Embraced by a majestic sun and crisp air, more than 250 people gathered last Sunday to dance to the smokey dub and jungle beats of the globally known Salmonella Dub Soundsystem at Port Douglas Yacht Club, proudly presented by Locally Hosted Australia.

Booked one year ago by Ella and Reuben Rusch while touring south, the Kiwi band returned in its full for their first live Australian shows since Peats Ridge in 2012. Their unique trade mark blend of reggae, jazzy horns, dub, rock and drum ‘n’ bass made their live show in the tropical Shire impactful and fuelled with adrenaline.

Over the last three years Salmonella Dub Soundsystem have been playing regularly in OZ but at the same time, quietly, they were working away on their next studio album blossoming into the next wave of new material sealed in their new album (due out in February/March 2016) with an EP leading up to the Australian shows. 

Andrew Penman (guitar/sample/vocals) stated that while “playing a run of live shows in NZ we tested out album material with our new 4 part powerhouse horn section, which made it possible for us to come back to a more old school writing process. We use to write song scratches starting from rhythm and beats then bass before dubbing and then test everything live to gain fast feed-back before going to the studio. Then with the advent of technology we’ve lost this process and working flow and chose to go the other way around and write and produce the songs first in the studio then playing what was the final product live only at a later stage.”

“The album is going to carry our trade mark of cross genre influences and bit rates from 84 to more jungle style 160 bpm. We like to collaborate with many artists especially from New Zealand through remixes. We use mostly analogue gear and were happy to have our hands on a NEVE mixer during our recent studio times in Sydney; in fact I play guitar with analogue effects as well as my dear Time Machine.” Proudly together for 23 years – “also because of the many interests all of us have other than music: like TV commercials or teaching and of course our families” affirms Andrew, the seasoned band keeps the enthusiasm levels always high and fresh receiving new interesting booking requests from Brazil, South Africa and also Europe as the last time they were in Europe was 2000 or 2001.

The full band will continue travelling south joined by Laughton Kora and guests to perform at Melbourne’s Prince of Wales in St Kilda on November 13th and Sydney’s Metro on November 14th. Both cities and venues are iconic in the bands development. Salmonella Dub’s first shows in Australia date back to 1998 culminating in a live performance on the ABC networks Recovery Show at 7.30am on a Saturday morning after loading out from a late night club gig at the Chapel Street Revolver venue.

Under the paradisiac palms of Port Douglas the worldwide acclaimed band together with Zennith full Band and the Soundbugz, raised energies and funds to support and celebrate the launch of the recently born concept (of the soon to be married couple Ella and Reuben Rusch), Locally Hosted Australia, a platform supporting locally hosted art, music and culture.

www.locally-hosted-australia.com

What was started from a Facebook group has now evolved into an online platform which unites all local artists, aiming at showcasing artworks, productions and services facilitating selling as well as collaborations. “The goal, confirms Reuben, “is to converge all people involved within the event and entertainment realm.

We want to be a point of reference for everyone looking to host an event or festival in need of anything from sound engineering to light mapping and everything in between: arts, crafts, and sound systems - the one shop for the entire spectrum of entertainment tiles as in puzzle pieces.”

“We want to pair more popularly acclaimed artists with the local arteries in order to drive attention and promote the community talents while offering all artists a member pool of services like webhosting, bookings, selling and promotion. With a wide extended network that goes from Victoria to North Queensland and other cross marketing actions, we want to make it easy for both event organizers and artists to match and collaborate as well as for the more general public to follow their favourite artists or discover new ones Australia wide.”

The registration free site offers tailoring a hosting and e-commerce space for every kind of artist and event professional, regardless of the scale and nature, for a one-time fee of $400 plus a 15% retention on sales. Sunday’s event was what appears to be the first of a long list of culturally rich events focused mainly on supporting local artists, thanking the community’s support and paying back with eclectic and pulsing entertainment episodes which acts as a trustful resource for all happenings in North Queensland and beyond.

For more information please follow this links:

www.locally-hosted-australia.com and www.travelbeats.com.au