Feature album: Royal Chant – Anyways and also Sorry

aw yeah….

Tomatrax

It’s feature album time again. You may have noticed the name change from “Album of the week” to “Feature album”. This is because these have been coming out less frequently then initially intended and rather than trying to change that we’ve decided to just subtly lower the expectations.

This week we are featuring the most recent offering from Port Macquarie’s Royal Chant. Yes that means this is the third time this year that Mark Spence has been featured in some shape or form, but he’s been busy releasing lots of stuff!

In this the band’s 9th album, Royal Chant continue producing infectiously catchy tunes delivered in a raw garage rocking fashion topped with Mr Spence’s poetic and cryptic lyrics.

13 years. 9 albums.RoyalChantget around.RoyalChant(often abbreviated as RC) is an Australian indie rock band formed in 2009 in the small coastal town of Port Macquarie. The band has made frequent personnel…

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Royal Chant nous dévoile le clip de The Daily Exchange

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Royal Chant (souvent abrégé en RC) est un groupe de rock indé australien formé en 2009 dans la petite ville côtière de Port Macquarie. Les membres du groupe ont fréquemment changé, mais l’auteur-compositeur principal et chanteur/guitariste Mark Spence n’est jamais parti. S’inspirant de Bob Dylan, Lou Reed, Robert Pollard, Shane MacGowan et Michael Stipe (pour n’en citer que quelques-uns), le vaste répertoire de Royal Chant contient des traces de Sonic Youth, de GBV, des débuts du proto-punk d’Idlewild et de tout ce qui a du cœur, une bonne mélodie et une ou deux pédales de fuzz.

Bien sûr, les Beatles s’y cachent aussi quelque part, le tout mélangé au fil des ans dans un mixeur de fuzz-box et fusionné avec une éthique de travail de col bleu, de bonnes manières, et un penchant étrange pour être à l’heure et lire la feuille de travail avant les concerts. Le 20 mai sortait leur nouvel album, Anyways and Also Sorry.

Et cette semaine, on…

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Album of the week: Sickboy – Vanity and velocity / Water never waits (throwback)

Old skool lovin’ xoxo

Tomatrax

This week we are throwing back to Mark Spence’s previous band before starting Royal Chant. Back in the mid naughties Mr Spence fronted an Atlanta based three piece named Sickboy. The name inspired by the 1996 film Trainspotting. As both releases were EPs, we’re featuring both to provide an album’s worth of music in aggregate.

The band’s first release was ”Vanity and velocity”.

Following this release Mark relocated to Australia. Shortly after the move, Mark explained that ”After Vanity & Velocity came out, some good things were starting to happen with the band, but we kept dropping the ball, both musically and personally. Most of it, if not all, was my fault, but there was always this inherent crippled nature in the way Sickboy functioned as a band in the States. Eventually, I sort of threw the towel in (or many towels), and accepted an offer to play drums on…

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Album of the week: Good fake – You vultures

Still doing things, even if the end of the world seems near xoxo

Tomatrax

This week’s feature comes from the online music project between friends in Tennessee, Missouri, and Australia, Good Fake.

On vocals is frontman for Royal Chant and Designer Mutts, Mark Spence. Mark had the following to say about the release.

“COVID has destroyed the live music sector and the only silver lining of any sort we have found thus far was a bit more time for creative projects further afield from our usual bebop, anti-folk, & indie rock comfort zones.

“You Vultures” is a 7-song effort that straddles the line between LP and EP, and definitely treads in musical territory outside of my comfort zone.

For fans of (maybe, we’re winging it here): Tool, A Perfect Circle, System Of A Down, Foo Fighters, maybe some old Radiohead, Stone Temple Pilots. I dunno, it’s in a heavier vein, you get me.”

Check out Good Fake’s Bandcamp page to find out more!

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Window of ’21

A brief respite
like waking
at dawn as it spreads
we sang
we danced
it came to an end
mistakes were made
and we would gladly
make them all again
now we sing
in our heads
into the void
carry on
as you were
joy is brief, of course
we know this
but still it hurts

Aw yeah xoxo

Tomatrax

10. Marble Sounds – No one ever gave us the right

9. They Might Be Giants – I like fun

8. Sylviane – Abeyance

7. Beauty in Chaos – Storm

6. Michael Cullen – Black dog

5. Royal Chant – [other]

4. We Yes You No – Tricycle Joyride

3. Postcode – Take me as I am

2. Ali E – Landless

1. Frantic Chant – Fiberglass Spiderlegs

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Hic Incipit Pestis

Hic incipit pestis
here it begins
these new Roaring 20s
which feel like an ending
and no one is dancing

The plague is upon us,
show us some mercy
as I fall to pieces on the train
at the latest news
that means something
only to me

I did not take it as well
as I had hoped

I do not take it at all

I blame the plague
for being distraught
out of sorts
late on my rent
and overly weepy

The train has stopped
my life in pieces
I march forward
out of doors, onto a platform
that can no longer hold any of us
for another moment

The plague is upon us,
show us some mercy

DIY Indie Film Clips For A Lazy Sunday

Got bored and decided to do a few more film clips for songs from our Minor Crush LP. (View the first five HERE)

I threw together some vignettes of domestic psychodrama for “Epithet”

And then I begged our good friend and long-time RC film clip producer/collaborator Matt Clements for a stash of NYC hyper-lapse footage and made a lyric video for the album closer “Fading”.

And that’s how we roll.

xoxo

Familiar, Strange, & Vague

This history feels
Familiar, Strange, & Vague
“Welcome to the company, m’boy!”
they said, grabbing my hand
and shaking me limp.
It was the beginning
of the endless cold in my bones
endless cracks in the façade
now sleepless & speechless since

“Always aim for the jugular, m’boy!”
they said
day after day after day
until these delusions
became routine
our daily bread
our cup of salted meat

Here I sit and shall remain
Familiar, Strange, & Vague

Film Clip Friday: Royal Chant – Accidental

Friyay

“Accidental” is the first single off our next LP, Minor Crush, which will be out at some point in 2019. Probably.