Interviews
Byron Echo
Interview with Ben Alcock, Lyn McCarthy and Christian Pazzaglia
Three Bangalow Creatives, Lyn McCaRthy, Christian Pazzaglia, and Ben Alcock have created the Bangalow Film Festival – with indoor and outdoor screenings planned throughout January. There’s even a drive-in!
Byron Echo
Interview with Austen Tayshus
Mandy Nolan - 0
Austentayshus is one of our fiercest satiricists. Speaking the unspeakable, the unflappable self-confessed provocateur is back for three shows in the New Year.
Byron Echo
Interview with Michael Cormick
One of the great unexpected gifts of COVID-19 is that it grounded so many incredible artists. People who would usually be overseas working or touring nationally. Many of them have had to reimagine their creative outputs in a much smaller setting. One such person is Michael Cormick.
Byron Echo
Interview with Áine Tyrrell – one half of the Country Witches Association
This December Solstice marks one whole year of witching by musician Áine Tyrrell and comedian Mandy Nolan who came together on a whim last year to create the Country Witches Association.
Byron Echo
Interview with Reuben Kaye
The obscenely intelligent, beautifully filthy, and rib-crackingly funny, cabaret superstar Reuben Kaye is the only way to bring in 2021. He spoke with the Echo ahead of his NYE show at the Bruns Picture House.
Byron Echo
Interview with Lisa Hunt
Musician and all round powerhouse Lisa Hunt decided that it was an opportunity to innovate the way musicians present, and so she’s come up with a dynamic program for Byron Bay – Summerstage in Byron.
Byron Echo
Interview with Men Like Us: Lindsay Webb and Dan Willis
Mandy Nolan - 0
It occurred to Nolan and Briggs that maybe the audiences that love their female take on life would love a man’s take on it too – but those men have to come from the same frame as the Women Like Us show. So, Men Like Us was born – a comedy show that features the comedic musings of the very Aussie Lindsay Webb, and UK comedian Dan Willis.
Byron Echo
Interview with William Crighton
The Change is Coming...
William Crighton’s latest release My Country speaks to environmental degradation in the pursuit of profit. It’s a subject close to his heart....
Byron Echo
Interview with Nardi Simpson
Join Byron Writers Festival for an evening with Nardi Simpson; Yuwaalaraay writer and founding member of Indigenous folk duo Stiff Gins, when she speaks about her debut novel Song of the Crocodile with Bundjalung writer, editor and Byron Writers Festival board member Grace Lucas-Pennington, on Tuesday at the Mullumbimby Civic Hall.
Byron Echo
Interview with Lisa Richards
Indie artist Lisa Richards has just released her seventh album. It was something she started thinking about after she went to the Farwest Folk Alliance in LA. Her album, I Got a Story grew out of the conference. For a woman who didn’t pick up a guitar until she was 30, who believed her life would amount to nothing, she has made massive changes. She sings because it liberates her. She spoke with The Echo ahead of her show at Lismore City Hall.
Byron Echo
Interview with Lisa Apostolides
Mandy Nolan - 0
Byron Youth Theatre’s latest original production How on Earth (Part 2) is funded by Regional Arts NSW Country Arts Support Program, Northern Rivers Community Foundation, and NSW Department of Planning, Industry and Environment, and is supported by Arts Northern Rivers, the Joyality Project, and the Brunswick Picture House. How on Earth (Part 2) takes the audience on an intriguing journey exploring some hard to face questions!
Byron Echo
Interview with Trent Dalton
It’s no surprise Trent Dalton is one of the most in-demand writers on the circuit. He’s wonderfully humble, he’s funny and open and insightful. He has this contagious positivity about life that permeates not just his writing, but his general disposition. The author of the best selling and award winning Boy Swallows Universe is back with All Our Shimmering Skies, an epic odyssey of true love and grave danger, of darkness and light, of bones and blue skies.
Byron Echo
Interview with Budjerah Slabb
For 18-year-old artist Budjerah Slabb, making music was an inevitability. Raised in a home filled with instruments, by a family whose time was split between playing in family bands and leading worship services in the local church, Budjerah has crafted a sound that melds the formative elements of gospel and soul with contemporary pop and R’n’B references.
Byron Echo
Interview with Bleach festival, Rosie Dennis, Artistic Director
The Bleach Festival shows a very different Gold Coast
This year’s Gold Coast Bleach Festival gives hope to artists and creative practitioners that we are...
Byron Echo
Interview with Tom Gleeson
Gold Logie winning Tom Gleeson is truly one of the smartest of the southern comedians – he has enjoyed his covid lockdown in Byron Bay. Ironically he had a go at us on his Go Away with The Weekly – but here he is! (It’s a fabulously funny segment btw).
Byron Echo
Interview with Tim Freedman
This has been the most unexpected year. The pandemic has brought the music industry to its knees. With musicians just starting to leave the cocoon of the covid sabbatical, Tim Freedman is one of the acts playing venues again thanks to the Great Southern Nights initiative, although Tim believes the government support has been slow and tempered with a bias.
Byron Echo
Interview with Choreographer Michael Hennessy
In a world that’s not built for you, can you dare to dream of life, love and a rightful place within it all? Choreographer Michael Hennessy spoke with The Echo about the upcoming show Oh How I Dreamt of Things Impossible at NORPA this week.
Byron Echo
Interview with Director Wayne Blair
The Byron Bay Film Festival is one of the first major events to make its way back onto the social calendar, opening on Friday at The Palace with a sold out session of Firestarter. There will be other screenings over the festival, as it is a film that everyone should see. Director Wayne Blair shared some of his story with The Echo.
Byron Echo
Interview with Mark Trevorrow
Mark Trevorrow at the Brunswick Picture House
Mark Trevorrow is one of Australia’ most legendary performers. Know his name but can’t place him? That’s...
Byron Echo
The Great Aussie Bluesfest of 2021 – Covid Safe and Ready to Go
With COVID restrictions slowly starting to ease and event numbers now at 50 per cent of capacity, Festival Director Peter Noble is feeling positive about Bluesfest 2021, stating ‘this is what a great Australian lineup looks like!’ Just this week Bluesfest Central released their lineup, which takes into account that, although acts like Patti Smith and George Benson said they will return after this year’s cancellation, it’s unlikely.
Byron Echo
Interview with Simon Greaves and Gyan of Safe Sets
Mandy Nolan - 0
Playing it Safe with Simon & Gyan
It’s been 30 years since musician Gyan released her debut self-titled studio album Gyan that saw her take...
Byron Echo
Interview with Jennifer Parenteau of The Loveys
Local band The Loveys have been rehearsing their newest and most ambitious show to date – Loveys Actually; Stories and Confessions. Taking a step from one-off gigs to a more theatrically styled show is something the band has been contemplating for a while, but have never really had time to develop. And then came the strange era of COVID-19. With all gigs cancelled, like every other performer, the band now had some time to work on new ideas, songs and stories. Jennifer Parenteau spoke with Seven…
Byron Echo
Arianna turns In-Side-Out for Ocean Shores – interview with Arianna Bosi
In-Side-Out is a pop-up exhibition, a shopfront lightbox in the Ocean Shores Village car park, next to Target. The event, held over this coming weekend, is a public exhibition of digital art and screen culture.
Byron Echo
Interview with Aine Tyrrell
Aines new song and the clip will be released 14 August and the launch will be celebrated with music, dance, art, visual projections and fire ceremony at the Brunswick Picture House with Áine Tyrrell and the Bunyarra Culture Collective on 21 August. Doors open 7pm.
Byron Echo
Interview with Tex Perkins
For a lot of musicians the COVID-19 lockdown has been devastating. With their live gigs cancelled many were looking down the barrel of a year with very little certainty. Tex Perkins was about to head off on a European tour with The Beasts of Bourbon, and he had a new album with Matt Walker to tour but that had to get put on hold. But Perko has been making magic in them there hills, with the creation of a unique live show, called The Show, shot in a rustic shed on the family property. What he and his crew have created is an intimate, yet rowdy evening of music, with a special guest each month, familiar faces, and new discoveries. While everyone was going on Zoom streaming from the couch, Tex was making good TV.
Local News
Lismore police pursuit ends in charges
Police say a man has been charged over alleged pursuits and a crash overnight.
Local News
Drowning risk warning for Australia Day weekend
Royal Life Saving is urging the public to take care around water this Australia Day weekend, with their research showing that the risk of drowning doubles on public holidays.
National News
How the study of dolphin airways could help save endangered whales
Paul Bibby - 0
Paul Bibby A new study exploring the health of dolphin airways has revealed findings that could help save endangered whale species. During an eight-month study at...
Letters
Conspiratorial breaths
R Podhajsky, Ocean Shores
Thanks to the Collins English Dictionary 4th edition, for insight to the realm of words. Conspire 2, to act together towards...