Vanessa Berry sees things differently from other people. Some would say she’s a genius; her mother might say otherwise. Like everyone, however (except Posh Spice and Allegra Versace), she likes sticky buns, and this enabled everyone at her STICKY book launch last week to start things off on the same foot.

That’s right, book launch. Those who have been chasing down Vanessa’s zines I am a Camera and Laughter and the Sounds of Teacups for years can now immerse themselves completely in Vanessa Berry land
by purchasing Strawberry Hills Forever. Vanessa’s op-shop obsession is dissected therein. As is her longing for the Camperdown Velodrome and her feeling of kinship with old ladies and custard tarts.

You need this book. Take yourself on a holiday to suburbia in a bunny suit.

By Penny Modra

With earmarks of Cabbalistic ritual, smacky trips, mind-rattling confusion, Spider Vomit are a passport to the northernmost hills of Melbourne’s band underground; a place where the sun hangs low, blood flows in rivers and the air is a heady mix of free-rock spirit and heavy drugs. Recent live performances of quasi-religious power have hinted at the group’s diabolical pleasures, but this debut EP’s heavy dose of psych-riffing, swampy rhythms and vocal invocations of evil fun is better than audiences could possibly expect. Widows Walk is the sound of a Bacchanalian cult on acid, draped in tie-dye and furs.

All the signs of ritual murder are present from opener ‘Tail Points to Hell’; glacial guitar fuzzing, knife-like drumwork, hammering bass and outright demonic duel vocals. ‘No Way’ is sludgey dance heaven with searing guitar solos and throat-shredding fuck-yous. ‘Problems’ has both the riff of the year and a spoken middle section reminiscent of Ciccone Youth’s ‘Two Cool Rock Chicks Listen to Neu’. Epic centrepiece ‘Widows Walk’ has four movements over seven churning minutes, and closer ‘Evil Bloody Long-Haired Woman’ is a hex-inducing revenge curse that ends with a keyboard suiciding. GOOD MEDICINE.

By Mark Gomes

Jesse Marlow is a pretty serious photographer. Like, he won the Australian Hasselblad X-Pan Masters (serious) competition in 2002. He has two books out (don’t ask how old he is, you will have one of those moments when your life comes into focus briefly and you need to go and buy stationery). In the past, Jesse has been a bit of a black and white fan but in this new exhibition he’s exploring colour.

Don’t Just Tell Them, Show Them is a collection of street photographs that is quiet, minimalist and thoughtful, but rainbow bright. There is irony, but it’s gentle, like the old man with a walking stick and the shiny, fit people jeering at him from a passing tram advertisement. Like the old lady whose jaunty red hat matches the graffitied wall next to her.

It’s a friendly and colourful but also quiet and slightly bleak view of our city. Luckily, in Melbourne, muted enthusiasm is just what it takes to get us like totally pumped up.

By Penny Modra

What:
Don’t Just Tell Them, Show Them. An exhibition by Jesse Marlow

Where:
Crossley & Scott, 29 Crossley St, Melbourne

When:
Opens Thurs July 12, 6-8pm
Runs until Sat August 4
Gallery open Tue-Fri 12pm-5.30pm; Sat 12pm-4pm

How much:
free

Contact:

There are few ladies who have gone down in history. A fair lady who articulated Spain’s rainfall. A floppy-eared cocker spaniel who shared spaghetti with a mutt, and Oscar Wilde’s Lady Windemere who peered over her fan with suspicion over her husband’s faithfulness.
 
All these ladies, prim, proper and poised, dined finely and dressed accordingly – perhaps the cocker spaniel was a bad example, but you have to agree, she was as sassy as pups get. Lady in Armadale certainly would have given their stylists a run for their money if they had a chance.

This boutique stocks frocks of silks, vintage fabrics and lace trimming for the Melbourne lady. Local designers and unique pieces by the ladies of the store provide a sizeable collection of dresses so teasing they’ll probably wink at you from the rack.

Quit moping about in your trackies and whinging about the weather. Pucker up and be a lady – the ladies at Lady are ready and waiting. After all, just like Lady Windemere’s matron contested, “only plain girls cry, pretty girls go shopping”.

By Isabel Dunstan

What:
Lady

Where:
Shop 8, 974-978 Kings Arcade, High St, Armadale

When:
Mon 12-5; Tues-Thurs 10-5.30; Fri 10-6.30; Sat 10-5; Sun 11-4

Contact:
9509 6889

Can we shift gears into First Person for a moment? Thanks. I’m not proud of it, but should admit my occasional cultural cringe towards Australian cinema. When I heard “first time director” alongside “refugee comedy” I feared the worst – well-meaning choir-preaching combined with blunt-force political laughs – so no one was more surprised than me to find that Lucky Miles is actually very, very good.

Iraqi and Cambodian refugees are abandoned in the Western Australian desert, waiting for a bus that never comes. So they walk, lost, arguing about directions, pursued by the authorities. Director Michael James Rowland uses the landscape to great visual effect, shooting the men at great distances, dwarfed by their new surroundings, trapped outside the regular rules of our road movies. The humour’s exactly the right kind of old-fashioned. Without pop-cultural jokes to date it, you can imagine this film still being screened in a decade’s time.

The political statement Lucky Miles makes isn't preachy or complicated: just that no matter where they come from or how they arrive, the people who arrive here are – you know – people.

By Martyn Pedler

Sometime in the 1950s, someone thought to themselves “Man”, they thought, “this fizzy powder in the middle of my Hoppy Pop is so good. It’s great. It’s the whole reason I suck on Hoppy Pops. Why can’t I just have a whole bag of this fizzy stuff? And, at that moment, Wizz Fizz was born.

The spoons didn’t happen immediately. There was a brief flirtation with licorice stick straws, through which people would suck their Wizz Fizz. Though the idea of imbibing powder through straws has taken off in other industries, the people behind the ‘fizz that makes you wizz’ had other ideas. Tiny plastic spoons made Wizz Fizz the perfect date snack. People were feeding one another Australia’s iconic sherbet at the drive in.

Sure, certain kids launched scams, wrote letters to Wizz Fizz claiming their bag came with no spoon, attempted to request extra bags of the fizz as compensation. But the real fans know Wizz Fizz always comes with a spoon. Wizz Fizz is something we can rely on; the powdery backbone of all our childhoods.

Unlike the Muppets, Wizz Fizz has rejected Disney, so if you’re on the lookout for your old fizzy friend, you won’t find Mickey Mouse, Donald Duck, Pluto or Uncle Scrooge on the packets no more. Now it’s Screaming Mimi, Gross Gus, Weird Wally, Mad Myron, Nerdy Neil and Doctor Freak. Six of the best.

By Penny Modra

John&
Paul&
Ringo&
George.

We’ve all seen this t-shirt. Only a real fan could have come up with it. And that’s the odd thing — try crossing The Beatles, Sonic Youth, the Situationists, Walter Benjamin and a Goddard and Kubric love in with sombre, restrained, ubiquitous, Modernist Helvetica, and you’ll be on the doorstep of a conversation with Experimental Jetset. Their influences are so clearly things that they’re fans of, but the filter it all passes through is old-school, hard-core Dutch graphic design.

While Melbourne’s finest duke it out in their best peacock feathers down at Fed Square this week, Dutch cult design favourites Experimental Jetset have quietly filed past the shenanigans and brought their po-faced fun to The Narrows. Just in time to miss the festival but coincide with the screening of Helvetica the movie (ironically brought to you by Stephen “Death to Helvetica” Banham), Experimental Jetset’s poster installation will satisfy anyone interested in their work specifically or in contemporary graphic design generally or in good ideas done simply.

By Stuart Geddes




 

What:
Experimental Jetset

Where:
The Narrows, Lvl 2, 141 Flinders Lane, Melbourne 

When:
Opens Fri July 13, 6pm
Runs until Sat August 4
Gallery open Wed-Sat 12-6pm or by appointment

How much:
Free

Like a gay lion, the sticky date pudding was once a humble beast. Content to sit on its own, quietly appearing on the menus of certain pubs and upper-middle-class dining rooms, or perhaps serving as a punchline to a long-forgotten dirty joke that never actually existed.

Along comes Trampoline with their gelati made from the milk of golden calves... The next thing you know, no longer is the blessed union of warm cake with caramel sauce, and ice cream relegated to the fringes of our suburbs. You can now enjoy the womb-like embrace of sticky date pudding at almost any hour of the day, topped with a scoop of Trampoline gelati, served by some vaguely indie-looking underage girl wearing shirts with suggestive slogans, for like, five bucks and change.

The last time food this good was liberated was when the Americans figured out how to put cheese in an aeresol can, and that turned out okay, right?

By Jeremy Wortsman

What:
Sticky Date Pudding

Where:
Trampoline, 270 Swanston St, Melbourne (and other places too)

When:
Usually 11am - 11pm

How much:
$5.50

Contact:
9662 4490