Our single launch last month was reviewed on FasterLouder.com.au.  Here’s a bit of what they had to say about the night:

Turn the tables once again, and main act Montpelier offer yet more points of difference on the musical smorgasbord of the evening. Fresh from a recording stint in Hollyweird, the Brisbane four-piece are a tight and polished pop-rock outfit seemingly from another time and place. This was no polyester-shirt, horn-rimmed glasses, shoe-gazing affair, but unadulterated melodic soaring, backed by some superb uplifting harmonising. Guitarist Dave Butler kicked off the vocal duties, but spent most of the evening wonderfully harmonising below bassist Greg Chiapello’s heart-on-the-sleeve singing style. Drummer John Pickering’s staccato rhythms provided a necessary counter-point early on and significantly lightened the mood in some of the darker moments. Nearing the set’s end, new singles The Rafters and Fireworks were treated to a slight re-working with Larsen joining them onstage for a little extra guitar and vocal kick. With keyboardist Andrew Stone strapping on a piano accordion, the two offerings were clear indications of this band’s ambitions to make memorable, fit-for-the-moment epic rock. The apt rise and fall of Last Boat Out To See You, with its nautical theme and interesting back-story, perfectly illustrated the intelligence and warmth Montpelier bring to their sound and whetted the appetite for more things to come.

Thanks for the review BrisJamin.  Check out the full article online here:

http://www.fasterlouder.com.au/reviews/events/21975/Montpelier-Tin-Can-Radio-Stu-Larsen-and-Lydia-Cole–The-Troubadour-Brisbane-151209-.htm

The boys over at www.scenewave.com recently did some pre/post coverage of our single launch.  I believe our gig was also the very first of their “live tweets” (P.S. follow them on twitter: @scenewave).  We feel pretty special about that.  Find the coverage here: http://www.scenewave.com/tag/montpelier/#2009/10/montpelier-live-the-zoo/.

This was such a great night.  To everyone who was in the crowd, thank you so so much for being a part of the show.  It wouldn’t have been fun without you.  We’ll have to do it all again very very soon.

Very pleasantly surprised to see that City News dedicated nearly a whole page to our launch.  Massive photo.  They were probably struggling for content today.  Haha.  Thanks a bunch City News.  Check it.

P.S. I love the play on words that magazines manage to pull with their articles.  “Raft of fans”.  Very clever.

While we were down in Sydney Dave had a phone chat with Time Off Magazine about recording in the States with Kevin Augunas.  Here’s what came of it.  The full article is online here: http://www.timeoff.com.au/html/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=3971:montpelier-&catid=11:features&Itemid=29

IN LESS THAN A YEAR, BRISBANE BAND MONTPELIER HAVE SCALED SOME INTERESTING HEIGHTS, SOME LESS LEGAL THAN OTHERS. SINGER DAVE BUTLER TELLS PAUL DONOUGHUE ABOUT THE RIDE.

A young band, less than six months old, ditches their tattered Bowen Hills rehearsal room for Hollywood. The four piece, Montpelier, with just a handful of shows behind them, set off to make a record with Kevin Augunas, the man behind the Cold War Kids albums.
“It was kind of random how it came about,” says singer Dave Butler of the audacious plan. “We were looking to do something really cool and we just had a demo together and sent it over and Kevin was interested. We didn’t have the highest expectations of someone like him wanting to work with us. It was quite a surprise, and quite a welcome one, that a producer like him would be interested in working with a tiny little band from Brisbane.”
Such a lofty experience – including the fact that the resulting EP was then mastered by Bob Ludwig, whose resume is a call sheet of rock’n’roll royalty – might lead some detractors to questions which major record label had discovered this clever, extremely agreeable young pop quartet and was pumping them full of cash. The answer is none.
“We sort of had to scrounge around for cash and go into a bit of debt,” Butler says of the month the band spent in Augunas’ North Hollywood studio working on their first EP. “It was an opportunity we couldn’t really turn down, so we just thought we would make it happen.”
Just months on and Montpelier are already back in the studio. They spent this past weekend in a Sydney studio working with The Church drummer Tim Powles ahead of the hometown launch this weekend of ‘The Rafters’, the first single from the EP.
“We have to work day jobs,” Butler says. “We pretty much just save as much as we can and put it together. It’s not as though we have unlimited funds, by any stretch of the imagination.”
Their interest in Augunas, whose straightforward, clean production gave Cold War Kids their bite and immediacy and worked for fellow Brisbane band Yves Klein Blue on their recent debut, seemed warranted when band and producer came together in the studio.
“His approach is just about trying to capture a really good performance and every time he asked about a take he was like ‘Did it feel good, did it feel right?’ Even if something sounded good, if we didn’t think it felt good, he’d just get rid of it.”
They also had some adventures outside the studio, with Augunas admirably playing the role of tour guide.
“We’d been there for about ten days and we hadn’t seen the Hollywood sign yet. So we told him and he was like ‘We have to fix this’,” Butler says.
As the five ascended the Hollywood hills, Augunas reassured them it wasn’t illegal to climb the letters – he had done it before.
“He takes us hiking up the hills and then off the path [saying] ‘By the way, if a ranger finds us, you guys do all the talking because I sound like I’m from around here’.”
An hour of bush bashing later, and they reach the sign.
“We [got] up there, sat on the first L, took video of it, we set off an alarm and the ranger came down and started shouting at us,” Butler says. “No one in LA would believe we did it.”
The self-funded four-week recording experience was both intense and important for the band, who will now concentrate on releasing and touring the EP they recorded in LA and working on a full length.
“I was really excited by the prospect and then the closer we got to going I just started getting terrified by the whole experience. So it went from excitement to terror before we got there. I guess it was just [being] thrown into this crazy big town,” Butler says. “It was a great experience.”

Montpelier play The Zoo on Thursday 8 October to launch the first single, “The Rafters”, from their forthcoming debut record. We recorded it on a recent trip to Los Angeles with Kevin Augunas, the producer who has worked with Cold War Kids, Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeros, and Yves Klein Blue to name a few.

We’d love for you to join us as we launch the single. We’ve been hanging out to let you hear it for way too long.

Joining us on the night are two awesome bands that we absolutely love. The Cardboard Kids are opening the night and Blame Ringo take the stage just before us.

On the night will be limited edition, hand numbered copies of the single, which comes with a track we just recorded called “Fireworks”. There will also be some hand numbered posters which happen to be the very first Montpelier posters ever.

To celebrate we want to give away some of this stuff. We’re giving away the number “1″ copy of the single and number “1″ copies of the two launch posters. The winners will also receive a double pass to the show. To enter email competitions@montpeliermusic.net before 5pm Wednesday 7 October.

You can hear a preview of “The Rafters” and all the songs from the forthcoming record now on our Myspace page.

Finally, here’s the details of the show:

What: “The Rafters” single launch
When: Thursday 8 October
Where: The Zoo, Ann St, The Valley
Doors: 8pm
Montpelier: 10pm
Cost: $8

We can’t wait for it!!  And we’d love love love to have your company.

Love Montpelier