Alternative Rock | Musicosity

Alternative Rock

San Salvador

Featuring former members of the retired Sounds Like Chicken, San Salvador combines dry and heavy reggae with rock and roll stretching the boundaries of genre stereotypes. Sure to make you kick on and dance, this live show will prove to groove.

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Drawn From Bees

Drawn From Bees are a collective of four ambitious musicians who since their inception late last year, have managed to make a respectable impact on the Australian music scene. Setting themselves a challenging role in late 2008 to write, record and release a fresh batch of music every six months, Drawn from Bees spent their formative year building a name and proving themselves as something more than a band with a crazy idea.

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Breaking Orbit

Progressive hard-rock band Breaking Orbit formed in Sydney, New South Wales, in August 2005. Known then under the name "Nucleus", the band released two EP's - 2006's "9 Months in Solitary" and 2008's "Circumvolution" - and played hundreds of shows around the country, establishing themselves as a force to be reckoned with within the Australian independent music scene. After changing their name to "Breaking Orbit" in late 2009...

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Mudhoney

Mudhoney is an alternative rock band. Formed in Seattle, Washington, USA, in 1988 following the demise of Green River, Mudhoney's members are vocalist and rhythm guitarist Mark Arm, lead guitarist Steve Turner, bassist Guy Maddison, and drummer Dan Peters. Original bassist Matt Lukin left the band in 1999 but briefly returned in 2000 to complete touring obligations. Mudhoney's early releases on Sub Pop; the "Touch Me I'm Sick" single and the Superfuzz Bigmuff EP; were influential in the Seattle music scene, and helped inspire the dirty, high-distortion sound that would characterize grunge.

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Spiderbait

Spiderbait are an alternative rock band formed in 1991 in Finley, New South Wales, Australia which consists of Mark "Kram" Maher (drums, lead vocals), Janet English (bass, vocals) and Damien Whitty (guitar). They have had two top ten albums and another three albums reach the Australian top 40. Their song Buy Me a Pony was #1 on the Triple J Hottest 100 for 1996, and the group enjoyed success with their 2004 #1 Australian hit cover of Black Betty.

When you have as big a celebrity fan as Stephen King, you must be doing something right! The three-piece from Finley, New South Wales, Australia, often jump genres from disco-pop (Stevie, Calypso) to mutant dance (Arse Huggin' Pants) - in the course of a single album, no less. And yet, they still manage to rock like mofos (Shazam!, Outta My Head, and - of course - their cover of Black Betty).

The three band members Mark Maher or "Kram" (drums and vocals), Damien Whitty or "Whitt" on guitar and Janet English on bass/vocals come from the small town Finley in southern New South Wales where they jammed together in their youth.

The band moved to Melbourne, Australia where Kram was studying at the Victorian College of the Arts School of Music. The band played its first gig at a loungeroom for a friend's party. The band soon became part of Melbourne's punk scene playing gigs at venues like the Tote Hotel in Collingwood, Victoria. They released their first single Circle K on Au-Go-Go Records with an EP titled P'tang Yang Kipper Bang Uh! following in 1992. The band's first album Shashavaglava was released in 1992. 'Shashavaglava' means 'dickhead' in Croatian. This album featured the songs Old Man Sam and a cover of English comedians The Goodies' song Run.

Spiderbait signed with Polydor Records and released their first album with the new label, their second album overall, named The Unfinished Spanish Galleon of Finley Lake in 1995. The album reached #14 on the Australian charts with singles Monty and Jesus receiving extensive airplay on Triple J. The album title refers to an unfinished project by the Finley Rotary Club, which became a venue for teenage drinking in their home town.

Their third album Ivy and the Big Apples was released in 1996, reached #3 and sold over 180,000 copies in Australia. Their first single Buy Me a Pony received extensive airplay on Triple J resulting in listeners voting it as their favourite song of the year. The second single Calypso also achieved commercial airplay, and reached #13 in the Australian singles charts in 1997.

In 1998, Janet English and her then boyfriend Quan Yeomans of Regurgitator recorded an album as Happyland. Around the same time, Kram and Richie Lewis of Tumbleweed released their own side-project the Hot Rollers - so named as both member's mothers were hairdressers. The Hot Rollers only album (self-titled) was released through Polydor.

Spiderbait returned together in 1999 with the album Grand Slam which also debuted at #10 on the Australian album charts.

Despite good airplay for the Grand Slam singles Shazam! and Stevie, their 2001 album The Flight of Wally Funk was a commercial flop, only selling 20,000 copies. The album was recorded in Whitt's living room.

Spiderbait recorded the Tonight Alright album in Los Angeles with producer Sylvia Massy who had worked with acts such as the Red Hot Chili Peppers, R.E.M., Tool, System of a Down and Skunk Anansie. The first single Black Betty was a cover version of the old Leadbelly song which became a hit in 1977 when covered by Ram Jam. The single reached #1 after 10 weeks in the singles chart in May 2004 (after debuting at #12), and stayed there for three weeks, becoming their biggest selling single ever. The film clip featured a hot rod similar to the car on the ZZ Top Eliminator. The song also made the soundtrack to the Electronic Arts video game Need for Speed: Underground 2. Tonight Alright was released on 28 March 2004, and debuted and peaked at #14. The second single Fucken Awesome debuted in the top 30 on June 28 2004. Interscope Records signed the band in 2004 to distribute Tonight Alright in the US and UK.

At the 2004 ARIA awards, Kram performed as part of the supergroup The Wrights, featuring members of many other Australian rock bands.

In September 2005 they released a Greatest Hits collection to reveal their back catalogue to younger fans who were caught up by Black Betty. This debuted at #6 and received a Gold Accreditation.

The band went on hiatus March 2005 after bassist Janet English gave birth to her daughter and planned a cycling tour across Europe. More recently Kram had announced plans of a solo album to be released sometime in 2006.

On 18 November 2006 the band performed at the Queensland Council of Unions organised Rock the Vote! concert in Brisbane after a nine month hiatus from touring. Read more on Last.fm. User-contributed text is available under the Creative Commons By-SA License; additional terms may apply.

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Fistful of Mercy

Fistful Of Mercy is Joseph Arthur, Ben Harper, and Dhani Harrison. The band formed in February 2010, when Arthur asked Harper to accompany him in the studio; Harper then asked Harrison, whom he had met at a skate park in Santa Monica, California, to accompany them. Upon arriving at the Carriage House studio in Los Angeles’ Silverlake neighborhood, the trio went on to write and record nine original acoustic songs. Harrison compared the trio's collaborative process to his father's stint in The Traveling Wilburys.

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Closure

1.) Closure was an emo band from Oceanside, New York, who was around in the 90’s. They played a style of frantic emo with driving guitars and somewhat high-speed drumwork, topped off with desperate screamed vocals.
They released a split 7” with Breakwater, a full length LP and contributed a track to the compilation “I Can’t Live Without It.” All of their releases were on Mountain Records, out of Huntington, New York.
Closure was:
Trevor - vocals
Adam - guitar
Mike - guitar
Mark - bass
Dave - drums

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Foo Fighters

Foo Fighters are an American rock band formed by singer/guitarist Dave Grohl in 1995 in Seattle, USA. Grohl formed the group as a one-man project after the dissolution of his previous band Nirvana in 1994. Prior to the release of Foo Fighters in 1995, Grohl drafted Nate Mendel (bass), William Goldsmith (drums) (both of Sunny Day Real Estate and The Fire Theft), and Pat Smear (guitar) to complete the group.

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