208L Containers - A Night At The Mirage LP

208 came onto the nipaluna scene at a time when everything was getting increasingly fucked for us. This environment imbued their music with a terrifying sense of urgency. It made for powerfully raucous and infectious music, where the anger was delivered through biting satire, and rattling guitar blended with one hell of a rhythm section impossible not to dance along to.

I think you can only spend so much time immersed in our political quagmire before going mad and attempting to dump a truckload of manure in front of parliament house, so I can respect the turn from work focusing on our current situation to getting absolutely stuck into a hyperfixation on some niche element of our cultural landscape. For 208, salvation came in the form of Andrew Denton and Christopher Skase.

Throughout the course of this album, we are treated to an absurd rollick through Australian TV personality Andrew Denton’s ill-fated attempt to extradite corrupt millionaire businessman Christopher Skase from his Spanish island hideaway and back to Australia to face trial. There are Nazi-run cafes in Paraguay, doomed Tasmanian IT start-ups, nudity on the ABC, and mad Mondays at the Mirage Resort.

We see the band opening up into new directions here. The album begins with a stunning reverberant soundscape while an archival interview sample plays, setting the gorgeous tone that leads us into the story of Skase and Denton.

208 are in full form here, with the band locking into the sound established in Knitted Family Helmet and Horseland. The main difference here is the addition of interstitial pieces of instrumental while an archive sample is played, which helps to link together the narrative of each song into the wider concept album. I am excited to give this platter a spin when I get my grubby hands on it, and I look forward to dancing myself silly when I catch them playing this live. I hope you do too. - Rosie Brennan