Perth Voice Interactive

For more than a decade Benedict Moleta has been plugging away, working on his music.

There was a time when the North Perth muso had dreams of fame, sending out press releases nationwide and gigging hard at pubs just about every weekend in a bid to break the big time.

With his eighth album The Magical World just wrapped up, these days he’s more low-key.

“I find it pretty unrewarding exerting a lot of energy on promotional strategies,” he says.

“Quite frankly, having done eight albums and pursued various promotion strategies over the years, with this one I’ve reverted to the approach I had before I got into the music scene, which is a quite innocent and simple approach to marketing. I haven’t done a whole lot of emailing or marketing across the whole country.”

Playing in noisy pubs where music can’t be heard and owners gauge your success by how many beers they sell is also something he’s not missing. “In 2005 I started organising gigs outside the normal music venues, like in town halls and art galleries.

“The environment being nicer, being quieter, it’s much more open to a broader group of ages: Kids can come, which doesn’t happen in pubs… [and] also older people who don’t want to put up with the action at pubs.”

He used to hear from older friends with kids, “I’d love to come to the gig, but there’s no way I can come to the Rosemount at 11pm, so I’ll have to miss out”.

With that in mind he’s planned his launch for The Magical World at the Maylands Yacht Club, a venue he’s played at a couple of times in the past and really enjoyed for its family atmosphere.

The largely acoustic storytelling record is steeped in local culture (and sung in a Australian accent, oddly rare amongst local musos). Moleta writes about local experiences, about his friends, and Happy Girl is a song about his dog Midnight, a striking black kelpie cross that’s a regular sight around North Perth.

The launch is November 16, 7.30pm.

by DAVID BELL