Acoustica - Programme 2006 - National Junk Band

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National Junk Band

Band Biography

Expect the unexpected! These "virtuosos of the bizarre" create a live stage experience that must be seen and heard to be believed. Wielding National guitars, ukuleles, a sousaphone, a phono-fiddle, actual garbage cans and metal sinks, these rhythmagicians make venues rock.

The music and antics of the defies categorisation. Is this post-millennium cabaret or new vaudeville? No, it’s the National Junk Band!

The fans have described them as:
‘the Sex Pistols meets Bing Crosby’
‘bluesy with a touch of Monty Python’
‘extreme entertainment’
‘layer upon layer of insanity, lunacy, anarchy’

Witness fire, illusion, passion, irreverent satire, singing saws, flying chooks and musical mayhem.

For four years the National Junk Band has had toes tapping and jaws dropping at festivals, pubs, joints, radio, and TV. With two death-defying albums to their credit, and the music to “Badcop Badcop” (ABC TV) in the can, they are about to kick over another with their latest CD “Tin Can Alley’. A quantum leap of style and musicianship for the quirkiest band in the land who even performed for the Pope (Pope Alice’s "Pacifica" at the MCA). What next - church music for atheists?

Albums

"Kitchen Sink Music"

"21st Century Sink"

"Tin Can Alley"

Reviews

"This show is an hilarious revelation - you never know what you’re going to get from one song to the next."
- Sarah Thomas, Adelaide Advertiser

"These guys have everything - including the kitchen sink"
- Inside - Melbourne

‘Mic Conway is a very, very talented man. He should be elected as one of Australia’s living national treasures.’
- Bill Riner, ABC Radio, Qld

‘...highly infectious music, hilarious jokes, dazzling magic tricks, fire-eating and much clowning around.’
- Robert Dunstan, Rip It Up Magazine

‘The hit of the festival... their CD was so good someone stole it from the ABC library.’
- Robyn Johnson, ‘The Planet’, ABC Radio National

Recent reviews of the album "Tin Can Aalley"

‘Aural extravaganza...

You enter into the spirit, which is pure fun. Everything is delivered with tongue lovingly pressed into cheek... in a lovingly self-depricating style on the unlikeliest array of instruments... The scary thing is, it all sounds perfectly musical. These alley cats can actually play.

What more could you want?

Go on, you know you want to.’

- Michael Smith, Drum Media
Review of ‘Tin Can Alley’ (28th Jan 2003)

‘Tin Can Alley ... their fabbo new album. You will laugh, you will cry, you will make the in-between face.’

- Craig New, Revolver
(#258 Nov 2002)

‘Blissful existence ... They genre cross, they satirise the musical, they cover (people) ... even Marlene Dietrich.’

- Rachel Holmshaw, Revolver
(259 Nov 2002)

‘Irreverent lyrics, impeccable musicianship, and more than a little humour... The National Junk Band is good value.’

- City Weekly (Nov 2002)

Festivals

National Folk Festival Canberra
www.folkfestival.asn.au/

Woodford Folk Festival
www.woodfordfolkfestival.com/

Port Fairy Folk Festival
www.portfairyfolkfestival.com/

Brunswick Music Festival
www.brunswickmusicfestival.com.au/

Apollo Bay Music Festival
www.appollobaymusicfestival.com.au

ABC TV

Title music to
'Bad Cop, Bad Cop'

Biographies

MIC CONWAY - A True History

Mic "Microphone" Conway

Vocals, National tenor guitar, ukulele, harmonica, gumleaf, musical handsaw, tap dancing, magic and juggling.

Mic started his international career at the age of 3, setting sail for overseas with his younger brother Jim, in a pink bathtub. This progressed into a career playing music with bits of junk ("Captain Matchbox Whoopee Band", and "National Junk Band").

His first appearance on television in a talent show saw his band beaten by a Swiss yodeller called Heidi, who had laryngitis and didn't... yodel.

Numerous films and television shows later, included being the Chinese Empress for David Bowie ("China Girl") and regular appearances on children's TV with a large bear without any pants (Humphrey, not Mic). He co-founded two circuses without animals "Circus Oz" and "Soapbox Circus".

After a show in London, with the "Conway Brothers Hiccups", he failed to recognise a beaming Freddie Mercury ("Queen"). While in southern US in '88 he wasn't lynched (despite his ventriloquism act with a dummy called "Ronald Reagan"). He has failed to join The Wiggles despite playing several characters in their film and TV shows and even once found himself performing as Dorothy the Dinosaur. Despite his band hanging up the phone on Ry Cooder, Mic's ridiculous career has seen him naked in front of a Japanese tourist bus (Aquarius Festival) to being a CIA killer ("Vietnam Mini-series"), hitting the headlines with "Sex on stage at pop show!" and even a punch-up on stage with a gang of bikies.

He has compered several TV shows and written music for film, TV, radio and stage. The Aria Award winning performer has been alternatively mistaken for a singer, a musician, songwriter, screen composer, actor, magician, juggler, instigator of oddball sight acts and even a creator of musical instruments. He has performed thousands of shows nationally and internationally, won several awards and gold records, and is saving up to be put in a Home for the Bewildered.

MARCUS HOLDEN

Marcus "Email" Holden

Vocals, Strohviol, mandolin,

National Guitar.

Marcus has been a stalwart of the Australian country, jazz and rock scenes for many years. With over 300 album credits with many of the top performers in the Australian rock scene including Jimmy Barnes and Diesel, he has also appeared as a soloist with orchestras performing his own works. He is a gifted arranger, producer and conductor. He co-ordinates and musically directs the FIDDLERS FESTIVAL as well as running "Bloody Dog Studios"

You can email Marcus at marcus@fiddlersfestival.com

JEREMY COOK

"Junkyard Jeremy"

Vocals, kitchen sink, washboard, thimbles, pots, cans, dinner bell, scrubbing brushes, garbage bin.

If it’s junk Jeremy can play it! Apart from coaxing musical sounds from assorted rubbish in Mic Conway’s National Junk Band, Jeremy also operates a small studio facility (Jemdrum), and has another full life teaching percussion and running drum circle workshops.

PHIL DONNISON

Phil "Philthy Dunnyseat" Donnison

Aka "Phil Harmonic", "Phileas McBlurt", "Blind Lemon Peel"!,/p>

Vocals, National guitar, National Steel guitar, National ukulele, kazoo and nose flute.

Co-founder of the National Junk Band, Phil’s first jug band was The Emancipated Rampart Footwarmers Jug Band, From there he went on to perform with the popular "Stovepipe Spasm Band" in 1969. It was then that he first met Mic and Jim Conway who had the "Jellybean Jug Band" happening (this later became the "Captain Matchbox Whoopee Band") and they had driven to Sydney from Melbourne to catch the Stovepipe at the Port Jackson Folk Festival. Whilst teaching in Papua New Guinea Phil formed the Philharmonic Footwarmers and played in some very unusual places. In 1976 he returned to Australia and formed another jazz outfit called “The Gladesville Sheiks”. A hot ensemble which played lots of jug band type songs with a large pinch of Fats Waller thrown in for good measure, even though there was no piano! But Phil tired of jazz bands, so it was back into jug band music when he teamed up with "The Original Sweaty Palms Orchestra" in the early 80’s. Whilst living in Fiji in the early 90’s his passion for National Instruments commenced and on his return he contacted Mic Conway and together they formed "The National Jug and Junk Band". The "Jug" part of the name was dropped after a short time as it became a bit cumbersome - and the rest is history!

Other bands Phil as been involved with are The Famous Peter Miller Jug Band, Tiny Tim's Antipodes Rhythm Kings, The Old Blokes String Band, and The Semitones

When Phil's not performing with the National Junk Band, his "real job" is freelancing as a cameraman/director making industrial and corporate documentaries, from which he has won many local and international awards.

CAZZBO JOHNS

Carolyn "Cazzbo" Johns

Sousaphone, jug, electric bass, swanee whistle, soprano vacuum cleaner tube, hosepipe trumpet, vocals.

Musical from an early age (harmonizing with her mother from the womb), Cazzbo took a long time to get around to harnessing this latent talent formally. At 16 she agreed to try the tuba in the school brass band - for a joke - and she’s still laughing!

Australia’s British-style brass band scene was the ideal environment to develop and foster brass playing and beer drinking skills. Whilst obtaining a Degree in Musical Stiff-Upper-Lippery at the Victorian College of the Arts, the Melbourne jazz scene offered opportunities to express her natural inclination for improvisation.

In 1987 Cazzbo moved to Sydney to take up her new appointment as Principal Tuba in the Australian Opera and Ballet Orchestra (AOBO - Opera Australia), a position she still holds. Cazzbo has numerous Aussie film and commercial soundtracks to her credit. Outside the orchestra pit in the Sydney Opera House it’s jazz, blues, world music and funky street bands. Sandy Evans, Bob Brozman, Dame Joan Sutherland and Luciano Pavarotti are just a few of the esteemed performers who have adjusted their curriculum vitaes to include: “I’ve played with Cazzbo”.

A chance meeting with Mic Conway prompted further study as Cazzbo undertook Mic’s comprehensive 30-second course in the art of jug playing. She’s even done commercial soundtrack recordings equipped with only the jug! Inspired by hearing The Hoosier Hotshots (on a cassette in Mic’s van on tour) she promptly took up the swanee whistle.

Cazzbo’s hobbies include cycling, recycling, staying up past her bedtime, and protecting the Old Growth Weeds in her garden.

“Despite her classical training, Cazzbo is a brilliant improviser with a great ear.”
- Bob Brozman

“Australia's free-wheeling tuba virtuoso.”
- Doug Spencer, Founder and Producer 'The Planet' ABC Radio National

“The Paul McCartney of the jug.&rd quo;
- Mic Conway