Melbourne artists you should know: Let Your Hair Down, Grace Cummings and more
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14.10.2021

Melbourne artists you should know: Let Your Hair Down, Grace Cummings and more

Melbourne Artists

Every fortnight, Beat Magazine rounds up the best new Melbourne/Naarm bands and artists making moves online, underground and on the airwaves.

For those looking to keep an ear to the ground with the best emerging acts, this column will have you covered every two weeks with Victoria’s finest.

This fortnight, we’ve been enjoying the new instant-classic from Grace Cummings, the jangly guitars of Power Supply and the cinematic soul of Let Your Hair Down.

Head here if you missed the previous instalment, featuring Hobsons Bay Coast Guard, Dianas and SO.Crates.

Grace Cummings

Grace Cummings sounds years ahead of her time on the first taste of her new album Storm Queen. The opening track ‘Heaven’ positions Cummings as everything the album’s title suggests – a fierce and powerful songwriter with the voice to back it up.

‘Heaven’ is raw and stripped back to its bare essentials. Cummings’ out-of-this-world voice is front-and-centre here, left to speak for itself over guitar lines that swoop and soar around each other in graceful, hypnotic fashion. Look out for Grace next year – Storm Queen has her destined for big things when it lands in January.

Storm Queen is out January 14 via ATO Records

Power Supply

Tailor-made for breezy backyard arvos with a beer firmly in hand, Power Supply are the next big pub rock band set to take Melbourne by storm. ‘Let’s Do This and Let’s Do That’ is just a small taste of what’s in store on their debut album In The Time of the Sabre-Toothed Tiger, and sets the scene perfectly with its jangly guitars and light-heartedness. 

An extremely local act – the record is pressed in Thornbury by Program Records, the jackets printed in-house by Zenith Records in Brunswick, and all members are longstanding community members – Power Supply capture everything we’ve missed about seeing live bands over the past few months. From their raucous energy to hummable tunes, there’s a bright future ahead of these boys.

In The Time of the Sabre-Toothed Tiger is out October 22 via Anti Fade Records.

Let Your Hair Down

College Of Knowledge have spent the past 12 months paving the way for the future of jazz, soul and funk in Melbourne. With releases from Surprise Chef, The Pro-Teens and Karate Boogaloo to back up their creds, the label is continuing its hot streak with Waiting Room, the debut album from supergroup-of-sorts Let Your Hair Down.

Previously known as The Let Your Hair Down Girls, they’re already receiving international hype from the likes of Bradley Zero, Tom Ravenscroft and Soundway Records’ Miles Cleret. They group are no strangers to the Melbourne scene either, originally forming as a side project for much-loved soul band Saskwatch and setting themselves apart by bringing a cheeky pub rock spirit to the usual soul-jazz formula. 

‘New Year, New Me (Who ‘Dis)’ is the perfect encapsulation of what they do best: funky psychedelia and boogaloo sounds drenched in the booze and sweat of Melbourne’s rock bars, all shot through a cinematic lens.

Waiting Room is out now via College Of Knowledge.