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The Drones

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Location: Melbourne, Australia

Websites:

• http://myspace.com/thedronesthedrones
• http://thedrones.com.au/

Bio: The Drones are an Australian rock group who rose to prominence during the early 2000s. They were influenced by an eclectic bunch of bands including ... (more) Neil Young,The Velvet Underground, Bad Brains, Suicide, Green on Red, The Birthday Party, Van Morrison, Bob Dylan and Nina Simone. Their sound has been described as The Birthday Party kicking the shit out of Neil Young in Hendrix' garage.
Musically the band does not fit easily into conventional rock music categories. While some of their material is based on conventional rock sounds and song structures, they also venture into the noisy, atonal, blues-based music that Tom Waits brought to a wider audience. The Drones also explore the music of the Australia bush made popular in Australia by Weddings Parties Anything. Like other Australian bands such as The Triffids, The Go-Betweens, Nick Cave and The Dirty Three, The Drones left Australia in 2005 to concentrate on the European market, where a larger market would make it easier to support their unconventional sound. However they eventually returned to Australia to find a ground swell of interest in them - generated by acclaim and publicity both at home and abroad.
The first incarnation of The Drones formed in Perth in 1998 and included a varied and talented line up over the next few years, with most of the musicians in the first 2 years garnered from the brilliant Gutterville Splendour Six. Rui Pereira and Gareth Liddiard had previously played together in the 'Gutterville Splendour Six'. Musicians in the original Perth incarnations included Warren Hall(double kick drummer in Moth, and skin-splitter for Gutterville Splendour Six) on drums, and adding guitarist James McCann (Harpoon, Nunchukka Superfly, Lowdorados, Gutterville). Steve Joines (Kill Devil Hills, Gutterville) replaced McCann when McCann relocated to Sydney. In early 2000, Liddiard and Pereira headed to the east coast to accelerate their progress. Initially they met with little success and endured tough conditions including an extended stay in a decrepit Victorian caravan park, and sleeping on an old mattress found on the roadside. Guitarist Brendan Humphries (Sweeney Todd and His Elephant Men, Gutterville Splendour Six, Kill Devil Hills)was included among the first of the Melbourne lineups, and later Fiona Kitschin was recruited on bass. Christian Strybosch replaced Hall on drums, Humphries returned to Perth, and the lineup of Liddiard, Pereira, Kitschin and Strybosch went on to complete their debut album, Here Come The Lies, released on Spooky Records in 2002. (less)