We all know it happens around the world, but, who knew it was happening in our fair city - punks caving to their childhood TMNT fantasies of climbing the city skyline, letting mischievous enthusiasm bulge bigger than common sense.

A lot of the buildings in the city touch, so consequently these rooves join together forming one large above ground labyrinth of endless inner city possibilities. Up until recently, this phenomena was news to us. Do we condone it? Not really. Do we encourage it? Maybe...

The Trafalgars @ Producers Bar

Get your fix of Indie rock'n'roll at Producers, The Trafalgars will be playing some tracks destined to be on their close-to-being recorded new album. Let them know what you like at the gig.

When: Friday, August 15th, doors at 9pm
Where: Producers Bar

Sneaker Party

We've said it before and we'll say it again; clubs with dress codes are wack and should be avoided like the plague. So when we hear about a club party endorsing the wearing of trainers, we're pretty A-ok about that.

Get your pre-tickets from Realstore for $10. Or $15 on the door. Best sneakers wins a door prize sponsored by Onitsuka!.

When: Saturday, September 6th, 9pm
Where: Sugar, 274 Rundle St

Oneday Electric Benefit Gig

With a ripper line up of Fraud Millionaires, Lyla, Imogen Brave and Hydrophonics. Who can’t get excited about raising money to fight the HIV/AIDS pandemic effecting the youth of Africa. So pull out your fat wallets and come along and support the cause in what is guaranteed to be a sweet night of local bands, with good food, and tasty drinks.

When: Thursday 28th August, 9pm
Where: Electric Light Hotel, 235 Grenfell St.

Rhino Room's 10th Birthday Party

Look out kids Rhino Room is turning 10 years old and to celebrate will be throwing The 10th Great Rhino Hunt. So don your safari suit, hunting gear, African attire, or animal costume and get along for a night of drinking, dancing and mayhem. Two levels with 3 dance floors, 3 bars, a games room, an outdoor area plus loads of drinks specials all night long. So get along early or you’ll miss out!

When: Saturday 30th August, 9pm
Where: Rhino Room, 13 Frome St

George Terrific

When you’re so far ahead of the local fashion trend that you can’t find a pair of jeans that fit just the way you want – or if all the T shirts you see on the racks just ain’t making you smile the same way you want them to in your head, you must be pretty damn cool. Some kids from Melbourne had this problem and took matters into their own hands and produced something amazing. George Terrific is a new underground clothing label – and like most things good, it’s hard to find. Check out their new range online and drop into local stockists Tapedeck Razorblade to satisfy your desires.

where: tapedeckrazorblade, 36 East Tce
website: georgeterrific.com.au

Good Riddance Starbucks!

In much the same sentiment as Susan Pipper in Dickens’ Dombey and Son and Patroclus in Shakespeares Troilus and Cressida before it, we say good riddance to bad rubbish. To bad coffee. To homogenized culture. To unethical procurement of the remarkable coffee bean. To ill treatment of university student baristas the world over! So, to Starbuck or not to Starbuck? We say no.

The news that the (in)famous Starbucks is closing 61 stores nationally is like honey to the soul. Citing the sub-prime crisis as a reason for closing over 600 stores in the states, Starbucks says the Australian stores are closing simply because no one buys coffee there.

So here we say a milky and flavourless super-sized goodbye to boring familiarity and a big hello to all the real coffee shops of our fine city. We already had a coffee shop culture in Australia, how silly of those fools to try and replace one of the fine products of multiculturalism with an inferior version.

Some of our local favourites:

Chocolate Bean
18 Union Street, city
Made with love and lots and lots of chocolate, you really can't go past the chocolate soup, lavendar truffles & hot staff behind the counter!
chocolatebean.com

Chianti
Hutt St.
For us ruffians they have a barista window out front so you don’t have to go inside the swanky restaurant. Flat White to go: great crème, not to hot, nice full flavour.

Nano Ready 2 Go
Hutt St.
A Hutt Street favourite with reliably delicious coffee, never mediochre, always excellent. Staff are ever friendly and relaxed. Sit at the cosy bar by the window and watch the Hutt Street parade roll on by.

Tapedeck Razorblade
East Tce.
New to the coffee game, and keen to impress with their barista skills. Good strong tasting coffee, never burnt, well priced, you can’t go wrong.

Short Black Espresso
Hindley St
This tiny hole in the wall feels like you've stepped into a Picasso. Dark walls, seemingly random colours and shapes. A truly unique Adelaide institution. The coffee: very good. For a quickie, just pop your head in the street window and yell 'Macchiato Pronto B#tch*'.

* perhaps without the B#tch..

She Wanted Flowers
by Joelie Croser & Lisa Losada

There's a little place, with a little bar, with little toys, and some little quirks you get for free. That place is the Grace, and this month it comes alive with flowers. Well she wanted flowers, but instead she got a whole mish mash of wonderful art. I hope she's happy? I hear she's hard to please?!

Perhaps you should judge for yourself.

Where: The Grace Emily,
232 Waymouth Street
When: August 12th - 31st.

Alice Potter & Jess Dare
at A Room of Her Own

To coincide with the coming of spring, Alice Potter and Jess Dare will bring their botanically themed trinkets to A Room of Her Own.

Since graduating from the Adelaide Centre for the Arts in 2006, the girls have worked as fellows at the celebrated Gray Street Workshop. While Alice and Jess share a love of colour, their jewellery varies stylistically: Alice combines laminex, found materials and sterling sliver to create thoughtful, yet pretty pieces; Jess uses traditional lampworking techniques to create small glass objects that recently, have evolved into figures akin to comic book characters.

Their upcoming exhibition is an ode to all things horticultural- bees, pink dusk clouds, ducks and lovebirds will flit and float through the gallery during the month of September.

Gardens Alive launches at A Room of Her Own on Saturday, September 6th from 6-8 pm.

Where: A Room of Her Own,
5 Elizabeth St (Queen St precinct), Croydon
Map: tinyurl.com/6na9f5
Website: aroomofherown.com.au

String Theory

When I first started noticing the beauty of photographs I think it was the moment, frozen in time that really caught my imagination.

But what happens when you push some of those still images into life with some cleaver time lapse trickery and stop motion?

The answer awaits you at the Queens theatre this month with the exhibition of dance artist Billie Cook & photographer Sam Oster.

Together they explore the boundaries of 2D imagery through their compression of space, time and gravity.

Where: Queens Theatre, corner of Playhouse Lane & Gilles Street
When: Tues-Fri 11-6pm, Sat-Sun 10-4pm
Website: silvertrace.com

Adelaide the movie

There are two talented young guys I know who are going to be famous one day. Right now they're two film hacks, but they're making waves in the big pool little films.

Their latest endevour is a film called 'Adelaide'. Its the first feature length movie they've attempted, but I've got a feeling they might just pull off something a bit special.

Want to see what they've shot so far? We think you might recognise some of the sights.

Check out the trailer: youtube

Weezer
Weezer (a.k.a. The Red Album) (DGC/Interscope)

I delayed listening to Weezer’s new record because their last, the flaccid Make Believe, was such a disappointment. But when I finally pressed play, I was startled, and not just by the fact that it didn’t suck.

For five albums Weezer have worked within set parameters: their niche has been power-pop saturated equally in distortion and melody. But while those trademarks are still in force here, frontman Rivers Cuomo and company also branch out from the formula. Several tracks are half rapped, the autobiographical Heart Songs is an r‘n’b influenced ballad that swells gorgeously, and Troublemaker and Everybody Get Dangerous are exhilaratingly punky. The audacious The Greatest Man That Ever Lived (Variations On A Shaker Hymn) alone incorporates several dramatic changes in style (from metal to Beach Boys harmonies to spoken word) in its six minutes.

Admittedly, the record’s second half is nowhere near as strong – letting the other band members share the songwriting and lead vocals for the first time was probably necessary to keep the group together, but weakens the album. Still, that front half is killer and restores my faith in Weezer.

But more significant to me than the renewed musical vitality was the realisation that lyrically this was the Weezer album I needed to hear at this point in my life. Weezer’s first two albums, especially 1996’s nakedly personal Pinkerton, were my bibles as an awkward, miserable teenager with no self-confidence. Rivers’ emotional, self-hating confessions reflected my own stereotypical teenage angst, and I played those albums to death. But I got my shit together (eventually), and those albums no longer resonate so strongly with me. We want to listen to music that reflects how we feel. Thankfully, Rivers seems to be a lot happier with himself these days as well. This album is filled with self-assured lyrics like “Doing things my own way and never giving up” (Troublemaker), “I'm fine and dandy with the me inside” and “One look in the mirror and I’m tickled pink” (from the first single Pork And Beans), hell, even Cuomo’s declaration that he himself is The Greatest Man That Ever Lived.

After the critical savaging received by Pinkerton, Rivers famously retreated from the world and didn’t release another album for five years. Based on the lyrics here, if critics end up focusing more on this album’s admitted flaws than its redeeming highs, it’s not gonna faze him.

Words by Oh-Banger

Cities vs. Submarines EP
by Railcars
(Gold Robot Records)

Despite pop music’s ever evolving nature, its most common embodiment is thought of as clean and neat. Ironic when a messy incarnation beneath a bustle of fuzz and chaotic noise can promote rich melody to a much greater extent. No truer testament to this is present than with Railcars latest EP release, Cities vs. Submarines.

From the kitchen of Jamie Stewart (Xiu Xiu fame), Railcars have crafted a sound rich in texture, and most importantly wholesome in melody. Distorted guitar riffs carry uplifting notions that transcend their own tone, as well as the assisting drum-machine and keyboard noise. Most critical however is the deep and erratic tone of Aria Jalali. The frontman and creative force projects an addictive energy and carries an enthusiasm that will rub-off on the most sceptical of listeners. With stunning delivery and intense imagery, he absolutely evokes the unwieldy genius of esteemed peers like Carey Mercer and Spencer Krug.

Cities vs. Submarines is by no means perfect. Rather than serving as a negative though, the existing flaws only serve to make this up-and-coming band evermore endearing and loveable.

Words by Nick

Listen: Cities vs. Submarines is not available in Australian stores, but hit up Gold Robot records or Railcars’ myspace and for the measly sum of $5 (plus shipping) you can get your mits on the vinyl. Don’t have a turntable? No worries, your new big black frisbee also comes with mp3 downloads!

Make it Move
(high quality digital content)

In these current times of corporate conglomerates it’s pretty easy to sit back and take orders from some fat geezer behind a desk. Everyone always has the comeback, its all been done before blah blah blah… So at Home Slice when we hear about some young dudes stickin’ it to the man, getting out there and doing it their own way we feel pretty chuffed! Make it Move is one of those young punks givin’ it a red hot go in the animation and digital content world. Combining the technical know-how of design animation and cross breeding it with a savvy artistic advertising approach Make it Move can make it happen.

Headed by one of the friendliest guys on the planet, this little digital content studio is going to go places. Lets just hope they use their powers for good and not evil...

watch: makeitmove.com.au

Dorkbot - meeting #2

Dorkbot do strange things with electricity. From creating musical instruments from wave pools to light sensitive creations that react to your every move in wacky ways.

Do you like making strange things powered by a few little volts of electricity? Well perhaps this is for you. Its an open friendly group, so pop down, bring some dork and have some fun.

Where: Schulz Building, Level 5, University of Adelaide.
When: Wednesday, August 13 at 7:00pm
Website: dorkbot.org

Hipster, the dead end of western civilization?

Sometimes we read an article that divides the home slice camp in vocal debate... this one even got the author death threats and forced him to move city...

“We've reached a point in our civilization where counterculture has mutated into a self-obsessed aesthetic vacuum. So while hipsterdom is the end product of all prior countercultures, it's been stripped of its subversion and originality."

read more..

(Cover story of Adbusters Issue #79, hitting the newsstands now.)