The Orbweavers have a new double single: Japanese Mountains / Spotswood. New dreamy songs about mysterious places beyond the Westgate, and volcanoes. 

Sunday matinee launch at NSC, joined by the epic doom-psychedelia of Angel Eyes. Limited edition illustrated single complimentary with entry, it also has an extra song about silk moths.

Doors open 2pm, $10. All finished by 5 pm.

Saturday 4 September, from 8 pm.

The Orbweavers play a duo opening slot for these two really beautiful Brisbane bands.

BIGSTRONGBRUTE, the alter ego of Brisbane musician Paul Donoughue, began four years ago. There are still solo shows, but more often Paul is joined on stage by a revolving cast of musicians – everything from a single trumpet player to a seven-piece band. Over time, BIGSTRONGBRUTE has shared stages (and backyards, hallways and abandoned construction sites) in Australia and New York with Jens Lekman (Sweden), Tiny Vipers (US), Mt Eerie (US), Songs, Dent May (US), Alex & The Ramps and I Heart Hiroshima.  In support of a new record, ‘We Can Sleep Under Trees In The Morning’, a five-piece version of BIGSTRONGBRUTE will tour the east coast with Melbourne singer Carry Nation. They will play together and share a backing band.

For those of you up with the gourmet news, you may have recently seen Daniel Aulsebrook, trumpeter of The Orbweavers, on the TV! Dan has been a contestant on Masterchef Australia the last few months. It has been very exciting for the rest of the band, watching him cook up a mean tagine and fillet salmon with exacting precision. Congratulations Dan!

We are off on a soujourn to Japan, playing one show in Tokyo to launch our new single Japanese Mountains /Spotswood from our forthcoming second album, at Shibuya O-Nest on 10 May: Easel New Word Vol.4 .

10 May 2010. Email us if you will be in Tokyo then.

More details of the single launch in Melbourne when we get back.

We will be guests on Tristen Harris' show 'Golden Age of Piracy' on Melbourne Radio 3RRR, this Wednesday, playing our 'formative five' - music that most influenced our songwriting.

We are opening support for Gemma Ray (UK) and Oliver Mann at NSC on Wednesday 14 April. This is our last show before we go to Japan.

Single Twin - Marcus Teague. Beautiful songs. We are excited.

“Teague’s work – whether with his band Deloris or with his more stark and tender solo guise – is often marked by something lost, something just out of the frame, which his songs somehow manage to capture in their frozen tableaux.” - Mess+Noise.  ( link: http://www.myspace.com/singletwin )

Come and hang out at Applecore with The Orbweavers. It will be a great day to sit in the shade and relax while listening to tunes in a unique domestic setting.

Bands performing are Crow, Dave McCormack & The Polaroids, Alphabet Head, Grace Before Meals, Teeth & Tongue, The Brunswick All Girls Choir, The Rebelles and recently announced Ned Collette and also Denim Owl

Breaking news:

Faux Pas, aka Tim Shiel, has made a beautiful, dreamy, very dance-lovely single called 'Silver Line' based around samples from our song 'Diving Bell'. You can hear it and buy it as a special single bundle with remixes by Kharkov, Kane Ilkin (of Solo Andata) and Loopsnake, and an alternative version, here

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The Orbweavers are thrilled to be supporting singer, songwriter, home recording artiste extraordinaire Ross McLennan for his final show for 2009 with his brilliant ensemble, the New World Sympathique on Sunday, 8 November at Northcote Social Club.

This will be a matinee show; doors open 1.30pm… then The Orbweavers on at 2pm, royalchord at 3pm and at 4pm, Ross and his superbly talented mini orchestra take the stage to bring the songs from Sympathy For the New World — and some new unheard gems — to vivid multi-instrumental life.

Tickets are $12 + booking fee and are on sale now via the NSC box office (phone 94861677), in person via Corner Box Office at 57 Swan Street, Richmond or online.

Having just returned from a successful series of shows in America and Canada, it is clear that Luluc’s undeniable talent is, at last, gaining recognition. On stage, they exhibit all the signs of a band who have spent many years deliberating over, practising and perfecting their songs together. Playing before an adoring audience at the Thornbury Theatre, Luluc headlined a warm and intimate evening’s entertainment.

Locals The Orbweavers were first up on an impressive three-act bill. Marita Dyson and Stuart Flanagan strummed their way through a gentle and often dark set of folk songs; Dyson’s vocals on Pins and Hummingwire close to those of Julia Stone. It was all going well enough but when the band requested trumpeter Dan Aulesbrook, who had been sitting amongst the audience, join then on stage; things really picked up. Auelsbrook’s slow and almost mournful notes were perfectly synchronised with Flanagan’s guitar, serving to really enhance their final two songs. It is bands such as The Orbweavers, playing a mere second-support to a like-minded Melbournian act, which serve to highlight the current rich state of the city’s folk-scene.

If The Orbweavers were dark-folk, the aching melancholy of Tiny Vipers(Seattleite Jesy Fortino) was pitch-black. The critical success of Fortino’s first two albums has clearly done nothing to ease her well-documented stage unease. Fortino barely looked up, barely even stopped during her whole set. She appeared uncomfortable and seemed almost out of place in the Thornbury Theatre’s warm surrounds. And yet, she delivered a thoughtful, challenging and ultimately rewarding performance; best exemplified in the searching ten minute title-track from her most recent album, Life On Earth. A “thanks” was mumbled to mark the end of her set, but it was met with warm and richly deserved applause.

Having taken to the stage and spent a few moments self-consciously fiddling and adjusting, Luluc opened their set with warm, drifting harmonies on The Wealthiest Queen. A lot of smiling and several call-outs from the seated audience suggested they were amongst friends. Steve Hassett’s clean, uncomplicated guitar next carried Body on the Water, a song perhaps more upbeat in composition than subject matter. Wearing a leather jacket donated by Lucinda Williams (just one of many high-profile admirers Luluc have picked up in the last 12 months), Zöe Randall was as charming and affable as always. Her impressive vocal range was quickly evident on Black Umbrella, underlining her place as one of this country’s finest folk voices.

Often referred to as a two-piece, Randall and Hassett have, however, been accompanied by double-bassist Pete Cohen in every performance I’ve seen of theirs and it was he who drove crowd favourite Little Suitcase. His value to Luluc is clearly recognised by the band’s founding members and Randall made clear that, could they afford to pay him, he would travel to play at all of their shows.

The minor reverb that had plagued several of Luluc’s early songs disappeared as they began the beautifully simplistic Warm One; a song Hassett admitted they didn’t normally play due to the amount of times they’d been asked to perform it at funerals. Having earlier made reference to her “punk roots”, it was fitting that Luluc’s one cover for the evening was of a band Randall says was crucial to her survival growing up in country Victoria; The Clash. Strange as it was to here the normally modest lead singer speak of bar fights and pissing on everyone, her reworking of Stay Free felt natural and entirely appropriate.

Having played the second of two new and unnamed songs and built up hope in the audience of a forthcoming album, Randal and Hassett divulged that, come February, they would be leaving Australia for “2-3 years”. A discernible groan suggested that this was not a popular announcement.

A very Luluc attempt at an encore saw the band flirt with leaving the stage, before Randall turned around and delivered a solo rendition of My Midnight Special. With Cohen now enjoying a beer in the audience, it was left to Hassett to rejoin Randall on stage for their final song of the evening; a lush tribute to Gillian Welch simply titled Gillian.

Looking around the Thornbury Theatre, it was clear that Luluc already hold a special place in many hearts. There is a deep-lying emotion in Randall’s song writing; at times conveying great vulnerability and sadness and at others, great power, strength and hope. It is sad to think that they will shortly be leaving our shores for some time. The consolation for their growing fan base is the knowledge that Luluc will undoubtedly be around for a while yet. Review by Jeremy SC, 12 October 2009

http://www.fasterlouder.com.au/gallery/12640/photo/681453/Luluc.htm

http://www.fasterlouder.com.au/reviews/events/20759/Luluc-Tiny-Vipers-The-Orbweavers--The-Thornbury-Theatre-Melbourne-91009.htm

The Orbweavers will be playing on Joy 94.9 FM and having a little chat on Local and Vocal Sunday 11 October at around 12:45pm.

Rave Magazine - Brisbane Street Press, 15 September 2009

"Atmospheric folk tunes from Melbourne five-piece.

Moody atmospheric indie-folk is the essence of The Orbweavers - you can almost tell before you hear a note, from the artsty-craftsy cardboard sleeve to a browse through the lyric booklet, where My Needle refers to "a matchbox full of needles for a gramophone player" instead of an explicit account of drug abuse (though the description of "medicine charms" points to a darker side as well). Throughout debut album Graphite & Diamonds, the group create shimmering music that is dark, but only in the sense that darkness can sometimes be comforting. There's an intriguing detachment to Marita Dyson's voice, like a more disembodied Hope Sandoval, as melancholic trumpet, sliding, twanging guitars and woody acoustic instrumentation combine to create an evocative album of ‘creepers' - songs that slowly but surely wind their way into your consciousness. Take a 2am drive with the likes of Periods Of Light & Rock on the stereo and just try feeling like don't you own the night!"
MATT THROWER

Online UK music publication Terrascope has published a review of Graphite & Diamonds.

"Australia's Orbweavers are a five-piece who have been described as playing folk-noir or alt-country music. However neither label quite does justice to a finely crafted, dreamy and atmospheric album in which Marita Dyson and Stuart Flanagan's vocals are ably supplemented by crisp, often low key arrangements of acoustic and electric guitars, augmented by bass, trumpet and violin and, albeit sparingly, drums.

The ethereal feel of this impressive debut is mostly propelled by Dyson's breathy, echo-enhanced vocals, which lends a hugely evocative feel to proceedings. The tracks on which Flanagan sings tend on the whole to be a bit more straight-ahead but are no less enjoyable. The Orbweavers draw on a variety of musical styles with strains of light jazz and mariarchi mixing with the acid-folk and alt-country influences to heady effect. Such influences are used so intelligently, however, that they lend the album an identity all of its own.

Standout tracks include the openers "Vitus" and "My Needle" and the Flanagan voiced "Met Her on My Way Home" and "Fairy Tales" but you could just as easily pick four other tracks that are just as good, which underlines the strength of "Graphite and Diamonds". Such is the narcotic effect of this fine album you occasionally wonder whether you might nod out or fancy something different, but there is more than enough quality here to keep the listener mesmerised and wanting more. If Alice in Wonderland were ever to be filmed in the desert against a modern backdrop, then the soundtrack really ought to sound like this.

File under "sublime and rewarding." (Ian Fraser)"

The Orbweavers will be playing a suite of quiet Sunday shows across Melbourne's north over the coming Spring months, with some by lovely musicians. We can drink wine, and stave off the sunday blues for a short while... the nights won't be late. Details are in our events page.

The Orbweavers are lucky enough to be asked to help The Spoils kick off their new album The Crook the Cloak and the Maiden at the Toff in Town on the 5th of September. Event details here.

The Orbweavers will be playing live at the NGV Australia Ian Potter Centre Federation Square following a talk by Shaun Tan, beautiful and dreamy australian children's book author / illustrator.

Thursday 6 August 2009, 6.00 PM

Entry is Free

Graphite & Diamonds is a collection of 11 dark and dulcet songs straight from the derelict knitting mills of Brunswick. There you will find a world of chiming pins and needle guitar, haunted violin, runaway vines, mystery, and fittingly, in this international year of astronomy 2009, the Moon.