Skulker

Skulker
Origin Sydney, Australia
Genres Rock
Years active 1994–2005
Labels Chatterbox Records
Past members Greer Skinner
Annette Harada
Angela Blackshaw
Naomi "Batti" Battah
Gregory Boulting

Skulker was an ARIA Award-nominated[1] rock band from Sydney, Australia[2] that originally formed in 1994.[3] After two albums, the group parted ways in 2005

History

The group's original members met at Cheltenham Girls High School in northern Sydney in 1994 and decided to form a band.

Ever since, they've been pitched as Australia's premier all-girl band.

The line-up at the time was Greer Skinner on lead vocals and guitar, Annette Harada on bass guitar, Naomi "Batti" Battah on guitar and occasional lead vocals and drummer Angela Blackshaw.[4]

After an initial period establishing itself on the Sydney live circuit the band came to the attention of independent label Chatterbox Records[5] and in 2000 Skulker released the album Too Fat for Tahiti. The title was apparently inspired by the band being rejected for a gig as a house band at a resort in Tahiti because they were "too fat".[6]

Too Fat for Tahiti spawned the tracks "Naughty" and "Hëj" that received considerable support from the national youth radio station Triple J and both were voted into the networks annual listeners' poll, The Hottest 100,[3] at number 50 and 80 respectively. The album was subsequently nominated for Best Independent Album at the ARIA Awards and Skulker was nominated for Best New Live Act at the Australian Music Awards.

Skulker then toured Australia exhaustively before recording a new album The Double Life that was released in early 2003.[7][8][9][10] A free download-only single "Rock Nugget" was released. It was downloaded over 20,000 times and received high rotation on Triple J. The girls also played alongside one of their major music influences Veruca Salt in The Metro Theatre, Sydney in July that year.

The album received feature album status on the network, however sales of The Double Life were disappointing compared to those of the debut. The band went on to release the singles "Coming Home" and "In Your Arms" and played the Big Day Out tour in 2004. Early 2004 also found the band opening for Pink in Sydney and Newcastle and toured nationally supporting The Superjesus.

At this point Batti decided to depart the band and moved to Canada to pursue other interests. Following the replacement of Batti with new guitarist Gregory Boulting, Skulker toured the east coast of Australia and recorded extensive demos of new material that have never been released. The band members have since decided to go their own ways and pursue further interests.

Discography

Albums

EPs

Singles

References

  1. ↑ "Q&A With Skulker", The Newcastle Herald, 1 April 2004
  2. ↑ Williams, Sue (13 July 1997), "Not So Spicy Aphrodite", Sun Herald
  3. ↑ 3.0 3.1 Kent, Melissa (6 June 2003), "Party girls they ain't", The West Australian
  4. ↑ Moore, Chris (29 June 2000), "Skulker Happy With Progress", Illawarra Mercury
  5. ↑ Lawrence, Elissa (26 March 2000), "Beached wails", Sunday Mail
  6. ↑ Watson, Chad (9 March 2000), "Slim Excuse", Newcastle Herald
  7. ↑ Baker, Tiffany (16 May 2003), "Metro - Frill seekers", Adelaide Advertiser
  8. ↑ McMenemy, Lauren (29 May 2003), "Rough play for Skulker", Adelaide Advertiser
  9. ↑ Simonot, Suzanne (8 May 2003), "Skulking it!", Gold Coast Bulletin
  10. ↑ Chalmers, Emma (16 May 2003), "Skulker keep their day jobs", The Courier-Mail
  11. ↑ "Too Fat For Tahiti review", Sunday Telegraph, 13 February 2000
  12. ↑ Buchanan, Matt (7 April 2000), "Too Fat For Tahiti review", Sydney Morning Herald
  13. ↑ Nahrung, Jason (4 April 2003), "The Double Life review", The Courier-Mail

External links