LULU'S FEBRUARY 2023 NEWSLETTER

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Featured in this newsletter

CECILIA GENTILI - "FALTAS" BOOK
ETERNAL DUST - "SPIRITUAL HEALERS, DEFENSE LAWYERS" LP
WHY BOTHER? - "LACERATED NIGHTS" LP
WHY BOTHER? - "THERE ARE SUCH THINGS" CS
SEX DRIVE - "SHOPPING BLITZ" LP
THE RABBITS - “THE RABBITS” LP
SPECIAL BRANCH - “LETHAL FORCE” 7”
ACID CHILDREN - “PERVERTS LOBOTOMY” CS
NARCOTIC VOID - “DEMO” CS
PEOPLE’S TEMPLE - “DEMO”
MR. NODE - “I DON’T GO OUT/VACCINATE ME” FLEXI 7”

We’re back.

Sorry for the lack of Jan newsy - December kind of got away from us, as I’m sure many of you can attest to. January was a good one; a beautiful and encouraging start to 2023.

February is shaping up to be equally exciting and invigorating. Perhaps most exciting around the shop is the announcement and release of the latest record in the Lulu’s Sonic Disc Club; “Spiritual Healers, Defense Lawyers”, the debut LP from Sydney’s fallen angels Eternal Dust.

This release has been bubbling away behind the scenes for a while now, and we’re incredibly excited that we finally get to share it with you all. It’s a phenomenal record; filtering the best of 30 years of freak music through the even freakier lens of the Sydney underground. Look out for it’s release on Friday Feb 17.

In news that is exciting to noone but us, we finally fixed the website so that GST is included in the listed price, not tacked on at the end. This has been a surprisingly hard thing to organise; please praise us.

Suss the stacked calendar and we’ll see you at a show <3

Much love,
        Lulu’s xx

NEW ARRIVALS

CECILIA GENTILI - "FALTAS" BOOK
LittlePuss Press

The tale of Cecilia Gentili is a wild one. Immigrating to the US from Argentina in search of a safer life as a transgender woman, she spent years living as an undocumented sex worker; collecting people and stories and scars.

Eventually successfully claiming asylum and gaining citizenship in the US (after surviving arrests and immigration detention), she immediately got to work working within organisations, and then eventually forming her own, that make sure other queer and trans people in similar marginalised positions are able to access the help they need whilst being treated with the respect and dignaty they deserve.

On top of this work, Gentili began performing one-woman shows of her life stories to small crowds of New York queers. Word of her hilarious, gripping performances soon spread and she began getting work as an actor, perhaps most notably appearing in FX's Pose.

After being hassled for years by LittlePuss Press' Casey Plett and Cat Fitzpatrick to, for the love of god, please write some of these stories down, Cecilia offers this. Faltas (Spanish for "errors"), is a memoir of sorts; a collection of letters to people in Gentili's life. From her mother to her father's mistress, her childhood best friend, and her rapist's daughter; Gentili's letters probe into every aspect of her long and varied life, weaving tales from living as a queer youth in 1970s Argentina, to hustling on the streets of New York and working in queer activism and advocating for the voices of the most marginalised within those spaces.

Lulu's is proud to be the sole Australian stockist for LittlePuss Press, and Cecilia Gentili's Faltas is a bold and exciting new entry in that canon. For fans of debauchery, revenge, sex, murder, family, and looking hot.

ETERNAL DUST - "SPIRITUAL HEALERS, DEFENSE LAWYERS" LP
Lulu’s Sonic Disc Club

Here at Lulu’s HQ we're very excited to kick off the new year by welcoming the newest members to our Sonic Disc Club - Eora Nation's Eternal Dust.

Forged by Ebonny Munro, Oscar Sulich, and Finn Parker in 2019, Eternal Dust emerged almost fully formed; their unique smokey shimmer and immersive live shows quickly becoming part of that city's soundtrack.

In their full length debut, ‘Spiritual Healers, Defense Lawyers’, Eternal Dust flow through the realms of dream pop, art rock, trad-goth, and post-punk; interweaving hazy melodic textures that swell bulbous with fervent emotion and melancholy.

Whilst invoking the romanticism and deep longing found in the sounds of their forebears, Eternal Dust firmly place their sound amongst the back drop of modern Sydney. Make no mistake; this is no throwback nor pastiche. This is undeniably a product of the Great Sydney Underground; that history in their swagger, that family in their shake.

Dream of a night at The Bronze followed by a crawl in The Cross and you might get an idea of the beauty to be found in ’Spiritual Healers, Defense Lawyers’.

Eternal Dust’s ’Spiritual Healers, Defense Lawyers’ out Feb 17th through Lulu’s Sonic Disc Club.

WHY BOTHER? - "LACERATED NIGHTS" LP             &
"THERE ARE SUCH THINGS" CS
Feel It Records

Why Bother? had me thrashing their "Year Of Mutations" LP fairly regularly and they continue to fascinate me with their latest joints. "Lacerated Nights" feels like another movie by the same director; this time a little more nihilistic dark as opposed to (think a dopesick Ramones) but it should come as little surprise that a band named "Why Bother?" aren't afriad to be bleak. "There Are Such Things" swings between total graveyard music - some real end-of-your-tether bizzo - and (most probably) highly sarcastic A-Go-Go pop ditties. They continue to keep me interested and I will continue to recommend them. Why Bother? Why not?

SEX DRIVE - "SHOPPING BLITZ" LP
Scarlet Records

A long time coming, the Sex Drive debut is here and grooved for your pleasure.  It is no small feat to put together a quality punk record that tugs at the strings without losing something crucial along the way. If you've seen them play live through the years then you should know what you're getting - but if you haven't, please allow us to paint a picture. Sex Drive have always been a mighty charming and wholly scrappy bunch; shaggy hair, distressed shirts (or no shirts) revealing coastal flesh topped up with pharmaceutical or street drugs, a love for revelry and a disdain for rules. They wear on their sleeve the uncomfortable situation of post-adolescent blues, you know the one; that scattered confusion that comes with being free of the past and pretending not to be shit-scared of defining your present, let alone the growing spectre of your future. Sketchy home tattoos earned under the influence, second hand cars that cost more in maintenance than you bargained for, sleeping on floors in the no-man's-land you call home where your moans of anguish are as real as your moans of pleasure, trying to work out what colour is most flattering for a first date (and whether it's okay to wear sunnies because you went too hard the night before), throwing caution to the wind more often than you can count, and learning the hard way that your mental health is even harder to maintain than the second hand car. To the dearly uninitiated, yeah, you're getting a big old mouthful of youthful exuberance spiked with melancholic acid. The same thing you hear in bands like The Saints or Hank Wood & The Hammerheads and other groups who aren't afraid to get their eyes dirty, is what you hear in Sex Drive. Long live the drive.

THE RABBITS - “THE RABBITS” LP
Mesh Key Records

Mesh Key continue their dredging of the Japanese underground archives with maybe their most interesting LP yet - certainly their most suprising.

Recorded in a flurry in the early 1980s, The Rabbits were the recording project of Syoichi Miyazawa, an insular, private man who started off playing bizarre detuned solo dirges in tiny Tokyo clubs.

After being introduced to and quickly becoming best friends with Endo Michiro, Miyazawa endevored to form a band and record some of his songs. After several lineups and recording attempts he wasn’t happy with, a frustrated Miyazawa spent a year holed up mixing their second cassette release “Winter Songs”. The result is a record that sounds wildly ahead/outside of time; full of delay soaked vocals, screaming guitars, barely together rhythm sections, doo wop baking vocals, harmonica solos, and heaps of pop hooks.

A fascinating document; The Rabbits sounds just as much a relative of Cleveland or the UK post-punk scene as other Japanese underground punk bands of the time. Revalitory and essential for heads and newbies alike!

spotlight on...
        ROACHLEG RECORDS

For our money, Roachleg Records from NYC are a finger on the pulse. They rally around the unwieldy tunes coming out of a zeitgeist right now in a world of punk bands, interconnected by subterranean and subconscious roots, trying to explore the edges of their sonic forests. Highly xeroxed, highly distorted, highly irreverent, highly pissed, highly recommended.

In stock at the moment you can find, for your pleasure;
the highly requested international reissue of the ROMANCY tape that came out on Cool Death last year, demo cassettes from ACID CHILDREN, PEOPLES TAMPLE, SØRDID, RODODENDRONS and NARCOTIC VOID, both of the URCHIN 7”s, the SPECIAL BRANCH 7”, and a bizarre eggy flexi from the mysterious MR. NODE.

For more details on some if these, some thoughts from the Mosha...

SPECIAL BRANCH - “LETHAL FORCE” 7”
Roachleg Records

Proper hard tunes from what I think is Ireland. SPECIAL BRANCH is such a sick name and this is a sick record. Über simple and strong. For fans of RAPID DYE for sure. Highly crunchaceous music to stomp mudholes and headshot your enemies to.

ACID CHILDREN - “PERVERTS LOBOTOMY” CS
Roachleg Records

Gritty textular punk putridity. Industrial tones and no fly zones. They have a song called “I DON’T LIKE MOTÖRHEAD” which offends me, but maybe it’s made up for by having tracks called “BALKANIZE THE USA” and “BAPTISE ME IN BATTERY ACID”. Acerbic stuff for those discerning minds who don’t mind the idea of a bit of urine in the pit.

NARCOTIC VOID - “DEMO” CS
Roachleg Records

Nineteen Eighties Midwest Hardcore Music on that tin foil acid trip. Lysergic hate. Irreconcilable fate. Bask and let your mind swell and heave. Highly unwell. There is no conspiracy here; just punks taking drug.

PEOPLE’S TEMPLE - “DEMO”
Roachleg Records

The most traditional punk sounding release from the latest batch from the esteemed gutterati Roachleg Records. If TSOL were from DC and had a hard on for the UK you’d be on the right track to understanding how this one sounds. The first two tracks are titled “LSD & ANARCHY” and “HORNY WARHEADS”, so y’know that’s basically an instant buy. It’s a shame we haven’t heard more bands tackling this sound with style lately, but I guess they don’t call ‘em PEOPLE’S TEMPLE for nothin’. Amen.

MR. NODE - “I DON’T GO OUT/VACCINATE ME” FLEXI 7”
Roachleg Records

I didn’t love Thee Nodes. This is way, way sicker. Think if Jay Reatard fell into Windows ‘97 and couldn’t get out. You’re a punk in a digital world and you just make it work. Real cool tones on this one, and I have a huge soft spot for songs that rinse a single drum beat. Leaves more space to clutter it with all the other psycho effects your 110100011 heart desires.