Pleasures

The Pleasures are a new band fronted by Catherine Britt and Lachlan Bryan. Formed in 2022, their first three singles received heavy rotation on local and national radio, and their debut record The Beginning of the End (released in August 2023) debuted at #2 on the Official ARIA Country Charts, spent 12 weeks in the Americana Music Association Albums charts and scored the band two nominations for the 2024 Golden Guitars Australian Country Music Awards before giving a standout performance at the awards ceremony! No shrinking violets, The Pleasures' sound is raucous, dirty and blues-inspired (occasionally interrupted by delicate moments of sublime country-folk), whilst their subject matter leaps from bold and bawdy to heartfelt and insightful. They call themselves a country band, but there?s as much Jack White influence here as there is George Jones (in fact there?s plenty of both), alongside the plethora of mythologised girl-boy country acts with whom they will inevitably draw comparison. If you get the feeling these guys have drawn upon every debaucherous night out, self-inflicted wound, bleeding heart and broken bone to come up with this noise, you'd be absolutely right. Catherine Britt is a singer-songwriter, a mother, breast-cancer survivor and outspoken activist who pulls no punches and tells it like it is. She grew up in Newcastle, but by the age of twenty had moved to Nashville, signed to RCA, become the youngest Australian to perform at The Grand Ol? Opry (she?s now done it another 30 times) and even released a duet with Elton John (one of her earliest, and biggest fans). Since then she?s been nominated for six ARIAs, won four Golden Guitars and toured all over the world as a headliner and with the likes of Chris Isaak, Tim Rogers, Iris Dement, Kasey Chambers and Dolly Parton (to name just a few). Lachlan Bryan grew up in a musical family in the suburbs of Melbourne, reluctantly taking piano lessons as a teenager before eventually falling under the spell of songwriters like Bob Dylan, Townes Van Zandt and, eventually, Willie Nelson. He and his band The Wildes have gained a passionate following from the seedy bars of their hometown to the music clubs and festival stages of Europe. Lachlan has also toured extensively as a solo artist - opening for the likes of Lord Huron, Joe Pug, Justin Townes Earle and John Hiatt. PHIL LEE Phil Lee is a weathered, wizened troubadour, and he sounds like the sort of guy you?d cross at your own peril. But his lyrics are strong and paint evocative pictures. And the musicianship and arrangement is a tasty balance of laid-back and tight-as-a-duck?s ass. The songs all sound as if they were cut with all the effects knobs turned to zero: no bullshit studio trickery for this guy. The latest album, ?The Fall and the Further Decline of the Mighty King of Love? consists of a dozen bittersweet and rough-hewn originals (including a co-write with Barry Goldberg ? the pianist in Bob Dylan?s group when Dylan famously went ?electric? at Newport in 1965. Along with working with the Flying Burrito Brothers, driving a truck for Neil Young and playing drums for decades, Lee has carved a unique niche for himself in the alt-country, acoustic post-modern honky tonk world. Fans of Steve Forbert, Townes Van Zandt, Gram Parsons, Guy Clark, Phil Cody and Greg Brown will dig Lee?s strong fourth album. ?The Mighty King of Love is back, sounding as much like Dylan?s twisted kid brother as he ever did, and hauling along with him a particularly luminous cast of Nashville?s finest?He started writing relatively late in life but there?s two generations of great music absorbed into his bones and it seems to flow right back out of him with a fresh twist that is pure Phil Lee?