STACK #208 Feb 2022

FEATURE MUSIC

WILLIAM CRIGHTON

– like in the songs you mention – they stick.

You've said that you think all of the songs on Water and Dust have hope within them; there's even hope within the harrowing, beautiful Killara . At the song's conclusion, you say Killara leaves us with a choice – is that choice as simple as action versus inaction? Once you find out the truth about something, or get an insight into something that previously you didn’t have, you’re faced with a choice to either live in a delusional state or adjust your thinking to the new information. Killara has a little convict chain-gang whistle in it, and there's also a sweet whistled melody in the gorgeous Keep Facing the Sunshine. Why did you decide to include whistling in these two, such differently-styled songs? A lot of these songs come about whilst doing other things: gardening, running, dishes, driving... Whistling and singing is a natural way to lay something out while your hands are busy. Sometimes those whistled melodies turn into other instrumental parts, but a lot of the time

Water and Dust by William Crighton is out Feb 11 via ABC.

Your Country includes some of your most direct lyrics about politics, business and our precious natural landscape.

What do you do when disappointment turns to rage, and threatens to become overwhelming? This song is about the power we have to enact change. This is our home, and it’s all of our responsibility to ensure that future generations can exist and flourish. There are a lot of great things about this country, but at the moment our leaders are just hiding the money they’ve stolen, ripping away public services, taking away individual rights, funnelling public money to multi-national corporations, and facilitating the destruction of our precious home – all the while giving themselves continual pay rises. No thanks. Next system please. What is the crazy jawharp instrument we're hearing in This Is Magic ? It’s the spirit of Cessnock, I suppose...

Continue reading the full Q&A online at stack.com.au

SASAMI SEETHES, SCINTILLATES

W rithing with an“anti-toxic positivity” which plumes from sumptuous arrangements, Sasami Ashworth's second album flings between melodic metal and folk-rock confessionals, never spilling a drop from the goblet of oppressor's tears she holds aloft. From the first moments of opener Skin a Rat (which features Megadeth sounds like a lullaby cooed at you while you're buried alive), Ashworth's spider- legged guitars pick over lush arrangements, and her unignorable knack for poignancy and power evokes Sharon Van Etten and Sheryl Crow. drummer Dirk Verbeuren, and

Squeeze by SASAMI is out Feb 25 via Domino.

Call Me Home comes floating in like a Brian Eno mothership before opening into cloud-busting beauty, and the title track is propulsive art- rock with dissonant guitar and gloriously unsettling harmonies. The whole thing is combed through with the qualities of a feminine and terrifying Japanese folk spirit Ashworth learned about while researching her own Korean-Japanese heritage: Nure-onna (“wet woman”) has the head of a woman, the body of a snake, and she kills her victims by draining their arteries with her blood-sucking tongue. We're smitten. ZKR

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