REVIEWS

thedwarf.com.au - July 2007

Journey indeed. This CD plays like a relationship. It flirts shamelessly with its la-de-da melodies and cheery piano accordion on ‘Rising Tide’ and ‘Swings and Roundabouts’. While the deep and meaningful moments are captured in the barebones acoustics of ‘Journey of a Thousand Miles’ and “A Story to Tell’.

‘Catching the Sun’ and ‘The New Midnight’ see the cracks starting to appear as the unnecessary poke their nose in (the female backing vocals are harsh and just don’t fit – like when your family finally tells you what they really think). Old chestnuts are simultaneously dredged up and fondly recalled in the old Billy Bragg incident ‘Waiting for the Great Leap Forward’, and suddenly you realise all of the other things going on around you that matter so much more. Songs you first dismissed as formulaic take on new meaning as you switch on and get let in on the private jokes.

A journey indeed. With water tight drums, sweet relief by way of pipes, whistle and squeezebox, and that unmistakeable vocal giving life to lyrics sodden with veracity and warmth. The change in line up is evident as this album is somehow distinctively The GO Set and yet so far removed from their past efforts. Better musicianship, more germane tones for the song writing, and more…soul.

- Wandmaker

The Drum Media - July 2007

Rolling Stone Magazine - May 2006

MX Newspaper (Sydney Edition) - April 2006

Beat Magazine - April 2006

The Hungry Mile
Satellite Magazine, New Zealand - March 2006

Two albums within the space of 7 months is a feat for any band, especially in today’s world of over produced, over glorified, and over valued albums coming out from bands that only feel the need to release albums every 2 years. The Go Set has backed up from last years well received “Sing a Song of Revolution” with a new album entitled The Hungry Mile, which hits hard and remains solid throughout all areas.

The Hungry Mile carries on from the last album and follows on with the unique sound the Go Set are famous for in many a pub around Australia, as well as New Zealand. The songs are sharp, well constructed and highlight the unique vocal talent of lead singer Justin Keenan, who jigs and natters his way through each song, with the tracks Bordeaux and All the Truth and Lies really showcasing his typical Australian twang.

An interesting aspect of the new album is the addition of a few slower, more personal songs. The hardness of his hand remains composed all the way through as Keenan opens up in a tale of truth told with conviction. Scarlet Snow provides a perfect contrast between verse and chorus and could be described as the most emotional song on the album. Both of these songs really add to the album as a whole and give it a well-roundness that was perhaps lacking in albums past.

The Go Set have managed to mature and carry on from their promising album last year and record what can only be described as their greatest album yet. Take a listen and attend the show, for you will not be disappointed.

Rating: 4/5

The Hungry Mile
Shite N Onions, Boston, USA - Feb 2006

From the surf coast of Victoria, Australia, The Go Set crank up the pipes and take the fight to the bosses as they relive the past through the people who never got to write the history books.
The Go Set first marched into view, all bagpipes and tattered banners and bandaged heads held high, with 2005’s Sing A Song Of Revolution, an exciting an accessible collection emigrant anthems and mandolin-spiked drinking music. The Hungry Mile sees a continuation of the band exploring the lives of ordinary people across a two hundred year spectrum of time, and how much those lives often have in common. It also examines more detailed and personal themes.

In an era when many bands are lost in an almost glam haze of self conscious dress-ups – mascara, ties, nail polish, sardonic retro, shopping plaza ‘punk’, etc. – The Go Set recall a time when Australian bands weren’t afraid to wear their hearts on their sleeves and put their balls on the line. It seems like a very long time ago now, but when bands like Midnight Oil, Spy Vs Spy and Roaring Jack once sang their songs of protest and real lives lived, people listened without banding the word “political” around, as if that in itself conveyed a musical style. The Go Set are coming out of the same realist, impassioned and historically-connected worlds of these bands, an almost-but-not-quite-lost Australia that knew bullshit when it saw it and that could recognize the many crossbreeds of underdog that made up a society without – as is the case now – scrambling over every scrap and shiny thing in a mindless quest to become the over-dog. In this era of bitterly cynical derivation and depressing pop idolatry – all of it the perfect soundtrack for this most materialistic of times – singer songwriter Justin Keenan and The Go Set remind us that some people still work shit jobs, don’t accept the carrots that dangle and dissipate in front of them, don’t vote for right wing corporate warmongers and are more than prepared to say they are nothing short of fucked off with the whole lying, exploitative status quo.

Initially received as a ‘Celtic rock’ or ‘Celtic punk’ band on account of the bagpipe-driven singalongs and chiming mandolin reels and stomps, The Go Set nonetheless live in their own accent and stick to their own guns. As befits the instruments and folk influences, The Go Set have one foot in their sepia-toned history but also one in their own fired-up present; this is not historical re-enactment with a Marshall stack. The band play their trad instruments with a conviction and relevance that transcends any of the novelty value that is sometimes ascribed to some bands. The opening track ‘Jig Of Slur’ is pure whisky and whirling around a tinkers’ campfire and establishes the Goeys’ solid ceilidh credentials. This blends into the pub rock shanty of Bordeaux, a song that typifies the high-spirited but wistful Go Set sound and Keenan’s bare and unaffected singing style. Then straight into the brawny, mandolin-laced immigrant anthem Davey, a story of last drinks before sailing from Ireland to the timber mills of New South Wales. The historical voyage continues with the galley drums and pipe and whistle riffing of ‘Tale Of A Convict’, a tribute to the desolation and utter powerlessness of Britain’s convicts in the South Seas. The transportation era is brought into the present with the rumble of ‘Salamanca’, a rollicking live favourite that reflects on the irony of freedom of speech in modern day Hobart, where earnest dreadlocked lefties agonize over abstract crusades amid the monuments of what was once, after all, a British gulag. ‘All The Truth And Lies’ is a slab of classic eighties crunch rock with a punching drumkit and angry sentiment that brings to mind that other great angry surf band, Midnight Oil.

The pipes kick in again with ‘Union Man’, a straightforward tribute to those countless anonymous souls who feed the engines of our showcase western societies: “We are the underclass and the lucky country holds us dear. Union man, can you save us? We need just a quid a week and a raincoat for this rain. Clocking in but we are never clocking out again.”

The buzzing rock is broken with ‘Hardness Of His Hand’, an acoustic ballad that portrays the plight of a beaten wife and mother, and the tragic, timeless irony of her complex trap. Featuring Mark ‘Squeezebox Wally’ Wallace of Weddings, Parties, Anything fame on piano accordion, the tune does indeed bring to mind the great and much-missed Melbourne institution that WPA was.
Just when you are ready to die inside, though, the boys fire up again with ‘Power Of Youth’, a pure and thrilling fist-raiser that reminds us all of the simple truth that while us little people still have breath in our lungs and revel in our freedom, we cannot truly be downtrodden by the scornful McDomination of our lives and our society.

Then onto the album’s opus, ‘Scarlet Snow’. In this particularly moving number – waltzed along again by Wallace’s accordion – Keenan tackles the subject of World War One and its blood sacrifice with confidence and compassion. Beginning, as so many such stories did, in a country town, the idealistic volunteers become soldiers who are soon swept into the maelstrom of the western front, where “frozen men and metal littered all the field, covered for a moment by the winter’s soft white yield”. A timeless hymn alternating between crashing cymbals and sad fiddle laments, Scarlet Snow nonetheless conveys a sense of hope in its rousing chorus; “Lay down your guns, boys, help the ships pull south across the sea”.

After the sheer scale of Scarlet Snow, we’re back in acoustic mode again with ‘Learning Slowly’. This song sees the narrator reflecting on parenthood as it relates to the self-awareness and acknowledgment of being a human being, ie, flawed;“I drink too much at times, I have been known to fight and I always lose on sure things”. This is one to listen to on your own over a few quite beers on a sunny summer evening.

‘The Longest Holiday’ is another crunchy pop number, and sits in contrast to the following ‘Bombs Falling’ which begins with a bullish diatribe by Australian Prime Minister John Howard, once famously described by left-wing journalist Bob Ellis as having “a voice like a bucket of snot”. A grim punk shout against war, it is also a damning attack on Howard’s priggish and sanctimonious pro-Bush stance.

The last song is the show-closer ‘Scots Wha’ Hae’ – as much Radio Birdman as Robbie Burns – and the album closes with a few rounds of Jig Of Slurs, giving a real sense of performance to the whole show. A live band if there ever was one, The Go Set have done themselves justice with The Hungry Mile. In its humanity and spirited trad roots, it is bound to enjoy a broad appeal.
Score: Six beers out of a possible six pack, (plus a whisky chaser!)

The Hungry Mile
Missing Link Magazine, New Zealand - March 2006

Alhough they don't claim to be an Irish band as such, the Go Set's music has that undeniable Irish sound right from the start of The Hungry Mile, with the first 1:30 being an entirely bagpipe and celtic drumming affair. Throughout this album I can hear all the influences that this band is known for; The Pogues, Billy Bragg and Midnight Oil - all backed by The Go Set's very own high energy and upbeat Celtic punk rock sound. It's the sound that will give you the sudden urge to dance a jig down to your local celtic pub for a few shots of Bushmills. Hey, if you're lucky the band might even be playing when you get there, because they're touring New Zealand this March.
 
A huge drawcard with The Go Set is that you can take the music on different levels depending on how you're feeling at the time. You can chew on the political issues covered in the lyrics, or just rock out to the music. What do they sing about? Iraq, war, class structures and the average working class Joe. Issues that are relevant to, not only Aussies, but to Kiwis as well. I also find the maturity in the bands' songwriting very impressive, considering they've only been around for a few years.
 
Teh other cool thing is the Go Set's use of instruments that you don't hear very often in rock music, such as bagpipes, Scottish small pipes and the tin whistle, all played for you courtesy of Johnny McHaggis. There's also Mandolin, piano accordian, violin, flute and bodhran.
 
Great fun and guaranteed to get even the most conservative of is up and dancing, The Go Set are coming our way, so watch out!

4/5

The Hungry Mile
Rip it Up Magazine, New Zealand - Feb/Mar Issue 2006

Melbourne-based punk outfit the Go Set are back with their second album, The Hungry Mile, and it's an excellent collection of catchy, energetic and interesting punkr ock. Recorded in just two weeks, the album shows just how much the band has grown since their late 2004 debut Sing a Song of Revolution.
On their new album, they have pushed boundaries to the edge, both lyrically and musically. Not only do they still keep their trademark bagpipe sound, they have also incorporated a violin, flute and accordian, which is a real headtrip.
Lead singer and guitarist Justin Keenan leads the way. He is a very under-rated musician and should be a well known name. Hopefully he will be in the future.
In a nutshell, The Hungry Mile is an interesting and uplifting trip, and is an excellent step in the career of the Go Set.
 
-Attilla