Angus and Julia Stone are quirky duo
By
John Aizlewood
27 Aug 2008
She was the missing link between Frida Kahlo and Meg White who sang like a less-contrived Bjork. Unkempt, undernourished and uncertain, he was the sort of hobo to whom you might guiltily flick a 50 pence piece then look back just to confirm he wasn’t following you home.
The brother and sister from Sydney wouldn’t have seemed out of place in Twin Peaks. They sounded like they looked, making unsettling music that ranged from the twee The Wedding Song (“We’ll make babies on the beach” indeed), to the disturbing A Book Like This and Wasted and Hollywood which announced that “life’s not a happy ending”.
Yet, the strolling Stones and their two-man band were more than bedsit miserablists, even though Angus announced Minds Have Walls with a punchable “this is about...um...er...oh don’t worry”. Too tuneful and broad of scope for lo-fi, too twisted for indie and too idiosyncratic for the mainstream, they are both wilfully arty and artlessly unpretentious.
Julia is something of a star. Flitting between guitar, piano and trumpet (her one-handed trumpet solo on Parallel Lawns might have been showing off but looked and sounded fantastic). Even when Angus sang Just A Boy just like a girl, she stole the song by skipping around stage like an especially giddy faun. As if to compensate for an aura he wisely neglected to compete with, she spent her quieter moments gazing up at him with the sort of rapt adoration I hadn’t seen since morning, when I’d given my German Shepherd some bacon and suggested a walk.
Details are correct at the time of publication - please check with venue before booking.
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