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June 17, 2026

Music roundup September 10

Latest News

Vale William ‘Bill’ Ewen

The funeral service for Marine Rescue Ballina volunteer William ‘Bill’ Ewen was held on Monday at Ballina RSL Club.

Other News

Israel’s assault on Global Sumud Flotilla – a first-hand account

It hit me like a lightning strike. It was the latex gloves that did it. Those pale blue five fingered clinical sheaths made me want to vomit. Last Tuesday, having just been repatriated from my time on the Global Sumud Flotilla, I was at Tweed Valley Hospital getting a forensic medical examination for my sexual assault at the hands of the Israeli occupation forces.

Cinema : Tuner – everybody has one hidden talent

From Academy Award-winner, director Daniel Roher (Navalny), comes his first narrative feature, Tuner a gripping crime-drama that follows a piano tuner’s unexpected aptitude for cracking safes.

Men’s Health Week: simple conversations

This National Men’s Health Week experts from Triple P – Positive Parenting Program are encouraging dads, granddads and father figures to embrace something simple but powerful: everyday conversations that support their own wellbeing and their family’s wellbeing.

LECC find police failed in their duty in the death of Lindy Lucena

The Law Enforcement Conduct Commission’s Operation Almas has criticised the police response to the violent death of Ballina woman Lindy Lucena at the hands of her partner in 2023.

Compassion missing

Predictably, Marianne McCormack (Letters, 3 June) chooses to ignore my personal claims that I am not a racist, to support...

Up to 550 homes pegged for Byron Shire’s newest suburb

Community feedback is now sought on three planning documents that will shape the future of Gulgan Village, a new residential suburb proposed on the elevated slopes of Saddle Road. 

http://youtu.be/2c9SpXmtUco

Allensworth are EVERYWHERE!

Via Huntington Beach, California, Allensworth, dubbed ‘Cali-Coastal Soul Music’, is returning to Australia and we are lucky to have them performing at four venues over the next week.

allensworth pressFrontman Jamie Allensworth and percussionist Anthony Gonzales are promoting their second album titled Against The Grain. Sharing the stage with funk and soul pioneers such as James Brown, Herbie Hancock and The Headhunters, Maceo Parker and George Clinton, to name but a few, The Allensworth Project is a mix of classic soul laced with blues, rock and a touch of reggae.

Thursday at the Treehouse in Byron,

Friday at Lennox Hotel,

Sunday at the Beach Hotel, and

Tuesday at the Platinum Lounge at the Lismore Workers Club.

Sample Food Festival: Music

The Jesse Morris Band will be spearheading a lineup of local troubadours featured at Sample Food Festival this Saturday in Bangalow.

The hinterland-based Jesse Morris Band will be on stage 2–4pm with Irish balladeer and now Byron local, Mick McHugh, on stage 1–2pm and the smooth sounds of Suffolk singer/songwriter Rob DeMasi from noon till 1pm respectively. This is all on the main stage area and it is 100 per cent free, locally grown and nutritious.

You can also catch the Jesse Morris Band at Club Lennox on Sunday from 4 till 7pm before they go touring up the far north Queensland coast, finishing at the Wallaby Creek Festival deep in the rainforest near Cooktown.

The Mac Experience

Seventh Wonder – The Fleetwood Mac Experience celebrates the 40th anniversary of the birth of the classic Fleetwood Mac lineup of Fleetwood / McVie / Nicks / McVie / Buckingham. For Mac fans across the country this is a production that will recreate, and allow them to experience, the sound and the feel that was Fleetwood Mac in their prime.
The show will take you on a 2-hour live concert journey through their timeless classic songs that span four decades, including their worldwide hits Rhiannon, Don’t Stop, Go Your Own Way, Dreams, Tusk, Sara, Gypsy, The Chain, Landslide, Big Love and Little Lies.

At Twin Towns on Saturday at 8.30pm. Tix are $35.

Katie and youKatie Noonan at the Bangalow Bowling Club

Katie Noonan is a 4-times ARIA Award winner, a musician with an impressive technical mastery and a voice so pure she has become one of Australian’s most versatile and beloved vocalists.

Katie Noonan performs at the Bangalow Bowlo on Friday. Tickets at the venue.

Warren Earl at the Gollan Hotel Lismore

At age nine it was obvious that music had chosen Warren Earl; once picking up the guitar he found it very hard to put down. Not long after his tenth birthday he began studying the guitar from several great performers who were active in the Melbourne roots music scene.

At twelve years of age Warren had his first paid performance, playing fingerstyle guitar like Merle Travis and singing Johnny Cash hits. Through his early teens is when the performer/artist/musician was born! After several east coast tours Warren spent two years in the UK and Europe touring both as a solo and session musician.

Having written a vast repertoire of original tracks, Warren Earl recorded a solo album in 2007 with a 1950s authentic sound – playing every instrument on the album. The album was a sellout and a favourite in the roots music scene.

More recently Warren Earl met up with old friend and recording engineer Red Rivers from Autone Records to produce a second album, with Red having a studio full of vintage recording equipment and the know-how to use it, together they came up with what is Slippin’ Out!

Warren is currently living in Byron Bay, and heading to the US for his next tour. You can catch him at the Gollan Hotel in Lismore on Thursday for No Depression from 7pm.

The Pierce Brothers at the Hotel Great Northern on Friday

The Pierce Brothers have just returned from a triumphant tour overseas, during which they sold out shows in London, performed to a monster crowd of 10,000+ punters at Lowlands Festival in the Netherlands and were the second-highest-selling act at the festival’s merch tent – selling more CDs than artists such as Snoop Dogg, Janelle Monae and First Aid Kit, massive achievements for a couple of young Melbourne boys who started out busking on Bourke Street!

They play the Hotel Great Northern this Friday.

jonstevensweb.picJon Stevens at the Bangalow Bowling Club on Thursday 25 September

For more than 30 years, Jon Stevens’s remarkable career as a singer/songwriter and performer has seen him achieve so much. This includes ARIA chart-topping success as the frontman of legendary Australian bands Noiseworks and INXS. He plays the Bangalow Bowlo on Thursday 25 September. Tix presale at the club now for $35, on the door on the night for $40.

Dinner with Grace Barbé

The glorious Grace Barbé is coming through Byron Bay during her tour along the east coast. She will visit Cafe Oska Byron bay for a duo dinner performance: Kreol – Akoustik!

Grace Barbé is originally from the Seychelles, and her music is the finest class world music with tropical island rhythms. A mix of African, pop, salsa and reggae – and a wonderful voice. She has just released a new album Welele.

Cafe Oska, 1 Carlyle St, Byron Bay, this Sunday. Pre-booking required because of limited spaces. 6pm start. Ticket of $30 includes a 2-course Creole-theme dinner. Call: 0416 887 884.

Federal Doma Cafe

Telegraph Tower play songs that are literate, moody, melodic and baroque. Concubine was described by Alt Media as ‘an intriguing effort… there are greater things to come’ and by Mess & Noise as ‘an assorted bleakness… these songs are not as well mannered as they seem’. They play Sunday from 12 noon at Federal’s Doma Cafe.

Dolphin Time

Entries for the 2014 NCEIA Dolphin Music Awards are now open to all original music created by musicians in the (0266) area code. There are twenty different music categories with a prize pool last year of over $38 000.

The judges this year include Kirk Pengilyl (INXS), Paul Pilsneniks (Studios 301), Mark Gable (Choirboys), Alex Smith (Moving Pictures), Ciaran Gribbin (INXS), Marcus Schintler (Weddings Parties Anything). Entries close 23 October.
Go to www.nceia.org.au.

Timbers-colour-2The Timbers perform at the Rails this Friday

This year The Timbers released their debut album Lawless and it’s been a wild ride ever since. They showcase a distinctive alternative folk flavour reminiscent of bands such as The Pogues and Mumford and Sons.

Expect a live show where ‘you can work up a sweat, dance and expect to be visually and audibly impressed with the high-octane nature of our performance’.

The Timbers play Friday at the Rails.

Wait for the Drop – NitroDrop at the Byron Brewery this Friday

NitroDrop is a psy-progressive act combing two talented producers – Gil Dagan aka Nitro and Dima Gafner aka I-Drop. Producing electronic music separately and together now for seven years, each of them is a master in his own craft.

Nitro and I-Drop both are coming from Dooflex Records, which is a sub-label of legendary Doof Records from Israel. Since the collaboration began they have been focusing on intelligent Psychedelic Full On and have released numerous tracks under this genre in labels such as Dooley, Planet BEN, All Records and many more. Today NitroDrop brings this fusion into psy-progressive dance music.

They play the Byron Brewery on Friday with Tetrameth and more. Plug in for a big electro set! 8pm $15/20.

Coco-LoSSAL!

Bursting onto the Australian dubstep circuit in 2008, 3rdeye is now widely regarded as one of the leading exponents within the country’s underground bass music scene. His sound has developed over the years and now draws from a wide range of influences and styles, including drum and bass, ambient, garage, dubtechno and house.

BACK 2 BASS is at Cocomangas this Saturday and the lineup includes two SAE audio lecturers (James Lyall aka 3rdeye and Jo Dreyer aka LoCoJo from AfrikanAmerikan) and two SAE students (Fern Becker and Nick Marsh.)

andrew-morris-Andrew Morris in the Shack

Andrew Morris has completed an epic Euro-rock opus written in Berlin! This, however, is not it.

No, the Brisbane stalwart, best known for his work with Bernard Fanning and The Wilson Pickers, as well as a series of crafted solo albums, needed a break from all the brooding.

Inspired by Tom Hodgkinson’s counter-consumer-culture manifesto How To Be Free, he summoned as many of the members of The Gin Club as he could muster, put on the beers and banged down a few unrehearsed gems in his newly set up northern rivers home studio.

The set, informed by Morris’s current solo shows, includes a crop of live faves such as Dylan’s It Takes A Lot To Laugh, It Takes A Train To Cry, Gillian Welch’s Look At Miss Ohio and Tim Rogers’s (You Am I) Heavy Heart.

The result is a session coruscating with uncommon vigour and spontaneity. And yet most of us would give a tooth to be able to engineer a product of such sonic warmth in the space of a weekend.

The Situationist – another lesson in song-serving intuition from Andrew Morris – is being released through Morris’s own label, Soul Arch Recordings.

As for the epic, brooding Euro-rock album… you’ll have to wait a few more months for that, but in the meantime you can catch him at the Sheoak Shack in Fingal at 7pm on Saturday.

The Original Desert Rock Man – John Garcia at the Hotel Great Northern

John Garcia is instantly recognisable as the voice of a genre, single-handedly bringing the California desert rock sound to the world via his works with Kyuss, Sio Urn, Unida, Hermano and Vista Chino, and spawning a million copycats in the process.

His deep baritone and soulful delivery take you on a hypnotic journey and when it’s coupled with huge riffs and driving bass it’s hard to escape. John has just released his highly anticipated self-titled debut solo record.

First class, catchy-as-hell rock ’n’ roll that drifts between classic and stoner.

Catch the infamous John Garcia at the Hotel Great Northern on Sunday. Tickets are $35 and are available at thenorthern.oztix.com.au.

Tantric Rock

In tantra the Sanskrit concept ‘shunya’ refers to the void at the end of the outbreath. In music it is the space between the notes. Shunya the musician unveils his spacious new album This Vast Mystery at the serene Sphinx Rock Cafe this Sunday.

Guitar instrumentals, songs of hushed vocals, and blissed laptop beats will be on the menu for the afternoon, a spring awakening. Some of the musicians who put the colour into the life of the new record will also be there, including vocalists Amrita Devi and Melanie Spears.

On a Roll with Sproule

Polka Dot Productions presents the musical stylings of Devon Sproule (rhymes with Rock ‘n’ Roll), a wonderfully talented free spirit, visiting our shores for the very first time. Canadian Devon Sproule was born in 1982 on a commune named Dandelion. The family then moved to Virginia, USA, where she grew up on another commune called Twin Oaks.

Her musical parents encouraged Devon from a young age and she released her first album and toured nationally at age 16. Married to fellow musician Paul Curreri, they lived in Charlottesville, Virginia, and often toured together gaining a large following in Britain.

Most recently they moved to the musical mecca Austin, Texas, in 2012. Devon has opened for Lucinda Williams, Richie Havens and Bill Callahan among others.

Devon Sproule has released eight albums; the latest, Colours, in collaboration with Canadian musician Mike O’Neill. Her idiosyncratic, highly original songs are often playful and confessional, while musically they contain elements of indie, folk, country, and jazz. Joining her on the day is Jimmy Dowling.

Sunday from 3pm at the Court House in Mullumbimby.

Bless Me!

Longtime local and international sound artists and New Earth ambassadors Lelama Sjamar, Focus Yidaki and El’tara Mahatma offer a Concert of Blessings, Sacred Sounds of the Earth and Stars, for a mesmerising experience of reconnection in the heart, the Earth and the dreaming of your soul.

Powerful vocals, merged with profound didgeridoo vibrations and rising frequencies of crystal bowls, embody touching soundscapes filled with healing blessings from the ancient ones to the heavenly realms. The resonant pulse of the heart drum rhythms unites all hearts and gives back to the Earth Mother. This sacred sound journey is bound to fill you with healing blessings and empower your creative nature.

Saturday September 13 7pm at Temple Byron, Melaleuca Drive, Byron. Tickets $20 at www.lelama.com.au or at the door.

MIGHTY-DUKE-&-THE-LORDSMeet the Duke

Crisp linen suits and sharp-witted lyrics meet junk percussion and double entendre. Calypso!

The music of the Caribbean island of Trinidad has been adopted by Mighty Duke & The Lords. I

nspired by the greats of calypso, such as Lord Invader, The Mighty Terror and the undisputed king of Calypsonians Lord Kitchener, MD&TL bring some local flair to an all-too-often overlooked music.

From their base of operations, Bamboo HQ, The Lords have been busily piecing together tunes out of the driftwood of old 45s and 78s that have managed to make it over the ocean to our shores, transforming them into tales fanciful and factual.

West African rhythms dance around playful melodies and cheeky lyrics while saxophones and trombones slip and slide around the steady pace of the guitar and the double bass.

Saturday at the Byron Brewery. 8pm. Free.

Dreaming Up Music

Into The Dreaming is a special public concert by solo cellist Louise King. With a special concert at Art Piece in Mullumbimby on Saturday September 28 between 3pm and 5pm, experience evocative music with engaging introductions about each piece, surrounded by stunning visual art curated by director Nadine Abensur.

Expect virtuosity, expression, vivid musical storytelling –
a spine-tingling collection of Australian music. The concert celebrates music by Peter Sculthorpe, Ross Edwards, Paul Stanhope, Betty Beath, Michael Knopf, Stuart Greenbaum, Stephen Cronin and Sarah Hopkins.

Music inspired by the Australian landscape, its people and its history. Don’t be disappointed; book online at www.eventbrite.com.au.

Tickets will be snapped up at $50 music lover , $40 earlybird, $30 concession, student, child.).

crystal-armonicaCrystal Clear

The Crystal Armonica is an instrument with a shadow. Chiho will be playing this extraordinary instrument at Temple Byron on September  27 with Phil Foord, who will be playing the Mayan and Indian flutes, didi and other shamanic instruments.

Together these two have played festivals and shrines in Japan, Bali and Australia. $25. 7pm.

For enquiries go to armonicasoundhealing.com.

 



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