The Twerps
The Twerps
8 Track, EP (2009, Chapter Music)
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Related: The Twerps.
Melbourne underground rock has been very adult this decade. The Stabs, Eddy Current Suppression Ring and even Witch Hats, to take prominent examples, explore different extremes of mostly adult concerns. All strike world weary poses, a few of which directly reference past outsider iconography. They’re either thoroughly corrupted (Witch Hats, Stabs) or flatly refuse to be (ECSR, The Nation Blue).There’s fury, bored workaday ennui, resignation to an outsider status, and all these groups sound fantastic when you’ve sunk a few pints/pots/schooners of piss: they’re the vindictive Friday night assuagement after a week at the grindstone. Their sonic imperatives are derived from the need for relief after a day in the adult world. They know a great deal.
As those groups lift off into the sphere of wider audience consciousness, new groups like UV Race, Dick Diver and The Twerps arrive at something emphatically different. Charged, awkward and youthful; refreshingly unrefined and underdeveloped – this is a new musical narrative to watch unfold, and it’s starting very fresh. Call it the teething intifada. It’s like they’ve turned to their immediate fore bearers and coyly asked, “Why so serious?”, before delivering a brisk slap on the forehead (they’d better fucking run). This slipshod, shat out, extravagantly infectious pop music is moving from the peripheries into centerfield thanks to wide releases on Aarght! and Chapter Music, and The Twerps are probably the most complicated of the lot of them. Which isn’t to say they’re very complicated at all, thankfully.
Because this is music for Happy Days and milkshakes, not jaw-relieving evenings in dark urban rock venues. Besides, The Twerps don’t sound like the types to hang out at bars anyway - more so milk bars. This is all risky love and longing; being excited about heartbreak and experience before adulthood unveils the corresponding grim truths. Dilemmas of the heart are intricacies to be negotiated and celebrated, not tragic cul-de-sacs and every trial is imbued with some light profundity – rarely mood shifting or spirit crushing. Marty Frawley leads the four-piece with an expressive man-boy voice - like a huskier Jonathan Richman - and he sings like he’s staring at the ground and kicking at dirt, shy and uncertain. Like Marcus from UV Race, his lyrics are raw and unembellished, completely honest but not confessional, because these things just are: why wouldn’t you sing about simple things in a song?
As for the music, it’s surprisingly downbeat, wistful but mostly propellant, with the lo-fidelity recordings working as a sun glazed camera lens obscuring the curvatures in the sound and concentrating on the sublimely luminous and jangly guitar textures. Many of these songs were originally released on a cassette via US label Night People, which is instructive: The Twerps sound like new gestures delivered through ancient means – recognisable motifs infused with a youthfulness and purity that is timeless and timely, like silk to the zeitgeist’s sandpaper.
by Shaun Prescott
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tip top wonderful. The art is real lovely too.
The Twerps don’t sound like the types to hang out at bars anyway - more so milk bars
Cough
nice review
Nice. LOVING the pants off this album at the moment.
So, the last paragraph is the album review?
silk to the zeitgeist’s sandpaper ...(?)
is this the CD that comes with the 45?
Yes it is loser. There's actually 9 tracks as well, we stuck another on after the vinyl had been pressed. Play it at 45 and you'll get a chipmunk version, beware!
get to the point.
im sure the album will be good, but there is no need to crap on like an old mole at a church picnic.
.......and where can i get the album?
I can dig this. Buy it through Chapter, I guess.
Launch tonight!
Playing times will go a little somethin' like this:
*8:30 S & C Wedding
9:30 Beaches
10:45 Twerps*
And Mikey Young and Chapter DJs before and after and in between.
(if anything the times will push back a bit)
x
Hey Twerps! I can't come to the launch tonight. Where can I buy the EP?
So good. Boguht today, loving it. FUCK YEAH.
Also, this:
made me chortle. I like shaun's turn of phrase, but it still had me laffing.
this record is my favourite thing of the last while.. immediate. good. yes.
It's great when good guys make great music.
Cool words man. You're from Melbourne and know what it's all about here; Good times - honest good times. Cheers to all our friends who made it down to Abruzzo Club tonight, I hope it was fun for everyone. That's all we could ask for hey. And sorry the beer ran out - good sign though! UV Race launch tonight can't fuggin wait! Rick Twerp x (thanks Jack)
This is a great review, because depending which side your bread is buttered on (ennui and corruption, or youthful purity), you find yourself agreeing with points Shaun makes here. I'm never quite sure whether I can embrace both those polarities, but they should definitely be able to co-exist.
Last night was grand. Just realised I left the record at my mate's place I crashed at though which is a pity because I feel like listening to it RIGHT NOW
I am listening to it RIGHT NOW!
Nothin About Nothin is becoming an obsession of mine.
it's definitely a goodun, The Abruzzo club was a choice venue too
C'mon it was a shit venue. Terrible sound at the venue and they ran out of beer. I was forced to drink bundaberg BUNDABERG!!!! the security guard was also fucking annoying. Alright man i'm moving off your step!
Besides all that, great band, just play somewhere else next time where they actually have a stage and you can see the band.
Great record. The Abruzzo was something different and worth it for that alone. Bit of 50's dance-hall vibe, perfect for the Twerps really. Sound wasn't great, sure, but when was the last time you got to play pokies on the Wild Waratah after a show?
thanks to everyone that came along and helped on Friday......
you made it a very fun and memorable night for all of us!
i hope you also enjoyed yourselves!!!
much love
xx
Actionralf said 1 day ago:
it's definitely a goodun, The Abruzzo club was a choice venue too
You said it was shit?
Am I the only one a little underwhelmed by this release? Maybe I was just so impressed with 'em live in Sydney last weekend that I'm not sure if it captures the same energy... I'll give it some mo' time though, the Repressed show definitely had that swell milk bar vibe a-happenin'.
I can't tell if I love or hate this. All I know is I hear the same song each morning and keep thinking I'm listening to Tales from the Australian Underground...
Today is Rick Twerps' birthday, give it up for one of the best dudes in Melbourne. Yiiieeewww.
Do they still work at the video store on Carlisle? Snobs.
Rick is a douchebag.
thanks babe, see you around ;)
Yo Rick, can you wipe my fines?
Ye sure man you're a top customer, as for 'old man fudge' over here, he might have to get the knock ;)
new songs on myspace
x
have a nice weekend!
x