Your complete guide to the 2016 WAM Awards Most Popular Live Act nominees. See the full list of nominees here.
Hideous Sun Demon are a psych-fuelled garage post-punk outfit. This year saw them release three singles, Oscillate, Cul De Sac Vision and Bad Girl, in advance of their still-to-be-released Industry Connections album. Music videos were released for both Cul De Sac Vision and Bad Girl. Earlier in the year, Hideous Sun Demon hit Melbourne for a tour and, more recently, they completed their Bad Girl national single tour.
The band were accepted into BIGSOUND and also played Sign My Band, Laneway and the North Fremantle Pub Crawl. Hideous Sun Demon enjoyed broad media coverage this year, which also saw the band support Mangelwurzel, The Shabbab, The Murlocs, Engless Boogie (USA), Thee Oh Sees (USA) and Mt. Mountain.
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Grunge-blues rockers Old Blood have had a huge year; they played RTRFM's Harbour Sundays and the final Beaufort St Festival, released their debut album Live at RADA, which gained local feature on RTRFM 92.1, and sold out the Rosemount Hotel for their album launch.
They supported the likes of The Kill Devil Hills, The Southern River Band, Harts (Vic), Koi Child, Endless Boogie (US), Kingswood (Vic), Eddie Boyd & The Phattapillers (NSW) and Marshall O’Kell (NSW). Check out their grungy blues sound below.
Psychedelic jazz-rock hip-hop outfit POW Negro released two singles this year, Racketball and Los Silos Session. They won $10,000 through the Big Splash Band Competition, and played Wave Rock Weekender, Stones Throw Records 20th-anniversary tour, Hidden Treasures — Fremantle’s Winter Music Series, and Fairbridge Festival.
POW Negro has supported the likes of fellow Most Popular Live Act nominees Old Blood and Koi Child, as well as Spit Syndicate, REMI, SAMPA The Great, Psychedelic Porn Crumpets and the Galloping Foxleys.
Garage-emo-punk-rockers Shit Narnia, affectionately known as Snarnz, have had a massive year. On the back of releasing their self-titled EP in April, earning them a place as one of RTR FM’s feature albums, Shit Narnia embarked on their first-ever east-coast tour.
They released their first single from the EP, This Is How They Kill Us, and supported a ton of bands including The Peep Tempel, The Shabbab, Totally Unicorn and more.
Rockers The Southern River Band are frequent performers, and regularly sell out their shows. They headed out on numerous regional tours this year, one of which was based around their single One Of These Nights (I’ll Be Gone).
They supported Old Blood, Tired Lion, Ocean Alley, Morgan Bain, Galloping Foxleys, The VANNS and Custom Royal, and received coverage across Cool Perth Nights, Tone Deaf and Avenoir.
Rock outfit Tired Lion spent much of their year touring nationally and through the EU. Major festival slots included The Plot, Latitude Festival, Splendour In The Grass, 2000 Trees Festival, Glastonbury Festival, ANTIFest, RTRFM’s In The Pines and The Hills Are Alive. They’ve also been announced for Yours & Owls Festival, Southbound and Falls festival.
Main support slots include Weaves and Spiderbait and the recent Violent Soho shows. Tired Lion were added to full rotation on triple j, as well as releasing a music video for their new single, Not My Friends.