a live act whose passion lies on the dancefloor, and lyricists who spill their personal pain for thousands to dance to. From the opening keys of Next To Me, through the propulsive chug of On My Knees, the record inhabits a world that is deep, lush, organic, yet electronic.
This world building has been RÜFÜS DU SOL’s focus since its inception, its name meant to evoke an otherworldly destination, a future point the band dreamed of arriving at from their bedrooms in Sydney, and, later, recording studios in Berlin and LA. This vision was vital to Surrender, as the band wrote songs to transcend the intimacy of the world they built together, exiled from their families, in a DIY ground floor Hollywood apartment studio. The result is a record that is bolder, braver and more far-reaching than anything they have done before.
The accompanying music video was filmed in August during a unique Red Rocks Amphitheatre show rehearsal. The band’s creative director, Alex ‘Katzki’ George, collaborated with Ruff Mercy, an animation director and artist based out in the UK to create visuals/animations on top of the video, giving the project a darker 90’s rave vibe. Ruff Mercy has worked with artists such as Thom Yorke, Disclosure, Run The Jewels and big brands such as Nike, Apple, Adidas and more.
As the band returns to the stage for their North American tour and array of festival performances, they experience once again the immense demand for their live return. Two sold out nights at Red Rocks Amphitheatre; 70,000 fans waiting to see them play across three nights at the Los Angeles Banc of California Stadium; festival appearances slated at Governors Ball, Austin City Limits, III Points; and a host of shows dotted around the south west United States act as a stark reminder to their influence on the global music scene.
On My Knees is out today on Rose Avene and Reprise/Warner Records
Surrender is set for release on October 22
DRAPHT SHARES NEW SONG PROBLEM HERE FEAT. COMPLETE & ELI GREENEYES + NEW ALBUM SHADOWS AND SHININGS OUT SEPTEMBER 10
Aussie hiphop king Drapht will tonight share his electrifying new track Problem Here, featuring fellow local Perth hypes Complete and Eli Greeneyes, dropping at 8pm AEST. Accompanied by a killer video, Problem Here is the second taste of the prolific artist’s brilliant new album Shadows and Shinings, an introspective and complex release demonstrative of Drapht’s impressive penchant for reinvention, out September 10 – and available for pre-order now. To celebrate the new album, Drapht will be hitting the road in September for a massive national tour, kicking off at Settlers Tavern in Margaret River, WA on September 3, then moving through Perth, Adelaide, Melbourne, Geelong, Maroochydore, Brisbane and wrapping up at Miami Marketta on the Gold Coast on September 26.
Problem Here follows on from the spectacular Shadows On My Walls (that was complemented by the wacky, supremely clever video), a haunting track written “on the verge of a breakdown”, as Drapht himself describes. The two tracks feel connected through the act of self-reflection – Drapht’s uncanny ability to identify the things poisoning his outlook on life and dissecting them through hooky melodies, nostalgic, persistant beats and clever production. Problem Here feels equally influenced by Eminem as it does Machine Gun Kelly and Andre 3000, and with brilliant vocal contribution from Eli Greeneyes (who also produced the track) and Complete, this song is seriously powerful. Speaking on the inspiration behind Problem Here, Drapht explains, “It was the last song written for my album. I had just bought my dream house in the hills of Perth, and the week I moved all my stuff in – planes started flying over. Then I found termites in the roof, snakes in the backyard, and to top it all off I have a toddler at home and I decided to throw a puppy in the mix just for some extra excitement. It was all a tad bit stressful…!”
Filmed and directed by close Perth friends Complete and Uncool Sam from Drop Shot Media, the video for Problem Here is comical and true to narrative, as Drapht enthuses, “This clip was loads of fun and super easy to make, as we just focused on bringing the lyrics to life within the house where the initial idea came about. Thankfully the termites and snakes weren’t living there anymore.”
The new album Shadows and Shinings is a step into new territory for Drapht, but that’s no surprise – Drapht has proven album after album that he will always challenge himself as an artist and push the genre of Aussie hiphop in exciting directions with every release. Shadows and Shinings is a 15-track adventure through the human psyche, contemplative and deep, but still full to bursting with addictive beats and clever production. Finished during the lockdowns of 2020, Drapht explains the process behind the album, “This album to me has been one big purge and a reset for the most part. It kind of feels like it’s meant to be slotted in just after my 2011 release The Life of Riley. Some song ideas had been following me around for 8 or 9 years, with others only being a few months. For the most part I owe finishing it to the isolation period in 2020. I had a lot of time to reflect on the identity and the relationships that came with making music. I found a lot of peace in letting go, going back to what I knew worked and concentrating on the people who truly matter… I worked with a heap of killer guests and friends on this project. There’s a lot of cathartic venting within the subject matter, but in all, it was the easiest and most enjoyable album I have made to date. I truly believe this is my best stuff.”
Drapht is a national treasure at this point, with platinum records, multi-platinum and gold singles and two ARIA awards under his belt. Shadows and Shinings is a stellar addition to his discography and will further prove his complete legend status, not just in the world of Aussie hiphop, but across the entire Australian music industry. Luckily, fans across the nation will have the chance to see Drapht live on his national tour in September – giving fans a taste of what to expect, Drapht says, “You can expect your old mate, backed by a high energy, six-piece live band of friends, and we’ll be playing 15 years worth of bangers.”
Problem Here featuring Complete & Eli Greeneyes is released at 8pm AEST this evening.
Shadows and Shinings is out September 10 – pre-order now.