Good review on Tonedeaf
The Silent City is the second EP release in an ambitious plan from the local six piece to release three EP’s aurally depicting, in the words of the band, a descent into musical madness. The first EP of this cycle, The Howling Fire, was delightfully rowdy and upbeat in its take on music.
Over the course of six tracks, The Silent City is almost like the Sunday morning after the big Saturday night that was The Howling Fire. Opening with the woozy, melancholy and ethereal “The Smoke”, this is an abrupt about face for those that thought they knew the music of the band. Lead male singer Ade Vincent shows shades and nuances in his vocal style and range hitherto unheard of and beautifully welcome.
The highlight of this release, “Red Road”, features rather striking female vocalist Jane Hendry up front and personal. An incredibly intimate and gripping ballad, featuring sublime use of piano and acoustic theatrics, this has a beguiling slow build and burn to it. This is the type of track that can totally make you fall in love with a band and singer, with such a personal and haunting vibe to it, you feel a bit guilty listening to it, like you’re in someone’s bedroom while they are playing away with some utterly beautiful music.
Other tracks, such as the country tinged “Looking Around” and the almost otherworldly “The Watchmaker”, paint a striking image of a band that refused to be pigeonholed or put into one box as far as their very ambitious soundscape and musical vision is concerned. This truly is an EP that shows the band in a wonderfully fearless light as far as their musical journey and direction are concerned.
The Silent City is a rather brave about face from what one expects from The Tiger & Me. This may alienate older fans, while definitely garnering the band some new ones. It will be interesting to see how the third EP from the band unites their sense of sound and vision.
- Neil Evans
Link: http://www.tonedeaf.com.au/reviews/new-music/119112/the-silent-city.htm
Rave Magazine review of The Howling Fire
Ambition made pretty
The Howling Fire is the latest release from Victorian indie pop outfit The Tiger And Me, an EP billed as the first of a series of separate releases, all of which are set to “explore a descent into madness, the ensuing struggle, and ultimate embrace of insanity.” It sounds like dramatic stuff, but the opening track So, Let It Go is surprisingly upbeat, reminiscent of Grizzly Bear’s more light-hearted material, building up and shifting dynamics amidst bright pianos and vocal harmonies. A slightly sombre mood is then delved into on the blues-y Don’t You Just Set The World Alight and the Latin-infused Tango, but it’s the musical abilities of the band that really make you take notice. With six members all playing a range of instruments including banjos, accordions and ukuleles, it’s an intriguing listen and only fuels anticipation for what will come next in this ambitious musical adventure of theirs.
STEVE RAE
TUESDAY, 25 OCTOBER 2011
http://www.ravemagazine.com.au/content/view/29742/181/
September Mailout
Tigers!
Hello.
I hope you've (all) been (very) well (lately, and in future).
We're "playing" a few "gigs" at a bar called the Sporting Club, starting "tomorrow". These shows will not differ greatly from the various other front bar residencies we've done in the past, including one at this very venue a few months ago, in that they'll be a lot of fun, pretty relaxed, a chance for us to try some new songs and play around with old ones. Basically they're free and early and always a laugh.
To summarize, if you don't value your face we will be happy to gently melt it off with our post-indie cabaret circus folk alt-baroque love boat clint eastwood rules. The football fans in the band (3 of 6, but the best 3) will be staying to watch Geelong and Collingwood on the TV out back, while the non-football fans in the band go and have a good hard look at themselves. We're doing this every Friday in September, EXCEPT the 16th, when Jane, Sarah and I will be playing the part of session musicians in Pinky Beecroft's band at a billionaire's private party in Hobart. True story.
If you haven't been to a show since we launched our new release 'The Howling Fire', we'll be selling those at the gigs, or you can now get them online at Vitamin. A couple of tracks taken from it are up on our website listen page. Reviewers have been saying lots of very nice things about it lately, which makes us happy. Although poor old Tobes keeps getting shafted, with his fine vocal work being serially wrongly accredited to me. Your brooding understated charm might be a winner with the ladies, Tobes, but it just goes to show that jumping around on stage like an idiot can pay off, in the form of occasional mis-accreditation. Here are some of the online reviews, if anyone is interested. Faster Louder, AU Review, The Dwarf, The Orange Press.
Hope to see you at one of the shows,
Ade
and, in reverse alphabetical order, Tobes, Tim, Sarah, Jane and Fez.
FREE SPORTING CLUB RESIDENCY
Fridays in September (except the 16th)
The Sporting Club Hotel
Free in the front bar
6-8pm
Facebook your face off here
Great review of new EP
The first review of the new record is in and it's a very kind and complimentary one. *Breathes out*.
http://theorangepress.net/2011/07/review-the-tiger-me-the-howling-fire-ep/
Melbourne Cabaret Festival
This Friday, Saturday and Sunday (July 22-24) hooray! Titled 'Speakeasy Vagabonds and Wartime Songbirds', this will be a big departure from our normal show, as we trade songs with The Nymphs across three short acts, and look at why the music of the early 20th Century means so much to both bands. The show features a cover of Tom Waits' version of one of the best know American songs of the Great Depression, collaborations with The Nymphs, some old tunes of ours and some new ones. Yesterday's Age had a little piece on the show and an interview with Jane. More details on the show here.
New single!
Our new single is out! It's called So, Let It Go, with a B-Side called The Little and Lost.
You can listen to them here.
These two tracks bookend our new EP called The Howling Fire, which will be released on July 9th at our Melbourne launch at The Toff in Town. Sydney and Adelaide to follow in August.
Pre-book for free album download
Tuesday Tuesday Tuesday Tuesday coffee coffee coffee coffee yeah!!! Sorry. So... We're supporting Emma Dean soon. Book tix before May 11 and you get a free digital album, featuring songs from everyone on her tour.
Tour details here:
http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=213311868685268
Free album details here:
http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=145375332198852
Hooray!
Builders Arms this Friday
THE BUILDERS ARMS
Friday 29th April
6-8pm
Free in the front bar
Good evening good people,
I hope you all enjoyed the 6000 consecutive public holidays thrust upon us by the fact that the first Sunday after the 14th day of the lunar month that falls on or after 21 March in 2011 just so happened to be the day before Anzac Day, giving us a great long Smörgåsbord of days off. There are two things that I pulled directly from Wikipedia in that sentence and if they are incorrect then blame not the messenger for I am simply the...messenger.
To business.
We wind up our on-again off-again April residency at The Builders Arms this Friday, with Tim Keegan back in the saddle. He has been in Vancouver and New York after winning an all expenses paid holiday for two. People actually win those, it turns out. Tim wins them. They had a helicopter ride to the top of a glacier. He's not on a glacier this week, he's playing bass for us at Builders, which is similarly exciting and possibly even more likely to cause death, or worse.
We're on from 6-8pm and the show is free in the front bar. There will be swing dancers present (well they were at the last couple of gigs and they said they'd be back) as well as a general air of frenzy and excitement mixed with confusion and incomprehension, much like the way my dog experiences life.
There will also be new tunes, always new tunes, as we roll them out in anticipation of our new EP. Launch venue is booked, I won't say where just yet, but it rhymes with The Doff in Town.
Okay I'm going grocery shopping now.
See you Friday, or later,
Ade
and, appearing reverse alphabetically,
Tobes
Tim
Sarah
Jane
Fez
Good Friday gig cancelled
Hello beloved ones,
We must announce that our Good Friday gig that was part of our April residency at the Builders Arms is CANCELLED due to the fact that the pub will be SHUT.
We contemplated setting up outside on the street but decided against it. It would be cruel for everyone to know that there is beer JUST IN THERE but we can't get to it.
So. Don't come to the Builders Arms on Friday 22 April. Come on Friday 29th April for our final residency show, when we will have Tim back from his Canadian adventure trip, and hopefully more swing dancers to make getting to the loos tricky!
See you later dudes.
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