Keys//Drums//Double Bass based in Newcastle, Australia. Moody pop for crazy people...

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When asked to classify the genre his music belonged to in his first Australian radio interview, the prodigal singer and amateur swimmer Jeff Buckley indentified his own work as ‘degenerate artfag chamber-core’. Newcastle band Huskarl bears few similarities to Jeff Buckley however when confronted with the dilemma of classifying artistically driven rock music in an age when ‘indie’ could mean anything and ‘IDM’ is apparently a genre, we feel that Mr. Buckley’s response goes quite a way to expressing our fearful disdain of the question.  We feel that a better question to ask (and what may indeed be the question you are already asking) is ‘Why would I listen to this band?’
The answer to that question is easy – Huskarl plays intricate, thoughtful and emotive music without alienating or confusing people. Sets can swing from heavy, haunting rock to 6/8 beats and vocal harmonies, with songs held together by the distinct styles brought by each musician. We have an alt-pop lover on drums, a Jazz saxophonist on synth and a bass player that thinks that Bono is a legitimate musician. Once mixed in with a singer-songwriter who is musically illiterate, we are left with a band that eschews the status quo by choice but remains accessible by practical necessity. 

After a year of playing to a string of unwilling housemates and two cats in the privacy of a suburban lounge room, Huskarl has recently begun playing the local scene and has quite quickly built up a strong following. The guys like the hard hitting guitars, the girls like the smooth vocals and everyone likes the melodic bass and elaborate drums. The oldies like the thoughtful lyrics and mind bending synth and the hip kids like the saxophone (albeit ironically). Of course, it also helps that we are all attractive young men – as the booking agent for our first gig said, ‘you look good and you look like you know what you’re doing, so I can’t see why not’.

We hope that you can’t see why not either.


Quality will find its way.
Booking: jane@this-saturday.com

Please visit www.efterklang.net for updated information. Thank you.

Joash Morris is following