Australian multi-instrumentalist four-piece MILDLIFE share video for new single ‘Rare Air’ – Watch Now

Australian multi-instrumentalist four-piece MILDLIFE share video for new single ‘Rare Air’ - Watch Now

Australian multi-instrumentalist four-piece Mildlife reveals the video for ‘Rare Air’, the first single to be taken from their forthcoming second album Automatic, due for release 18 September via Heavenly Recordings.

The video for ‘Rare Air’ was filmed at the Dunmoochin Foundation, a breathtaking plot of land an hour outside of Melbourne whose aim is to nurture emerging and established artists and researchers. The foundation has been part of Mildlife’s bass player Tom Shanahan’s family for decades, and on Dunmoochin he explains “In the ’50s Clifton Pugh (Australian artist and three-time winner of Australia’s Archibald Prize) purchased 15 acres of land in Cottlesbridge which he named ‘Dunmoochin’. Other artists then came from the city to live and work on the site. One of these was my grandmother, Alma Shanahan who was a potter and sculptor. Her and Cliff were an item for a brief period there.“

In order to jointly protect and control the land, they formed the Dunmoochin Artist Cooperative, some of Australia’s most important and influential modernists came and settled on the site including Mirka Mora, John Olsen, John Perceval, Fred Williams, Albert Tucker, and Rick Amor. “It has also been the location of some pretty legendary parties that played host to interesting characters from all walks of life. It’s rumoured The Rolling Stones attended some of these parties when they were on tour in Australia.” Shanahan adds.

Watch ‘Rare Air’ – BELOW:

Alongside the video, the band share two remixes care of London-based producer and DJ Apiento. Born of mutual respect for each other’s work, Apiento’s ‘Rare Air (Apiento Remix)’ and Rare Air (Apiento Dub) remix adds an extra layer of buoyancy to the tracks.

With Automatic, the band have made a step-change from their debut. It’s more disciplined, directional and arguably more danceable. As on their debut album Phase, the band are unafraid to let a track luxuriate in length without ever succumbing to self-indulgence. “The recorded songs kind of become the new reference point for playing the songs live,” explains vocalist Kevin McDowell. “They both have different outcomes and we make our decisions for each based on that, but they’re symbiotic and they both influence each other. It’s usually a fairly natural flow from live to recorded back to live.”

Following the release of 2018’s Phase, Mildlife completed a sold-out debut national headlining tour, followed by a whirlwind ten date tour of the UK and Europe that culminated in a euphoric homecoming set at Meredith Music Festival. On their home turf, they’ve enamoured crowds across a variety of festivals and supported amongst others, the like-minded Stereolab and King Gizzard and The Lizard Wizard.

The release of Phase resulted in the band being nominated for Best Album at the 2018 Worldwide FM Awards, Best Independent Jazz Album at the AIR Awards in 2019 and walking away with the gong for Best Electronic Act at The Age Music Victoria Awards.

Mildlife’s second LP “Automatic” is due for release 18 September via Heavenly Recordings.

Xsnoize Author
Mark Millar is the founder of XS Noize and looks after the daily running of the website as well as hosting interviews for the weekly XS Noize Podcast. Mark's favourite album is Achtung Baby by U2.

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