Here’s a clip I shot with Spencer P. Jones about a year ago now. This piece is yet to be released officially, but after Ed Kuepper tracked down and posted the video upon his facebook page, it’s gotten a lot of attention, and so I may as well bring some of the attention in here.
A simply idea, it was shot over a single afternoon in Spencer’s house, and cut over the next week. It’s the first in an ongoing series of collaborations with the famed NZ guitarist, and I look forward to bring you more from him soon.
Matthew T. Ellery – Films
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And they say Chapel St is dead. I’d like to admit, relucantly at first, that I spent my second weekend in a row on Chapel St. Tonight, for the most part, I didn’t fare so well. With the idea of a ‘good time’ fast disappearing, my friend and I stumbled out of our club of choice at 4am, hoping to get a taxi home and end this misadventure. What we found, instead, was a truly amazing busker. For over an hour we stood there, singing and even dancing, as the crowd grew and the buskers coffer filled with piles and piles of notes. As the Cat Stevens songs kicked in, the growing crowd drew louder and more jublient with their backing vocals, ending with the local constabulary turning up to shut down the impromptu show during an almighty rendition of Brown Eyed Girl, bolsted by a tall and striking blonde young lady scatting over the end chorus in true Morrison style.
The performance made all the money, all the hours and all the chasing of the night worth while, and while I didn’t catch the names of anyone involved, I hope they some how find this post and get in touch with me. It was one of the finest 60min periods of this year for me – and, I think, for many others.
Well, it’s certainly been a while. My secret project is still ticking away (here’s a hint, it’s a Melbourne instrumental group), but I do have some other exciting pieces coming up.
Ding Dong Lounge on Market Lane is reopening with an amazing opening lineup, featuring Mark Lanegan, Mike Noga, Stonefield and Little Red, and I’m very pleased to announce that I will be filming the weeks proceedings. It’ll be a hectic few nights followed no doubt by a marathon editing session, but I look forward to bringing you all the first glimpses of the newly renovated Ding Dong Lounge. I was in earlier today, and it’s looking great!
It’s been a long time between (metaphorical) drinks… I ended up pulling out of the Michael Rother shoot at the last minute. It was a difficult decision, as I was very much looking forward to the show and eventual film, but a (not so secret) mystery show I shot the night before occupied all my time in planning, and the Rother show slipped through the cracks. I think I may always wonder if I made the right choice by pulling out. Anyway, there’s still Adelaide legends Grong Grong this Sunday for a project by Neumusak, and hopefully later this year you will all get to see this weekend pasts mystery show.
Spencer’s material, however, has hit bit of a hurdle and needs a massive rethink (and reconnection I believe). I look forward to the completion of those works, but I think it will by a while yet before the great public sees them. It’ll be well worth it though.
I also realised the other night I still have a couple of sets by The Stabs and the Drones floating around – I may have to resurect them.
Once again, for quicker info, you can always find me at: My Facebook
Just a quick update, I now have one of those Facebook page things up and running. You can find it here:
Matthew T. Ellery – Films (Facebook)
Please add it/like it if you haven’t already!
In other news, last night I shot The Nation Blue and Little Ugly Girls at the Tote as part of a project lead by TNB’s Matt Weston. I’ll be very interested to see what becomes of it.! More details when I have them.
Coming up this Saturday though, Immigrant Union live at the Espy, and hopefully Mark Seymour too.
Not a great deal to say about this, just another Saddests video from their amazing Electric Shadow performance, seen here with their take on the Shangri Las. With the Queenscliff Music Festival approaching at JP playing in virtually every band there, keep an eye out for some more videos of the Saddests in the next few weeks.
Last week it was announced that Harmony would be playing Meridith’s ‘Golden Plains’ festival, March of next year – an amazing achievement for the group! What thrilled me even more was when a friend pointed out to me that my video of Harmony was now being displayed on the official Golden Plains website, something I never saw coming…
With this all happening, Tom requested that a filmclip be made out of the Old Bar footage (well… he actually asked a couple months back, but there was now some urgency in the matter). I happily obliged, though wondered how different I could make it given that their playing style and perfomring style are so similiar – I have to wonder if anyone can even tell the difference without looking at the names!
Well, I did what I could to make it different, and here it is, hope you enjoy:
http://2012.goldenplains.com.au/whos-playing/harmony/
It’s been a while since I’ve posted, but I’ve been busy in the down-time. A filmclip has been recorded with Spencer P. Jones, as well as a live dvd, with even more clips to come… but you’ll have to wait a little longer for them.
In the mean time, I’ve continued going through the old Dimitron footage, with mix results.
First up was New War, a group that gave a really stand out performance on the night. I’d never encountered them before, and their minimalist rhythms and sounds really got me intrigued – however, it’s taken me a year to get around to them!
Secondly is Matt Bailey. An amazing performance from the second stage, I fell in love with his sound immediately- the delay in bringing some footage to you was due to the audio problems we encountered on the smaller side stage – no line mix! But, not wanting to waste the footage, I’ve persevered with what I had, and here’s the resulting low-fi recording and video if his great performance. With a bit of luck, I’ll be recording him again very soon, this time with a much higher audio quality.
Some months back I saw Harmony at the Old Bar. I don’t know too much about them – but what what I do know, is that I consider them to be the best band in Melbourne at the moment. Not much else to say apart from that.
Roughly this time last year, I was nervously setting up in Mick Harveys studio for a messy evenings shooting of Brian Henry Hoopers’ ‘Wasting Away‘, when I heard some beautiful piano drifting down the corridor. I didn’t speak to the girl playing it (at least I don’t think I did…), who, from what I gathered, had come along with JP, but the music certainly pricked my interest. A few months later, upon the completion of the piece, I received a message from her praising my efforts on I Get Up Again and expressing interest in some videos for her own work – my first fan it seemed!
Over the months, we would talk of a concert at Montsalvat, a Super8 clip at a windy beach, and even improvised shows on street corners – obviously, none of those things came to be (at least not yet), as last month she announced she would be playing a last Melbourne show at the Northcote Uniting Church, and then leaving, for Paris, indefinitely. This was certainly a shock to me. The Uniting Church show sadly fell through, owing to a missing door key, but a replacement was hurriedly pieced together for Tuesday at the Old Bar, Saskia’s birthday, and the day before she would leave.
It was certainly a bizarre show – the gentlemen before Saskia were very easy to listen to, and I regret not recording them as well. Saskia came on at 11, an hour after her scheduled start, and in between wandering around the bar gathering friends from the smoking area, she played just three songs before the publican issued his ‘wrap it up’ orders to the mixer. Sad, but a beautiful performance none the less, with its own eccentricites – I was glad to have seen it and been able to pass it on.