26 March 2010
Scott Spark
Kamahl
Friday 26 March
Tickets are $21.50 and are available through qtix or phone 136 246 (includes booking fee), or at the GoMA box office on the night (subject to availability).
Scott Spark (7.30pm)
Brisbane-based musician Scott Spark’s intelligent, addictive pop is the result of the artist’s songwriting and production, along with simple, introspective music that urges listeners to feel the emotion in his songs. Spark’s music is influenced by performers such as Jon Brion, Nina Simone and Tom Waits, and the themes that Spark communicates range from love and death to shift-work delusion and the variety of situations that life throws up. Spark’s music has been likened to the sound of contemporary musicians Ben Folds and Rufus Wainwright.
Spark took keyboard lessons from an early age, and as a teenager he also learnt the saxophone and Wurlitzer organ. However the list of instruments featured on Spark’s forthcoming debut LP is much longer — featuring synthesiser, piano, toy piano, trombone, guitars, bass, glockenspiel, French horn, trumpet, ukulele and a bird-caller.
Spark’s album is the result of recordings with a range of local musicians, including Adele Pickvance (The Go-Betweens), Heinz Riegler, Megan Washington (Washington) and John Parker (Misinterprotato). The songs were mixed in Portland by Tucker Martine (The Decemberists, Laura Veirs, Death Cab For Cutie, Sufjan Stevens) and mastered in Los Angeles by Gavin Lurssen).
Walking this fine line between music that is upbeat and crestfallen, Scott Spark will feature the music from his forthcoming album at APT Up Late.
Kamahl (8.30pm)
For over four decades, the work of Kandiah Kamalesvaran, better known as Kamahl, has been identified with Australian music history.
Kamahl arrived in Australia from Malaysia in 1953, the child of Tamil–Hindu parents, and learned to sing by listening to pop music and classic jazz artists Nat King Cole, Paul Robeson and William Warfield. He always swam against the tide, acquiring a reputation for toughness and arrogance, which he used as a shield against feelings of racial inferiority at the time. His first album, A Voice to Remember, was released in Australia in October 1967.
In the 1970s, Kamahl audaciously hired the London Palladium to star himself, and twice playing Carnegie Hall in New York. He arrived in Europe in the summer of 1975 and became a household name by the autumn of that year with ‘The elephant song’ which remained a number one hit for six consecutive weeks, making Kamahl an overnight sensation. Since that time, Kamahl has released singles and albums in the United States, Canada, United Kingdom, New Zealand, South America, India, Singapore, Malaysia and Germany. Kamahl has been a Member of the Order of Australia since 1994.
Kamahl’s appeal crosses generations of Australian audiences. In 1982 Queen Elizabeth II invited Kamahl to give a Royal Command performance for the Commonwealth Games in Brisbane. In 2004, he performed at the national Big Day Out festival to thousands of young festival-goers. He has also made in cameo appearances for numerous Australian television shows.
At APT Up Late, Kamahl’s performance will take visitors on a journey through musical history, touching on themes of romanticism, optimism, inspiration and patriotism.
