Pilerats, Journalist

The latest apple in Future Classic's eye mulls over a huge year, with bigger things to come.. Jess Higgs is somewhere in Sydney watching a storm materialise over a beach. I’m in Brisbane, surrounded by clutter in my study. We’ve hung up on each, and have been playing ping pong with each other’s calls for the past few minutes trying to get the interview back on track: real professional. Chances are you might already be familiar with Higgs’ work, previously featuring on Flight Facilities’ Foreign Language as Jess, and also as her moniker George Maple on Flume’s Bring You Down.   George Maple, and 2014, sees Higgs taking a step out of the shadows and into the limelight of a fledgling solo career. New single Talk Talk, from her forthcoming EP Vacant Space, is a blend of evocative, electronic production and some sultry, soulful vocals. Currently splitting her time between Sydney, America and London, she took 15 minutes out of her Tuesday morning to talk to me. The new single is Talk Talk.

The EP's out, it's time to go to the beach and launch it with some shows.. You've probably seen us bleeting on about HAMJAM a lot this past week or so, but we feel it's for good reason. Last week saw the release of their debut self-titled EP, featuring the first single Love - go on, buy it HERE. What we're really loving though is the video clip for Love, filmed by Tame Impala/POND guru Matt Sav, filmed on location at one of WA's famously sandy beaches... We can't stop laughing at the clip, we can't stop singing the songs, and we're looking forward to the band launching the EP with a few special shows next month - check the dates after marvelling at the video clip below. HAMJAM EP LAUNCH SHOWS:  Sat 1 Nov // Mojos Bar, North Fremantle, WA w/ Aborted Tortoise, Kitchen People + Ben Witt (TICKETS ON DOOR) Mon 1 Dec // Monday Night Mass @ Northcote Social Club, Melbourne, VIC w/ Peter Bibby + guests (FREE) ADDITIONAL SHOWS: Sat 8 Nov // WAM Festival Saturday Spectacular, Northbridge, WA w/

Some fresh disco-house from outta Brisbane.. Meet Capetown, a new production duo featuring a couple of Brisbane industry heavyweights - choosing to remain faceless for the time being - but already making waves in the club scene with specially-conncocted remixes for Tensnake and Jacques Le Cont and Young Franco (with an Allday one dropping soon). Before they drop some Alldeezy steez, there's this - their debut single, called The Night, and featuring Phebe Starr. It brings to mind a kind of earlier days Miami Horror days, with Starr's smooth vocal perfectly suiting the track's slinky tropical disco-house vibes, perfect for the dancefloor and a sunshiney beach chill equally. With summer just around the corner, we get the feeling we're gonna be hearing a lot more from these two over the coming months. Follow Capetown: FACEBOOK // SOUNDCLOUD

When you’re late to work because there was a party on your train..

New tool shows sex offenders living near AirBnB rentals..

A new single, from a new EP, ahead of a US/UK/AUS tour - boom.. Tkay Maidza's our fave, we've said it heaps, so I'll just point you to previous track postings HERE and HERE, where we extoll ridiculous amounts of (very deserved) love upon the hip hopstress. It seems the rest of the world is very quickly taking notice, and today Maidza has dropped a new single Switch Lanes, from her forthcoming Switch Tape EP (due October 24 via Dew Process/UMA), and ahead of a global tour that takes in the US, UK and then back home for the summer (check the dates down the bottom). Switch Lanes was produced by an equally swaggalicous artist in Paces (himself just dropping a new tune and new EP announce LAST WEEK), and it's a pretty perfect pairing, dripping in Paces' signature steal drum vibes with Tkay providing a more-restrained flow that shows a softer, more soulful side. It's just a fucking winner all round. Follow Tkay Maidza: FACEBOOK // SOUNDCLOUD

Drake and DJ Mustard lead the way.. Filmed last month in Atlanta, tonight the BET Hip Hop Awards will air tonight in the States. For the second year Snoop Dogg hosted the rap spectacle, and the full list of winners were revealed today on the BET site. Hip hop heavyweight Drake scooped the pool, winning Album of The Year for Nothing Was The Same, and Video of the Year for Worst Behaviour (watch it here). DJ Mustard took home the DJ Of The Year gong as well as MVP Of The Year – not surprising considering the West Coast forefather pretty much has a monopoly over the game right now, having produced most of the #1s you’ve heard this year. YG, Young Jeezy and Rich Homie Quan were winners of Best Collab – Group for their track My N**ga (who could forget YG’s crazy reaction when he got nominated? You’ll find the full list of winners and nominees on BET’s site. Can’t believe Iggy won over Young Thug in Who Blew Up though. A moving moment came by way of beatboxing pioneer Doug E Fresh paying tr

Post-CIRCO hangs with dreamboat beatmaker Ryan Hemsworth.. Earlier this year when we dropped the first ever Pilerats Rat Pack Compilation (listen HERE and expect the next one soon!) and somehow we managed to score an exclusive track from the one and only Ryan Hemsworth (I say somehow but our Record Label boss is a smooth operator). It was an early proud moment in a constantly growing pile of proud moments in the world of Pilerats Records in 2014, which became even cooler when he came over to headline CIRCO Festival around the middle of the year (wrap video HERE). In the days following we spent a little time with the quietly spoken producer, and given he's just announced details for a new album - Alone For The First Time, due November 3 via Last Gang/Secret Songs, now's the time to share that chat.

Melbourne's killer music and arts festival gets a new home and an amazing lineup.. Melbourne’s most progressive music and arts festival - a place for creativity to be absorbed and celebrated - Sugar Mountain will take place in its fourth year on Saturday 24 January, 2015 at a brand new, inner-city location – VCA (Victorian College of the Arts). After three successive years at The Forum, starting with the inaugural festival in 2011, the event organisers - Tig Huggins, Pete Keen, Brett Louis and Nicci Reid - partnered with Melbourne’s Mushroom Group in order to realise their grand vision and 18 months in the making Sugar Mountain returns with a - put simply - stellar lineup of music and visual artists that has us on the west coast scouring plane ticket prices. We'll get straight into the lineup before pouring over the rest of the event's awesome plans for epic change: Nas performs Illmatic Body/Head (Kim Gordon + Bill Nace) ODESZA | Ariel Pink | Soul Clap Horse Meat Disco | The 2 Bears |

The good dudes of One Day drop a silky smooth new jam.. A few weeks ago we professed our love for Aussie hip hop crew One Day, featuring members of Horrorshow, Joyride, Spit Syndicate and Jackie Onassis, and they've just released a typically smooth new single in Leave Your Windows Open. The guys spent all of September playing a heap of big shows around the country, backing them up with chill Sunday arvo gigs and preaching the good word of Aussie hip hop to fans hungry for smooth beats and flow from some of this country's nicest dudes. Leave Your Windows Open would also go down smooth on a Sunday, or any day of the week really. While they're taking a little break from the touring life at the moment, Jackie Onassis will be heading out on tour soon (check all the details HERE). Follow One Day: FACEBOOK // SOUNDCLOUD

Converse celebrate the FA14 Allstar collection by answering the question: What would sneakers do?. Your dirty pair of Cons have seen a lot of good times at gigs and parties no doubt. Converse Australia knows it, and wants you to personify those good times you’ve trod.  They’re the shoe that everybody can wear, no matter your scene or style, comfortably and confidently. And while the diverse range of individuals who wear Cons are all free, walking ads, the company’s had some pretty incredible marketing campaigns over the last decade. There was the Cons-as-corsets campaign in Japan, its 100 year anniversary campaign featuring ‘Icons of the 21st Century’ (including journalist Hunter S. Thompson, M.I.A., James Dean, Karen O, rapper Common and more, and its ‘timeless’ visual-art aligned campaign in 2005. Converse’s latest global campaign is maybe its best yet. Entitled ‘Shoes Are Boring’, it may just seriously compete with Nike’s iconic ‘Just Do It’. Here’s the gist of the campaign, as it e