Party Dozen – the Sydney-based duo of saxophonist Kirsty Tickle and percussionist Jonathan Boulet – have announced a new LP, Crime in Australia. It’s set to arrive on September 6 via Temporary Residence Ltd., and the new single ‘The Big Man Upstairs’ is out now. The track arrives with a video that uses documentary footage to tell the story of Joh Bjelke-Petersen, the “hillbilly dictator” who ran the Queensland government for two decades. Check it out below and scroll down for the album’s cover art and tracklist.
“It’s a story full of such unbelievable corruption and thirst for power that feels sadly relevant to the state of the world at the moment,” the band said of ‘The Big Man Upstairs’ in a statement. “A government rife with corruption and an inevitable explosive response of punk rock, activism and counter-culture. There were some very important movements happening at the time but of course we had to focus our scope more on the music side of things. It just doesn’t seem real. A special police task force waging war on music??”
The duo wrote, recorded, produced, and mixed Crime in Australia themselves. Boulet explained:
Marrickville in the 1960s-70s was a notorious crime hot spot. If a car was stolen, or someone was missing, they’d look for them in Marrickville. Since then, the area has been highly gentrified and slowly the once grimy industrial warehouse lined streets are being swapped for monstrous apartment blocks with palm trees.
We began without any theme in mind, just the beginnings of some song ideas. As we were discovering the songs for this album, each song felt more and more at home in an old cop tv series soundtrack. The Crime theme quickly became apparent. The record feels split into two contrasting sides: The first half is ‘order’, being as listenable as Party Dozen has ever been. Each song is law abiding and dignified in its own place. The second half is ‘disorder,’ becoming more unlawful, unhinged, louder and noisier.
Crime in Australia Cover Artwork:
Crime in Australia Tracklist:
1. Coup De Gronk
2. Wake In Might
3. Money & The Drugs
4. Les Crimes
5. The Big Man Upstairs
6. Judge Hammer
7. Bad News Department
8. The Righteous Front
9. Piss On Earth
10. Jon’s International Marketplace