logo
'Monastery' Max Alduca

'Monastery' Max Alduca

Sydney bassist Max Alduca is one of Australia's hardest working performers, collaborating with everyone from pianist Freyja Garbett to saxophonist Ben Lener.
He's also just dropped his own debut as a bandleader. It's entitled 'Monastery', and the music within is a mediative mix of introspective, open ballads and open interplay between Alduca and his quintet. Featured in the band is James Waples on drums, Luke Sweeting on piano, Michael Avgenicos on sax and Hilary Geddes on guitar.

Orange background

Try Our AI Features

Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:

Comments

No comments yet...

Related Articles

Monday Racebook: Gilbert Gardiner's horses to follow and forgive from Flemington on Saturday
Monday Racebook: Gilbert Gardiner's horses to follow and forgive from Flemington on Saturday

News.com.au

time28 minutes ago

  • News.com.au

Monday Racebook: Gilbert Gardiner's horses to follow and forgive from Flemington on Saturday

Form expert Gilbert Gardiner analyses Saturday's Flemington Community Race Day, revealing his horses to follow as well as five to forgive. • PUNT LIKE A PRO: Become a Racenet iQ member and get expert tips – with fully transparent return on investment statistics – from Racenet's team of professional punters at our Pro Tips section. SUBSCRIBE NOW! â– â– â– â– â– FIVE TO FOLLOW SPLASH BACK (1-length 1st of 12, Race 7): How could you not? Savage turn of foot late to nail TERRESTAR and the plucky SASSY BOOM after being hemmed away in an almost impossible position third last in traffic. Her win at Caulfield the start prior was equally impressive. Spring beckons for the rising six-year-old mare. SPLASH BACK FROM THE CLOUDS 🤯 🤯 She might be pretty good! Splash Back comes from nowhere to the delight of the punters, giving Tom Prebble a race to race double! @Grahame_Begg — 7HorseRacing ðŸ�Ž (@7horseracing) June 21, 2025 FIELDELO (3.8-length 2nd of 11, Race 9): Crashed into a rising star in SHE'S AN ARTIST, who smashed the clock to win the 1100m Three-Year-Old Handicap by 3 3/4 lengths. Tracked the winner to the 800m but unable to quicken as sharply when She's An Artist sprinted clear. Fieldelo, trained by Toby Lake, stuck to her task to run second. BRIDAL WALTZ also gallant in third. She's An Artist shares a resemblance to a certain sprinter & she might share some of that ability... ðŸ'©â€�🎨 The bald-faced filly trounces her opposition under hands & heals. @CWilliamsJockey @cmaherracing — (@Racing) June 21, 2025 RELENTLESS VOYAGER (4.5-length 6th of 12, Race 8): Expect to see more of him in coming weeks and months. A lovely Australian debut, albeit luckless, by the imported stayer, twice stakes' placed in England last year. The Ciaron Maher-trained gelding had not raced for 10 months before last Saturday. Held up multiple times inside the last 200m and barely got out of second gear. "What a day for team Payne!" Jimmy The Bear atones for an uncharacteristic poor run last start, bounding away with the David Bourke Handicap ðŸ�» Michelle & Patrick Payne have a quartet & their apprentice, Tom Prebble, has a treble 🤩 — (@Racing) June 21, 2025 FROM A DISTANCE (0.8-length 2nd of 11, Race 4): Worked into contention nicely in the straight but snookered between horses on the heels of winner TAKEN. The Symon Wilde-trained gelding got clear air eventually, inside the last 75m, and surged into second position. Could be hard to hold out next start at 1600m. Stablemate DARKBONEE (3rd) saved best work late after being held up. Taken lugs 60kg to extend his winning-streak to four ðŸ'Œ @CWilliamsJockey collects his first winner of the afternoon. @MickPriceRacing — (@Racing) June 21, 2025 HARD TO CROSS (4.3-length 8th of 13, Race 5): Wet track, 1600m third-up could be a nice recipe for the typically consistent performer. Posted wide without cover last Saturday in the second half of the field and shunted deeper again in the straight. BRIGHT STRIPES (3.1-length 7th) an eye-catching run late. Cafe Millennium collects an elusive second victory after going winless since his debut ðŸ¤� @lindsayparkrace has their galloper humming since joining the team this preparation. @LukeCartwrightt — (@Racing) June 21, 2025 • â– â– â– â– â– FORGIVE RED GALAXY (6.4-length 11th of 16, Race 5): Travelled outside leader FREAK OF NATURE (11.2-length 13th of 13) and both weakened in the straight. Jockey Craig Williams told stewards Red Galaxy made an abnormal respiratory noise on pulling up. A post-race endoscopy detected a throat condition that may have affected Red Galaxy's performance. Freak Of Nature also pulled up with signs of a throat condition. AVEBURY (4.6-length 8th of 12, Race 7): Faded out of contention late but potentially reached the end of her preparation. Raced consistently of late, with big weights, including a Caulfield win four starts back. OBSERVER (6.4-length 5th of 8, Race 1): Won too impressively the start prior at Sandown, bolted in by five lengths, to sack off one blemish. The two-year-old colt appeared to travel well at Flemington but wilted when jockey Craig Williams asked for an effort as BUCCLEUCH (1st) and MILLENNIUM BLADE (3rd) challenged at the 300m. Buccleuch surges away from his fellow 2yos under the guidance of @TheBeeegan ðŸ'Œ @mj_payne — (@Racing) June 21, 2025 â– â– â– â– â– STEWARDS SAY Jockey John Allen reported ST LAWRENCE (Race 8) failed to respond under pressure and was disappointing. A post-race veterinary examination did not reveal any significant findings. Trainer Gavin Bedggood could offer no explanation for the performance. Stewards will follow up with the stable.

King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard — Phantom Island
King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard — Phantom Island

ABC News

timean hour ago

  • ABC News

King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard — Phantom Island

From Deep Purple and Metallica to KISS and even Sigur Rós, bands tapping orchestras for some added class is nothing new, and often to mixed results. But trust King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard, arguably Australia's wildest and most prolific band, to put their unique spin on what is sometimes dismissed as bombastic cliché. Phantom Island is the group's 27th album in 13 years, (You do the maths!) What's more remarkable than the pace at which this six-headed beast pumps out new music is that the quality has rarely dipped with each release. Having restlessly switched through genre gears — power metal, psych jazz, microtonality, electronic pop, boogie rock, spoken-word Spaghetti Western — this time, King Gizz add symphonic strings, horns and woodwinds to their freewheeling mix of trippy riffs and jam-band glam. The spark for Phantom Island came from meeting members of the Los Angeles Philharmonic on tour, leading to the band enlisting British conductor Chad Kelly. He added orchestral arrangements to 10 unfinished songs written and recorded alongside last year's bluesy, unruly Flight b741 . The resulting material is unlike any in the band's far-reaching discography, and has ballooned into a homecoming December tour of both rock and orchestral shows, where Kelly conducts a 29-piece ensemble. After the grandiosity of the opening title track, there's plenty of special moments that rely less on orchestral heft and more on unique fusions. The brass punching up the '70s choogle of 'Deadstick'; the eerie strings bookending 'Lonely Cosmos'. Lush flutes and acoustic interludes augmenting the Southern-fried twang of 'Sea of Doubt', while muted horns and romantic swells perfectly complement the sharper, psychedelic edges of 'Silent Spirit'. Matching these songs' mutating melodies and moods is an emphasis on passing the mic, with guitarists Cook Craig and Joey Walker trading verses with regular vocalists Stu Mackenzie and Ambrose Kenny-Smith. With so many voices and instruments jostling for space, it can make for busy listening. However, the production — more polished and cleaner than these wilfully woolly rockers typically sound — makes untangling the knotty textures and grooves easier and especially rewarding on a good pair of headphones. For all the record's sonic complexity, it's only a creative nudge forward compared to the bold leap in songwriting. There's nothing wrong with chanting about your creature of choice over gnarly riffs (Rattlesnake! Dragon! Balrog!), but Phantom Island allows some humanity to slip into the fantasy. Many years of being locked into a punishing touring lifestyle is beginning to take its toll on King Gizz, with lyrics reflecting on habitually leaving their partners and kids to meet the demands of their cultish, global fanbase. ' There's more to it now than just leaving/ 'Cause there's so much more to miss' , Walker confesses between sighing strings and slide guitar on 'Eternal Return'. ' I would say don't be a musician, my son / Be a doctor, lawyer, or a stand-up citizen, ' Kenny-Smith advises on 'Silent Spirit', words which hit all the harder given he followed in the footsteps of his dad, Dingoes frontman Broderick Smith. Touring burnout and fame fatigue, just like recruiting an orchestra, is another rock star cliché burnished into something more compelling through King Gizz's singular filter. They use crashing airplanes and voyaging ships, of both the sea-and-space-faring variety, as metaphors to layer some Gizzverse world-building into vulnerable, world-weary lyrics. Like 'Space Oddity' and 'Rocket Man' before it, 'Spacesick' uses an intergalactic trip as a metaphor for isolation. Mackenzie, lost in the orbit of the road, longs for the grounding gravity of dinner with the wife and kids. ' How did the little ones sleep? Did you make it to the zoo? … your brother told me they cried a lot when they saw a guy who looked like their pop.' Even as poignant lyrics express the interior melancholy of these intrepid travellers, the music conveys a sense of adventure. The 27th episode in the ongoing tale of King Gizzard's wild journey might leave lingering questions about the sacrifices and sustainability of their absurdly creative and successful enterprise, but as always, it's a thrill to be caught up in the ride.

Animal poo painting competition aimed at normalising faeces
Animal poo painting competition aimed at normalising faeces

ABC News

timean hour ago

  • ABC News

Animal poo painting competition aimed at normalising faeces

Tasmanian museum owner Karin Koch created the world's first animal poo painting competition because she's passionate about destigmatising faeces, but also to have fun. Ms Koch is the creator and owner of Pooseum, a primarily science museum dedicated to dung. In 2024, she invited artists to submit works made with animal poo in her inaugural competition called the Poo-tastic Tasmanian Paint Off, with a $2,000 prize on offer for the winner. After a successful first year, the contest returns, this year asking artists to paint "expressive portraits" made with animal poo. A commissioned portrait of former politician, and environmentalist, Bob Brown, painted with pademelon droppings provides inspiration for aspiring poo artists. Ms Koch said the death of a close friend to bowel cancer, who had noticed blood in his stools but kept the information secret for two years, inspired her to open the museum. She initially planned a museum dedicated to human faeces but, after moving from mainland Australia to Tasmania, her focused shifted to animal poo. "For thousands of years, animal faeces have been used in various ways, particularly in rural regions across Asia and Africa," Ms Koch said. Ms Koch has commissioned paintings and sculptures made using animal dung to hang on the walls of the Pooseum. She has sourced artworks and sculptures from as far as the United States, the United Kingdom, and Germany. A "highly detailed" artwork in cow dung and gold leaf by German artist Werner Härtl hangs on the wall of Pooseum. The artist began to create artworks from diluted dung when employed as a farm worker in 2012 and described it as an "extremely versatile" product. Artist Karen Lyttle had never created an artwork from animal poo prior to winning the inaugural poo-painting competition in 2024. Her piece, named Crap Wallpaper, shows three plump pademelons, their intestinal tracts and, appropriately, their droppings. "The whole pattern is based on eating and defecating," Lyttle said. Lyttle combined the grass-textured and cylindrical droppings of pademelons with PVA glue and water to create her paint. "It was a real learning curve … I tried different mixtures with it, like oil and all sorts of things," she said. Lyttle embraced the product's versatility and said working with pademelon poo quickly felt "totally natural". "The nutrients [from poo] go back into the ground … to help Australian farmlands … it's the whole cycle of life." This year's rules are stricter, and a theme has been introduced for the competition, which is open to Tasmanian-based artists only. Ms Koch said her expectations are "much higher" after a successful first year. In the 2024 competition there was no theme, but for the 2025 competition, Ms Koch said she selected portraiture as she loved painting portraits herself. Ahead of the competition, she commissioned a large portrait from Tasmanian-based portrait artist Ewen Welsh, who selected the person to be depicted. Welsh approached Bob Brown through Dr Brown's partner, Paul Thomas. According to Mr Welsh, the former politician, and environmentalist, "straight away said yes", but asked Welsh to wait to share the portrait until after the latest federal election. "Every stage I sent [him] an email and said, 'Is this OK? Do I have your permission?'" Welsh said. Ms Koch said she was "extremely proud" to display the portrait of Bob Brown. She is excited to see submissions for this year's competition. "I've always enjoyed doing things that haven't been done before," Ms Koch said. "Though primarily a science museum, the Pooseum balances education with humour, proving that even something as gross and messy as faeces can be a fascinating subject for learning."

DOWNLOAD THE APP

Get Started Now: Download the App

Ready to dive into a world of global content with local flavor? Download Daily8 app today from your preferred app store and start exploring.
app-storeplay-store