"Critics do as critics will - but did you ever them sing?" - Mick Thomas
Adam Gibson looks let to join the ranks of fine Australian musical storytellers such as Paul Kelly and Mick Thomas
- Sunday Telegraph, Sydney
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One Of Those Nights
Sydney writer and musician Adam Gibson has formed a band including ex-Hummingbird Simon Holmes to create background music for his more-than-authentic spoken word tales of Australiana. While it may sound like the kind of thing that would only appeal to people who like, you know, poetry (shudder), the end product is one of the most unique, interesting and compelling groups to emerge from our land in a long time. 'One Of Those Nights' is about the mundane nature of regular day-to-day existence, in that not much happened for our narrator on such nights of importance as the ones when Joe Strummer and Grant McLennan died. 'Everyone's Eyes Are Always Much Smaller In Real Life' is a ramble through an old photo album and the memories it conjures including Jim Beam and Cokes, Weddings Parties Anything gigs at the Coogee Bay Hotel, road trips to Townsville, singing Hunters And Collectors songs, the Big Day Out and a girl from the North Shore named Bridget. Sensational.
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* ALBUM OF THE WEEK *
THE AERIAL MAPS - In The Blinding Sunlight
Occasionally an album resonates with you so strongly that its contents become almost addictive, and In The Blinding Sun Light - the debut full-length by Sydney outfi tThe Aerial Maps - falls squarely into that category. The brainchild of songwriter and poet Adam Gibson (formerly of Modern Giants), the record is a beguiling collection of literate, distinctly Australian narratives which effortlessly capture the true essence of our nation - all family holidays, steamy childhood summer nights, long drives and desolate, scorching landscapes.
Gibson's laconic spoken word delivery is disconcerting atfi rst but soon puts you under a spell, the unforced wisdom of his evocative recollections and thought-provoking asides intoxicating in their candour and detail. The band's music is understated but essential, giving the evocative wordscapes space to meander and expand. Highlights are many - ruminations on the passing of a father ('On The Punt'), memories of childhood ('Be Home Before The Streetlights Go On'), adolescent adventures ('Everyone's Eyes Are Always Much Smaller') and the obligatory rite-of passage overseas jaunt ('London Still Exists') - but it works far better imbibed as a whole piece.
The fact that throughout the album the lyrics namecheck or allude to Paul Kelly, Weddings Parties Anything, The Triffids, Hunters & Collectors, Midnight Oil and The Go-Betweens is more than coincidental - The Aerial Maps fit perfectly into this pantheon of bands, acts who thrived on documenting Australian life and experiences with an objective detachment that transcends parochialism or the dreaded cultural cringe.Above all these songs serve to remind us that we live in an amazing country and it's inspiring that someone's willing to remind us just how fortunate we really are.
**** ½
- Steve Bell
Time Off magazine, Brisbane, 22/10/08
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Aerial Maps - On The Punt
Maps vocalist and songwriter Adam Gibson is poised to knock every other Australian songwriter of repute into a cocked hat. His literate gems contain beautiful turns and shifts within nearly every line - it's impossible to second guess the destination of his train of thought - managing unique and evocative wordscapes without pomp or artifice. His combo are none too shabby either, being largely cobbers from his previous combo, the under appreciated Modern Giant, and offer perfect and sympathetic accompaniment. Listening to Aerial Maps is like the feeling you got reading The Racketty Street Gang or Cloudstreet for the first time. There's a name for this feeling, but they just haven't named it yet.
- Coodabeen Champions, ABC Radio
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On the Punt (Single)... The Aerial Maps
Poet Adam Gibson - nicer bloke you wouldn't meet in a day's march, and ever-hopeful Roosters supporter - has been trying to mix his laconic Australian words into a musical format for a while. He's got close, like in Modern Giant's late gasp, The Band's Broken Up (the one with 'The Hummingbirds, The Clash, Midnight Oil' refrain you may remember but never knew the name of…). New ingredient here is Simon Holmes of the aforementioned Hummingbirds, who adds further pop nous to the affair. Goes alright.
- Ross Clelland, The Drum Media
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THE AERIAL MAPS - One Of Those Nights
(Pop Boomerang)
The Olympics will always do it. Get a bunch of excited sports lovers in front of a commercial television host, both parties the epitome of imagination bereftness, and that good old cultural cringe is guaranteed to return with a vengeance. 'Oi oi oi!' the sports dickheads wearing the Australian flag as a bandana will yell in indiscriminate response to any question, and the rest of us will grimace, sure we saw these proud, patriotic yobs in footage of the Cronulla riots. Why, the second people think of what it is to be Australian, do we still turn back to the '70s era of Kingswood Country? The Aerial Maps are a Sydney band, based around songwriter and storyteller Adam Gibson, as well as ex-Hummingbird and powerpop favourite Simon Holmes. It's Gibson's knack for telling highly personal yet Australian-encompassing stories that has already defined this band, successfully surfing that difficult wave of describing common cultural phenomena, without crashing into lowest common denominator parochialism. One Of Those Nights, for example, is a spoken word description of that painful part of a breakup when you have to decide who gets the rights to mutually loved songs. It's a relatable theme that I can't recall hearing a song about before, and the fact it pays realistic tribute to Badly Drawn Boy's You Were Right - "And I remember doing nothing on the night Grant McLennan died / And on the night Joe Strummer died I did stuff all" - just adds to the appeal. Tales of driving to Townsville over dry river beds, or getting a photo in the crowd at Nirvana at the first Big Day Out, or crowdsurfing at the Coodgee Hotel with two Jim Beams and Cokes without spilling a drop. These are stories of the Australia I recognise, and while definitive Australian texts like Cattle & Cane or Hourly, Daily didn't have to sit you down, point you in the face and say "These are Australian stories", it's still infinitely preferable to the rest of the nation-defining images shown by Channel 7 every day.
Review here: http://www.ravemagazine.com.au/content/view/10684/182/
- Rave Magazine, Melbourne
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THE AERIAL MAPS
Blinding Sunlight (Popboomerang Records)
The Aerial Maps' frontman Adam Gibson has been compared to two of Australia's best-ever songwriters in Paul Kelly and Mick Thomas, and while pretty much no-one in the land can truly lay claim to such high ground, the emerging Sydney five-piece prove they're a cut above the average. Taking their quintessentially Australian storytelling cue from Aussie legends such as The Triffids and The Go-Betweens, the band are one to watch. (JG)
- Time Off Magazine
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