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Newcastle Herald

National

Lisa Rockman

Soundbites: When Katy Perry met MasterChef's Reece

A heads up for fans of Katy Perry and Mayfield's own MasterChef Reece Hignell - the pair meet in tonight's episode of MasterChef Australia and it's well worth a watch.

The five winning contestants from last night's mystery box challenge are cooking for immunity from Sunday's elimination. In honour of MasterChef Australia's theme song, Hot N Cold, the judges tell the contestants they must create a dish with heat but, in a twist, their sweet or savoury dish must also include a cold element.

The woman behind the song herself strolls into the MasterChef kitchen mid-way through the cook to act as a guest judge. Hignell was beside himself.

"I saw her in Newcastle for her California Dreams tour in 2011 so I was very starstruck when she started talking to me," Hignell told Soundbites. "She's so lovely and so extra but so normal. I was covered in sweat and freaking out, and I think I was swearing non-stop too."

As an aside, Hignell says he has rediscovered the magic of '90s pop and is an avid fan of Madonna, Lady Gaga and Beyonce.

Live streams

As we know, plenty of artists are live-streaming performances while COVID-19 social distancing restrictions remain in force. Check in on your favourites.

Prince and the Revolution: Live is streaming on YouTube tonight and tomorrow (US time), courtesy of the Prince Estate. The late superstar's performance was recorded at the Carrier Dome in New York in 1985 and the audio remastered by Bernie Grundman. Well worth a watch.

Also, Blues on Broadbeach was to have been held in Queensland this weekend but instead, music fans can tune in to Bandwidth: Presented by Blues on Broadbeach on Friday, May 15, from 7pm on Facebook. US blues legends Robert Cray and Don Bryant have just been added to a line-up that already includes Tommy Emmanuel, The Black Sorrows and Karise Eden.

Vinyl vibes

Closer to home, and at an entirely different pace, Newcastle's Voodoo DJs (Mathmatics and Tone) have been keeping the party going with their live DJ sets. Keep an eye out for them on 20/20 Lounge (May 20); and on the Voodoo DJs and Deejay Mathmatics Facebook pages (May 23). They mix up funk, soul, hip-hop, blues and breaks and are strictly vinyl only.

Metal mash-up

Hamish Unahi from Newcastle band Take My Soul has started a new band with members of Lycanthrope and From Crisis To Collapse. Faith in Lies is its name and the band is poised to release a debut track with an EP to follow. He took five with Soundbites this week.

Is Take My Soul still together as a band? Take My Soul is still cranking and I am still very much a part of the action. We have new material coming out shortly and we had a string of shows booked just before all the lockdowns happened so will be looking at rescheduling those as soon as we are able to.

How does the Faith in Lies sound differ from Take My Soul? Faith in Lies has been something I have worked on for several years. The sound is way different to Take My Soul; it's hard to describe but I would probably say it's a bit more old-school in its roots with a lot of thrash metal influences in the guitar and drum work.

When did you approach the various band members about this new project? Did you have to sell the idea to them? There was no real plan for a band or to take the EP live until I showed a few people the demos to gauge any interest and was surprised with the enthusiastic responses. Chad and the boys from Bryon Bay band From Crisis To Collapse actually talked me into doing something more with it.

How have you managed to write and record a single and EP during lockdown? It's been a lot of fun. We had started a lot of the material before lockdown but none of it was in final stages so with the help of local recording wizard James Strezov from Newcastle's Studio 1618 we were able to track individual parts and send them to get mixed at his studio, and all from the safety of our homes.

How would you describe the band's sound? We don't really try to confirm to any metal genre as such, but as Chad would say we have thrash intensity with a little modern metalcore vibe thrown in for fun.

Faith in Lies is Dan Grieg (Lycanthrope, vocals); Hamish Unahi (Take My Soul, guitar); Chad Ellis (From Crisis To Collapse, guitar); Matt Stoja (Lycanthrope, bass); and Chris Hix (Take My Soul, drums).

Local talent

Soundbites had a chat with Ben Gumbleton of Boo Seeka yesterday and there is plenty to be excited about when it comes to this Newcastle duo. Their new single Take A Look is a contemplative cracker. Full story to come.

Fresh faces

Lover Lamp - a new seven-piece band from Newcastle featuring members of Suburban Haze and Tired Minds - releases a digital debut single Ponyrace (I'm A Little Hoarse) tomorrow. It was recorded at Woodriver Studios with Joe Andersons.