old news
17.07.08: we are very excited to announce that the feature film for which we have written and recorded an original score, ten empty, is now showing in australian cinemas. ten empty, which filmink has said “…resounds with rare honesty and sings with hard fought emotional truth”, delves behind the barbecues, beer and brick veneer of suburban australia, delivering a moving and uplifting drama. directed by anthony hayes and co-written by anthony hayes and brendan cowell, the film's excellent cast includes daniel frederiksen, geoff morrell, lucy bell, tom budge, brendan cowell, blazey best and jack thompson. the trailer for the film can be seen here, and you can read lots more about it at the official website www.tenempty.com.
our score, which has now been released digitally via itunes (aus), was recorded last year by steven schram, who recorded our 2007 album runaways. it's our first feature film score, and we enjoyed the process immensely. we recorded roughly eighteen cues, mixing some of the most delicate music we have ever made with some of the most tense. the soundtrack ep feautures ten of these new instumental pieces, as well as break for me (from our 2004 album second storey). head on over to itunes and grab it.in other aof news, we are slowly working up ideas and tunes for album four, but as yet we have only distant plans for recording. there is a chance of shows later in the year so stay tuned. for now, please go along and see ten empty, we hope you enjoy it.
all the best, aof.
02.05.08: well, it's just gone may, and hardly a peep from us aof cats so far in 08. but we're still here, in our small corner of the universe, thinking up our next move. and it appears that next move has found us. after a break at the start of the new year, we've started rehearsing again, slowly thinking about new tunes and ideas. the beauty of these recent rehearsals is that we're taking an incredibly relaxed approach, and just, for want of a better word, jamming.
don't expect to hear any of the fruits of these free flowing jamathons for quite some time though. it seems most of 08 will be a relatively quiet year for us, and any close follower of the band knows that we're quite fond of watching a year (and a few thousand music trends) pass us by while we sleep to the sounds of our own guitars.
we're not the laziest band on earth however, and there may be some shows later in the year. if something does come up, it will surely be here on this website, our myspace and our mailing list in good time.
until then, best,
aof
News 01.09.07: well, it seems that in just three short weeks we'll embark on our largest aussie tour for quite some time. we'll be playing 11 shows, all over the land, celebrating 'mysteries', the third single-type-deal from our third slow-burnin' album runaways. joining us for the trip will be melbourne's ace little red, and in w.a. the excellent schvendes. head on over here to our brand new mysteries tour page for all the dates and details. as always, we can't wait to get back on the road/tarmac/runway/steamship.
also, to further celebrate mysteries, melbourne director gemma lee has filmed a brand new clip for the tune, which should hit tv soon. for now though, head on over here at youtube and have a look. massive cheers again to gemma and team for all the hard work. (they also made our clip for free you, which has been youtubed too.)
if you've yet to hear mysteries, while it should be appearing on the airwaves from time to time, the best place to have a listen online is over at our myspace page. enjoy.
all the very bestest, aof.
news 27.07.07: well, runaways has now been fully launched all around the place, and we are having a smallish break. thank you to all of the fine bands that joined us: subaudible hum, guy blackman, and the tom budge good time band. awesome companions on the road, no less. thanks also to all the many people who came along to the shows, as, frankly, it would have been upsetting if no-one turned up.
now, we aren't the types to languish in the post launch wilderness. and so, instead of sitting around while our guitar calluses crack and fade, we will soon be getting on another tour-plane. yes, we are very excited to announce that we will playing in paris at the excellent quartier d'été festival. this year the festival is hosting an australian music stage, at les arenes de montmartre, from late july to early august. other bands joining the bill are: architecture in helsinki, the presets, paul grabowsky and the david chesworth ensemble. our show is on tuesday 31st of july at 8pm. more details are available from the festival's official site.
we're also putting together a massive australian tour for september/october in support of our imminent single 'mysteries', (the third single type deal from runaways). melbourne's little red will join us for the whole adventure. we'll have the full details of the tour up on the website soon, but for now head to the concerts page for the dates. we recently shot a new video clip for mysteries, once again calling on the skills of director gemma lee and her team, and while this new clip is still a ways off, the free you clip can still be seen over here at youtube, and on tv too, whenever the tv people decide to play it.
and that's about it for now, but keep at least one eye on this site for any news as soon as, if not before, we hear about it ourselves.
yours truly, aof x
news 07.05.07: hey there, hope all is well, wherever you are reading this from. this scribe is hung over, so apologies in advance if this update digresses, or if, which is more likely, it is simply boring. all i really wanted to say, and i think a foggy head can manage this, is some thankyous. firstly, to all those who came and saw our set at all tomorrows parties. we had a great time, as we did at the entire festival. massive thanks to mick, warren and jim for inviting us all the way there, and to the small knives for the cranking chalet party.
also, thanks to taka and naoya at wonderground, and all those at shibuya o-nest and era, for the shows in japan. and as well to the members of the excellent audiences we had. as always, we had a stupidly awesome time in tokes. it's impossible not to.
and now, for more shows. our runaways album launch tour finally starts on sat 12th may in melbourne, and continues throughout may. guests on all these dates will be the fabulous subaudible hum. in syd and melb we'll also have the rollicking, unhinged tom budge good time band, and at the brissie and adelaide shows we will be joined by the insanely talented and charming mr guy blackman. so basically, even if you hate our music you should come along anyway, cause the supports are ace. head over to the concerts section for all the dates and ticket details in full.
lastly, a few little bits and pieces. there's a long and interesting article on us, written beautifully by emmy hennings, over here at rock-spot mess and noise. it's well worth a read. also, for those that have yet to see our new clip for free you, head on over here to youtube and have a watch.
cool, now all that's been said, i can go and lie down. tomorrow will be a brand new, hang-over free day.
love, aof.
news 02.04.07: well, as we said here a few weeks back, our brand new, third album runaways has arrived in all its warm, desolate glory. so far, it seems people have connected very well with the new tunes, and that makes us very happy. so thanks once again go out to steven schram, tim whitten, tom lang, the remote control crew, and all at wonderground in japan for helping us get this one out into the musical world. anyway, look out for runaways in all good aussie and japanese record shops (and on itunes too).
as night follows day, now that runaways is out, we will be touring. starting from the end of april we will be doing quite a few live concerts to welcome the new album. starting at all tomorrow's parties in minehead, uk (this year curated by local superheroes of sound dirty three). we are immensely proud to be a part of this stellar line-up. it's going to be killer. after that, we're winging our way down to japan for two shows in tokyo, one in shibuya and one in shimokitazawa. and finally, we'll land back in aus to do our local launch tour here, throughout may. guests on all these aussie dates will be melbourne's fabulous subaudible hum. in syd and melb we'll also have the rollicking, unhinged tom budge good time band, and at the brissie and adelaide shows we will be joined by the insanely talented and charming mr guy blackman. so basically, even if you hate our music you should come along anyway, cause the supports are ace. head over to the concerts section for all the dates and ticket details in full.
lastly, it seems we have a brand new film clip for free you, our new single. the clip features a first for us: we are actually in it. this is something we never thought would happen, but as it turns out, being in our own clip was a relatively painless process, due mainly to the excellent directorial skills of gemma lee and her fine cinematic team. have a look at the clip over here at youtube, and it should be up on our myspace pretty soon too, if it isn't already. oh, and aussies, keep an eye on rage (abc tv), as it's bound to show up there as well.
and that's aof news for the time being. of course, there'll be more to come as it emerges from the mist. and to all those who've grabbed a copy of runaways and are listening away, many thanks to you.
anyway, see you at one of the shows, wherever you may be, and take luck,
aof hq
news 13.03.07: with the humming of a tapped guitar neck, an open chord on a high fret, so new album begins. yes, 'runaways' has finally been released (in australia on remote control records and in japan on wonderground records). it's taken us a lot of yapping and listening, a lot of hitting and strumming, negotiations, navigations, phone converstaions, emails, demos, dinners, lunches, beers, tears, fears. but the result is 11 new aof songs, and that's worth a (quiet) celebration.
here's the full 'runaways' tracklist (with a word-association-qausi-description in brackets after each):
1.
sycamore & sand
(getting depressed at the beach)
2. distance as virtue
(it's cold out west)
3. free you (vanilla
ice cream)
4. eastbound (seeya!)
5. misty as the morning
(c'mon, honeybunch)
6. territories (here
we go...)
7. ride after ride
(ebony and ivory)
8. less than an instant
(time to slow dance)
9. in the free blue
(no so fast...)
10. mysteries (ouch!)
11. night on night
(sleep time)
'runaways' incorporates the following inventions: drums, grand piano, cymbals, tambourine, hammond organ, electric guitars, acoustic guitars, electric bass, yamaha psr78, juno-d, electric guitar and bass amplifiers, all sorts of small metal boxes with dials on them, vocal chords, trumpet, rhodes, shakers, hub cabs, sticky tape, plectrums... the list goes on. anyway, pontifications aside, long-term aof listeners will know it’s often quite some time between records for us, so we hope you are as excited as we are that we have some new tunes to share.
and share them live too. we are insanely excited to announce that we will be playing at the dirty three curated all tommorow’s parties festival in the UK in april. we’ll also be doing two shows in tokyo at the start of may, just before our aussie launch tour. keep an eye on the concerts page for dates and details.
ok, more soon. and look out for the newie, 'runaways'. it has a little green car on the cover (no, really).
news 12.12.06: well, all we can say is a massive thank you to all those who came along to our recent shows in melb, syd and bris to help us welcome our new single eastbound. extra thanks too for indulging us and listening to the other new tunes we played too. if you still haven't heard eastbound you can listen to it right now over on our myspace, um, space. there's also a second cut from our forthcoming third album there too, a song we've been playing for quite some time live called night on night, so check that one out too.
as we've already reported, the new album is now complete. we tracked twelve songs all up, but one poor number fell by the wayside (shame, it was a goodie). so that makes eleven that will form the new long player. there's quite a range on there - there's some cruisy ones, some long and sad ones, some rockers and some pretty ones. one song is even a leftover from the second storey story that sucked back then but is cool now. with local sonic gun steven schram helming the controls for recording (and recording, and recording), and long time aof friend tim whitten riding the faders for the mix, (and us playing the instruments...), it sounds a lot like us really. which we think is a good thing. anyway, more on the new album very soon.
till then, bestest, aof
news 04.06.06: hey everyone, hope you are all well, wherever you may be reading this from. this is just a very short aof news update, as, being ensconced as we are in the studio, there's not much to report on. firstly though, thanks to all those who came along to the spanish club show a while back. it was a lot of fun, especially testing out some of the new tunes. big thanks to holly throsby for playing (amazing as always) and also to the spritely hot little hands for working up some pop magic. thanks also to mary m and all at the spanish club for being such amazing hosts.
the new aof album continues to take shape. we have tracked 12 songs, and they're nearly in their final guise. we're hoping to be mixing it in august. big thanks to our recording magician steven schram for working so hard, and putting up with our so-called democratic process. we'll have some more details on song names and vibes and all that closer to release, but for now, we're still trying to lure this sonic monster into our album-trap...
we don't have any shows coming up, unfortunately, but that's what making albums is for... we're betting there'll be some when the disc drops though. so, that's about all the news there is. we could make some things up, but that would be mean and misleading, and kinda too now.
rock slowly, aofhouse.
23.04.06: hey all. well, april has dropped by for a cup of tea again, and isn´t it just like seeing that old friend you only see once a year? this april saw us rounding up a european tour, our first for some time, and it was a1 top-stuff. 14 shows all up and they all went really well. of course, none of any of it could have been possible without the help of many outstanding individuals and musical groups. firstly, thank you to andreas at puschen for booking the whole tour, and for hosting us superbly in berlin. massive thanks also to michal from fluffwheels, who not only is an excellent driver and a general logistics magician, but he also tells a great story too. cheers also to robin at ac30, sarah m. for putting some of us up in london, and marcus for mailing the lost books from darmsdadt to koeln. further thanks to clare b for playing support most of the way, (her new songs are amazing), as well as 31 knots, the white birch, and the essex green, all of whom shared stages and beers with us. thanks also to all of the individual promoters for each show, to bella union, normal and trifekta records for helping out out with records to sell, and also to the inimitable mette d. for selling cds for us for the first few dates. oh, and to those who came to the shows, if it wasn´t for you, it would have been one long dress rehearsal for nothin´. so cheers!
anyway, we were road testing some new tunes while we were traveling, at soundchecks and shows too, listening back in the van, and well, amongst all the laughter and tears, it seems we have some tunes coming together for the next aof disc. some of the tunes raged like wild beasts - tortured colossi of mangled, towering angst - and some tunes sung sweet to the ear like mornin´ birds. business as usual, really, but they´re sounding pretty good. it´s amazing how songs change so much as they grow up. but it´s all good news really, because on may 8 we head into martin street studios, with melbounre sound prodigy steve schram, to start tracking the newie. so, the month of may will be a long one for aof, as we try and put all our fresh tunes and ideas together into a new sonic zoo. anyway, ramblings here aside, we can´t wait to get going on it.
the last piece of aof news this month is that will be playing a mid recording session show on may 12 in melbourne. this will be mostly to remind ourselves of the fun parts of being in a band, but secondly to play some of the newies to people other than ourselves and steve. the spanish club will be the venue, and you can find more details about tickets and supports over here in the concerts section. apologies to aof listeners residing elsewhere, but the melbourne show is all we could manage in the face of studio commitments… anyway it´ll be good to get outta the studio and onto the street for one night that´s for sure.
ok, I could write about some other stuff, but I wont. If you´ve read this far, thank you, you are very cool.
aof hacienda.
news 02.01.06: firstly, thanks so much to all of you cats who came out to see us at our recent melbourne, sydney and brisbane shows. we had an amazing time to be sure, and we were very glad the new songs seemed to go down ok! (phew!)
well, in very exciting international news, we will be in taiwan for the first time ever over the first weekend of january. we are playing this saturday the 7th at taipei's excellent live venue the wall. we have heard great things about taiwan and the music scene there, so we can't wait. the fantastic folk at taiwanese label white wabbit records have also just put out both second storey and wires. yeah!
In further international news, it’s looking more and more sure that we’ll be getting back over to europe for three weeks in march/april 2006, which, frankly, will be the total business. we’ll have more details on the euro tour very soon…
we are also proud to announce we will be playing at the march-bound, very first sydney edition of the st. jeromes laneway festival. judging by the last one we did, last feb in melbs, this will be an amazing day. we had a total ball last time. the festival is not till 5th march 2006, but we thought we’d let you in on the semi-secret early... more details here
okey
dokey, that's all for the moment, love to you all, keep it unreal,
aof
news 26.10.05: well, it's been a while, has it not, aof listeners the world over... yes, we've been on a small hiatus. miles has been hanging tough, marty has been making a beautiful new record with clare bowditch, peggy has been chilling out, and ollie has been playing jazz drums in denmark with his other band the hoodangers. so, after three months of jazz in scandinavia, ollie has returned with some tuborg flavoured new songs...
so, aside from extra curricular activities, what's happening at camp aof you ask? what indeed... these new songs that's what. and some aussie shows to make sure we learn them. we've been hunkered down at standalone studios bashing out the new tunes, some thirteen new tunes, for the last couple of weeks now. things go very well. there's one brand new song that we wrote in five minutes, and surprise, surprise, it's probably one of the best of the bunch. it always happens that way. don't ask why. it would be really embarrassing for you to ask why anyway, because it would involve you, at this moment, saying to your computer screen, 'why?'
so we are way excited to be heading out on another east coast tour of australia, with shows in sydney, melbourne and brisbane over november/december. the dates and details about tickets can be found on the concerts page.
these will be our last headline shows for the year as we have to get on with nutting out this new record of ours. it's an interesting bunch of tunes, a few rockers, lots of slow ones, few poppy things here and there. the usual bag really, but there's something about 'em. seems this record's gonna be a little more up maybe, a little more positive. second storey, you know, man, that was depressing...
okey dokey, that's it from us. make sure you come and say hi at the shows. we love to yap.
best, most outrageous regards netpeople
aof
news 18.09.05: hey all, so the relative quiet time at aofhouse continues for the moment, as unfortunately, we’ve had to delay our proposed september european sojourn until april/may next year. sincere apologies to all those who have been willing us to come to their city. any booking queries for our european dates can be sent to andreas@puschen.net, our agent there. luckily next year is not so far away now, so the wait wont be such a long one… instead though, there will be some shows in our great wide homeland. we will play shows in sydney, melbourne and brisbane during november. more news on the exact dates will come soon, so keep an eye on our concerts listing. hopefully we will have some new tunes to play too. no promises, all intentions. there are a couple of new tunes that could definitely make their live debuts though… and on that, more and more writing is being done for our third album. recording plans are being tossed around now, but rest assured there wont be a three year gap this time. only around two.
lastly, thanks to all of you, the t-shirts and cds available on this site have been flying out the door like they’re going out of fashion (which actually, they probably are). so, you can still buy all that stuff here. oh, and we have some black t-shirts as well as the cherry red and blue ones. yay.
ok,
enough rambling. over, aof
news 06.06.05 hey all, welcome to yet another scintilating aof web update. sometimes it seems the whole world hinges on these little updates, and i get nervous fingers typing... well, it's been a pretty quiet time for us lately, really. we recently demoed the skeletons of eight new songs at marty's studio, and while they were a little rough around the edges, the tunes themselves are coming up really well. we're hoping to be able to have at least some of the newies in the set for our upcoming tours of europe and australia toward the later half of the year. we'll see how we go.
speaking of touring, alongside working on tunes, we've been laying the groundwork for our second tour of the u.k. and europe, which is looking like it will commence mid september. it's still very early in the planning stages, so we have no solid idea of exactly which countries and cities we'll be visting, but please keep an eye on www.puschen.net (our euro booking agent) for any updates, and of course there's our concerts page for updates too. we'll hopefully also be doing another quick tour of australia as well, around november. then we'll start making a new album. but that's all in the future...
lastly, for all you readers out there in the wide, wide world, our sophomore record 'second storey' has now seen release in even more european countries as a result of our licensing deal with the lovely folk at bella union. so as well as trifekta records in australia and wonderground in japan, the record is now available in the following locales on the following imprints: u.k.: bella union, germany: rough trade, france: v2, italy: v2, scandinavia/finland: v2, spain: sinnamon records
this is very exciting for us! please hunt the record down and have a listen to it, wherever you may be. the fate of the world doesn't depend on it, but the fate of ours does... take much care
love, aof xxx
news 19.04.05 well, we just got back from japan and, really, can we just say, wow. we had an even better time this time than when we were there in 2003. the tour went really well, and we'd like to thank taka and his posse at wonderground records for doing such a great job organising it. thankyou also to those who put us up, the nouge, craig and fukari, damien and miyuki, and martine. also thanks to to p-shirts, paper bag lunchbox, wooderd chiarie, miaou, vampilla, hosome, mute1945 and crossbred. you are all great and inspiring bands. craziest band award easily goes to hosome and their seven minute set of extreme, blurry hands veloco-pop. ground components watch out. your stage moves may have been eclipsed.
well, the japan tour officially draws all aof touring activity to a close for a while at least, but there will be more touring at home and abroad in a few months time. For now we're going to get going on writing a new record. we've a couple of new tunes brewing actually, but we reckon we're gonna keep them secret for a while yet. ollie does have some solo shows coming supporting excellent perth band the panics in sydney and melbourne (may 20 and 21, northcote social club, melbourne and may 27, 28 and 29, the vanguard, sydney) so perhaps you'll get a preview of some tunes then... more details on the shows here.
second storey, uk/europe: april 4 saw the official release of second storey by the fine bella union imprint in the uk and germany. we are extraordinarily happy and proud that our labour of love and pain is available domestically in the uk and germany now, and it should soon be available in other parts of europe too (france, italy, and scandinavia). our links page will take you to your local european distibutor if you're after more info on where to pick the record up. otherwise just head to your local fine music store and grab it. we'd like to extend our gratitude and respect to the wonderful folk at bella union. thankyouse.
and that's about it for the minute. oh, one last thing, over the next week or two we hope to be doing a few small updates to this site, so if any readers (that's either of you two) have any suggestions please feel free to drop us a line here and we'll hope to include them. really, the site will stay pretty much the same (we get so many nice comments about it, why change it?) but we reckon that given it's nearly five years old, a bit of upkeep/modernisation/reality check wouldn't go astray. so there. new stuff soon. but no candid touring photos of marty talking to his drums.
anyway, till next time, stay well, keep on goin', aof.
news 23.3.05 hey-ho, sadness riegns here at camp AOF as our 'come round & show me' tour-de-australia winds up. massive thanks to every one of you who came along to the shows and had a listen to us and all the amazing bands we got to play alongside. it was our biggest ever australian tour, and it featured out biggest ever musical highs, our lowest bad-humour lows, and some pretty nasty hangovers too... but that's sorta the way we like it. fortunately for us, we still have a couple of shows to go post-tour and we thought we'd better share the details with you. these include our appearance at sydney's cockatoo Island festival, a benefit gig we are doing in melbourne for the asylum seeker project, and our second ever tour of japan.
sydney's cockatoo island festival, held on a little island in sydney harbour, is a massive three-day extravaganza with heaps of great bands from both at home and o.s. we will hit the factory stage on friday 25th march at 5.25. we love playing festivals, so we're very much looking forward to this one. for the full line-up and playing times check here. secondly, sunday april 3rd sees us hitting the stage at the corner hotel in melbourne along with ninety-nine, the tranquilizers and crayon fields, for a benefit gig for hotham mission's asylum seekers project. the project, which provides welcome and essential assistance to refugees who may be unable to work or gain access to government benefits and other support due to their status as asylum seekers, is a great cause, and one we're honoured to support. for more details on the project go here, and on the gig, here. come on down and show your support too. lastly, our second japanese tour kicks off in early april! put together by our ace japanese label wonderground records, the tour starts in tokyo on friday april 8, with a second tokyo show on sunday april 10 and then shows in osaka and kyoto on monday 11th and tuesday 12th of april respectively. all the shows will be with amazing dirty three guitarist mick turner, as well as awesome local acts too. check the full dates and info here. we can't wait to get back to japan, as we had such an ace time last time, and we can't wait to catch up with taka, the nouge, and the metch...
and that's about it for now, signing off, aof.
news 16.01.05: hello all and welcome to the new year, we hope your festive season was both merry and relaxing. team aof has some fantastic news items to welcome the new year, and the promise of some tours both at home and abroad. so read on.
firstly, we are very proud and very happy to announce that our sophomore full length album, 'second storey', will see release this march on fantastic u.k. label bella union. the album will be preceeded by a limited edition seven inch single of 'your easy part' backed by 'what's best & what's easy', which was a b-side on the australian single release of 'along the run'. we are really, really excited that 'second storey' will soon be available domestically in the u.k. for more info on bella union here's their site, and for any u.k. based readers, look out for our record in your finest stores round march.
in other release news, february will see the arrival of the second australian single from 'second storey', 'come round & show me'. the late-album dark-pop moment is not all you get though, the single will also feature a new aof tune 'you are now so distant tonight', a mellow late nite moment recorded at our drummer marty's standalone studios, as well as a pop tune called 'down different roads' that ollie wrote and recorded for the short film 'heartworm' by ben chessell. closing the cd is a version of 'come round & show me' recorded live by leah baker at the abc's southbank studios for radio station triple j's home and hosed local music show. so there's some pretty special aof bits and pieces on there really. it should be in australian shops by the end of feb, so keep an ear out for it.
tours! we will be doing (as promised) a pretty wide-scale tour of australia this february and march in support of the new single 'come round & show me', including some shows in regional towns we haven't visited in ages, as well as the big cities. the full dates are here. we are very happy to announce that theredsunband will be our guests for the majority of the dates, with other local supports from sodastream, holly throsby, paper tiger and delpino to name a few. the whole journey has been proudly sponsored by triple j's home and hosed, as well as the australian government's excellent contemporary music touring program.
one final piece of news, it seems we may be so lucky as to have been invited back to japan for our second tour there. 'second storey' was released last august in japan on the excellent wonderground label, and our friend takaaki has booked us some more dates in tokyo and osaka at the end of april. as soon as we have confirmation on the finalised dates, we'll post them in the concerts section.
and
that's about it, see you at one of the shows! aof h.q.
news 08.11.04 hey all, finally another update from aofhouse. we've been a bit slack on the website front, but this is pretty much cause we're all taking a breather after the second storey launch shows, which all went really well actually, so thanks to all that came down and swayed along etc. apologies to those who got turned away from the sydney show at newtown rsl, we faced some particularly pedantic door staff who just refused to let extra people in to the venue, even if they were on the door list... anyway, we got in, which was lucky really. big thanks also to all the bands who played with us for this run of shows: iron on, dollar bar, small knives, youth group, ground components and heligoland. you are all top-shelf. and thanks to tom lang and tlj for working so hard for the aof cause/effect and ensuring we had the time and space to do our make up and get into our stage costumes prior to each show.
well, that brings us to the focus of this update: we have a couple more shows coming up: saturday december 4th we will be playing at the homebake festival in sydney, which has sold out. we're not sure what time or stage yet, either. secondly, our only other show for 2004 will be in melbourne at the famous spiegeltent on thurs december 9th. it seems we'll be on quite early in the evening around 7pm. it's always nice to play in a tent - we did some shows back in 1998 in a three person caribee dome tent which were a little intimate, but i think the spiegel is supposed to hold at least 300. tix available through www.ticketmaster7.com.
also, as we've said before, we will be doing more aussie shows in the new year around feb/march, in support of the second single from second storey, the late album nugget 'come round & show me'. we're still working on the extra tracks for the single, but it should hopefully include a couple of unreleased aof songs. it's due around feb to co-incide with the tour. anyway, that's about it for now. we will hopefully have some news soon on some some international release details for second storey, but more on that next moth. i mean month.
for now, best and most outrageous wishes of fortune for the upcoming festive season. aof.
news 18.08.04 well finally it's here, our new record 'second storey'. it was released locally august 16th on trifekta records, and august 3rd in japan on wonderground records. we are so happy it is finally out, and we are very proud of it. thanks to all those involved in its making, tim whitten, tom lang, lovers, friends, family and pets. thanks also to those who've helped see it get to the shops, tom larnach-jones at trifekta, takaaki kato at wonderground, and everyone at shock records. big love.we'll be launching the record in all major east-coast cities, so check the concerts section for details. basically it's: brissie - the zoo, fri 10th sept, with dollar bar and iron on, sydney, sat 18th september, with youth group and the small knives, and melbourne, fri 1st oct, with ground components and heligoland. for all those not in brissie, sydders, or melbs who want some aof live version, we will be doing a major tour early in the new year, and we promise we'll get to all the other big cities and inbetween then.
so without further ado, here is the tracklisting for 'second storey':
along
the run
your easy part
break for me
busted, broken, forgotten
two rivers
where trouble lived
sing song
real time
come round and show me
heart translation
anyway,
we hope you all enjoy it, and we hope to see you soon at a show. till
then, stay gold, aof.
well, after an eternity, the release of our new album ‘second storey’ is only two weeks away now (16th aug). to celebrate its arrival, we’ll be doing a very special show just four days before it hits shops, on thursday 12th august at manchester lane, melb cbd (cnr manchester lane, and flinders lane). manchester lane has a reputation for being a pretty classy kinda place, so it’s gonna be a pretty cool show, but its also a smallish place, so tickets are really limited. you can grab them from polyester records, gaslight records, and the venue (9663 0630), but best be quick if you wanna come. sydney’s fantastic and rapidly expolding theredsunband will be supporting us too, so there’s another very good reason to come on down… we will be in very high spirits on the evening, no doubt, given the album we’ve been working on for so long will finally be a reality!
for those of you who don’t live in melb, or can’t make it to the manchester lane show, there’ll be proper launches for the album in brisbane, sydney and melbourne through september/october. these dates are in the concerts section, if you wanna suss them out. for those of you in other parts of australia and the world, we are working hard on organising tours to your home towns… but more on this in the future.
lastly, there’ll be a film clip for ‘along the run’ appearing very soon on rage and other good australian based music video shows. (it debuts on ABC's Rage friday 30th at 3.00AM (actually sat morn...). directed by excellent local filmaker sotiris dounoukos, the film clip was shot recently at the athenaemum theatre in melb, so look out for it. and in true aof form, there are no members of the band in it… luckily.
well, that’s about it. hopefully see you dressed for success down atmanchester lane, or at one of the album launches. much love, aof.
news 24.06.04: !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! july 5th will see the release of our new four track single ‘along the run’. this is not a joke. the ep (see front cover right), featuring two cuts from our upcoming album and two extra rare b-sides from the album sessions, will be in all good aussie record shops on the afore-mentioned date, courtesy of the downright fucking ace trifekta recording company. we are so pumped you could use us as a lilo.
The
track list is as follows:
1. along the run (no surprises there, it’s the name of the single)
2. busted, broken, forgotten (from the upcoming album)
3. what’s best and what’s easy (non album cut)
4. ghost letter (non album cut)
the single has a limited run of 1,000 copies, which sounds impressive
for some reason. it probably just means we’ll either have way
too many, or people will be holding us to ransom over them. whatever,
we just hope you like as much as we do.
we will be launching this single in melbourne at the evelyn hotel on sat 17th july with righteous guests youth group (syd) and the small knives (bless their melancholy hearts), both whom have recently released absolute corkers of records. unfortunately, we wont be launching the single in any other towns but that’s ok because there will be a full tour when the album comes out. we will also be supporting uk band gomez at both of their melbourne shows at the forum on the 5th and 6th of july, though by all accounts these shows are sold out… anyway, check the concerts section for full details of all the shows, including some pretty solid dates for the album tour later in the year.
yes, our second full length album ‘second storey’ will see release in mere weeks. japan gets it first on the 4th august (through the top-ace wonderground label) and in australia it hits shops on the 16th august (on trifekta). there will be more details on the album as it comes closer to release, as well as firmer launch details, so stay tuned. we can’t wait to have a new record out, so we can stop listening to it ourselves and let someone else do it. until then, see you at a show. love from the aof digital response unit.
oh, and if you’re reading this in the 48 hours between this post and 10 pm on sat 26th june, ollie does a solo show on said evening in brisbane at the troubador, playing aof old and new, remotes, and brand, brand newies.
news 04.04 just a short update this time round, as there's not much new to report on. we know we've been harping on about it for ages but work is pretty much complete on our new album. at the moment we're just getting it ready for mastering and slowly beginning to suss out who's going to release it and where. none of this is confrimed yet, but we can pretty confidently say we'll have a new record (a single or the full album) in stores by july/august (in Oz and Japan).
its pretty certain we'll be touring around that time too, so make sure to check back here for dates come mid year. in the meantime ollie will do a smattering of his usual casual solo spots (see the concerts section for dates). anyway, that's about it. we should have some more concrete news on the album and touring soon, so keep your net radars on. love, aof staff.
news 01.04: another aof news update, huh? aof news is really thin on the ground at the moment, but here's what there is: we've finished recording our second album. WHAT??? did i read that right? what the fuck? yeah you thought it would never happen, but it has, and its taken even us by surprise. we've made another record.
well,
in fact, it’s not quite finished yet. we still have a few more
days of recording to polish it up, etc., and then we have to mix and
master it, but the bulk of the recording is done. we recorded fouteen
tracks during the sessions for the album, tentaively titled ‘along
the run’, with our main man tim whitten at metropolis audio in
melbourne. as with all aof records, the tunes are pretty diverse, from
edgy rockers to wussy weepy numbers, its all there. faves of the band
so far are: sing song, unforeseen circumstances, along the run and where
trouble lived. but the bands favourites are never the same as the listeners
favourites and we’ll be interested to see which songs our three
fans like. the album’s due julyish, with a single around
may, so i spose we’ll find out then.
favourite misquoted lyrics from the album so far include: "oooh i took a rat into the coldest place", "they'll find my balls are round and not know what to do" and “where mammaries burn”. those these are just the band’s faves at the moment, we look forward to any other people come up with. maybe we’ll even make a page on the site dedicated to misquoted lyrics… ollie’s lazy vocals always lend themselves to some interesting interpretations…why not embrace it?
anyway,
aside from all that, we’ve no gigs lined up, probably not for
a while, either. but ollie will be doing his usual smattering of solo
shows, and you never know when another aof member or two will jump up
on stage or sing along from the bar. his next solo show will be as part
of festa el cheapo at Melbourne’s retreat hotel (in sydney road
brunswick right by cnr glenlyon rd) on the 24th jan. it’s an arvo
affair, from noon til dusk, with an arvo bbq. the full line up is: machine
translations, sodastream, disaster plan (duo), ollie browne, c.w. stoneking,
hueco (duo), and m. charles. tix are onsale now from polyester records,
gaslight records, and from the venue. they are $12 + bf. hope to see
you there for beer and snags and tunes, three of the greatest things
this planet
has to offer.
and
that’s it for this month. try and hold yourself together until
the next update, …aof katsss.
news 03.09.03 hello there, internet freaks. doctor aof is back with another update, which is good, cause i know you’ve all been checking your computer every five minutes to get the latest news on your favourite snore-core band. well here is the latest news: we have completed our very first tour of japan, and we had more fun than a five year old mucking around in the plastic ball pool at ikea. it was way, way cool.
big thanks go out firstly to takaaki kato at wonderground for being the best host/tour manager ever (we love you too, andreas). secondly, thanks to the kids from miaou, our tourmates for the most, and also mr. nakai and his ace parents. also thanks the shibuya nest, club dawn, and tight rope, and their awesome house engineers. thanks also to the luckies, toe, p-shirts, tennis coats, and all the other bands we played with, we love you all....hopefully we will come back one day (with a better keyboard).
now it’s only our upcoming aussie shows we have to worry about. we play friday 5th sept at the corner supporting mum, one of iceland’s finest. then we have our own extravaganza at the hi fi bar (melb cbd) on saturday 20th sept, with support from the ace rectifiers, and local rock freaks ground components. this will be our last melb show for a good while, probably. then, on the friday 26th sept we play brisbane’s zoo supported by brissie soundsmiths trinkets. its been ages since we brissied it up, so make sure you’re there if you’re in the area.
new album news! put down your hot beverage! finally we have booked studio time at melbourne’s metropolis studios. we will head in there october 19 with our main man/sonic genius tim whitten to lay down our second album, lovingly refered to (by myself) as ‘hybernator’. its gonna have these tunes (at least): 2 rivers, heart translation, your easy part, break for me, along the run, busted broken forgotten, the wind still rings with change, less than an instant, and some other wicked yet to be named sleepy numbers. but don’t head to jb hi fi just yet, it wont be out until next year...2004. try putting that in your diary.
and that’s all the news friends. till later, people of the screen, aof cats.xo.
news 07.07.03: yo groovers, movers and losers, aof are back with another update. yeah we know, that's about as exciting as the commonwealth games, but hey, updating the website man! yeah man! someones gotta do it. and its gonna be one of us cause no one else gives a shit.
we
have done our first shows back after a long break, and they went well,
(we thought). thanks to all those who came along and laughed/cryed/bobbed
their head/drank heavily/asked for their money back. we had a good time,
though don’t tell anyone we didn’t get through our rider
for the first time ever.
anyway, we have some more shows coming up, so we can redeem ourselves.
and guess what, they're in japan! our first ever tour there kicks off
in august with shows in tokyo, osaka, and nagoya. one show is with local
friends the lucksmiths. from memory the only other gig we ever did with
them was in brighton (uk). its kinda cool that we only seem to share
a bill with them when we’re overseas. check here for the dates
in full. we cant wait.
to celebrate this, we'll be playing our first headline shows in a year in both melbourne and sydney. sat 26th july we hit (sort of punch lightly, not really hit) the evelyn hotel in brunswick street, fitzroy. other acts on the bill include the ace registered nurse and those much loved drinking buddies from slam county friendly injun. in sydney we’re at the annandale hotel on 2nd august, with support from red sun band and melbourne’s wonderful clare bowditch. so come on down and help us with our rider…
and
that’s about all the news there is, oh and we’ve studio
time booked for october, but knowing us, we’ll actually get round
o it in 2009. cheers, beers, fears, fishing from piers, aof.
news 02.06.03 hey there all, here is some big news, we will play our first shows in almost a year this week. the first is billed as an ollie solo show at the tote (collingwood) on thurs 5th June, but there’s a good chance the whole of team aof will jump up onstage to try some new tunes, (if we get our shit together in time). also playing will be joel silbersher and his ancient meat, and cameron bird of architecture in helsinki solo. you couldn’t steal two better support acts from the eurovision song contest. and hey, its at the tote, we’ll all get trashed and ring old friends in tassie.
the even bigger news is that we have our first official show on monday 9th june at the espy (esplanade hotel, st kilda) as part of the ‘move your r’s’ benefit. we’re on at 8.30 in the gerswhin room. also playing are machine translations, a.i.h., the rectifiers, catalyst, the spazzy’s, riff random and heaps of others. it’s a great cause, and it will be top ace fun too, so show yourself, and wreck yourself. see youse there.
ollie also has some solo shows coming up in sydney in support of ace spunk records acts m ward and the folk implosion. check here for the dates.
that’s about it you slow rock loving groovers, keep it as real as you feel is the deal with each meal. aof.
news 11.04.03 hi there, everyone. finally an update. after probably the longest aof web page neglection period ever. the reason for the delay? well, there’s not much news. we’ve never been the types to rush things, and basically we’ve just been taking our time to live a little, work a little, and contemplate our next album. the best thing about taking so long to write an album is that fifteen different musical genres go in and out of fashion during the time it takes us to write a record, which gives us even more of a reason to not give a rat’s arse about style. apart from those glam rock records we did.
there is one great piece of news though, 'wires' has finally seen release in germany through normal records. thanks heaps to stephan and all at normal for believing in 'wires'. we love germany, and had an awesome time touring there at the end of 2001, so hopefully this release will give us reason to head over there for another tour.
as for the aof new album, we have about seven tunes now, tentative titles are: ‘your easy part’, ‘untitled 1’ (this song will never have a name and its temporary title is way too shit to mention here), ‘two rivers’, ‘heart translation’, ‘along the run’ (alternative title: ‘song for daisy steiner’), ‘the wind still rings with change’, ‘break forming’, and possibly a really new one (not band-tested yet) called ‘new shepherd’s song’. as we’ve mentioned before they are a mixed bag, but no great departure from the old ‘wires’ material. upbeat, downbeat, eggbeat, whatever.
unfortunately (depending on how you look at it), all this writing means no touring for aof til later on this year. hopefully by the time we do get back on the road, the world hasn’t moved on to flying cars and we’ll have to learn to drive again (ollie for the first time). speaking of ollie, he'll be doing some solo shows in the meantime, maybe even up the coast. so keep your eyes peeled and keep checking the concerts section to get the most possible use out of this scintillating hub of internet based information. see you all soon, hope you all feel as good as you look. love, aof kids (adults).
news 28.11.02 firstly, hello to anyone in america or japan who has bought our record wires; it has finally been released in both those countries. in america it is on the ace three beads of sweat label, and in japan on top new label wonderground records. thanks to both of those labels for putting their faith into our record and our band. hopefully the release of wires in both these countries means we may be able to tour there, something any sane aussie band would absolutely love to do, so maybe we'll see you over there soon.
we'll its been a pretty relaxed year for us, but we kind of needed a bit of break as the wires year was a pretty hectic one. we've still been writing for a new record and we have around six songs that we are happy with now (we are very hard on ourselves). the newest ones are called 'along the run' and 'break forming', and they are depressing and moody - surprise, surprise.
we don't have any shows booked in at the moment, but there are plans for some east coast australian dates in mid feb 03. ollie may be doing a couple of solo shows (he loves them so much) in sydney and melbourne late jan too, but don't hold your breath. ollie has also been asked to score the music for melbourne based filmmaker ben chessell's second short film tentatively titled 'heartworm' (ben's first short was the very successful 'the only person in the world'), which he is very excited about, cause it kinda makes him feel like a real musician.
no other news really, marty aof has been recording with our pals sodastream for their third album, which will be yet another corker we're sure. we don't care where marty spreads his talent, just as long as he doesn't leave aof when the 'stream start playing stadiums. he's also gonna be a dad any minute soon so we have to be nice to him.
also, much love and many happy memories to life without buildings, who called it a day earlier this year. we love your band - one of the best live gigs in a lifetime. for as long as we travel up and down the hume highway you'll always be spinning.
Anyway, that's about it for aof news, let's go to the pub…
news: 09.08.02 well this news update should definitely begin with some of the most sensational aof news ever. marty and his partner clare are having a baby. all other aof members send their joyous congratulations out to them. ollie, miles and peggy also feel that they have contributed greatly to marty's overall ability to deal with children (ollie especially, who is always throwing tanties). this is ace, ace news.
we are finally cranking out some new tunes. we demoed four last week, with the working titles of 'two rivers','(no name yet)', 'heart translation' and 'your easy part'. they came out pretty well. each song is either really upbeat, or really fucking depressing. but that's probably a good thing. actually we've still got to write the upbeat bits. hopefully we will finally enter the studios to record properly early in the new year, around the end of feb.
'wires' is finally coming out in the usa in october on excellent indie label 3 beads of sweat (www.3bos.com). it will also be released at roughly the same time in japan on great new label wonderground records. (www.wonderground.jp). all this is also fantastic news.
lastly,
we will do our first show in ages at the corner hotel in melbourne on
thursday august 22nd, in support of american songsmith josh rouse. we
look forward to seeing him play. we also look forward to testing out
some of our new tunes. anyway, that's about it. maybe we'll see you
at the corner on the 22nd.
aof newz 08.05.02 well, we've had our first rental car incident. got the twelve seater wedged between the ceiling and the floor in a hotel carpark. its funny until you read the bill. at least we were only travelling at 5kph when we… ahem… 'crashed'.
theres a bit of news this month: our first ep/record 'the very strange year' has been re-issued by our ace old label half a cow records. new packaging and all. same music on it though. that record always makes me (ollie) think of the public bar in melb where we used to play often (and stay on until about six am). its probably because the photo taken on this inside (by talent extremist cameron bird) is of us playing there. those were the days, what a strange year that was, ah memories. anyway, tvsy should be in all good aussie record shops now, and of course online at www.halfacow.com.au.
also, excellent uk magazine 'comes with a smile' has put both an interview with us in the pages and a demo version (recorded by our drummer marty in his old lounge room) of 'give me tonight' on the accompanying cd. it's a very well written and presented mag, and definitely worth checking out. other things in the mag/on the disc for this issue are arab strap, howe gelb, josh rouse, bill janovitz, silver jews, american analog set, as well australia's own darren hanlon, to name a few. you can order the mag online at www.rocketgirl.co.uk an also www.heyday-mo.com. there might be a few copies floating into polyester in melbourne too. cwas's website is here: cwas.hinah.com.
lastly, we're getting out of the inner city rat race with some regional and uni shows in victoria in a couple of weeks supporting brissie band george. the dates are in the concerts section.
well that's about it. thanks go out to the church for having us as support on their nsw shows last week. anyway, back to writing that second album (it looks like we'll be recording again in november). take it easy.
news 26.3.02 well, well, a quiet three months has turned out to be fairly busy for aof. in a couple of community related events we day-timed it at the st.kilda festival, and spent a lovely couple of nights in perth for the fringe festival. we got to see the always special sodastream acousticing it up in their own hometown. a big thanks to the festival organisers for flying us over and putting us up in such a fine hotel....
our february tour couldn't have been better (except if we'd rehearsed more) thanks so much to all the punters who came along, and extra thanks to jason "solo man" molina from songs:ohia for not just being so good, but for being the funnest tour mate since the aof / 2 litre dolby flip-flop tour of perth back in '99.
on saturday we had the honour of supporting the go-betweens at the corner hotel which was great to say the least. it was the first any of us had seen them live and it was fucking terrific. the whole crowd was smiling its face off.
next week we'll be doing two nsw shows in support of the church, as a part of their aussie theatre tour. wed 1st may newcastle civic centre, thurs 2nd may enmore theatre. we look forward to it
also the folk at trifekta have their new website up and it's top shit. you can order cds on it even if you're overseas. we encourage you to steal your best friend's credit card and buy two of everything: www.trifekta.com.au. there's not much other news except that we are still trying to write another record in an effort to get something new out this year. wires looks like it'll be coming out on some great indie labels in japan (wonderground - in july?), italy (blue tears - later in the year) and america (3bos - three beads of sweat - september) , and is also about to come out in new zealand on flying nun. more info about all this as it comes to hand.
farewell, aof
news 07.01.02: now that it's 2002 we can put heaps of palindromes in our news page. if you can count all the palindromes in this news update, then you spend way too much time on the net.
if you hadn't already noticed, we've had some time off. yeah we've been writing tunes, yeah we've been practising, but that's not what being in a band is all about. it's about friendship. that's why we roughed it at woodford folk festival drinking cask wine. that's why we share the same mobile phone. that's why we hang out together ALL the time. we love it. to celebrate this we are working on a negative, down, running-with-a-bad-crowd, dirty, broken rock record. it's going to be called 'mean bullies'. it's going to be inspired by the desert, and it will feature a live snake.
we will soon be doing our last tour for 'wires'. we're gonna bring that collection of old bawlers out on the road one more time, and to celebrate we are having a very special guest whose music has been played in the touring wagon incessantly over the ages. this will be the excellent jason molina, an american songwriter and singer who records under the name songs: ohia. we are honoured to have him join us for the tour. if you haven't already, you should check out his many great recordings, which are available in most good indie record shops on u.s. label secretly canadian records. you should also make sure that if you are coming to one of these gigs to come down early and check out his tunes. this is all happening mid feb, check the concerts section for the actual dates.
there are a couple of other shows we'll be doing prior to this tour. the first is an appearance at st kilda festival on sunday 10th of feb, we'll be playing at 4.30 on the acland street stage. also, we are delighted to have been invited to play as part of the perth festival and we'll be playing there on the 26th of january at ozone in northbridge. thanks heaps to the folks at both of these festivals for having us play. that's it for now, more news later. byeeyb.
news 18.11.01: well, most of us are back from overseas now, though marty's still traveling around and was last seen atop the rock of gibraltar. the first aof overseas tour went really well and was also ace fun. there weren't too many fights, and the band remains together.
special thanks and cheers go out to andreas, carsten, (and peter as well at kliengeld distro), and all the german promoters for treating us so well and making us feel like real musicians, joss for looking after us so generously in ireland (as well as pete and albert), simon in glasgow, matt, matt and tony in london, anna in brighton, all the folks at la giungette pirate, lisbeth et al in hasselt, and the wonderful folks (especially maurice) at vpro/crossing border in amsterdam.
thanks also to the following rock acts for being so excellent and for sharing bills with us: echtziet, north of america, erhard and missouri, mina, couch, joan of arse, the dudley corp, the essex green, graham langley (savoygrand), the lucksmiths, roads to siam, tears in x-ray eyes, and superchunk. thankyou as well to people who bought cds, and took a gamble on coming to hear us play (especially the couple in brighton uk, for who it was a toss up between our gig and a strange movie about lost dwarves or something).
now we are home, we have some shows coming up. the first two are at the punters club on december 1st and 2nd (sat and sun). we have some ace guests: on the first night we we'll be joined by sleepy township and ides of space (syd), and on the second we'll be joined by sodastream and bruna. we will also be appearing at homebake again this year, on the 8th of december. we will be playing at 5 pm on the hopetoun stage.
anyway, other than doing these gigs we'll just be concentrating on writing songs and looking for jobs. and that's the news. wow. oh, and thankyou to the two toms, tim and marcus. you know why.
news 30.08.01: thanks to all who came down to our farewell shows at the hoey and the espy, we hope you all had enjoyable evenings. thanks also to the rebel astronauts, ukiyo-e, knievel, kirsty stegwazi and the friendly injun for joining us on the gigs.
not much is happening for us now except preparations for going os. all our international dates are posted in the concerts section, so far we have 22 dates starting in new york and finishing at this stage in london. we'll be on the road for around six weeks, which is easily the longest period of time we've ever had to spend on the road together. anyone who is in the area of any of the shows we are doing abroad, come down and say hi and have a beer with us. we'll be the ones with the dirty clothes and the swags. after our touring commitments, aof members will be holidaying in such diverse locales as greece, turkey and thailand. there will be no shows in these places, but lots of djembe drumming on the beach.
probable highlights for the tour include: new york, just because it's new york. german autobahn negotiation. paris, if we get there, we'll just stay there for ever. scotland, glasgow rock city. and lastly, playing some shows with the lovely music'd joan of arse in ireland will be ace. right now its all looking good except for the bank balance.
we'll definitely be doing some australian shows again in december, however at this stage we're not sure where they'll be. an appearance at woodford festival outside brisbane is likely, and we may even be back on at homebake in sydney. we don't know if we'll be able to update this site while we're away, but we'll email out any gig details on the old 'two messages a year' aof mailing list as they become clearer. anyway, goodbye and thanks for reading the news today.
news 21.07.01: we'll be relaxing this week after our run of five gigs with steve malkmus and the jicks. big thanks to them for being such personable and friendly touring companions and for playing such enjoyable/rocking shows. a memorable moment of the tour: ollie and peggy relaxing over some nice thai dishes in newtown casually asking the waiter what time it was, he says "it's nine-thirty", ollie and peggy think"'that's a familiar time, what else is supposed to be happening at nine-thirty?" going on stage.
most annoying moment/s of the tour goes to our stupid rented marshall amp with its lead-lined flight case. how about taking several pieces off the amp itself with a screw driver everytime we get to the airport to get the thing down to the regulation 32 kilos.
other aof news: we are still knocking together our first overseas tour. we may well be a part of cmj music marathon in nyc which would/will be excellent. other than that we are working on shows in germany, belgium, switzerland, italy, ireland, scotland, and england, where peggy was actually born. all these dates will be added to our concerts section soon/later.
our last news update concerns more concerts. we will be doing (at this stage) four more shows before we go. for all the details see our concerts section. at the moment it's two in melbourne and two in sydney. we hope to have some new songs for these gigs, for our sake as much as anyone else's. so feel free to come down to one of our fare-well shows and give us some of your un-cashed travellers cheques.
news 14.06.01: the site's been off air for a while - we had to find a new host - we were with one.net, sorry about that. there isn't a lot of news from aof at the moment given that we've been traveling around the country as a part of augie march's tour. next up is two shows at the zoo in brisbane (thurs 28th and fri 29th). all the other shows have been going well, and thanks to all the augie fans who came down early to watch us play..
some other big news is that we'll be playing the supports nationally for stephen malkmus + the jicks tour which is ace. we're doing four shows over five days flying everywhere and stuff which will be pretty different than the usual road deal. (check the concerts section for the details) the tour will finally see us going to perth which we always enjoy, however due to the hectic schedule we will only be doing the malkmus show whilst there. we wish we could stay for longer and do a bit of sailing.
we've been getting a few requests for the lyrics to the tunes off wires, but we kind of feel a bit strange putting them on the site, so we probably wont be putting them up.we're going to ask stephen king to write the lyrics to our next record and then we can release it as a horror novel.
lastly thanks everyone who came along to our recent gig at the punters club in melbourne, and thanks to grand salvo and radius for playing too, and to guy and ben for airing so many dance-worthy classics after the show.
If you are looking for something to do, feel free to go vote for us ('reasons are all i have left' is our latest radio single thing) on the jjj net 50. say your bit for aof.
news 23.05.01: hello, and welcome to the aof news update. first, thankyou to anybody reading this who came down to one of our launch shows, we hope you had as much fun as we did. well, we really only started having fun after the shows. memorable touring anecdotes include: dancers in sydney - people were actually dancing at one of our shows - is that possible? can they teach us how to do it? also, the award for most-memorable-touring-evening-spent-together-as-a-band-but-not-all-that-good-a-bunch-of-friends-really goes to the night we spent in a motel in bordertown s.a. with nothing but a case of beer. we actually got so bored we ended up asking the motel owner if he had any games we could borrow. he didn't, not even monopoly. we ended up hanging out at the petrol station looking mean.
since the tour we've been taking it pretty easy, trying to write some new tunes, hanging out in parking lots, kicking cans. people think being in a band is really easy. they're right. soon, in june, we will be hitting the road in support of augie march who are embarking on another tour. we are very excited and have, in fact, already packed, except for peggy who is still living out of the bag she packed for the last tour and miles who packs only muesli and lives by the old shirt on the back philosophy. you can check out these dates in our 'concerts' section. this support tour will act as a fine prelude to our own tour which will hopefully occur in july. this whole bag of touring will see us going to pretty much every major city twice (except perth). we try to play the regional places too, but they're hard to justify budget wise, because in reality more people turn up to our rehearsals than they do to our regional shows. we are also trying to organise some underage shows too, because hell, we were underage once, thirty years ago.
our last piece of news is that we are currently planning our first o.s. tour, which will start in germany and go right throughout….germany. hopefully we'll be adding some more dates in belgium, the netherlands, italy and the uk. so that should be a bit of an eye-opener (or a band break-up-er). other than that, keep your ears out for our new single reasons are all I have left + moonlight, which will hopefully get a few spins on radio to coincide with our touring. and that's it for now.
